Finished Projects

Hi everyone,

Here are some projects that I recently finished.


Before.  I bought this at Goodwill for $0.39


After.

This project was inspired by my great Aunt Helen.  She was actually my Great Grandma's Aunt.  I was privileged to know her.  He passed away around the time I graduated from High School.  She was a fantastic lady.  She helped her husband build and run two successful businesses then she became a nurse.  She loved furs, pearls, and diamonds.  But she also loved dogs, camping, and swimming.  When I knew her she had trouble seeing well so she had to wear both contacts and eye glasses in order to read the books she loved so much.  She was extremely nice, smart, funny, and sharp tongued!  She didn't hesitate to tell you if you were doing something she didn't like.  I loved that about her.  You always knew just were you stood.  No guessing necessary.  I admire that.


I made this out of any old book cover for my beautiful cousin, Stephanie.

I painted it with some red paint and then gesso once the paint dried.  Then I decoupaged the butterflied from a napkin over the gesso.  Once all of that was dry I painted it with several colors of water color paint.  Then I decoupaged yellow tissue paper and her name.  The letters were cut with my Aunt's cricut.  The two pieces of flower jewelry that hold the 4x6 picture came from the box of jewelry that Janet gave me.  The napkin came from a swap with Hazel.  I also decoupaged squares of the white part of the napkin in a random pattern over the book before painting it with the water color.  I'm really happy with the way it turned out.  She is going to display pictures in it at her open house.


I bought two of these clipboards from Goodwill a while ago.  I paid $0.99 each.  I've had a plan for them since shortly after I bought them.  Now I have finally started those projects.

This isn't the greatest picture.  I need to take my pics outside during the day but I never remember to do that.

I recently got an 8x10 picture.  It came in a large envelope with a piece of light weight chipboard.  I cut the chip board to size for the cover of this scrapbook.  It will be a book of my craft projects.  My husband will have one for his projects too.  I started mine first because I need his help with the cover of his book.  He was busy today. 

I covered the chip board with some scrapbook paper that I have had forever.  Then I wrote all over the paper with a black sharpie marker.  I painted white gesso over the writing.  I also scraped the gesso around so there would be thick and thin spots.  After the gesso was dry I lightly sanded it and decoupaged a piece of a sewing pattern over everything.  Again, I sanded it a little once everything was dry.  I inked the edges with some Tim Holtz distress ink.  After all of that, the base was finished.  Now the embellishing started.

My husband cut a wooden spool in half for me.  I inked it and wrapped some crochet thread around it.  I just bought the flowers at Michaels this weekend.  The key has been in my husband's workshop and then in my craft room for a while.  The buttons are from my stash.  The letters that are a little difficult to see in the pic have been in my stash for probably 8 years.  I've used several of them but I still have a bunch left.  I think they look great on the cover.  The dress form is from the Tim Holtz cling stamp, Seamless Experience.  I stamped it, cut it out and inked the edges.  The cameo that I glued over the dress form came from a package I bought from VintageInspireCreate on Ebay.  She is also MrsMcCabeScraps on You Tube.  I love her videos.  I bought a box of various craft supplies from her.  She goes to Goodwill and a flea market alot and gets great deals on really interesting things. 

That's just he cover now I need to make all of the pages. 

I hope you enjoy my projects.  I'm happy with the way they turned out.

The wild life is conspiring against me

Hello everyone,

If you know me personally then you probably already know at least part of the story I am about to tell.   Whether you know me or not I hope you sit back and get a good chuckle.

My husband and I got married in May 2000.  We went to Mackinac Island for our honeymoon.  We drove for about four hours, waited for an hour for the ferry, took a horse and buggy to our hotel, and then spent another hour trying to get checked in and find out room.  Then we waited for our luggage to be delivered.  After all of that we finally went outside to walk to town and officially start our honeymoon. 

A bird pooped on my head.

