MIA

If you're wondering where I've gone, I am still here but have been in the process of moving... not far from where I was, but moving none-the-less! I have decided to leave my husband so that's why I'm moving. I've been thinking, contemplating, crying, and changing my mind back and forth about this for months and I've finally made up my mind. It was a bit rough the first couple of days after the move, but I'm better now. It's okay, this is what's best... Sooo, enough of that... on to the happier stuff...

My mom and I will be painting the basement of my new place tomorrow so I can set up my new studio! I'll try to remember to take a before picture so you can see how dark, dreary, and creepy the basement is now and then of course some after pictures!! I'm really excited to get it done! Right now it's dark, wood paneling, grey concrete floors and just plain icky!! LOL! We're going to paint EVERYTHING except the floor a nice creamy white! I think it will really lighten it up and it'll make a great studio! AAaaannnddd, I have a bunch of big (and small) mirrors to strategically place after we paint to reflect what little light comes into the basement from the miniscule windows!! I really love Teresa McFayden's basement stuido in the Aug/Sep/Oct 2009 issue of Where Women Create magazine... that's sort of the look I'm going for!

I also don't have my computer hooked up yet with my new ISP... I'm using my daughter's laptop right now, just so I can check my Etsy shop and eBay store. I should be all hooked up by the 25th of this month and I'll post all the basement/studio redo pictures then!

Tania

Shabby Chic Faux Chandelier

I've decided to make something for myself again (I don't do that too often!). I had this metal lampshade skeleton that I picked up from a yardsale free box over the summer, so I decided to make it into... well... a hanging lamp! A shabby chic, blingy, girly hanging lamp!

My freebie lamp shade armature started out really shiny metal which I didn't like so I scuffed up the metal with some sandpaper and then gave it a quick, uneven coat of walnut brown spray paint that I had on hand, then scuffed it up again to remove some of the paint.

Please excuse my craft bench mess!! Then I started wrapping torn strips of muslin around the bottom portion of the shade. The longer your strips of muslin are the better, I didn't have a large piece of fabric so I had to tie pieces together to get them long enough... whatever works right?!

This is what it looks like after I wrapped the whole bottom portion of the shade.

Now take some vintage hankies and tie them on the top.

Fold the hankies in half diagonally...

Then roll them up like a bandana you would wear on your head.

My lamp shade has three metal pieces on top, so I used three hankies!

Now you can open them up a little bit for a fuller, frillier look.

Here it is with the hankies all tied on.

Then I took some chandelier crystals that I had and some button craft thread (just really thick, sturdy thread) and sewed a crystal at every other scallop on the shade.

Like so...

Here it is with the crystals... I took the picture away from my messy art table... it was kind of hard to get my arm far enough away from the camera! Luckily I have long arms!! LOL!

Now I took three different, shabby chic colors of lace...

and tied all three colors together at the scallops where there are NOT crystals.

Then I pushed them up to the top... because... well, because I didn't like them at the bottom!

I'm going to add some more "stuff" to my lampshade soon and show the finished product... be sure to come back and check it out!

Halloween Banner

Yay! More artwork for me!! Have you seen the Joli-Paquet blog yet? If not, you've GOT to check it out, they have really great tutorials which is where I found the tutorial to make my new BOO banner to add to my Halloween decor! Easy-Peasy and SO cute!

It's made with large manila shipping tags and vintage book pages!

"Seasons" Altered Book Round Robin

I just finished my spread for the first book that was sent to me in the altered book round robin I'm participating in! Our book themes are "seasons", so I chose winter for Nola's book. This is my spread. I used two used dryer sheets as my backdrop for this scenery! I wanted some gauzy, sheer looking fabric and when I went through my fabric stash nothing caught my eye, then I thought of a dryer sheet! Once they have gone through the dryer they are soft and somewhat sheer... perfect!

I made a little fabric house with crackle looking fabric for the house, white eyelet for the roof, tan for the chimney and a piece of torn vintage book page for the smoke!

