Day 2



Meet Roscoe, he is the big rooster the resides in my front yard planter. He is in charge of the yard and he's sure to let everyone who passes by know it! Roscoe is anxiously waiting for the corn to be ripe for picking, he stays very close to keep the mice away from the stalks. However, I think his vision is fading as the corn looks like somethings already been into it! I think his better bet is to eye ball the three big pumpkins sitting close by.
As you can plainly see my love for fall as over flowed into the front yard ... and this is only the beginning!




Since my children have been grown and my grand kids live so far away I really haven't decorated much for Halloween. This year Longaberger has created the cutest decorations for Halloween. The witches hat, posted above is my absolute favorite. Someone in the design team really had their thinking "hat" on when they developed this one. If your interested in purchasing this hat it is available through the end of September. Leave a message at baskets4anita@aol.com if you would like to place an order.




If you have been in the Collectors Club for any time at all you will remember the Acorn Basket and lid. This year I filled my hurricane from the Pottery Barn with all shapes and sizes of acorns. I placed it on one of my small doll quilts that I pieced in late fall color tones. Right here in one small space are three of my favorite things ... baskets, quilts and decorating.
Stay tuned, the decorating continues ...



I Love Fall ... Comes with Age

  There's something about late summer and early fall that makes me feel like "nesting." I love how the sky looks softer, the air smells different - maybe cleaner and the sun set earlier every night. Even for those of us who live in Southern California appreciate the beauty of fall. I'm blessed to have a beautiful liquid amber tree in my front yard, actually my entire street has them. By November they are all aflame with orange, yellow, golds and touches of green. Just absolutely beautiful to the eye. I even enjoy the squawking flocks of shiny black crows that hover every afternoon. It's the time of year that mother nature is telling the earth "it's time to get ready for those cold, long, dark nights."
                                                                                            The air was chilly this morning and the sky

 was a nice shade of battleship gray. The perfect kind of weather to decorate for the changing seasons. I head out to the storage shed and right there in front of my eyes are my four tubs filled with pumpkins, leaves, Longaberger baskets, corn, acorns and other various autumnal items. I started with the dining room table (to the left) and made an arrangement of my large stuffed pumpkins, black candle sticks and my favorite black crow. Looking at the finished arrangement just makes me smile and hungry for a pumpkin spice latte' at Starbucks! Oh, I can smell it already.

     I just can't imagine anything more important then giving thanks to God. I love my large orange pumpkin with "give thanks to God" carved on the front of it. My husband, Joe and live in the family room of our home. I placed this wonderful pumpkin on our fireplace mantle where we can see it all the time. Well, at least until the end of November that is!

 How many of you out there in cyber land make home made bread? I don't mean in a bread machine! I mean in an actual "dough bowl?" Well I have several of these wonderful hand carved bowls and to date I have not made one loaf of bread in any of them! However, I have filled them with everything from fruit, nuts, balls of cloth, rocks, candles you name it, I put it in there. But, never any dough ... ironic isn't it?

 Longaberger started making these awesome pumpkins last year. This year they introduced a large as well as a  small pumpkin. The beauty of these are they are made of hard rock maple and they will NEVER rot! How cool is that? I even have Indian corn tucked in behind the pumpkins also made from maple. Just when you think that the Longaberger Company can't come out with anything else they make pumpkins and corn! If you would like to purchase any of these rot free pumpkins go to longaberger.com/esuite/home/anitataylor



It's Official, Christmas is Coming ....

   Today was my kick off the holidays open house and it was an awesome day. The picture to the right is a display of many of the Longaberger new holiday baskets and accessories. Including the November Holiday Helper Jingle All the Way basket and the Santa's Belly Tissue set. These two little baskets were a hit, my customers loved them!  My very good friend Penny Hunter offered her services for the day in monitoring the kitchen. She made sure the food was served and the guest were full ... they were very happy. The menu was Cranberry Chicken Salad, Waldorf Salad, Pumpkin Cobbler, assorted chips, Sweet Spiced Iced Tea and of course water.

