A "Banner" day

When I saw the banner project featured in last year's July Country Living magazine, it took me about five seconds before I ran for my purse and jumped in the car to head to the craft store for supplies--I loved it THAT much! And since I knew I would be visiting my mom over the Fourth of July, we decided to have a fun little joint crafting session and make these adorable crepe paper rosette banners.Well. When's the last time you made a craft that elicited swear words? I can answer accurately: last July. What we had was a fun joint crafting session all right, however it turned out to be not-so-little. The editors at Country Living need to employ the services of a technical writer or at the very least check out one of the myriad paper-crafting magazines in the market and learn how to write coherent, specific, step-by-step instructions that don't leave your readers confused and foul-mouthed after trying to guess at what they're supposed to be doing.


Though we worked on them for several days, neither of us actually finished our banner. I know I was so frustrated when I got home that I stuffed the pieces in a box and figured I'd just deal with them next year. Well, next year arrived a few weeks ago when I dug out my box of patriotic decorations and found my rosettes waiting patiently. A year away from them definitely gave me fresh inspiration and a willingness to tackle them again. The last hurdle to getting them done was figuring out a way to hang the rosettes, a subject about which the magazine article was again maddeningly vague. I finally figured out something that would work and although it wasn't perfect (colored crepe paper+liquid glue=not a good idea, something I clearly repressed from last July) for this project my mantra has become "DONE is better than Perfect!" I got the banner finished and hung in no time, so now I can share it with you!

The original article called for hanging the rosettes from a chain made of sparkly pipe-cleaners. I have far better things to do with my time, and I had a much better option: this cute Americana tissue-paper garland by Bethany Lowe. Much easier and much cuter, in my opinion. I hung up the whole thing with push pins (no one is tall enough to see the holes I left in the wall) and to cover up the visible pins on the ends, I sewed up a few little rosettes using some red/white/blue striped crepe paper streamers.

I quite like the banner now and I'm glad I made it, even though it was a headache-and-a-half! Mostly I'm just glad it's DONE! (as always, you can click on all pictures to enlarge them.)

Corn on the Cob-cakes

Is this not HILARIOUS? This picture is from the July 2008 issue of Family Fun magazine and I literally laughed out loud when I turned the page! You can click on the photo to enlarge it and read the text. This is from the new book Hello, Cupcake! (the author is an editor with Family Fun) which I haven't yet seen but am anxiously awaiting from the library. I'm SO making these cupcakes this summer, if it means I have to create an occasion to do so. They're just too darn clever to pass up!

RED is best

I know in today's fashion climate that it's considered passe' to match your shoes to your handbag, but I'm willing to be called a fuddy-duddy when the shoes and bag in question are a) shiny and b) RED!

Apron Love

My aunt Janice is an incredibly talented seamstress and crafter. She taught Home Ec for nearly 2o years, if that gives you any indication of her level of skill and creativity. She now has a side business designing the most adorable apron patterns that are sold in local quilt shops, and I wish she'd start an etsy shop so that everyone could see her work! As a wonderful surprise, she made me this apron a few weeks ago:


Is it not SO CUTE? Oh my gosh, I love it! The fabric is awesome, and there is black rick rack AND black ball fringe to boot! I want to wear it all the time.

I love how she made it with one tie longer than the other, so the bow sits jauntily on my hip.


I love it so much I think it is now the Official Apron of Vacuuming in High Heels and Pearls.

Tagged!

I've been tagged by Jillian!

What was I doing 10 years ago?

• I was home from college for the summer and working at some boring office job I found through the temp service. I did a different one each summer so I can't keep them straight.
• I had just started dating my now-DH that February. He left for the summer for some ROTC training camp so I'm sure I was very sad.
• The most exciting thing was I was getting ready to leave for LONDON for study abroad in August!

Five snacks I enjoy:

• Chocolate. Anything.
• Ice cream. Preferably chocolate ice cream, or ice cream with chocolate on it.
• Anything gummy or chewy, like red licorice.
• Chips and homemade guacamole.
• Did I mention chocolate?

