First official project in the new room
Yay! The first official project of the new craft room/studio has been thunk up and finished! The room isn’t – finished – but I did move a table in there with a lamp so I could start using it. Still waiting for lighting and a furniture piece and some cabinets.
There must have been a company promoting dog tags to grammar schools in the 1960′s. I’m sure it wasn’t just my school. They weren’t the cool dog tags like our GI’s fighting over in Viet Nam had. Ours were… well, they looked like this:
I remember being disappointed it wasn’t like a real dog tag, but still excited to have it. With my name on it and everything. I ran across it the other day and thought it might be cool to add some charms and actually wear it again. It was probably worn for about a month before living the rest of it’s life in my jewelry box. There were some random charms at hand and these were pulled out:
With the result being this:
Do you have one of these dog tags? Or perhaps your mother has one? Why not pull it out and put some charms with it, too? I think it’ll be fun to wear.
The granddoggies Howl-o-ween
The city where my daughter lives has a doggie costume contest every year around Halloween, called Howl-o-ween. This year it was on Halloween. I am ashamed to admit I was so happy to have somewhere to go last night instead of staying home alone to hand out candy. Ricky always seems to be working and the job is left up to me. Not that I don’t enjoy it while it’s happening, but….
So Erin dressed The Boys up and I joined them at the parade. Ross was a Chia Pet and Rip was Antoine of internet fame.
“We’re so happy to be here!”
Ross the Chia Pet.
Waiting patiently for a treat.
Rip, the winner of the Best Handmade Costume. Erin was dressed up as the “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” lady. Wish I’d got a full picture of her. She was unrecognizable.
Halloween’s tomorrow???
Good grief! Halloween’s tomorrow and what have I done as far as decorating at home? I located the box of Halloween decorations. Pulled it out, but never even opened it. I did find some quick spots for the decorations that have been bought throughout the year. No thought given to placement – just find a clean spot and put something there – and nothing to write home about. But I did decorate the booth. Again, nothing over the top like I’d like to do, but at least there’s something there.
A good bit of that has changed already. Several things sold and I’ve brought in more stuff. But I didn’t want the holiday to get by without doing something on the blog!
It all has to be replaced with Christmas and Thanksgiving immediately. The city wide Christmas open house is next weekend. Too early in my opinion, but they didn’t ask me. Wouldn’t have cared what I said anyway.
Country Living Fair pt. 2
It’s only been a week since the Country Living Fair?? Seems like forever. And, unlike most weeks, I have other things to talk about. So I’m going to let this be the end. There’s nothing much more to say anyway.
One of the most exciting things was seeing them filming for The Nate B. Show. Now, I rarely get to watch the show, but I was a tad disappointed that Nate wasn’t there. I don’t know if they’ve aired this yet, but here are my pics.
They were in the 5 Cent Mercantile booth, one of my favorites.
Cari, of Cash and Cari, had a booth there, but I’ve never seen that show (I know, I know.) so it didn’t mean as much to me. Melanie and Tiffany had their picture made with her while I was off on some other tangent.
Now. What did I buy? A couple of new Christmas ornaments, a Halloween decoration, um…. uh…. hmm…. I don’t remem… Oh! A ring and… well, shoot. Must not have been anything exciting if I’ve forgotten already. The experience is the best spent money. But here’s one thing I do remember and actually took a picture of.
It’s really hard for me to find W initials for my name. M’s are everywhere, but never a W. So when I found a whole bunch of WC plaques for $8 each, I was super excited. Where would I ever find both my first and last initial in one plaque? I was so happy. Then Tiffany said, You know that stands for water closet? Uh, no. I didn’t think of that. Then…. It’ll go on my bathroom door! I’d show a picture of it on the bathroom door, but 1) it isn’t on there yet and 2) it wouldn’t be as interesting. It’s just a plain ol’, white painted luan door. Bor-ring.
Country Living Fair Report pt. 1
Yes, we went! Tiffany, Melanie, my daughter Erin and I. We took off to beautiful Stone Mountain, Georgia and ogled the goods at the Country Living Fair! Two whole days of walking, ooo-ing and ahh-ing and even some buying. And walking. Did I mention we walked a lot?
We were there shortly after opening on Friday morning. It was so crowded, it began to get on my nerves. It’s annoying to have to watch out for people stepping on you instead of getting to really see all the goods offered. I didn’t take many pictures. I was just too overwhelmed. (I seem to get overwhelmed quite easily! Never noticed that until just now.) Tiffany took 5 million pics. Her report will, I’m sure, be a lot more interesting. Especially since she got a picture of The Cowboy.
So the first place we stopped was the Earth Angel tent. The first booth I stopped at in there was the booth I kept going back to all throughout the weekend. I was mesmerized by the altered art collages. Swoon! Here are some pictures I took there. They’ll be linked to the huge size so you can see really close-up.
