What's going on around the art room...

It was another busy week with my mind racing from one thing to another like I do. I have been enjoying Kaari Meng's new book, "Treasured Notions". Oh. My. Gosh. Her mood boards never fail to take my breath away! I can look at them over and over and so I do.

I have been working on some new things for my Etsy store and listed them last night. I made up a few packets of these vintage book pages and bundled them up with soft, yummy rayon seam binding. It looks so pretty juxtaposed against the aged paper! There are lots of foreign languages and other goodies included so it was fun putting them together.
I also put together a couple of new inspiration kits. You might remember this vintage Peter Rabbit book cover from my post about the Stars Antique Mall. Surely that little boy must be the Farmer's son.

Tonight I am sorting through a button box that arrived in the mail today. Big sigh. There's nothing like a button box. Life is good.

Another Party

Well heck! I was in such a hurry to get my little cards in the mail to CRESHENDOh that I forgot to take a picture to post here. Luckily I have a couple of duplicates because I didn't cut them straight enough so these will have to do. You can also see what I did with the back side.

I was pretty happy with how they turned out so I ended up mailing off 21 of them. I just had the fronts color copied on the heaviest paper Staples offered then the back side in black and white on the same paper. I glued them together then cut them out. I'm not sure I'd care to make hundreds but this little batch was pretty easy and fun to make. I'm sure I will make at least a couple more sets to have on hand.

With that, I'm on to the next party... Last night I signed up for Karen Valentine's "Where Bloggers Create II" (I put a button over on the left, too). I'm not late to this party since it isn't until June 19th but 330 people RSVPed ahead of me. Wow! I can hardly wait to see all the art rooms and creative spaces. I'm always looking for new ideas and hoping I can offer a few, too.

My son, Andy, came over today to help me with the pictures. He has a much better camera than I and spent a couple of hours snapping here and there and talking about what I wanted to offer for show and tell. I wasn't expecting him today so I was scurrying around trying to tidy up. It looks so much better now that I kind of hate to mess it up! This is a sneak peek at one of the "whole room" shots. Neither one of us has a camera that's capable of taking that kind of wide angle but I think this looks pretty good. I folded down the leaves on the table so it doesn't look so cramped and the top of the table is EMPTY - what's up with THAT???

Late to the Party

Well, once again I am late to the party! Jenny Doh put out a call on her blog today for Moo cards and a dangling carrot offering a shout out on her blog to those chosen. Well of course I had been meaning to get some Moo cards - everybody is doing it, right?? But now I don't have 10 days to wait for moo.com to make some for me so I spent this evening working on my own. Oh well, I like to make things you know...

Photoshop wouldn't cooperate and honor the size of the crops on a new layer and I don't have time to figure out why so I printed every. single. one. and wasted a ton of paper and glued up a page to take to the copy shop tomorrow. This is what I have so far. I cropped them out of the inspiration kits I sell in my Etsy store. If all goes well I'll post the finished project. Wish me luck!

Fun Finds

I headed on over to the VofA this morning, because that's what I do, and I scored a couple of fun finds. First is this adorable little birdie figurine. I already have 40 or 50 but I can never resist another one. Just too cute to pass up!
The porcelain doll parts we in one of those poke-sacks I love to sort through. You bring it home and it's like a whole new treasure hunt discovering the little bits an pieces that were hiding behind each other. These doll parts were mixed in with some floral stuff I really didn't need more of (LOL!), several tubes and bottles of beads and some fancy containers of glitter. Love those ballet slippers!

A Milestone and A Reveal

The milestone - BLOG POST #100!
When I started blogging a little more than a year ago I wasn't sure blogging would be something I would like to do and I certainly wasn't sure I would be able to stick with it. I can say now that blogging and reading blogs has become a integral part of my life.
When I began I was determined that my blog would be a place to share the things I love to do; making things, junking, gardening, and NOT a place to grumble and lament. The consequence was the blogging gave back to me by making me more aware and appreciative of the time I spend doing things that bring me joy. Slow down. Look for the goodness. Look for the good things that happened today. Really.

And now the reveal........
This is what I have been totally engrossed in for the past three weeks. I got this strange notion that I could make clothing buttons from my accumulation of vintage cabinet cards. A strange notion indeed! It turned out to be much harder than I anticipated. LOL - that's my M.O. I ended up spending the better part of three weeks problem solving. I'm calling these proto-types but in reality, MANY versions came before these.
They are actually a dome shape but they look really flat in this picture so I still have that one last thing to noodle through but I'm hoping I can list them in my Etsy store sometime this week. BTW... that woman in the upper right corner is my great grandmother - isn't she a cutie!!!