Five things on my TO DO list:

• Schedule cleaners for the living room carpet and couch. Even though we just had the carpets done a few months ago, it already looks terrible. Having a potty-training 3-year-old is not helping.
• List some of my mountain of stuff I've bought for eBay so I feel slightly less guilty about bringing more junk into the house when I yard sale.
• Read and plan my Sunday School lesson for tomorrow. How did it get to be almost Sunday again so fast?
• Go to the pool with Maren and work on my skin can...uh, tan.
• Work on my swap package for Kari. Tell my muse to hurry up and get her little heinie over here, as the deadline is approaching!

If I suddenly became a billionaire, I would:

• Rent us a week at a beach house. Heck, maybe two weeks. I'm going beach-crazy right now!
• Have all the carpets in my downstairs ripped out and replaced with beautiful hardwood floors and fabulous area rugs. (see the carpet cleaning note in the To Do list section)
• Schedule a vacation to somewhere tropical for me and the DH and drop Maren off at her grandparents' on the way.
• Book a trip to Disney World for October for all of us so we could see the Halloween decorations
  
• Buy a whole new wardrobe from Anthropologie. I love their clothes so, so much but they are just so expensive.
  

Five jobs I've had:

• Bookstore employee
• Office drone
• Scrapbook store employee
• Mom, which mean yesterday alone I did at least five separate jobs: personal chef, chauffeur, maid, construction foreman, wrangler.

Five things you may not know about me:

• I still haven't put our wedding album together, and we've been married for 6 years now. My excuse is I don't have anywhere to display the finished album anyway.
• I've recently decided that I think it would be fun to keep chickens. My HOA does not agree however, so that will have to be postponed.
• When I sleep I have to have the covers pulled up to my chin. If it's hot, I'll just use a sheet, but I have to have something. It's a weird security issue.
• I love rhubarb!
• My all-time favorite dessert is Texas Sheet Cake with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. That's heaven on a plate, it is.

Thanks for the tag, Jillian! Jillian has a collection of LuRay dinneware that makes me drool on my keyboard! She also has an online antique shop --go check her out!

And because I hate posting without photos, here's an old one of some great sheet music from the antique store and some yard sale jewels. Have a great weekend! I'm off to the pool. :)

How NOT to Care for Vintage Canisters: A Cautionary Tale of Woe

In my dream kitchen, the antique white cabinets with nickel hardware and lovely wavy glass inserts would stretch all the way to the ceiling. In my actual kitchen, they are boring builder oak, have no glass or hardware, and they stop short of the ceiling by about 15", leaving a weird empty space at the top. I've been able to use that empty space to display some of the vintage kitchen stuff I've amassed, so maybe it's a good thing that I don' t have my dream kitchen yet. The downside to the arrangement is that the items I have up there become coated with a film of grease, which then combines with dust to create a nasty sticky mess. Once in a while, far less often than I probably should, I haul things down and clean them and rearrange.

This past weekend I wanted to rearrange the items to display some of my new Jadeite bowls, which of course necessitated a thorough cleaning of what is already up there. Because I'm lazy and hate to scrub that yucky film off by hand, I decided to put a few things through the dishwasher, including two of my vintage kitchen canisters. I chose the "light wash" option with no heated dry, just to be safe. Or so I thought.

When I opened up the dishwasher to dry everything off, I found this:


and this:

ACK!! The heat from the dishwasher melted the paint off and just destroyed them. That one on the top had the cutest strawberries on it, and the other one was in really great condition with a yellow lid. And not only that, but the trap in my dishwasher was all clogged up with chunks of the paint, so I had to pick out what I could by hand.

Immediately all I could think was, well--What was I THINKING? I should have known that was a bad idea from the very beginning! I am very careful never to put my vintage Pyrex in the dishwasher because I know it ruins the finish. The vintage stuff just wasn't made to hold up to the high heat & abrasion of dishwashers today. I should have known that would be the case for the vintage canisters, but my laziness temporarily outweighed my reasoning abilities.

So, the moral of the story is that laziness doesn't pay off! You can bet I'll be scrubbing the rest of my vintage treasures by hand, no matter how grimy they are!

**Edited to add: I just found out the hard way that you should also not use 409 on vintage canisters. The lid to my darling, almost perfect condition Krispy Kan is now ruined. I think I'm going to stop now before I ruin anything else. Cleaning is overrated, anyway. Pfffftt.