I don’t want this all to be hideously long and boring, so I’ll only post a few pics each day.
So what else is new? Nothing more has happened in the craft room studio. Waiting on my “lectrisherman” husband to hang the lights and get the plugs hot. Also waiting on him to help move a piece of furniture from the shop to home. I have started a serious fall clean-out though. Worked all day yesterday on one wall in our bedroom. The wall with my closet. Now it’s on to the wall with the chest of drawers that holds said lectrisherman’s undies and socks. But I’m off to work in a few minutes. Sigh. Time and no money, or money and no time. Or, if you’re like I’ve always been, no money and no time.
What can I do with this quilt?
I wanted to share with y’all a quilt I found at a yard sale a couple of weeks ago. It’s made from flour sacks and pink muslin.
The flour sack print has faded badly and the pink has faded to almost white. There are also some stains in the middle.
Can you make out the word “Allied”?
And I don’t think I’ve ever heard of Belisk flour.
But most of the sack print is on backward!
And yep. I had to shell out three whole smackeroos. I’m sure the ladies having the sale, who were in their 70s and 80s, were shaking their heads in wonder as I left. What would she want with that old thing? And I was wishing I’d got there earlier.
So now. What am I to do with this? Make pillows? A chair seat? Leave it as is? Unquilt it to expose the right side of the print? It will be hard to cut out around some of the best print. If it were yours, what would you be inclined to do with it? If you know me well enough, you know it’ll be a long time before I get around to tackling it, so I can entertain ideas for quite awhile.
One man’s trash….
Many, many moons ago, my husband brought home a green, plywood box on legs. It had been in either the electrical shop or the machine shop where he worked. Apparently, the guys got something better and were throwing this box out. I think Ricky brought it home for himself for a tool box, but we needed a coffee table and I quickly claimed it. This was way back in the day, I tell ya. Wayyyy back. I’m sure there are plenty of pictures with that green box in them, but I haven’t cleaned out closets yet and it would take me an hour to find one buried in the picture box which is buried in the bottom of a closet. Let’s just use our imagination, shall we?
Years later it was replaced and was relegated to the back porch where weather got to a couple of sides.
Now, you know I’m working on my new craft room, ahem, studio, and love the look of the stacked suitcases. (Actually I love the idea of each suitcase having it’s own shelf, but that’s for later.) I had some cool suitcases, but they needed something to sit on rather than being on the floor. I looked out the window and saw the box, so sad and abandoned. So I started scraping.
Not a bad look! At least I like it. Some of you will, some won’t.
The suitcases I have were stacked waiting to be filled.
I think I’ve figured out what’s wrong!
Yes, I know it’s been awhile since I’ve updated the blog. I’ve been told that numerous times. Yes, I’m still alive. And yes, there’s been at least one call asking that. I’ve been asked by more than a few people why I haven’t blogged lately. There were lots of excuses – work, sick cat (she’s fine now), busy, no time, no inspiration, nothing interesting going on to talk about, overwhelmed trying to do too much… And yes, it was all these things and half the time I was in a funk. Almost depressed. About nothing. But I believe I’ve figured out the underlying reason. My surroundings were in chaos. (That’s no earth shattering revelation for those who know me.) The house was in a mess. The shop was in a mess. There was no calming oasis. Only sleep.
What brought me to this realization? I started cleaning house. Really cleaning. I’ve worked 2 days in one room. The room I live in the most. Rearranged some book shelves that I haven’t seen in two years because the new TV was big, sat on a high piece and totally covered the book shelves. You can imagine the dust. Ahhh-choo! Ricky got a bee in his bonnet to take out the old TV cabinet that the new TV was sitting on. The TV is now sitting on a painted wooden box. This won’t be permanent (but if it’s like the old TV cabinet we’ll have a new TV before I find the right piece). The room got cleaned up and straightened and dusted and vacuumed. Got the dust worms off the always in motion ceiling fan blades – how does even that happen?? Got rid of books I haven’t looked at in years and have lost interest in the subject. And it feels so good!
Even though there are still things to be done in this room – hand prints on the French doors, torn curtains to mend – I’m ready to move on to another room. Repeat the process. It’s invigorating to have a clean home. Inspiring. Makes me want to do other things. And I’ve only done this one room. Got 9 more to go plus two bathrooms and the hall. Two of those rooms are blank canvasses.
Erin came and took her old twin bed home. She wanted it for one of their spare bedrooms. I have plans for her old room. I’m thinking I want to try to let that be the white and gray room with touches of a pale blue-green.
The other blank canvas is my new craft room! It’s ready for me to move into, finally! Inspired by the new Restoration Hardware catalog, I decided to go with an industrial look. We’ll see how that goes. But at least I’ll have something to blog about in the coming days.