Les thought that was hilarious and wanted me to reenact my reaction so he could get a picture.  I refused.  We wiped the poop off my head and kept walking. I WAS NOT going back to the room to start all over again.

A few years later I went to Massachusetts with my parents and siblings.  We went on a whale watch in Boston.  There was a large group of kids on the boat for a school field trip.  The chaperones allowed the kids to eat as much candy and run as much as they wanted.  As soon as we actually started moving the kids started throwing up.  They all had bags of vomit.  My little sister started to turn green.  I'd never actually seen anyone turn green before that but I swear to you she was a pale shade of green.  I didn't want to watch her throw up so went outside and leaned against the windows in order to enjoy the view and the breeze without the vomit smell.  My parents and sisters were on the other side of the window.  After a few minutes I looked to my left toward the front of the boat and saw a man getting sick off the side. I turned to the woman on my right to say something like "Oh, poor guy" and she was covering her head.  So, I thought I better do the same.  It's a good thing I did because I ended up with puke from my shoulder to my shoes.  My lovely family was falling on the floor laughing.  I went to the lower deck to wash my hands but of course the bathroom was not working!  So I wiped up as best as I could and went back to sit with my family.  The wife of the man that threw up was sitting next to my parents the whole time and everyone saw the whole thing as it happened.  He came in and apologized.  He also said "I guess I shouldn't have had those three donuts this morning".  Nice.  I didn't need to know what was sprayed all over my clothes.  This was all before we even got to the whales.  I took pictures of the whales with puke on my hands.  After we got back to shore we walked several blocks to a restaurant where I could wash up better.  I had to walk the city for the rest of the day with my jacket turned inside out and wrapped around my waist.

A couple of years after that I was on a March of Dimes walk with my sister and step-mom.  This is the same sister that looked like she was going to throw up in the last story.  (No throw up this time).  About 10 minutes into the walk a bird flew out of a bush and scared us half to death.  I yelled "poop!" (language cleaned up for the kiddies).  Karen laughed and said something like "That's right" and pointed at my shirt.  I had bird poop on my shirt for the rest of the walk!

When there are a lot of birds flying around now I often here "Watch out Kerri!!"

Yesterday at Charlton Park I was talking to a Mom and felt something on my neck.  I asked her if there was a bug on me.  She said no but about a minute later I looked down and saw a huge spider on my sleeve.  I swatted it off and the Mom stomped on it.  I looked down at my sleeve and saw bird poop that I hadn't noticed before.  What in the world!!!!!????

Somehow I have offended the animal kingdom or something.  I realize the vomit story didn't necessarily have anything to do with animals.  But then again we were going to watch whales!  Coincidence, I think not!!

Hopefully I didn't make you sick.  I hope you got a chuckle from my misfortune.

RAK & swap packages

Hi everyone,

I received some packages today.



This came from a fellow Raveler.  It was a complete surprise.  She sent me tons of ribbon, ribbon flowers, lots of tea, and a dark chocolate candy bar!  Yum!  Thank you so much Caitlin (Earthnut)!


These are the buttons I received from GardenLynn for our Ravelry Playshop button swap.  Thanks Lynn!

Thank You Janet!!

Hello everyone,

I hope everyone had a fantastic weekend.

My friend Janet spoiled me this weekend.  She gave me two boxes of stuff that she had cleaned out of her crafting space.  There was a gingerbread house kit box in one of the boxes.  When I opened it I did not find gingerbread!  I found tons of beads, bracelet slides, wire, jewelry findings etc.  They will work great for my altered boxes etc.  There was just too much in those boxes to list but I will be having tons of fun creating projects for a long time.

THANK YOU JANET!!!

Pin cushion and shadow box

Hi everyone,

I hope you are having a fun Memorial Day weekend.

I started this shadow box yesterday and finished it this morning.



