Pink Poodles on Parade

Patience is a quality that doesn't come easy to me, but boy am I ever glad when it pays off!

There's a large antique mall that I visit every once in a while. One vendor was apparently getting out of the business and had everything reduced 50%. Antique store kryptonite, right? So of course I checked out the goods but the problem was that this vendor a) had only a huge locked glass case and was b) way in the back of a large store. The giant hassle of having to go hunt down an employee to open the case and then hover over me while I shopped kept me from ever purchasing anything. The vendor took several months to go out of business, and each time I would check the case just to see if there was anything new. One item in particular caught my eye each time but it was priced quite high, even with the discount, and eventually that vendor's lease ran out and his goods were gone.

Here's where the patience part comes in: last week I happened to be at a thrift that I rarely visit, due to it being a bit out of the way. Whoever does the pricing at this thrift knows what to look for in terms of vintage stuff--anything remotely interesting is immediately put in the locked glass case in the front of the store and priced far beyond what a reasonable person would pay even at an antique store. I always look but am usually turned off by the high prices. That day, though--that day I got lucky, because what should I find in the case but the EXACT object of my affection from the antique mall!
You can see why I love it, right? The perfect shade of pink, the jaunty hat and bow, the spaghetti fur, and best of all, the black cat-eye glasses with rhinestones! Pure 1950s perfection. She even has her original Napco foil label.I image that vendor just dumped the unsold merchandise from his booth at the thrift and took the tax write-off. It was priced higher than I like to pay at the thrift but still a fraction of the asking price at the antique mall. And I think that after all those months of admiring it, it was meant to be! Thrift seredipity, if you will.
Pinky the Poodle Planter joins Pinky the Poodle Pincushion, another thrifted treasure that has a place of honor on my desk. Pink Poodle Perfection!

This is what a box of Happy looks like

Little Yellow Houses

For as much junk as I have in my home, my walls are surprisingly bare. I have very few photos hung (but big plans for those soon) and almost no artwork. I was thrilled then to finally purchase a couple of pieces that I've had my eye on for a long time now and hang them on my formerly bare walls!
These gorgeous paintings (really, mixed-media pieces if you want to be precise) were made by my dear friend Jodi. I first saw them several months ago when Jodi posted about some of her work being displayed at a local shop against a red wall. Normally I'm not much of a yellow person but the combination of the yellows, blacks and grays against that red was just so striking that I've never forgotten it! I have similar red walls in my front room so I knew that they would look right at home here too.

I was right--they're just beautiful. I loved them from the photo online, but they're even better in person! It makes me happy to look at them because they're so pretty, but also because they make me think of someone I've really admire because of her hard work and commitment to her creative dreams. :) Jodi has an etsy shop if you'd like to see more of her work!

Crafty inspiration from Blogland

Even though several of my beloved magazines are folding, thank goodness there's still more than enough inspiration to be had in blogland! Last week I saw these Bookmark Bijoux from Andrea Singarella and was smitten! I already had all of the materials and I spent a happy hour playing around with two of my favorite things: velvet ribbon and vintage bling.
I love an instant gratification craft! Fun, easy, and pretty results.

More great craftiness from blogland last week:

• This gorgeous pearly heart from Heather Bullard. Aren't the colors of those pearls just gorgeous?
  
• Joli Paquet is back! I loved their Christmas projects so I can't wait to see what they have cooked up for Valentine's Day. Tiffany Kirchner posted this darling vintage-style pop-up card.
• I swoon over these velvet-and-pearl strawberries from Holly Doodle Designs! I want to learn to make these; I don't think they're too difficult, I just need to find a pattern and some pretty velvet.
  

What about you, friends--have you been doing any crafting lately?

It's more contagious than we thought

Well, crap. Not another one! I will admit that I let my subscription run out last year because I haven't scrapbooked a page in oh, longer than I can remember--but I always liked this mag and I'm really very sorry to see it go.

At this rate, I'm not going to have anything to read while I eat my breakfast. I might even have to start reading ~gasp~ my scriptures!

