Category : Blog

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I am totally hooked on this “new to me”  technique. I’ve seen it in a magazine, You Tube, blogs etc. Trust me…this technique has been around the block a time or two. Of course, I am super late in actually trying it but I had said I wouldn’t buy any new art supplies. Well…technically I didn’t buy a new art supply, I bought a concentrated cleaner. That counts right!?!?

Anyway…Since not everyone on the planet has read about it I’ll tell you what I did. It is so simple and has such cool results.  A word of caution…this will be messy…protect your surfaces, hands and clothing.

First you take the CitroSolv concentrate full strength and pour a bit into a small container. I used a foam brush to apply it directly to the front and back of the National Geographic pages I wanted to use.  The more ink on the  pages the better. After slathering on the CitroSolv to as many pages as you’d like…close the magazine and walk away for about 20 mins or so. When you come back…put on a glove and start opening the pages…they will likely fall right from the magazine as the CitroSolv seems to un-glue the binding as well.

I hung my pages to dry with clothes pins overnight.

I painted a few pages with CitroSolv before going to bed to see if the effect would be any different. The effect seemed a little more “muddy” to me rather than having the cool bubble effect. Still totally usable papers…just different.

These are some of my favorites but as you can see below…I ended up with a bunch of fun papers to play with.

Over the weekend we had guests…my brother-in-law and his girlfriend. I had asked her if she’d show me how to knit some time. She said sure if I’d show her how to crochet.  We both learned something very interesting, I knit like a crocheter and she crochets like a knitter. It was difficult for each of us to break the habits that we used for our previous yarn work.  I’ve been trying again and again but never get any further than this. I’ll keep trying.

I also made this journal cover  the other day but as I was working on a second one…my sewing machine started acting goofy. I think the timing is off…or maybe the tension. I’m going to have to bring it in for a tune up. It’s about 25 years old and has never been looked at…it’s well over due.

BRRR!! It’s a cold one here today.  It looks beautifully…the sun is shiny bright but then you step out the door and it slaps you in the face!  At least it’s not super windy.
I’m having a nice hot mug of tea of organic oolong tea today since I have to go back out to go grocery shopping.  I actually went to workout this morning already…gotta wear off all those goodies somehow.

Go see what my Tea Tuesday friends are up to today… Visit Kimmies blog and look on her sidebar.

Here we are at the end of the line for this year long Dress-up Project.
I went round and round with a design for December but everything I thought of, I’d have to buy material. Since I pledged not to buy new supplies this year I had to come up with something else.

I decided on PINK for my Holiday formal dress. I love this color! The fabric is so soft and shimmery too.  

One design I had considered was the classic little black dress, perfect Holiday party wear, but I didn’t have and plain black fabric. Yes I could have went the paper route and painted a little black dress but that wouldn’t have been the same!

I’d also given some thought to my imagined bridesmaid dresses for a Christmas wedding. As a young girl sitting in Church at Christmas I loved the tree in the corner and the sea of poinsettia plants around the pulpit and communion stands. I could picture the whole wedding.  Keep in mind this was the 80’s so I had wanted a black velvet long sleeve top with a  layered tartan shirt and a wide gold sash with a bow in the back. Of course both the sash and tartan would be a bit shimmery and the skirt would have had some body to it so it would have a nice bell shape.

Well…little girl dreams change as we grow up and so do the styles..thank goodness. We had a spring wedding in Vegas! Elopement is SO much easier!!

Here’s one last look at all the dresses in the wardrobe.

Go check out the rest of the December Dresses at the Alice and Camilla blog.
Special thanks to Margaret for coming up with this fun project!!

Oh the weather outside is frightful…. la dadada something something…
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

I wish I could stay in all day but I’m having a quick brace of tea and a cookie before I head out for library duty at the kids school. Due to budget cuts they eliminated the media para meaning that they ask for parent volunteers to check in, check out and shelve books. I’m happy to help out but it makes me a bit crazy when the latest PTO newsletter came out talking about how great the school has done with the last fund raising event. How about giving the woman her job back!  

Ok I must now get down off my soap box to put on my boots… I don’t mind driving in snowy weather, I was a school bus driver for a couple years, it’s just all the other cars on the road that I don’t trust!!

In case you were wondering…this is another set from my folks collection. Figured I’d show the bottom for those who are in the know…not me but I’m sure you’re out there…

Stop by Kimmies blog to see what my fellow tea drinkers are doing today.

With the long Holiday weekend, I finally took some time and felt inspired enough to do a bit of creating. 

First I grabbed my “maybe some day” journal that I slap my leftover paint in. Then grabbed my scrap bucket. This was just sort of something to remind myself that I actually could make something again.

After that I felt like I could be on a roll. I was thinking about gifts for teachers, casual friends and just those “oh gosh I totally forgot about so and so” gifts. It’s always good to have a little stash of items around without breaking the bank.

These are a couple of altered composition books that I may keep for gifts or maybe list in my etsy store.
Yes, you read that right…
I finally got up the nerve to actually list some things in my storefront. I’ve been busy photographing items to list and then of course writing up the listings. I’m sure once I get a system down it will go quicker.

I can happily say I’ve made my first sale as well. If I’d known it would have happened that quickly I’d have listed stuff months ago.

I wanted something special this week since this will be my first Thanksgiving without my dad, so I borrowed this set from my mom.

This is one of my favorites from Dad’s collection.  His collection focused on sets with scenery on them.

He was always on the look out for a nice scene but of course, would surprise Mom with a delicate floral set when he found one.

I love the thistles framing the scene, the scalloped edge and the handle. Drinking tea from this cup makes me sit up a little straighter and cross my legs at my ankles. Granted, this is not my usual style..I’m more of a curl up in a chair and sip from a steamy mug kind of gal but it’s good to be “ladylike” every once in a while.

My parents have a very large tea cup and saucer collection. The funny thing was that they both had collections BEFORE they even met.  I’m sure you’ll be seeing more of their collection…

Stop by Kimmie’s blog to see what the rest of the Tea Tuesday gang is up to today.

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