Trunk Show - you are invited!

So happy that I am a vendor a this event! It is the first year and I can tell you - it will be a great shopping experience!!

My version of Halloween - more creepy elegant than scary...

available for sales at Boutique 208, across from Heinz Hall in Pittsburgh

I must admit that I just don't love Halloween and the creepiness of it.

Poe Inspired.

A stitch in time...

Saves nine, right?  What does that saying mean - minutes, days, hours?  Anyone know?  I know I have not saved any time this year.  It has just been moving, cleaning, moving other stuff around, painting, moving stuff around, painting other stuff and moving stuff around again.  I have not plugged my sewing machine in since February! I did some fun little hoops.  Almost instant gratification.   I am hoping to get back into the creating mode more routinely... wish me luck.  I miss it!

Pink and Paris - perfect!

What to wear for a special Valentines Day dinner at home?  Heels, pearls and perhaps something fun and flirty...

your invitation to Handmade with Love!

What I didn't give you for Christmas (aka Pinterest FAIL!)

I have an old Martha Stewart Living magazine that I have kept for years, probably decades if I do the math, because I have always wanted to make a homemade snow globe. I never could get past that exotic ingredient, glycerin, of which the importance was stressed, so that the snow/glitter floated instead of dropping.

MARTHA's

Flash forward to the age of DIY and of course, there are a ton of tutorials for how to make them and someone mentioned that glycerin is available at the the drug store. AH HA! At the same time, my aging cat Rocket has developed a serious baby food addiction. For a while she tricked me into thinking that she could only digest the $1.09 Gerber yucky chicken pasty stuff that makes me heave. And was eating 3-4 jars a day. Do the math! I don't spend that much on my own food everyday! But, the pile of adorable little glass jars were so perfect for my beads and baubles as mentioned here previously. Then, I remembered Martha's snow globes. Yep, just in time for the holidays.   First step, find little trinkety items that wouldn't rust, melt, mold or get icky in water and could fit in the tiny jars. I found trees at at Michaels and adorable miniature sleighs ($3 each - ouch!). The tress were flocked if I do say so. Remember that. And it rhymes with, well, if you ever crafted or shopped or dined or talked to me, you know what I'd say next. After about $60 on supplies - fine glitter, colored glitter, water proof glue - two varieties in case one failed, MS's pearly paint for the lid - adheres without sanding - (look closely and you will see the Ragu lid where it didn't!)!  

I marched right up to the local pharmacy counter and asked the young girl behind the counter, where to find glycerin. And she walked me over to the suppositories, which by the way, are very expensive. And explained that was what was inside. I remember muttering that I didn't read that in the directions and I guess I could just squeeze them in. She quickly alerted the manager nearby to my predicament as, "can you help her? she's working on something big and needs a lot of glycerin and doesn't know how it will work..." As I stood there with the box of suppositories I quickly said that what I was working on was a CRAFT project before he thought I was really constipated. He put the box back on the shelf and took me to the next aisle, first-aid supplies and ta-da - a cheap little bottle of glycerin. Score!

 

We assembled for a craft afternoon and made them. Or tried to. The timing didn't have the instant gratification that the kids wanted - wait for water-proof glue to dry fully? I'd missed that pre-planning. It quickly became a two day craft. Luckily it was all spread over mom's table not mine! I made mine extra special. With my German glass glitter in a perfect shade of pink. Fab-u-lous. By the following day that one appeared to have some type of chemical reaction - while the rest just looked a bit murky. The glass glitter looked really like toxic waste. After another day it was the murky river water we're known for here in the 'Burgh. Most of them turned out okay. A bit murky no matter water combo of water proof glue, distilled water and glitter I used. After a few days they all look good as long as you don't shake them and make them all murky again. Which makes them the saddest snow globes ever... and only $80 on supplies for these special gifts.  You're welcome!

These are a few of my favorite things!