52Q 4 ME

I've been thinking a lot about journaling lately. This really isn't anything earth-shattering, as in my church we are encouraged from a very young age to keep journals--I've just never been very diligent about doing it regularly. I do have my journal that I kept while I was on Study Abroad in London; I knew that it was important to do so then and I was right as it's priceless to me now. I've also journaled about a few significant things that happened like 9/11/01 and the death of this dear man.

When I saw Natalea's post about the 52Q project she was doing, I immediately knew it was something I wanted to try! 52Q is a year-long journaling project designed by Emily Falconbridge with a new question available on her blog each Monday. I decided against the 'art journal' angle, only because I know that it will keep me from getting it done each week. Instead, I pulled out some hand-painted paper that I've had in my stash for probably 8 or more years and cut it into a cute shape using the very cool Big Shot die cutting machine I got for Christmas.
To keep the cards together, I punched a hole in the corner and will thread them onto one of those big binder rings from the office supply store. I had the brilliant idea to clamp the whole stack together and use my electric drill to go through all the cards at once so the holes would be in the same place on each one. Great idea in theory, but in practice it didn't work so well. I suspect that I used the incorrect drill bit for the job, as it chewed up the paper around the edges of the hole. I had to go back through and repunch each card by hand, which is exactly what I had been trying to avoid in the first place! Oh well, now I know better.

I'm looking forward to this little project for 2009! I'm subscribed to Emily's blog via Bloglines so every Monday when her new topic pops up, it will be easy for me to just grab a card and write my answer and string it on the binder ring. I'm still thinking about other journaling ideas I can implement, like making a journaling jar or writing monthly letters to Maren. If you're looking for a fun and different journaling idea for you or your family, check out what my cute friend Angie just did with her family!

Isn't it Ironic? and Tablecloth Tuesday

This is the envelope that came with my latest issue of Country Home on Saturday, one day after the magazine's sad demise was announced.The irony isn't lost on me. I'm really disappointed that yet another of the magazines I love is biting the dust. I've read that with the problems in the home-buying industry, ad revenue for so-called "shelter" magazines is way down, which is the reason that Country Home's publisher gave it the ax--not lack of subscribers.

I also find this ironic, because in a time when retail spending is down, it seems to me that people are more likely to look to sources that tell them how to reuse things they already have (or can get inexpensively) rather than telling them to go drop a bunch of coin on brand-new shiny stuff to fill up their McMansions. While Country Home isn't necessarily all about doing things on a budget and regularly features spreads of gorgeous homes full of expensive antiques and fabulous kitchens and reclaimed heart pine flooring, I do think it advocates decorating with vintage, thrifted and antique items or making over furniture that readers might already have.

It seems then that Country Home is exactly the kind of magazine that would be popular with home decorators on a budget and that advertisers would figure that out and buy ad space accordingly. I guess the problem there is that thrift and antique store don't have big advertising budgets like the fancy furniture and flooring companies do. Country Home and Mary Engelbreit Home Companion, RIP. Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll pull a Victoria on us and return somewhere down the line, we can only hope. All I can say is that if someone tries to mess with my Country Living, I'll be on a rooftop with a rifle. Publishers, you've been warned.

So, on that slightly psychotic note, let me move on to the thrifting portion of my post. I stopped into a thrift with Maren the other day for the ostensible purpose of finding more Madame Alexander Wizard of Oz Happy Meal toys for her collection. We did score a pair of Cowardly Lions and a Pinocchio who'll have to stand in for the Tin Man until we find one, but Mommy found a few treasures as well.My first thrifted quilt! It's no gorgeous feed-sack beauty like the kind that seem to leap into Sarah's path, but red and white polka-dots are more my speed anyway.I don't think it's particularly old, but I like it. The backing fabric cracks me up because it doesn't match at all--that must have been a stash-busting maneuver by the quilt's maker. I do quite like the pink and green, even if it totally clashes with the red and blue on the front.

I also picked up this fun vintage barbecue-themed tablecloth. Love the bright colors! Thrifting bright vintage fabrics is perfect antidote for dreary January skies, isn't it?

Mushroom mania, continued

And the mushroom love continues at my house, this time with a trio of cute fungi. The ribbon was just procured from the $1 bins at Michael's and the vintage embroidered pillowcase and silver and bone ring are both in my etsy shop right now! For more mushroom love, check out Laurie's recent post.