One more thing that needs to be done before I can relax, no, two more things. I’m desperate to get all the closets and drawers cleaned out and get the shop clean and most of my stuff moved out and into the booths. I’ve decided not to worry about putting it all on Etsy first. Get all that stuff out there for sale in person and start fresh with Etsy later. Ricky will be taking over the shop for his hobby/workshop.
Even if we’re not looking at the messes, they’re somewhere in the back of our minds, nagging, taunting, bringing us down. Should I chronicle the process? Would it help inspire anyone out there? What if I get tired or bored or lose interest and quit tomorrow? Or get busy with work or something again? Should I take before and after pictures? Appall everyone with my clutter? What if there’s only a before and never an after? I’d be pretty darn embarrassed. So I dunno.
You know what’s funny? I’m reading Funky Junk’s 31 Days, Blog to Biz, hanging on every word because… Me too! That’s what I want to do! And I can’t even keep up a week at a time. Sheesh.
How would you alter this?
It’s been awhile since my last post. Honestly, I’ve been so busy there was nothing interesting to say! Obviously, I haven’t been interesting busy.
The other day hubby came home with a couple of things on the back of his truck. Someone at work gave them to him. Apparently, he’s becoming the I’ll Take Anything Anybody’ll Give Me Junk Man! He’s learning and it’s about doggone time!
So he came home with this:
Which is a no brainer. It’ll get a bead board back and some paint and new knobs. But there was also this:
A tater ‘n onion bin. I guess. Remember when they were all the rage in the ’80′s? I have a story about that. A friend and I did a craft show together. I was selling (and I use the word “sell” lightly) hand made jewelry and she had fancy, little girl hair bows. We sat there all day long. Between us we probably took in $20, but we saw a million tater ‘n onion bins being toted out that day. I hold a certain bitterness toward them. Although I do acknowledge their usefulness.
I’d like to update the look of this one and would like suggestions. Have any of you seen these updated? Or have any ideas? The only things I can think to do is paint – a given – and where the hearts are, put either some decorative paper there, or maybe a black and white Graphics Fairy print on white muslin. Or, if I could find something round that would cover the heart… Or maybe I should just try to sell it as is? What say you guys?
So what has kept me so busy lately? I’ve got a Big Girl Job! Well, sorta. It’s part time and some weeks more work than others. My SIL does appraisals and was worked to death. She needed an assistant and here I am! Things are hopping right now and we’re pretty snowed under.
Speaking of hopping, the new booth is going great guns! I’m having a hard time keeping up and that’s a good thing. A WONDERFUL thing! What makes it so hard is that I want to put all the little things on Etsy before taking them to the booth. But I don’t have much time to put stuff on Etsy. And the furniture I have needs anything from minor gluing or deep cleaning to painting and there’s certainly no time for any of that.
One other thing. I opened up my web site last week and saw that the hosting account had been suspended. What??!! Ack!!!! Turns out I’d been hacked and someone was sending spam using my email. But after a couple of days I got all that sorted out. My next project will be changing the look of the blog. Someday. Soon? Maybe?
So now you know pretty much everything I’ve been up to for the last couple of weeks. Sorry it wasn’t more exciting.
Is this sweet or what?
I’m still getting things from my friend’s mother’s estate. Every time we think this is the last haul, more stuff comes out of the woodwork. So I was over there with the three “boys” Saturday. It was mostly a book day, but the oldest started pulling things out of a metal cabinet. (Hey… I forgot to ask about the cabinet!) He came out grinning and jokingly said, “Want a homemade Easter basket?” You should have seen his eyes when he saw my eyes light up and heard the sounds tumbling out of my mouth like I was looking at a newborn kitten. He couldn’t believe it. And yes, he would have thrown them away.
They are soooo sweet! Made in the late 1950′s, maybe early ’60′s. Can you guess what they’re made from? They’re about 4″ tall and 5″ diameter and made of cardboard.
Cottage cheese buckets! I can just see their mother wondering what to do with two rowdy boys and a baby. Or maybe the baby was on the way. She probably saw the craft in a magazine and decided to have a little craft session. And then kept them until the day she died, over 50 years later. These will definitely go in my vintage Easter collection. I’ll cherish them.
And while we’re talking about holidays…. uh, we were talking about holidays, weren’t we? I saw this on a shelf and asked if it could come home with me.
Sure it could! The oldest had made it from a model kit in the ’60′s. Another item I’ll add to my collection and cherish.
And while I’m thinking about it, here’s another cute story and something I’ll keep.
There was a note attached to the Santa candy container in the middle that read, “[The oldest son] got mad and started to tear this one up. I thought they looked so cute in their stockings when they were little.” Yes, I’ll have to keep these, too. You might wonder how someone can give things like this up. Remember, it’s three guys. They kept loads upon loads of things, but simply couldn’t keep everything. So I’ll be the keeper of some of their memories for them.
My Latest Etsy Items
Other places I hang out
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