Woolymossroots

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Giveaway from Sponsor: Mountain Hearth Handcrafts

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Today’s giveaway is brought to you by Wooly Moss Roots Sponsor- Mountain Hearth Handcrafts.
Lara, the artist behind Mountain Hearth Handcrafts, makes handcrafted faeries and forest creatures, felted wool wall art, birds nests and homestead goods. (We have one of her felted wall hangings in our home and we love it.) Lara is a family friend and the gal I go to when I want to identify a local plant (she seems to know them all!) We share a love for farm fresh food and making things from scratch. 
I’ve enjoyed her blog: A Mountain Hearth over the years (and she has a crafting blog: Mountain Hearth Handcrafts and Facebook Page too.) I’ll let her introduce herself and her business to you.
In Lara’s words:
I started Mountain Hearth Handcrafts almost three years ago, when I realized my love of crafting was growing into a pasttime that could support itself. I opened my Etsy shop and began vending at local festivals with a friend’s old wooden Saturday Market booth, and just kept going from there. One of my favorite parts of making things is giving it away to someone else, so having a craft business works out really nicely that way.
I am a lifelong crafter and outdoorswoman from the Olympic Peninsula up Washington State. In many ways, I still think of it as my home, although I’ve lived in Oregon for the past 8 years. My childhood home was in the foothills of the Olympic Mountains and we were on the edge of private timberland that bordered the Olympic National Park. These hills and forests were my playground, and I ran wild through the creek bottoms and tall Cedar trees. My parents took my brother and I camping and backpacking a lot, and we always enjoyed exploring the outdoors together. My mother is also a very creative person, and we were always doing crafts together. I was always making something, whether out of mud and sticks, or beads, paper or clay. I used to take my barbies camping and build these elaborate villages with bark and moss for them to live in. I have a lot of fond crafting memories.
I aspired to be a writer, and english teacher, or a backcountry ranger. I ended up studying classic literature at St. John’s College in New Mexico, and then changed course for Horticulture and Natural Resource Sciences at W.S.U. While studying there, I met my husband, had twins, finished college with babies, and changed course again to being an at-home mother for the past 10 years. Homemaking is an occupation I take very seriously, and I put a lot of work into creating a modern homestead on our little piece of land in rural Oregon. This past Fall, life took another change of course, and I had to leave my homestead and full-time work of homemaking behind to re-build my own life as a single parent. I am currently living in a cottage on a 20-acre farm where I raise my children, work as a part-time volunteer coordinator at their school, run my handcrafting business, grow food, wildcraft food, make things from scratch, embark on many outdoor adventures, and very soon will raise chickens again. My newest creative endeavor has been making handmade chocolate from scratch with the cocoa beans, and adding flavors of garden herbs and wildcrafted plants, which I am hoping to incorporate into Mountain Hearth Handcrafts soon.
I love working hard on the land and focusing my energies on living a simple, sustainable life. When I am not busy cooking, canning, growing food, camping, wildcrafting or tending chickens, I find great joy in creating with wool and treasures collected on my outdoor adventures. I love making art that celebrates the seasons and brings them into the home. By fostering a greater awareness of Nature in our homes and lives, I believe we may increase our care and sense of stewardship for the world in which we all live. When you buy handmade goods from Mountain Hearth Handcrafts, your purchase directly helps sustain and support a family’s endeavors to live lightly on the earth.
For today’s spring giveaway, Lara is offering one of her handmade birds nests, made with an invasive species (European Beach Grass) and completed with mosses, lichenes, and felted wool eggs. An excellent spring decoration or seasons table centerpiece.
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In addition to the giveaway, she is giving a coupon code good for one week on Mountain Hearths Handcrafts. Enter the coupon code: NESTING at checkout and get 10% off your order.
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To enter today’s giveaway, leave a comment below. 
Winner will be chosen at random on Wednesday evening and announced on Thursday.
Comments Closed
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Thanks for the giveaway Lara!
Now off to market we go.

Comments

  9. What a lovely way to use an invasive species. I would love to have that pretty nest on my dining table; a sweet reminder of new life during this springtime.

    Reply

  13. I experienced great joy in raising a child so in tune with nature, who could look at a piece of wood, a rock, or a lichen, and see a work of art waiting to be created! Lara’s Mom

    Reply

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