Thrift / trash-picking Thursday

It's Thursday (the day after trash day in my neighborhood) so that can only mean that it's time for another installment of What Heidi Dragged Out of the Trash! And this week's find is:


Two perfectly good plastic faux-Adirondack chairs, with foot rests! I've looked them over and there is absolutely nothing wrong that a good squirt with a hose won't fix. Can you believe these were out in the trash? Yipes. They were at the same house where I scored all the flower pots a few weeks ago. Apparently those are some seriously wasteful people living in that house, eh? I'm going to keep a close eye on their trash in case they decide to throw out any expensive electronics or $100 bills.

My neighbors threw out a ceiling fan and a cute metal window box the same day, both of which I would have rescued if I didn't already have a fan in every room and three such window boxes on my back deck. And two weeks ago I trash-picked a giant roll of brand-new chicken wire, although I didn't photograph it because a picture of chicken wire is just not that interesting. But really, I was psyched to find it because I had been talking to my dad about using chicken wire in my garden just the week before, and now I don't have to buy any! Plus I can use the extra to make one of those cute chicken-wire frames I've been seeing around blogland.

And as it is Thrift Thursday, I thought I'd show a few pics of some recent finds.


The vintage pearls, brown earrings, two Christmas pins and the wing pin were all found at the same sale. I'm completely in love with the Christmas tree pin--it reminds me of the big Czech glass trees that I saw in Omaha last year. This is the new star of my vintage Christmas brooch collection! The pearls are great, though the clasp needs a cleaning. The silver wing pin has me intrigued. It has the letters W A R D and is engraved with an inscription on the back. I can't figure out what it is from, though I've done quite a bit of Googling already. Does it ring a bell for anyone out there in blogland?


And of course, more vintage ornaments and a box in good condition. This morning there was a sale advertised at a senior center in a neighboring town. The ad sounded rather promising and you know about my old people = good vintage junk theory, so Maren and I drove over. I'm afraid it was a bust--tons of stuff, and all I bought was the box on the right and the crystal necklace pictured above. The sale was rather disorganized and a good portion of the items were still in boxes. Normally that doesn't bother me, but the mess combined with tight spaces, a whiny toddler and gale-force winds made it most unpleasant. Oh well, there's always next week!

Parasols, Pink Lemonade & Polka Dots 20 Questions

I'm excited to be participating in the newest Sweet Goodness swap! My partner is the very cool Kari, also known as Artsy Mama. Here are my answers to our 20 questions:

1. What is your favorite Summer Drink(s)? I love anything lime-related! That Simpy Limeade stuff is so good over crushed ice, with a handful of lightly crushed raspberries. Lemonade comes in a close second, though. I don't do alcohol or tea.

2. What is your favorite Summer Activity? Ideally it would involve me on a beach, but since I live in land-locked Colorado, the swimming pool will have to do!

3. If you could spend a lazy afternoon reading, what would be in your hands? During the summer I always get the urge to read "summer reading"-type books--mostly YA fiction. Last summer I reread several old favorites and found some new gems as well, such as the Anne of Green Gables series. I also read a lot of non-fiction--I just finished this and am working on this one as well.

4. What is your favorite type of craft/art medium? My first love will always be paper crafts.

5. What is one art/craft supply you absolutely have been dying to have or try? I got soldering tools for Christmas but have been too chicken to try them out! I have been meaning to get them out any day now--I think 6 months should be long enough to conquer my fear.

6. What are your favorite colors in our 'rainbow sherbet' theme? Pink, lime green, yellow, orange, aqua (or blue) My favorite color combination is red & turquoise, so in this version the closest thing would be pink & aqua. It totally doesn't match my house (which is largely red & navy) but I cannot resist!

7. What is your favorite sweet treat? I love ice cream! I cannot keep cookies or cake/cupcakes in the house because my willpower is simply no match for their yumminess. I have a BAD sweet tooth.

8. Are there any craft or art supplies you would NOT be interested in receiving? As much as I think knitting looks interesting, it's one mess I just can't get into right now. And I like fabric, but I stink at sewing!

9. What is your favorite song today? For a summery song, I love "Boys of Summer" by Don Henley (thanks for the catch, Sue! :). Always makes me turn it up, roll down the windows and open up the sun roof.

10. How do you 'pamper' yourself during the hot summer days? I love to get pedicures in the summer. It's just as much a necessity as an indulgence for me--hot dry weather + sandals/bare feet = goblin feet.