January Flower Garden

Happy 2009! The Christmas decor is finally down--whew! It took me three whole days and halfway through day two I was really hoping that the Clean-Up Fairy might make an appearance and spare me the rest. I persevered, and was rewarded with an empty house and a storage room where I can once again see the floor. Normally in January I put up my "winter" decor--glittery snowflakes, a gorgeous Wendy Addison glittery Winter banner, etc. but for right now I'm just enjoying the emptiness.
When I was in Utah over Christmas I visited a favorite antique mall and did a bit of shopping. I've read of other bloggers who buy vintage hats just to take apart for the old millinery flowers but I've never found a hat that was inexpensive enough to make that worthwhile--until this trip, when I found THE HAT. I should have taken a 'before' photo, but imagine a small net cap (6.5" diameter) absolutely covered in every conceivable type of millinery flower. Now, I'll never be accused of being too subtle--I generally think a smidge over the top is just about right--but the woman who wore this cap must have looked ridiculous with such a concoction on her head! There's over the top and then there's whoa, and this hat defintely fell into the latter category.Lucky for me, I saw the swan under this ugly duckling of a chapeau! I bought it for the princely sum of $5 and just spent the last 3o minutes rescuing almost 40 millinery flower lovelies from the clutches of the most horrid glue I've yet to encounter. I have to wonder if this hat was a homemade affair, because I can't imagine any milliner worth her hatpins would abuse a bottle of glue and a pile of flowers in such a manner. After the first ripped flower I got wise and used my trusty heat gun to melt the glue so that I could pull the flowers apart from the hat and each other.
There's still quite a bit of that heinous glue stuck to the back of each flower but I'm optimistic that I can find ways to use them so the glue won't show. I'm love my little vintage flower garden and I'd like to thank the lady who, 50 years ago, put every flower she could get her hands on onto one hat. I'm much obliged to her!

Christmas Card Confession

I have a confession to make.

Those are my Christmas cards, still unsent. I did get a few out on Christmas Eve, but the rest of them I wrote this morning. Nothing like a bit of procrastination, eh? One year I actually did send New Year's cards; I have a neat rubber stamp of an hourglass and I use sparkly colored glitter for this sand. This year, I'm just late! When I addressed the envelopes back in early December I purposely put the stamps on them, so that I knew I couldn't just shove them back in the box until next year. See, I know my weaknesses.

No big plans for us tonight. Once we had a baby I finally got over the feeling that if I didn't have some fabulous New Year's Eve plans, I was a total loser. Now I don't even care if I stay up until midnight! I don't even want to make special food after all the overeating we did last week, so we'll just have a normal dinner and watch a video. Low-key, but sounds good to me! Tomorrow I want to start de-Christmasing but I need to get the new toy mess cleaned up before I'll have room to make another mess.

Goodbye, 2008! And now I'd better run to get the cards in the mailbox before the postman comes!

Soldered Santa #2

I think I'm finally getting the hang of this soldering thing. Sure, my pieces are still a bit rough around the edges and my technique could use improving, but at least I'm to the point that I'm pleased with what I've made and don't want to throw it immediately in the trash.
This is a little ornament I made for my friend Shara. The Santa is a vintage gummed package seal and the back is a vintage Dennison label and lots of twinkly silver German glass glitter. The bead on the bottom is from an old earring. I'm pleased with how it turned out and I hope Shara likes it too! Once I clear the mounds of Christmas crap off my desk and get some glass ordered, I'm hoping to make some Valentine pieces. On one hand I hate to put away all of my vintage Christmas pretties but on the other--as I expected--I'm just ready for the mess to be gone. From the slew of organizing post around blogland, I know I'm not the only one!

Christmas Leftovers

Hello again! I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas with lots of good memories--we did! We spent the week in Utah visiting our families and just got home last night. Now begins the unpacking, laundry, and cleaning up the mess we made when we were getting ready to go! Before I get started I wanted to share a few more photos of Christmas stuff before I forget and move on.
These fun treats are the Snowman Hats I made to take to Maren's preschool party. I used the same idea as these Pilgrim Hats, (I used chocolate bark instead of chips) and decorated them with a strip of Fruit by the Foot for ribbon and cinnamon candy holly berries (I wanted to use mini M & M's but they're not peanut-safe). They were a huge hit with the other parents and teachers and they were yummy too! If I'd remembered when I was doing my shopping, I'd have used a little tube of green frosting and made a little holly leaf to accompany the berries, but they were still pretty darn cute even without it.