Once upon a time I had a fabulous collection of vintage bulbs, all acquired for next to nothing at yard sales.  Found sadly in dusty boxes with the cellophane missing, usually with a mix match of newer bulbs.  One day a very bad cat decided they were so pretty that he would like a much better look and climbed the tree.  On Christmas morning no less!  Shards of broken pretties scattered on all the presents.  The sound was pure sadness.  And then the vacuum. 

 I have been much more cautious with what is left of my collection ever since!  I've come up with this much safer way to display and enjoy them.  The small pale pink bulbs at the top of the pink ladies are clustered together with silver leaves and are very delicate.  There used to be pale blue, green and silver too.  I've seen a few like them at antique stores, but the prices for old bulbs are crazy now... 

In my little condo cottage I don't have room to display all my holiday decor or we wouldn't be able to walk!  I have a few golden globes from my grandparents' house that I scooped up before they were donated.  They are about 6 inches and look handblown.  I never saw them on display there - my memories at my grandparents' house was a huge silver tree with blue bulbs.  The gold ones are packed away this season.  And so is my pink ceramic tree, a fabulous yard sale find!  I love that someone in the 1960-70's broke tradition and did a pink tree with pastel bulbs instead of the basic green!  Someone was very shabby chic before there was a name for it.  

I have a vintage silver tree too - also packed away.  I love that each branch goes back into its kraft paper sleeve.  For now this one will do, the girls have the mate to this small silver tree in their bedroom.  I like the scale of it.  And I L-O-V-E that I finally painted this trunk a pale white-washed blue.  It was my first real antique purchase back in 1992 and I paid top dollar at an antique store in Winchester.  Ouch - they saw this Yankee coming!  I haven't loved it since I left VA in '94 because it was just too country for my French Provincial, Shabby Chic style.  Now, I love it again.  The porcelain bisque items - also acquired in the 90s - during the Party Light candle party phase.  So happy that I ran out of space for 3-wick candles and bought something that endured!  Off to do some pierogi making and sewing... 'Tis the season!  Merry Christmas to all!  Thanks for stopping here!  

The sign that I have not been crafting...

I have time to link to a Saturday Night link party!

Funky Junk Interiors Storage party

 

 My stuff is all nice, neat and orderly. So sad.  All these containers are full of little baubles, bling, buttons... but I have been so swamped at my real job that I have not crafted since August!  It was a serendipitous moment recently.  Me in my oversized royal blue sweat pants driving my daughter across the subdivision at 6:50am and spotting this white hutch in a neighbor's trash pile.  (BTW, Really?  Why don't people donate usable items? why send something like this to the landfill?) So I scored this very solid and very heavy hutch whilst still in my jammies, and operating this mission solo since no 10 and 12 year olds want to be seen picking trash with their mom in their own hood, I heaved it into the mini-van and up 3 flights of stairs!  Just in time too.  I had noticed that the middle shelf on the white bookcase was starting to bow under the weight of mason jars loaded with bling.    

Believe it or not, I know where every little bitsy bit is located, just as much as when it is all in a creative mess around my feet as I am pulling trim and sewing it onto stuff.

Not that I don't have a huge stash of work in progress!  But at least out of sight doesn't make me as crazy.  And, it's not like any of this is perishable - I'm missing the fall/winter vending season (pout/mean face) BUT it will all keep until I am able to focus my time and energy here.  I may end up gifting from my own inventory - co-workers, friends and family be warned - button jewelry, aprons and totes may be coming your way!

I do like having my inspiration board visible even in this creative drought.  Outback Red anyone?  Oh, my 1980's winter white cords and bulky ski sweater - such high fashion memories... this label was a great find that makes me smile!



 

I have an aversion to plastic storage containers.  I've had them back in the day for scrapbook stuff, but it drove me nuts!  So, my tiny beads and sequins are visible and orderly in baby food jars.  Why do I have baby food jars??  Well, not from a grandbaby thank goodness.  (I need another decade please, and I know V would agree!).  My sweet OLD tuxedo cat is 19 and has started an expensive diet of chicken puree baby food.  The glass jars are the only thing good about that...