11. Do you have any kidlets or pets? A 3-year-old DD named Maren and a big doofy yellow lab named Bronco.

12. What is your best potluck dish for summer get togethers? Desserts are my forte. I think cupcakes are always appropriate and appreciated, but for summer I also like to make pink lemonade pie. It's tart & refreshing!

13. If you could take a summer vacation anywhere, where would it be? I always get the bug to go to Disney World in the summer, even though I know that Orlando in July is just about one elevator stop above the fires of Hell. It's just that the two times we visited there were in June and July, so somehow my brain associates summer with the Mouse. I'd love to go somewhere tropical, but that goes for any time of the year, not just summer! I'd love to take a summer trip to the house that was featured in the movie "Dan in Real Life".

14. Describe your decorating style. Does that say anything about your personality? Yard sale chic. Is that a style? I love to pore over the photos in Country Living magazine. I like the mix of well-loved classic styles, with an infusion of quirky antiques and vintage pieces, all artfully yet effortlessly arranged. I should note that my house doesn't look like this yet--more like a yard sale exploded--but I'm working on it, really.

15. What are your initials? HJG

16. Why do you like to join swaps? Who doesn't love to get a box of treasures in the mail? I love shopping for just the perfect things that I hope will make my swap partner smile and feel special. :)

17. You have 25 dollars to spend just on you for a little treat. What do you buy? ((you can list more than one thing) I head to the antique mall and splurge--I never spend that much on one thing! Maybe I buy a really fabulous piece of costume jewelry for my collection or a great aqua pottery vase.

18. What's one craft supply or art supply you absolutely can not live without? I luurrrve my pure silver German glass glitter. It's almost like sprinkles--it makes everything more yummy!

19. Who's the last person you hugged? My little girl. She gives great hugs. :)

20. What's your favorite number and why? I've never had a favorite, really. Never thought much about it. Four does have a nice, even ring to it. (I'm much too OCD to go for an odd number, LOL)

Viola's jewels

Viola must have cut quite a figure in the small agricultural town of Alamosa, a place that even today boasts fewer than 8000 residents. I haven't seen her myself, but it sounds like her appearance was..well..distinctive, so I can get a pretty good picture in my head from descriptions given by people who did know her. Viola was petite but bosomy, she wore a large black wig and I imagine, wasn't shy with the lipstick. Viola played the piano for years at numerous local functions and it seems that she always dressed like a performer, even if the venue was no more glamorous than the town's Senior Center. Viola loved her 'bling', long before that particular slang term entered the public lexicon.

I learned about Viola just two weekends ago, when I was visiting with family in southern Colorado. My mom and I got a hot tip from our yard saling buddy Noodles (not her real name, LOL) that there was something of interest at one of the antique stores in town. It seemed that Viola had decided to move and is liquidating much of her 'bling' at said antique store. Noodles was in the shop the day after Viola had been there, and said that there were several tables literally covered in costume jewelry--it was spectacular enough a sight to cause even her husband to remark upon it. Vintage costume jewelry? In massive quantities? You're singin' my song, Sister.

Viola's jewelry had already been for sale for a couple of weeks by the time we got there, but there was still plenty to choose from. My mouth truly fell open when I looked in the glass case and saw the variety and scope of Viola's collection. There were brooches that were easily as large as the palm of my hand, gorgeous bracelets and necklaces in every color, and some pieces were present in multiples of two, four, six--apparently Viola used to wear them as buttons down the front of her blouse. We were positively giddy as we played dress-up with Viola's sparkling beauties. It was hard to narrow it down to a few must-have pieces--I could have swept the entire contents of that case into my purse without a second thought--but I finally picked out the things I knew I couldn't live without.

Green and teal, 1.5" tall and 2" long

Gorgeous pear-shaped clear stones, 2.25" across

Starfish, 3" across. This is the first thing I spotted in the case and it was love at first sight! I almost didn't get it because I rarely wear those colors but I knew I'd regret leaving it behind.

