Tree Branch Button Giveaway and Featured Artist

Visit me at http://etsy.com/shop/thehickorytree to order some of my earth friendly tree branch buttons, wood gift tags, wedding decor or earthy jewelry.

For the month of October/2011 I'll be having a fantastic button giveaway for a couple of lucky blog followers or those that heart my etsy button shop.

In addition I'll be featuring some fantastic Etsy Artists that specialize in Knitted, Crocheted as well Sewing and Fiber creations. Be sure and check them out and if you are interested in being featured please email me at www.thehickorytree@gmail.com. It should be a fun month.

Gardening and Tree Branch Buttons

Please check out some of my newest creations on http://www.etsy.com/shop/TheHickoryTree

Well it's June already and I'm just getting my garden in. I'm about 2 weeks behind schedule this year. Usually we have it in by Memorial Day but with all the rain we’ve had plus I was in Chicago last weekend for my daughter’s bridal shower I’m really behind. Thankfully my husband has been watering all the plants so they are still in great shape. We got the tiller going last night so if I can get it tilled before the rain comes tonight I’ll be good to go. I’m kind of excited about the new shop. It’s going to be more casual than my other shop, www.TheHickoryTree.etsy.com where I mainly sell tree branch buttons and gift tags. I came across these fantastic nuts call Tagua Nuts or vegetable ivory. They are harvested from the Tagua Palm tree and being used as a beautiful replacement for illegal ivory as well as providing a living for those living and working in the rain forest.

Heck if it can save an elephant's life and the rain forest with one little nut at a time, then that's tremendous. Below is a picture of some Tagua nuts that have been polished but with a little bit of the brown bark remaining.

Well it is Fall decorating time at my house again. I will really miss the summer, but it is fun to bake and get all those delicious smells in your house again.







We've been making Maple Leaf Sugar Cookies and Waxed leaves for fall decorating as well as for a Fiber Artist Show I'l be attending in a few weeks.

The waxed leaves are a fun way to bring a little bit of the outdoors into your home for the season. I use beeswax that I buy from a local honey producer. But you can substitute pariffin wax (found in the canning section of your grocery store), or even a scented soy candle but a soy candle will be scented and a bit shiny.

It's super simple to do:
You'll need:
Dried leaves with stems
Wax paper
gloves (optional)
beeswax or paraffin (I use about 8 oz)
old double boiler

Gather some dried leaves that are pretty shades of browns, reds and oranges. Make sure you leave the stem on as that is how you will hold it while dipping in the wax. Using a double boiler, put water in the bottom pan and the wax in the top pan. Slowly melt the wax over a medium flame. When completely melted hold the leaf by the stem and just dip the leaf into the hot wax. I line a plate with wax paper before hand so I don't have wax residue on the plate. It takes only seconds to dry and they seem to last forever. Fun project, just make sure you stay safe by using gloves and not leaving the wax on the burner too long. My sister uses an old crock pot she found at a garage sale to melt her wax, and simply leaves the wax in the pot until she needs to use it again.






Maple leaf cookies are another great item you can make to bring a little festivity into your home. I found some cookie cutters at a local Joann fabric store but you can also buy them online at sugarcraft (see link)
http://www.sugarcraft.com/catalog/cooky/cookyleaf.htm

Maple Leaf Sugar Cookies
Ingredients
1-1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 pound soft butter
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon maple extract
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg


In bowl, sift together flour, cream of tartar, and salt. Using mixer, cream butter in another bowl, and then add vanilla and maple extracts. Beat until light and fluffy. Gradually add sugar; beat until well mixed. Add 1 egg; mix well. Slowly add dry ingredients. Form into a ball. Wrap and chill 1 hour. Before rolling out, dust dough and surface with flour. Roll out to 1/4-inch thickness. Cut out with maple leaf cookie cutter (or any shape). Can reroll scraps. Bake on a non-stick pan at 350 degrees for 5 to 7 minutes. Enjoy!