 This year I converted a portion of my garage to use as my in house Longaberger store. It worked out great! I was able to display almost all of my cash and carry out there. I got everything priced and set up in areas that worked well together. The next few pictures are the "gift shop."

          This is my All American corner. The only thing left is the Longaberger Pie Plate, a lamp and the Flag Rules sign. This was a very popular corner for shoppers!

       And this little space in the room was for sweethearts! EVERY single thing on this table was sold! Yeah!!!  The Sweetheart basket set, a table for two and a set of Botanical Fields  plates and mugs. So many treasures to be had.

       The final space (my laundry room) like you couldn't figure that out! Was set up for Christmas. One lonely little basket and the stocking were left. Down on the floor was a basket full of FREE stuff. Yep, protectors, liners, tie on, and so on, all gone! I also had a basket filled with $1.00 items, most of those were gone too. Everyone left happy, happy. For fun the gals played a search for Longaberger products game and everyone could make and take tree ornaments home. If you missed it, maybe next time!

Feelin pooey

Mom's feelin pooey today so she left me in charge. I could hear her coughing during the night and she didn't get out of bed until 8:00! That is REALLY late. The only thing that got done today was tag makin. Yep she made price tags for the baskets, I was in charge of gluing on the buttons. Mom did a lot of sneezing and blowing her runny nose.  I licked her face as much as I could to help out but she was still wipein and blowin. She's gone to bed for the night so I need to get goin and get some sleep.

The Process Continues ...

Here we are, getting ready for the holiday open house!



The "giftables" are wrapped and ready to sell!

Miss Betsy and I had another very busy day getting ready for the open house on Sunday. We began at 7 am in the garage office getting everything moved out.  Chased all the dust bunnies, dead bugs and took a load to Goodwill. Once that was done it was time to set up the cash and carry products in place where it can stay when to party is over. Three hours later .... it's looking pretty good if I don't say so myself. After having some yogurt for breakfast I took a break and ran errands ... did I say a break? Ha, that's funny.

Once I returned home it was back to the job at hand. I wrapped the giftables and set up the display ... partially. Betsy was right in there helping me come up with some new ideas to use the new Longaberger hurricane. We decided it was a perfect vehicle for peppermint candies!

Stay tuned, tomorrow is another day of prep!



Perfect Bathroom Trio!

The new Longaberger medium lantern is filled with stacked guest towels with the Salt and Pepper Caddy and a Longaberger pump. Who says candles go inside a lantern!!



Getting Ready for my Holiday Open House.

Another busy day getting ready for my holiday open house this Sunday. If you aren't on my mailing list and would like to attend please come by. It begins at noon and it will be a lot of fun! Food, cash and carry baskets for sale as well as holiday gifts wrapped and ready to go. I'm working on getting my "old" office set up as my in home store for my cash and carry products. Wish me luck getting it all done. I still have to price everything and plan a menu, good thing I have the whole week, I'm going to need it!



A Day to Give Thanks

The Table is Set ... each guest received a set of personalized note cards.



A Collection of Longaberger Lanterns!




Summer Chicken Salad Sandwiches, Pasta Salad and Fresh Raspberries Yum!




Naomi, Vicky and Debbie



Carmen, Pam, Marty and Penny



A happy Vicky!

Today was just a nice relaxing day for me to give thanks to my amazing group of Horizon of Hope co-workers. These ladies put so much time, treasure and talent into making this fund raising event the success it is. We enjoyed a nice relaxing lunch of summer chicken salad, pasta salad, fresh raspberries and topped it off with a yummy Pumpkin Cobbler and whipped cream. After lunch we all had an opportunity to share what we felt went well and what could use improvements. Overall the consensus was we did a lot very well!
Debbie treated us all to a jar of her delicious homemade fresh apple butter. And yes, Betsy was at the meeting as well, she had a lot of thank you kisses to hand out to the group as her personal thank you.

Yep! Betsy was at the luncheon!!