Supplies:
Shadow box from Goodwill: $0.39 or $0.59
Dress form, pattern, tape measure, and scissors from Goodwill: $0.79
Buttons from stash: Free
Flowers from garage sale: less than $0.10
Thimble from sister in law: Free
Wood pieces from Goodwill: maybe $0.25
Earring from Estate sale: $0.15
Paper from scrapbooking stash: Free
Sewing pattern from Aunt Michele: Free

I painted the shadow box black after lightly sanding it.  Then I decoupaged pieces of a sewing pattern over the outside of the box.  The background is scrapbook paper made to look like an old catalog page.  I glued the buttons into a stack and then glued the stack onto the bottom of the box.  The dowel that is the base of the table was a scrap from my husbands wood shop.  I had a flower shaped wood cutout from Goodwill that I thought would work well as the table top.  So I had Les cut it down for me.  The chair was in the bag along with the flower cutout from Goodwill.  The thimble came from my sister in law.  I turned it upside down and glued in some garage sale flowers.  I took the post off the back of the earring and glued it to the back ground.  The picture in the center of the earring came from the G45 steampunk debutant paper.






I made this pin cushion this morning:

Supplies:
Candle holder from Goodwill: $0.59
Embroidered table runner from Aunt Michele: Free
White beads from necklace: Free
Small gold beads from swap: Free
Small amount crochet thread from stash: next to free
Polymer clay flat back pearls: small fraction of $2 block of clay
Button from stash

I did not paint the candle holder.  I like the color so I used it as inspiration for the rest of the project.  My Aunt gave me several table runners, table cloths etc.  This one had some damage so I decided to use the prettiest part of the embroidery.  I cut a large circle and made a running stitch around the edge.  I stuffed it with batting and pulled the thread to make the cushion.  It is hot glued to the bottom and around the inside edge of the candle holder.

Then I threaded some crochet thread through the holes of a button and then threaded the gold and white beads on that thread and tied at the bottom around another bead.  Then I hot glued the button on the under side of the candle holder.

The flat back pearls were made by rolling small balls of polymer clay and cutting them in half with a craft knife.  After baking I painted them with white and pearl colored paint.

Best gift ever! and Goodwill haul

This might not look like much to you but it is so important to me!  My Dad made this when he was a young kid.  He was born in 1953 so he probably made this around 1963.  When I was a kid it was in my bedroom.  Over the years Dad has taken it with him each time he moved.  Somewhere in those moves one of the drawers was lost.  I told him that if he ever decided to get rid of it to give it to me.  So he did!  It makes me so happy.  I washed it and oiled it.  I will not paint or alter it but I will use it.  The top and bottom shelf will be good places for pictures frames etc.  I think I might keep some craft supplies in the drawer.

Dad made this out of old barn wood, nails, and glass knobs that they had around the house.


This is my haul:

Small antique inspired boxes (dated 1980) $0.79 each
Basket: Free from my Mom along with a neat looking pin.  She knew I would use it in something
Small chest with three drawers: $0.99
Candle holder: $0.59
Glass Koeze's jar: $0.79

I'm using one of the small boxes for glue storage.  I just put a piece of cereal box in the bottom to catch any drips.  I've been thinking of making up gift baskets to sell and giveaway to friends etc.  The basket might be used for that.  The jar will probably end up with flower making supplies etc in it.  The candle holder is going to be a pin cushion.

I've had a couple of ideas for the three drawer chest.  I think it might end up holding tea in the kitchen.  I'm not sure yet.

Possible Giveaway

Hi everyone,

I'm thinking about having a giveaway.  If I do, what would you like to see me giveaway?

I having been thinking of giving away a couple of handmade items and some trims, buttons etc.  What do you think?

The rules would be something like this:

1.) You need to leave a comment on your favorite of my posts
2.) Leave a comment on the giveaway post letting me know whether or not you would like me to start doing You Tube craft videos.

I would like more followers but I will not require people to become followers in order to enter the giveaway.

Please let me know what you think.


Thanks!
Kerri