The trees are vintage rick-rack that I just folded in half and then added little silver punched stars to the top. The poem and saying were printed in the "typewriter" font on vintage bookpage. One page has some sparkly, fuzzy, white wired trim along the ground level for snow and the other has some sparkly, blingy rhinestone trim! Silver punched snowflakes, spray glitter and an overlay of tulle finished it off!

Then I made a bookmark with vintage white velvet ribbon and an old snowflake lapel pin (directions for these kinds of bookmarks are in the latest Somerset Life magazine), really simple to make and just the right added touch for my page I think! Oh, and I also added a little tag with some words about winter cut from a vintage Scrabble dictionary that I have, there is another silver punched snowflake on the other side of the tag.

So, I signed the artist's sign in page at the back of Nola's book and I'm ready to mail it off to the next participant... and receive another book to work in, Yay!!

PS. You can see my book that I created for the round robin here!

The Red Sampler

I was inspired to create this red sampler board after seeing a beautiful vintage fabric sample book in one of my Somerset magazines issues... please don't ask which one, because I have a TON of them and I don't have a CLUE which one it is in right now!! I hate that... I see something and then when I want to find it again I spend half my day looking, looking, looking!!!

Anyway... I used the back of a vintage red scrapbook cover for my backboard and a portion of the front cover as well. I quilted a piece of muslin with gold thread and then started adding my "sampler" elements.

A beautiful vintage flower applique that I've been saving and saving for just the right project, some antique lace snippets that I have also been hoarding, vintage seam binding tape, vintage red velvet ribbon and burlap ribbon too!

Vintage buttons, doilies, ribbons, etc. and an old hat elastic card. I added a little red veil on her hat!

Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving?! WTF?! It's not even Halloween yet! I know, I know, but when you have an online shop, you have to get stuff in there early! Heck, the brick-and-mortar stores already have Christmas stuff out!! These are a couple of Turkey Day collages that I made.


I think he's so cute with his little Turkey drawn pumpkin carriage!

And this couple is so cute sitting at the Thanksgiving dinner table! They look so shy and innocent!

Halloween Decorating

Well, I dug in my tiny, under-the-stairs closet for my rubbermaid tub full of Halloween decor and I've decided several things... 1) I need more storage space for holiday decorations (that probably won't happen anytime soon so... 2) I need an orange and black tub for Halloween stuff because I had to open EVERY tub to figure out which one had the right holiday inside! and 3) my collection of Halloween stuff is sad... :( so much of my stuff is old and outdated I didn't even bother getting it out... I need MORE!

Anyway, here is what I did drag out, this is on my front porch, the little ghost hiding behind the pumpkin is something that my mom painted years ago. You should check out her Etsy shop for some really cool Halloween things she's painted recently!

This is also something that is on my front porch, I love his toothy grin and his little golf tee stem!

And this is on my porch too!

This is my dining room table centerpiece, I need some more ornaments for my tree, anyone have a source for some cute handmade ornaments? The glittery Halloween sign is from Walmart... yep, good ol' Walmart! I bought it this year and it was only $2.50!!

This is one of my ornaments on my tree, it's a little jingle bell skeleton, isn't he cute? I have two.

And this little guy is something I picked up on one of our bi-yearly excursions to Snohomish, you can read my mom's post about it here.

This is the display on my coffee table. The little drummer pumpkin man is also something I got in Snohomish. He was in a dark 40% off corner of a little shop that we stopped in and he was in sad shape, his little drum was just hanging from the front, it needed to be wired back up so he can actually play! And I made the little hat for him, he seemed naked without something on his head! The pumpkin is another Snohomish find, and the ghosts are another of my mom's creations! Oh, and the beautiful doily underneath is one of my grandma's that she made for me before she passed away.

Little wooden interlocking ghosts that my mom painted are on top of my entertainment center.

Along with this darling dracula paper mache gourd... again from my mom!! You gotta love having a talented mom!! LOL!

So, that's the extent of it! I'll be looking for more on our trip, we leave tomorrow!!