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When I started this project in 2017, I never envisioned it would grow as it has. It went from an initial delivery of smaller bags with just a few items, to larger bags with more items and handmade case sets and cards. Deliveries increased to several a year! Readers have generously given so much of their time and money to sew the case sets, stamp cards and ship boxes of goodies for the domestic violence shelter. That first year, we made 35 bags at a cost of about $8 each.

The next year, we made 64 bags raising about $700 ...

Our Safelight Project has been a success this year. Together, we raised the money, made the case sets and stamped the cards to make enough spa bags to last several months. Today, let’s catch up with the contributions and delivery.

I haven’t had a chance to thank everyone who contributed to the project. First, so many of the monetary donors have requested anonymity, that I am just going to thank you all together. You know who you are, and I know who you are. Your incredible support made this project possible. Thank you!

Many boxes of wonderful cards ...

Last week I promised to get my autumn theme tablescape done to show you and inspire you to set a pretty table at your home. This year, I wanted rich color, so I began with a dark burgundy tablecloth and a hexagonal table topper.

The place settings have copper color chargers, white china plates and my autumn leaf salad plates.

I got out the gold tone flatware as the warmth of the gold is wonderful with the autumn colors. Crystal glasses and individual salt and pepper shakers are on the right side.

On the left, gold napkins are held with ...

Yesterday, our MINI club participated as a group in the Autumn in the Mountains car show. Knowing it was coming up, I found some autumn theme ducks for the cars and tied little cards I made to them as a sort of party favor.

They were so cute with their fall leaf wings and acorn caps, and I think were a hit with the car owners. I took extras so I could put one in MINIs that were not current members.

I made up a photo scavenger hunt for us as well, with things like a British Flag, seen here ...

This is just a quick post to let you know that our financial goal for the Safelight Project has not only been met, but well exceeded! This will allow us to do even more good than I had planned. Many generous donations have come in over the past week between paypal and checks arriving in the mail. Thank you all so much! We have enough money to do 100 bags, plus some extra goodies for the shelter residents during the holiday season.

The first order from Dollar Tree for the full size care products has been made and arrival is ...

We’ve had a fair amount of rain this week, and that has kept the forest verdant green. On the veranda, the flowers are still pretty, blooming profusely. These begonias have done really well. I had this one last year and overwintered it in the sunroom.

This pot is filled with begonias grown from seeds. You can see the seeds forming on the plant above, so I’ll get more next year. Growing pot plants from seed is a lot less expensive than buying them from the garden center.

These impatiens were grown from seeds as well. It came up ...

Back in July, I received an email from Christine at the Safelight Shelter. She let me know that their supply of spa bags was getting low. I looked up the project history, and found that our last delivery was in January from the 2024 campaign. It was delayed due to Hurricane Helene. So, I went to the storage room to see what I had. There were 10 canvas bags, some case sets, cards and a few lotions and soaps. I pulled all that out and made a list of what was needed, then headed to the store to purchase items ...

About 2 weeks ago, I received a box in the mail sent by Carole L. that contained some case sets for our Safelight Project along with a nice donation. I knew I had a bunch more case sets in the storage room, along with cards and tote bags. I emailed a thank you, saying Safelight had what they needed for now. But then, I saw all the case sets, cards and tote bags needed were still awaiting assembly and delivery on shelves in the storage room. It got me thinking, when had I done the last delivery? Settle in for ...

The last delivery of spa bags for Safelight is planned for October. This week, more things came in, so I took an inventory of what I have and what we still need. I have plenty of money, but I need a just a few more cards and case sets. If you’ve made some and are holding onto them, go ahead and ship. For newer readers, see this post – Safelight Project – for an overview of our community service project to benefit a local shelter for abused women (and sometimes men), now in its 7th year. This year so far, we ...

This week I wanted to use the rest of the surplus of money collected for the Spa Bag project to do something fun for the Safelight Domestic Violence Shelter. I set aside what will be needed for the October delivery of the last spa bags, and found I had just enough to do a special project for this week. In the past I have found some fun water bottles with great messages, but that was not the case this year. I really couldn’t find anything I considered appropriate. The last thing I want to do is give an abuse ...