September Branch Meeting

Greetings from Judi Provenzano's house! She graciously hosted our Longaberger Branch Meeting for September, it was great to see so many faces this month. As part of the meeting I brought some Christmas ideas to share. Unfortunately the picture didn't really capture what I had hoped for. So to help you out I will narrate the photo. The black Spring basket has a Paprika liner which I attached tiny silver jingle bells, so cute. I also attached the little bells to the stand up cracker basket liner.

The theme of my presentation was to take products I have and "dress" them for Christmas. I recycled both the cracker and the small berry from a few years ago when we sold red baskets and filled them with gift giving ideas. A paprika coffee mug, Longaberger Arabica coffee and stick peppermints fill the berry and a small poinsettia and our Apple Cider potpourri fills the cracker. Great for teachers, hairdressers, etc! The lantern is filled with stacked hand towels making it a great alternative to use on the bathroom counter with the wrought pump dispensers and caddy. What you can't see is the new 8-1 three pieces. I used the cake plate with the bowl on top filled with a poinsettia.

You will also notice several of Judi's basket collections hovering in the background! She has A LOT of baskets let me tell you! If you didn't make it this month I hope to see you in October ....

Holy Moly, yep it's that time of year again. Time to start thinkin of the holidays. So, off I went to Michael's craft store with my coupons in hand to buy the necessary ingredients. A Styrofoam wreath,

T-pins and oh ya another stop at Target to get the coffee filters. While my husband Joe and my partner Betsy watched WWII war stories on the TV I created a festive wreath! So much fun and oh so easy to do. I attached one of the 2010 Longaberger Christmas baskets filled with a tiny pine wreath and a small Vallencourt santa, just too cute. Yes. I know it's only September but it's never to early to be creative, let those juices flow!

Taking Time to Sew ...

Some of my doll quilts .....



Meet Emma


     I sat down at my desk this morning to do some work on the Collector's Club Spring Tour. I looked at my phone, then at the trip folder and kerplunk, Betsy was on my lap. After a thorough face washing Betsy helped me decided that today was sewing day!

     My sewing room is one of my favorites in the house. It's bright with sunshine and many of my favorite things are in there. I added a few photo's to share with you my passion for making doll quilts. Several of my newest ones are hanging on the wall. If you look to the right you will see Betsy's name sake ... Betsy Ross. Yes, she really does look like that, she is a folk art version and I LOVE it! Below is my handmade doll given to me from a friend in Australia. Her name is Emma and she loves the sewing room as much as I do.

     Today I worked on finishing two of my mini quilts and began cutting out a large quilt that I will be working on over the next year with two special quilting friends. Have you ever noticed that when you craft or work on a project with friends it seems more relaxing? Women need to "be" together to have time to chew on their troubles, solve world affairs, the latest diet and so on.  As much as I love the solitude of my sewing room I treasure the time I sew with friends.

Mom's a nerd!

OK, she did a Longaberger show today at Pyles Elementary school today. She was so excited, new guests, new idea etc, etc. She set up a great display in the classroom and took some pictures of the room, her set up and Kim, the hostess. So, she gets home and sits down to post the pictures on her lap top. then she realized she did NOT take out the disk yesterday. Yes, you guessed it, she took pictures, clicking away with out a disk ... did I say mom's a nerd? Yikes, her memory is so bad.

So, today's blog will be pictureless, except well for cute little me! I know this is heart breaking news to many of you but what is a nerd to do?

I  heard her telling papa Joe that the show was fun, teachers coming and going, snacking on goodies and chatting. Some had heard of Longaberger and some couldn't even say Longaberger. The new woven pumpkins were a big hit as well as the pottery. Longaberger makes baskets ... right? 

My Country

Have you ever been to my home? If you have you know I love my country. My grandfather served in WWI in France at the battle of Aragon where he received the bronze star. Both my dad and my uncle served in WWII. My dad served in the pacific theater and part of his service was going into Hiroshima as part of the clean of of the atomic bomb. Did he have nightmares? You bet he did, would he have changed anything when it came to serving his country? Absolutely not. He raised me to respect the flag, and what it stood for. It was no coincidence that I was born on the 4th of July.