I mentioned earlier in December that I'm a bit obsessed with red and white toadstool ornaments. I must not be the only one who loves mushrooms because I found them at Pier One, World Market, Wal-Mart, Anthropologie, and Macy's this year! Here's a photo of some of of the shrooms I've collected:
Kkeep in mind that this photo doesn't show the 5 toadstools I found at Macy's (including a few giant Martha Stewart versions) or the really neat vintage toadstool guy I bought at an antique store in Utah on Saturday.

I also found this kitschy decoration at a thrift store earlier in the month:It's a little wooden crate with a few flocked toadstools, plastic greens and vintage glass beads. I totally dig the red velvet ribbon and it's even painted my favorite color of shabby aqua blue! It's like it was made just for me!To go along with the toadstools I found these little wooden gnome ornaments (in a bag from the thrift) and some of these glass guys like Sarah found at Macy's. More toadstool love can be found with Sarah's woodland tree, Suzy's mushroom tree, and Hannah's giant sequined toadstool.

Just before I left for vacation I received a delightful box from a dear friend which included this little glittered house in my favorite turquoise and red that I just had to show you! Isn't it darling? Shara even included some little brown toadstools! Does she know me or what? Thanks again Shara, I love it!

And now, I have a couple of overflowing laundry baskets calling my name!

Holiday Decor at my house

We're here in Utah at my parents' house but I still had a few more photos I wanted to share with you of the decorations in my home. I'm short on time so I won't give descriptions but hope you enjoy--click on any photo to make it bigger. I have a few left to share tomorrow as well! Hope things are beginning to feel a lot like Christmas wherever you are--they certainly are here!

Soldered Santas, a beaded bouquet and crafty links

A few weeks ago I had an opportunity to make some ornaments for a few lovely friends and wanted to show you what I came up with because I'm pretty thrilled about how they turned out! I knew that I wanted to try soldering again--I'm determined to get good at it, by golly. I rummaged around in my supplies and found a few scraps of one of my all-time favorite scrapbooking papers, some metal Making Memories snowflakes, and the cool Tim Holtz tags I bought in Phoenix at Mystic Paper. I soldered a jump ring on the top to hold the ornament hanger and also on the bottom, where I hung a pretty iridescent bead taken from a vintage earring. I tied on a bit of matching red seam binding and tucked them into organza bags. I love how they look and hope the recipients like them too! I definitely feel a bit more confident in my soldering abilities now as well.

Along with the vintage glass bead garland yesterday, another vintage Christmas item I always look for when thrifting or antiquing is glass bead picks. I covet them so very much, but for me they have been just about impossible to find locally and they are pretty pricy on eBay--I guess I'm not the only one out there who loves them! When I walked into my favorite local store, Patina this was the first thing I saw and truly, it was love at first sight:I've never seen anything like this and I probably never will, as it was handmade. It's a bouquet made of all different shapes, sizes and colors of mercury glass beaded picks, tinsel, and vintage glass ball picks. Oh, it is glorious! I love it so, so much (like everything else I've ever bought at Patina) and I'm not sure I'll be able to bear to pack it away after Christmas--it might have to stay out for a while so I can look at it more!

Looking for something cute, vintage-style and crafty to do with the kids? How about these darling little snowman scenes from Holly Doodle Designs or these neat vintage-inspired chenille candy canes from Jerusalem, via Vintage Indie.

Tonight Maren and I are going to make snowman hat cookies for her preschool class party in the morning. We're going to use the instructions for Pilgrim hats but forego the yellow buckles for something a bit more wintry. If they turn out hopefully I'll have a picture for you tomorrow!