Well it's Friday, yay! I have a long weekend ahead of me and I'll be busy making buttons, magnets,gift tags as well as some new items for my Etsy shop. I've gotten some very nice pieces of Tamarack wood from my son. Tamarack wood is actually a deciduous tree (i.e. maple, oak, hickory) that looks like a conifer (i.e. pine, spruce, fir).

Trees: beautiful, really essential parts of our lives. They supply the wood we use for our furniture, fires, pencils, matchsticks… Trees give us the oxygen we so dearly need to live. Trees can bring the even most barren/desolate of places to life, and their fruit can quench the thirst of the tired traveller. There’s lots more to trees

So I thought, why not write a post to appreciate these works of nature? The following are 12 amazing facts about trees, which can perhaps help us appreciate the value of trees. Enjoy


Numbers. Numbers. Numbers.
1. Trees get about 90% of their nutrition from the atmosphere (carbon dioxide, etc), and only about 10% from the soil.

2. The averaged size tree can provide enough wood to make 170,000 pencils.

3. One (a single) tree produces up to 260 pounds of oxygen a year. That is more than enough to supply oxygen to a family of four people. Make that a few thousand trees, and you’ve got an oxygen supply for a whole town!

4. A tree can absorb as much carbon in a year as a car produces, driven over 8 500 miles. Line the highways with trees!

5. Trees planted in and around property can raise that piece of land’s value by up to 20%. That’s a lot!

6. An acre of trees can produce up to 4000 pounds (~1 814.4 kilograms) of wood every year. That’s over a ton of wood a year!

7. Trees help cool down the atmosphere. They can bring down your air conditioning costs by up to 20 percent.

8. A healthy birch tree can produce up to 1 million seeds a year

Record Setting Trees
1. The world’s tallest tree is a Sequoia (or California Redwood) in California; it is more than 360 feet tall.

2. The world’s oldest living tree is thought to be in Sweden. Its root system has been growing for 9,550 years. Now that’s old!

Trees With Historical Significance
Trees can live for thousands of years. They therefore witness important and historical events throughout history. And so, naturally, there are some trees today that are considered important from a historical perspective:


1. The L’Arbre du Ténéré (pictured above) was considered to be the most isolated tree in the world (the only one within more than 200 kilometres). What a lonely tree… sadly, it was struck by a vehicle, and was destroyed.

2. The Tree of Hippocrates is located in Kos, Greece. According to legend, Hippocrates taught his pupils the art of medicine under this tree.

Sources
These sites have a lot more amazing tree facts:

Interesting Facts About Trees

10 Facts About Trees and How Trees Help Save the Environment

Do You Tree?

My Etsy Shop and some favorites

It's Finally Friday.

Well Day 2 of my Blog. I need to get to my day job by 6:00 am but I managed to get up at 4:00am and finish uploading pictures of some gorgeous tree branch buttons that I had made last Monday. I was also able to glue some tree branch magnets which I'll be listing tonight. The magnets are White Oak, some of the most dense wood you will ever find. White oak is used for wine and beer barrels (say that 10 times fast) according to my son. That's his picture. He's a Forestry Major at Michigan Tech University in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan (Yoopers - got to love them). I attached a few pictures of the drive through the winding roads. It's breathtaking.

If have never had a chance to check out the 'UP' as we call it you really should. Copper Harbor in the Keweenaw Peninsula is just spectacular in the fall. It's extremely far north, at the tip of the Keweenaw. Last Fourth of July my family went to Copper Harbor to view the fireworks and it doesn't get dark until midnight. Quite cool.

Anyway, back to the Magnets. I wanted to have a Giveaway after my Blog gets 50 followers. Fifteen (15) Tree Branch Magnets made from 5 different woods. So 3 magnets from Oak, Cedar, Maple, Elm, and maybe Mulberry or Cherry, something definitely fruity.