My home is filled with Americana. Some antique, some folk art while others are hand made by friends. They are my treasures and each one holds a special meaning especially my dad's beat up brass army bugle. No matter where I have called home the bugle has a place of honor. A few days ago we, as a nation celebrated the 10th anniversary of September 11. A day that time stood still, a day when each of us knows exactly what we were doing when the twin towers were hit. A day when I realized that the United States was vulnerable to being attacked on our own soil. It was also a day when we stood together as one in solidarity. We showed the world we were one and behind our President and in support of our troops. I have never forgotten 9/11. I have never forgotten the stories my dad unwilling shared about WWII, and I will never forget that I am an American and I am proud of what and who we are, warts and all.

To commemorate the 10th anniversary of September 11th the Longaberger Company has created a beautiful basket with an engraved wood craft lid with the words "We Remember" the two piece set is $60.00 before SH and Tax longaberger.com/anitataylor click on this link to view and order the set.

My Office Staff

      It's Monday morning and it's time to get busy in my office. If you look (very) closely you can see I am busy getting my Holiday Open House invitations printed and ready to mail out. Can you believe it's already time to start thinking of the holidays? Geeze, it comes faster every single year. The open house is scheduled for September 25 at 12 noon. I'll have yummy food, a make it take it craft for everyone to do, shopping and more shopping. If you don't get an invitation and want to come please do! It's going to be a lot of fun and the prices will be amazing!

       Betsy is busy this morning being a pest. Joe already took her for her morning bacon so it's really time for a nap ... does she look tired to anyone??

Get to Work!

Ya know, all I heard all day is "I've got work to do" blaa, blaa, blaa. So far all I've seen anyone do here is lay in that water hole in the back yard and sit in the sun. So much for getting anything called work done.

Betsy

Ah! The baskets are loaded and ready to head off to the inland empire for a home show. Patty Carlson is the hostess today and it's always fun to do a show for her. Patty is a great cook and loves to feed her guests. Pam Harp is making the ride with me today, I'm so grateful to have her along to keep me company - makes the long drive seem shorter. After days of blistering heat I woke up this morning to a cool 66 degrees and rain! Can you believe it. What to wear, what to wear on a day like today. If you're wondering Betsy is here, she's laying right next to me hoping I'll agree to take her for a ride before I leave for my show. I think it's about time for my morning coffee so off to McDonald's we go!!

Are You Ready for Some Baseball!!

Woo hoo! The Yankee's are in town for the weekend and the Angels have their Ace pitcher Mr. M. Mouse locked up and ready to go. Being the smart team that they are they have purchased the new Longaberger Lantern to keep their ace safe from the compitition. When this functional lantern is not keeping pitchers locked up it also makes a great place to burn a candle ... how creative! The lantern has a brass finished link attacked to the top allowing it to be hung over a dining table or outside on the patio. Don't forget to watch the game tonight and root, root, root for the home team!

Betsy's Response

While all those silly girls ran around in the 100 degree heat, I stayed home in the nice cool house and took a long nap ...

Season's of Hope



Me and Donna Guisado, the winner of the Fall Wreath!




The beautiful Summer wreath and 17 years of Hope.




Some of my guests! Heidi, Donna, Tiffany, Panny, Rita, Kristen and Pam!!



The tables are all dressed and ready for our guests!

August 27th we celebrated  our Longaberger Horizon of Hope fund raising event in Chino Hills California. We had 100 plus guests in attendance and a guest speaker, Dr. Catherine Weber. It was such a wonderful day accompanied by a delicious Mango Chicken Salad, a home tour and amazing Longaberger products were raffled off to raise money for Breast Cancer Research. We also held a chinese food box sale where the winner received one of 4 custom wreaths. The fall wreath was won by my customer Donna Guisado, she was thrilled! In spite of 100 plus degree temperatures everyone had a wonderful time and we raised a lot of money for the American Cancer Society! What could be better!!