The most wonderful time at the thrift store redux and a Christmas catalog link

Still loving the great vintage pickins' at the thrift stores now that all the Christmas stuff is out! I made a stop at the thrift last Thursday while Maren was in school and was rewarded with these beauties.
They were stuffed in a bag with some other ugly (new) beaded garland but when I flipped the bag over and saw these I think I might have gasped out loud! This might be just the prettiest vintage glass bead garland I've ever seen and certainly the most elaborate in my small collection. Wow! What a treasure.
Vintage glass bead garland is one of my Holy Grails of thrifting. I find it so rarely that every strand I've managed to turn up is absolutely precious to me and I hoard it jealously. The problem is that I don't have a good way to display it--it doesn't work on my tree and when piled in a bowl or on a cake plate it just looks like sparkly spaghetti. I've seen so many neat handmade items embellished with these glass beads that I'm trying hard to get over my hoarding tendency and my fear of actually *using* it. I'm trying to remember that I'd get a lot more enjoyment out of the garlands if I used them (even if that requires cutting them apart) as right now they're just tucked in a plastic tote out of sight. I did manage to unstring a few beads from one to use on a project I'm working on right now. Baby steps!

If you still have time to waste after yesterday's Betamaxmas link, how about checking out this very cool online compendium of old Christmas catalogs? The earliest is from 1940 and the most recent is 1988. I've been loving the 1986 Sears catalog..I was 8 that year and I've already found several of the toys that I remember hoping Santa would bring. Just the Barbie pages alone have me squealing!

Vintage cookie cutter garland and two more fun Christmas links

I mentioned a little while ago how smitten I was with this tutorial over at Joli Paquet. I was able to find the repro vintage cookie cutters at Home Goods and armed with more vintage cutters from my collection and ribbon bought for half-price at JoAnn's the day after last Christmas, I set about making my own garland.(Sorry for the lousy photos--it's hard to get a good one since there's always light coming in) Making the garland couldn't have been easier--just measure the ribbon, find the center and string on the cookie cutters! I knew I wanted to hang mine on the curtain rod over my kitchen window but the valance I had up, cute as it is, didn't match. Luckily, the same friend who lent me the other valance also gave me this cute gingham curtain trimmed with fat white rickrack, which turned out to be the perfect background for displaying the garlands.
I started out by making the bottom garland but when I finished I still had plenty of cookie cutters left and another spool of ribbon, so I made another! The only thing I did differently from the tutorial was leave off the buttons, for no other reason than pure laziness!

I love how the garlands turned out! What a fun, easy and satisfying craft project and a cute decoration!

The Christmas countdown clock seems to be ticking a bit faster for me today because in exactly one week we'll be on the road to Utah to spend the holiday with our families. That means I have to get all the gifts purchased and wrapped, get us packed, packages mailed, do any baking, gifts to friends, etc. by Saturday. Yikes! I wish I was one of those people who does their Christmas shopping all year round but that just doesn't really work for the people I have to buy for, so I'm usually scrambling at the last minute

Hopefully you're further along in your preparations than I am so you have a little time to check out my favorite time-waster website this Christmas, Betamaxmas. You'll love it if you're a child of the 80s like me! Be sure to check out the TV Guide for the programming lineup and move the antennas on the TV to make the picture fuzzier or more clear.

If you're still crafting and need some great vintage Christmas images, check out Clearly Vintage, a blog that has new vintage images each day until Christmas! She also designs a line of vintage-inspired rubber stamps that are really neat.

And one more thing for those viewing this on a blog reader--I've updated my blog roll on the left side to include a whole mess of blogs that have great vintage Christmas inspiration. Go check them out!

Window frame card display project

A few months ago my sweet dad helped me hang an old flea-market-find window on my wall, and I've been patiently waiting for inspiration to strike so that I'd know how to embellish it. The other night I was looking through some ideas I'd torn out of magazines a while ago and found it--my inspiration! Within about 30 minutes I'd collected all the supplies, put it together and was admiring the finished product! I rarely finish a project that quick (or at all..ha) so it was particularly gratifying.

Here's the inspiration:
This was torn out of a BH&G Holiday Decorating special magazine from 2003.