Stars Antique Mall

I spent a very relaxing and "authentic" day with a dear friend I hadn't had a chance to spend time with in way too long. We strolled the Sellwodd neighborhood, prowled the isles at Stars Antique Mall, had a marvelous lunch and just chatted our heads off. So good to not rush and to catch up with each other!
I was specifically looking for lovely lady cabinet cards and didn't find much - isn't that how it goes when you go to an antique mall with a shopping list - LOL! I did pick up these few tidbits along the way and always enjoy the hunt. I'll be telling more about the lovely ladies as soon as that project is ready for show and tell.
Here's to authentic days with good friends!

Fun with Bias Tape

I had so much fun experimenting with the ribbon work in Helen Gibb's book that I decided to see how it would translate to bias tape. So much fun! It is a little harder to push the needle through, of course, but I love the results. The wrapped roses are VERY sturdy compared to the ribbon version and I think they would hold up well on the top of a box or a basket handle where they get a lot of handling.
I used 'cover your own button kits' and the same bias tape as the petals to make the centers on the pink and orange flowers.
The red flower is my favorite and it is stitched to crinoline just like a ribbon version. I might still stitch a few black or brown beads on top of the coiled yellow center. It could use some seeds!
I didn't finish the little woven piece yet but it was pretty simple, too. I just used a thin piece of cotton for the backing then "tacked" the bias in place with Stitch Witchery and machine stitched it in place.
It's kind of hard to see in the picture but the shell button on the little blue bow has two clear beads sown on top to give it some sparkle.
I was inspired by Amber Demien's "Beribboned Bulletin Boards" article in the Spring 2010 Somerset Life magazine so I think my next project will be using bias tape in place of ribbon on a bulletin board. Fun with bias tape!

Better late than never!

Ahem. I think this is just about the longest I've gone without posting and here I am, soooo close to my 100th post! I thought surely I'd be there by now but it wasn't in the cards.

Had a wonderful visit with family from out of town and hosted several family get togethers but some bad-mojo-virus crashed my party. After chasing me around for about a week it tackled me to the ground last weekend and hasn't let me up.

Since I haven't had the energy to shoot or post the things I was working on before I got decked I thought I'd share this picture from my backyard so you would have something pretty to look at. This rhododendron is named "Mrs. G.W. Leek" and it is among my favorites. It is in full bloom right now and made a beautiful backdrop for many family photos while we were all gathered.

Every Button Tells a Story

Sorry this post is going to be long but I know the rest of you button enthusiasts out there will LOVE seeing these.
For the first time in a very, very long time I was able to score an amazing tin of buttons. I won them on eBay and feel just a tad guilty because the seller's photo was so poor and out of focus that no one bid against me. I could make out one button that looked kind of interesting so I decided to take a chance. I was blown away when they arrived in the mail last week!
Glass rhinestones set in metal and plastic. Love, love, love the giant "jewels"!

Glass buttons, including Moonglow, rhinestones, a paperweight and aurora borealis. This picture really doesn't do them justice!

Celluloid wafers and tite tops, including a couple of glow bubbles.

Fabric, bone, rubber and vegetable ivory, Lucite, etc. Check out the two vegetable ivory whistles near the center. They are in perfect condition. I don't usually go for fabric buttons but these oval ones are some of the best I've seen. A couple of neat cuff buttons, too.

Shell and mother of pearl. Loving those ovals!

These didn't photograph well at all but there are some amazing and very old cut steels in this group of metal buttons.

When you poke through a button box you've got to wonder where each of these buttons came from and how they came to be together in this box. What did the clothes they were cut from look like? Who was the person who carefully saved each one? If only they could talk! Yes, every button tells a story.

Five Little Birdies

I was wandering through the Goodwill store on my lunch hour last week when I spotted a little platic baggie of artificial birds. They looked kind of different. I examined closer and discovered I could just barely make out "Occupied Japan" stamped on the tails. How cool! I have seen a lot of Occupied Japan but never artifical birds. They are made of an unusual material, kind of like paper mache wrapped in dryer sheets - LOL!

Naturally, I couldn't resist buying them. Here is what I did with them when I got home...I had some leftover pieces from the new art room lights so I used them to make two ribbon towers for storing my narrow ribbons. The little birds are wired to an old pick I had laying around from a worn-out wreath. Fits perfectly as a topper on the ribbon tower - don't you think?

Dirt Maker

Yep, you heard me right. I spent Sunday afternoon building this fancy device for sifting dirt. A dirt maker. Our soil is really rocky here so every time I dig a hole to plant something I have to pick out the rocks by hand before I deposit the "old" dirt in the compost. My son built something similar so I pirated his design and made one for myself. I think I can make some mighty fine dirt with this - don't you think?

Desk Project - Part 3

I am SOOOOO far behind on my blogging. So much going on around here! Friday the keyboard tray was installed and Saturday I bought the new cables so everything reaches. Yeah! I have my work surface back. I will tell you about that clutter on top of the desk someday soon - so much going on around here....