Bouquet, 3.50" across, 3" tall. This is one that is as large as my palm. There were some that were even bigger, if you can imagine.
Red aurora Borealis swirl, 3.25" long and 2" tall. I think this one is just gorgeous and I love the swooping shape.I told the owner of the antique store to be sure to tell Viola that her beloved jewels were going to a good home! I absolutely LOVE every single piece that I bought and I can't wait to wear them. For now, I just love to look at them and hold them, turning them so they catch the light and sparkle like crazy. I think I might have liked to meet Miss Viola--sounds like she was a heck of a gal. :)

While I had my camera out to photograph my Viola pieces, I decided to photograph the rest of my costume jewelry collection and I made a Flickr set, for anyone who loves the sparklies like I do. This is the bulk of my collection--although I'm always on the hunt for more! Don't know that I'll ever find a selection quite like Viola's, however!

Tiny Dancer

Thrift Thursday

Oh, your comments on the spider pictures were just hilarious! :) I had an idea those photos might elicit some good stuff, and I was right. A little more info--we were out visiting yard sales on Saturday morning when we came upon a sale run by a couple of tween girls, one of whom had her pet tarantula climbing up her leg. Well, of course we had to go check that out! She said it was a Rosy Tarantula, so named because of the slightly iridescent russet-colored hair all over it. It was actually kind of pretty, if you could get over the fact that it was still a GIANT HAIRY SPIDER. As far as being brave enough to let it traverse my torso, you'll notice that I'm not actually holding it in any of the photos--it was far less creepy to just let it climb than to actually touch it! And although I'm not a huge fan of spiders in general, they are not #1 on my list of Most Hated Creatures; that honor goes squarely to scorpions of any type. You can bet if those girls had a pet scorpion that I'd have screamed and run in the other direction.

Giant arachnids aside, we had a grand time junking on Friday and Saturday and here are a few of my favorite finds.


No matter how many I already have, I just can't resist vintage ornaments! The ones in the back aren't old but they are neat and because of their small size I thought they'd be good for crafting. I love the red one on the right in the front--it has a crown on it! I've been wanting one ever since I saw one like it that Rebecca found. And in front of the crown ornament is my very favorite--a beautifully aged blown-glass toadstool. That one was from an antique shop but well worth the $5 I paid.


The background of this photo is a vintage dogwood tablecloth. When I spread it out for this photo I realized that it's in very poor condition with several large holes and stains, so it will definitely have to be a cutter. Good thing it was less than $1.00! The sandwich bags were a fun find--thanks to my mom for spotting them! The package is unopened. Not sure what I'll do with it yet. The souvenir Utah teacup and yellow Fire King mug were a dime apiece, as were two other mod Pyrex coffee cups that aren't pictured. The salt and pepper shakers still had their antique-booth label on them which said that they are chrome and bakelite. Not sure how they ended up in a thrift but I'm just glad they did!

This little guy is a hard plastic Knickerbocker rattle. My sweet mom gifted him to me--she thought he'd look great in my kitchen with all the Jadeite. I think she's right, don't you?

A few other "finds" from the weekend:


--A tiny baby bunny, found in my grandpa's front yard. Maren loved him!

--Wild asparagus, gathered along roadside ditches. We were a bit late in the season so this was all we could find but it was still fun to look.

Between the junking, the critters and the vegetables, it was a weekend full of discoveries! Wait until you see what else we discovered ;) but that's another post!

You find the darnedest things at yard sales

Yes, that is me. Yes, that is a tarantula. No, I did not buy it!

Giveaway May Week 4 Winner

I'm still out of town but promised I'd do the drawing for the Giveaway May Week 4 Cupcake package before I return home. Oh great and powerful Random Integer Generator, what do you have to say tonight?

Random Integer Generator
Here are your random numbers:22
Timestamp: 2008-06-02 04:30:46 UTC

And commenter #22 is...April B!!! Congratulations April--I'll email you to get your mailing address!

I do want to thank all of you who read my blog and entered the contests during May. I have discovered so many new bloggers that I'm excited to read more about. I truly do appreciate each and every comment that you all leave here. Thank you so, so very much. :) I had such fun putting together the giveaway packages and still have a few things I'd like to send to a new home, so I'll be doing those periodically over the summer.

And now, to bed. We're leaving for home in the morning and for some reason Maren has decided to wake up at ridiculous hours while we've been here--today she was up at 5:34 a.m. Ugh. I've had a lovely weekend and have some fun things to post about this week!