Here's my frame:I used double-sided tape to attach the ribbons to the top and bottom of the frame. I used a small square of the same tape to attach the cards to the ribbon--there may be a better way to do this but I wanted to get it done.
The greeting cards are all thrifted. The round card on the bottom left is gorgeous--all lovely Victorian embossing and soft green velvet ribbon (that was from an antique store and was more than I usually pay for cards but it's just beautiful!). The round item on the bottom right is an old coaster, and the two Santas in the middle are vintage die cut decorations. On the top of the frame I have three vintage bottlebrush wreaths I found at a thrift last month. Two of them needed new ornaments but that was easily remedied with tacky glue and a few items from my collection. I had been looking for a way to display them and this was just perfect!

There's so much Christmas goodness out there in blogland right now that I'm almost overwhelmed! If you're a fan of the Barenaked Ladies, here's a link to a fun interview with Ed and a free download of the boys singing a very funny version of "Jingle Bells". (PS--if anyone knows how to permanently download that to your computer, will you leave a comment? I'm stupid when it comes to stuff like that).

It's the most wonderful time of the year...at the thrift store!

It's 7:03 am and the house is so blessedly quiet! It snowed last night so school is delayed an hour today, meaning that Maren will only be there for 1 hour and 30 minutes and honestly, I'm half inclined to just keep her home altogether so we don't have to go out in the snow and cold. We'll see, I still have a bit before I have to decide.

This most certainly is the most wonderful time of the year at the thrift store for anyone who loves vintage Christmas (and wants to buy it cheap) like I do! All of the thrifts around here keep their Christmas decor in storage until sometime in November and then I become like a woman possessed, just thinking about all the vintage *goodies* that might be lurking unassumingly between the bags of tangled Christmas lights and ugly candle holders. Last week I heard the thrift calling and although the day was snowy and I only had a few minutes to pop in, I was rewarded with treasures!
These went straight on the tree. My favorites are the ones with pale green and pink stripes and sparkly old glitter. I do profess a certain secret love for the ornaments made of styrofoam and sequins as well...I gotta have my sparkle, and I've never met a sequin I didn't like!These were also waiting for me back in the craft section. I can always tell when they've had a donation of someone's old sewing supplies because they have several bags full of vintage goodies at once (the rest of the time it's bags of old zippers and that horrible 'craft' ribbon from the 1980s). Those are my favorite times! I love the button cards with the lovely ladies in the minty pastel colors.

I'm still not quite finished with my decorating. Yes, I've been at this for over a week now but in my defense, I did have a couple of days this past weekend where I was gone and unable to get anything done. I think it's taking so long this year because I've been making a bunch of new items--fun stuff and I'm loving the process, but it does take time. I do have a deadline--my folks are coming on Thursday, and I want everything to be pretty for them. Deadlines are a good thing for me!

I'll leave you with one of my favorite non-traditional Christmas songs that seems pretty appropriate for my world this morning. Oh, and the video is lame-o (just a collection of still photos) so minimize the window and just listen to the pretty music. :)

Winter decor inspiration from Hallmark Magazine

I'm sure by now you've heard through the blog grapevine that Mary Engelbreit Home Companion has sung its swan song. Big time bummer, but I'll admit that over the last year or so I've liked it less and less. I can't put my finger on why exactly--I'm not sure if the content has gotten thinner or it has gone too 'artsy' or what--I just know that I haven't enjoyed reading it like I used to. However, the recent Antiquing issue was fabulous, and seemed to me to be a return to the old Home Companion that I liked so much. Sad that it made that turnaround right before its demise.

However, I've already found its replacement in the pantheon of the magazines I love so well: Hallmark Magazine. Somehow I scored a free subscription through a link on this blog and I've really been enjoying it! The December issue has a fabulous spread with bird-themed Christmas decor in the most beautiful shade of blue, silver and touches of red.

all images from Hallmark Magazine December 2008 issue

Here's a link to the article if you want to see the other photos. There's even a template for that darling bird garland made of vintage sheet music, beautiful blue ribbon and tiny ornaments. I think I'll try to use these ideas for my January 'winter' decor. I was at Wal-Mart yesterday to buy the mushroom ornaments I saw on Sarah's blog and found some cute little glittery bird ornaments in silver and aqua that could definitely work for this theme.

Today marked the beginning of the second weekend of The Purple Pansy Boutique! If you're local, do come by--we're open from 10 am to 5 pm. If you mention that you saw this on my blog you'll receive an extra entry into the door prize drawing!