In the past two weeks, a lot has happened with the Safelight project. When I left off last time, I had just received a shipment from Dollar Tree, and was beginning to put things together.

The first thing to do at that time was to unpack all the boxes and sort into piles or baskets.

I opened up the boxes of soaps, and decided they needed to be put into some kind of bag to contain the glitter and keep the soap from rubbing off on the other items in the bag. I also needed a lot more products to ...

Now that the quilt show is over and my basement is cleared out again, I am turning my attention back to Safelight. We have plenty of funds, case sets and cards to do a nice delivery next week. For new readers, this project is one that readers and I have done annually for 7 years. Most of those years have seen at least 2 deliveries. See the kickoff post Safelight Project 2024 to learn what the spa bags are all about, and the domestic violence shelter they support.

After our last delivery in February, I received this wonderful letter from ...

We have extra funds for the Safelight project, so I put some to use this week to make Valentine gifts for the current residents of the shelter. They had 20 adults, so I made 22 gifts just in case they needed more by the time I could deliver them. I found some fun things to include.

These little felt fortune cookies had wonderful fortunes inside. The sentiments were perfect for this project, so encouraging.

I wanted to include a card inside, so I got out my inspirational stamps and looked them over for just the right thing to say. For ...

It is so fun to go to the post office these days, and find packages of case sets and cards rolling in to get us going on this year’s project. I am, as always, blown away by your creativity and generosity, as many of the handcrafted items have also contained monetary donations. Below are the cards received from Lenora S, along with case sets from Joan S and Melanie T.

Lenora’s cards are so amazing, and the insides are just as spectacular.

Gorgeous photography are on the cards received from artist and photographer Jeanie C, who blogs at ...

The Safelight Project made great headway in the past two weeks, as case sets started coming in, and checks arrived. I was stunned at the amounts on several of them, in the hundreds of dollars! So much so that I can announce that we have exceeded our financial goal!! To say thank you seems so inadequate, but to Dorothy F, Janet S, and Tina W, you are all amazing. The three of you funded over half the project! Special thanks also to Kay, Susan and Vicki, your generosity is much appreciated. Those donations along with a lot of $5-$50 ...

This past week, I got an email from the shelter director at Safelight, Morgan Abendroth. She wrote “We have used up our last spa bag and I was wondering if you are still making them. They are such a great addition to welcome clients into shelter. We would love to get more if that is possible.” I had asked them to let me know when they were down to a dozen, but with the holidays it got lost in the hustle and bustle. 

In previous years, we have come together as a community to assemble spa bags for new residents ...

Last week and this week, the Safelight Project was finished up. In the mail in the last days of the project, more case sets arrived from some wonderful readers. These lovelies came from JoAnn S and Joan S.

These arrived the same day from Holly S and Chris L.

And these wonderful sets arrived from Elana G.

While my friend Lynne was over doing her quilt, we sat at the table and put the tissues inside the tissue cases, then put them inside the cosmetic cases to get started on the assembly. We also put the cards and small lotions ...

The past two weeks have seen much progress in our Safelight Project. For new readers, once again we have come together as a community to assemble spa bags for new residents of our local domestic violence shelter. The spa bags go a long way to making a difficult transition a little better, providing much needed support for residents who are going through a horrible time in their lives, betrayed by someone they loved, fleeing abusive situations with their children and virtually nothing else. Residents said the bags helped them feel special and cared for, at a time when support was ...

It has been a slow start to this year’s Safelight Project, but we have begun to see some progress this week. I am delighted to report that we have exceeded our revised financial goal in order to deliver 50 spa bags and we will be able to do 60. Any additional funds received over the next couple of weeks will go to adding more bags to the total. It would be great to deliver 75 bags, but we’ll see what the mail brings over the next week.

Several boxes and letters arrived at once, containing checks, case sets ...

Settle in for a long post about a lot going on, things to see and read, and projects where you can participate. Around the feeder we have a lot of pretty birds, and hungry birds! This week there has been a variety of avian friends chowing down on the seed and suet, including some newcomers. When two new species showed up for the first time this year, I had to do another bird count and send it in. Here, a red bellied woodpecker shares the seed with a two goldfinches and two titmouses (hanging off the backside).

The bluebirds are ...