SPARK No. 2--classes

It was hard to know how to describe Spark when I was telling people where I was going. It wasn't strictly a scrapbooking or or paper arts retreat, so I usually called it an art retreat. Now I think calling it a creativity retreat is the closest I can come to describing what we did there.

At Spark, there were four core classes and four mini classes and we all got to experience each class. The first one we enjoyed was this darling project taught by Margie:

We were asked to bring a lampshade with "good bones" and a selection of wallet-sized photos so we could construct our own chandelier like Margie's example above. We stripped the lampshades and then used cute fabric to wind around the wires, then used all kinds of cute stuff to make the hanging strings below. I don't have mine to show you because it's not finished, but when I get around to doing it I'll be sure to post it.

The second class was this beautiful flowery clip taught by Janet Hopkins:

We used beautiful fabric flowers from the Parisian Anthology line, Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist, tulle, seam binding, vintage tickets, and rubber stamped die cut fabrics to make a gorgeous flowery creation that can be worn as a brooch or a hair clip.

The third class was taught by Elizabeth Kartchner and used products from her Dear Lizzy line for American Crafts:

We only had an hour for this class so mine isn't done but it's a darling little pennant flag-shaped album that's bound on a colored dowel.

Next was a class from Rhonna Farrer that taught us some basics on how to use digital elements to create images in Photoshop or Photoshop Elements.

Rhonna is an amazing digital designer and she used digi images in our class kits to create all of these huge posters that were hanging around the venue. I have Photoshop Elements but haven't been able to figure it out on my own so I was really looking forward to this class! Unfortunately I don't have a laptop so I couldn't practice along with her but I took detailed notes so I need to get playing before I forget everything.

After dinner that night we all went up to the rooftop, where there were make & takes from several different manufacturers. I made a cute headband from Miss Ruby Sue and a really pretty necklace using the new Vintage Groove line by Making Memories.

And then, the crowning event to a fantastic day: we all went down to the garden outside the venue, wrapped up in coats and blankets (it was freezing!) for a private acoustic performance by the charming Mindy Gledhill!

You may not have heard of Mindy Gledhill yet, but trust me--you should remedy that quick. :) She is an indie singer/songwriter who has a distinctive and charming voice and style. If you click over to her website you can preview a few of the songs on her new album, Anchor (which is available through Mindy's website or iTunes). She performed a few of the songs from Anchor, including the song "All About Your Heart," which she wrote for her friend nie nie. In between songs, Mindy shared with us about how she dealt with roadblocks and how to push through them to find your creativity. It was so, so delightful, and we drove home in a cloud of happy. :)

Saturday morning our first class was with Emily Falconbridge.

She taught us to use beautifully-dyed wool roving to make wet-felted wool scarves and beads. I opted for the beads, which you make by wetting the wool in soapy water and then rolling them between your palms to compress them into balls. Sounded easy, but it was a lot harder than I expected and I'm still not finished!

Our last "project" class was taught by April Meeker, an artist that I was unacquainted with prior to Spark, but who does all kinds of wonderful things from drawing to sewing to sculpting and jewelry-making. (I bought one of these at Spark and can't wait to wear it if it will ever quit being 85 degrees.) I don't have a photo of our project from this class because I was racing to try and make it! We used all kinds of paper and ephemera to collage a square canvas. This one was hard for me because we only had an hour and I'm not very speedy, so I didn't get much done. Someday when I've finished all of my Spark projects I'll post them.

The last class of the event was taught by the talented photographer Wendy Whitacre (who coincidentally did the photography for Mindy Gledhill's Anchor album!).

She was such a great teacher and taught us the basics of using our DSLR cameras. We practiced taking photos of cupcakes and a few other still lifes and trying to freeze/show action of the blue Powerade being poured into the vase. Thanks to Wendy, I've actually ventured beyond the "auto" setting and I can't wait to practice using my new knowledge!

At Spark, even the classrooms were pretty places!

The classes at Spark were truly inspiring. I love the projects we did and the techniques and skills we learned.

SPARK No. 2--decor

Thank you all for your lovely kind words about my grandpa. I appreciate them! Things are starting to feel like normal again around here. The suitcases are put away, the laundry is clean, and there is food in the pantry. Phew! I want to get my Halloween decorations out on October 1, so the next big task is getting the front room cleaned up because I can't let myself make a new mess with the Halloween boxes until the current mess is cleaned up. But before it gets any later, I do want to share with you one of the main reasons I went to Utah a few weeks ago.

Last year, I was intrigued when I heard about Spark, a creativity retreat of sorts that was held in my hometown of Salt Lake City. It was the brainchild of Rhonna Farrer, Elizabeth Kartchner and Margie Ronmey-Aslett, three creative ladies who have their roots in the scrapbooking and papercrafting world but who do lots of other creative things as well. I didn't attend last year but once I saw the photos and video of the event, I wished that I had and hoped that they'd do it again for 2010.

When the announcement came earlier this spring that there would indeed be a Spark No. 2, I was ready! My mom and I decided to make it our annual Girls' Weekend, with the added benefit that we wouldn't have to spend money on a hotel, rental car or airfare since it was being held about 20 minuted from my parents' home. It was a weekend that The Mister had to be out of town but my sweet dad agreed to watch the kids for me and as it turned out, Maren was off-track (a three-week break between trimesters for year-round school) for the first three weeks of September, so we all packed up and headed to Utah for a while.

We didn't know much what to expect heading into Spark but we were excited to find out! As we neared the building on Friday morning, we spotted huge balloons rising from the roof, waterfalls of pink twinkle lights cascading down the side of the building, posts wrapped with colorful buntings and more pink lights--and that was just what we could see before even pulling into the parking lot!

As we walked up to the building, we were greeted by this guy (and his turquoise twin)

who appeared to be guarding this wall, which was filled with beautiful chalk drawings done by Rhonna.

The entrance to the building was hung with streamers and colorful banners and rosettes--and that was when we knew we had made the right choice in coming! :)

We went through registration and onto the Main Hall, where I think my jaw fell open when I walked through the doorway:

The huge room was filled with beautiful things everywhere I looked! Those big white grids hanging from the ceiling can actually be raised and lowered by a switch, and the Spark ladies had them hung with all kinds of fanciful things: banners made of Monopoly money and playing cards, birdcages, dress forms, paper parasols, frames, chandeliers, paper lanterns, butterflies, and even a bright pink bicycle!

I'm not kidding, it was breathtaking! And that was when I was REALLY sure we were in the right place. :) After I managed to tear my eyes away from the ceiling, we looked at the tables that filled the room. Each one had an amazing centerpiece made up of cool vintage junque, more game pieces, and cute handmade Spark flags.

I'm pretty sure I NEED a vintage pink typewriter now! It was like this throughout the whole venue--Spark took up the entire building, and on tables and in little nooks all over there were beautiful, interesting bits of eye candy! Some of it came from a junk shop in SLC and some of it was from the Spark girls' own collections.

Walking into that Main Hall was inspiring just by itself, before we even did anything else. I've been on the hunt for a large butterfly punch so I can make strings of butterfly garland for Maren's bedroom, and I wish I could figure out a way to suspend huge grids from my living room ceiling so I could capture the feeling of the Main Hall in my home.

I have lots more to share but I'll divide it up into a few posts because this one is already really long.

Book Page Leaf Wreath

I made it 32 years, one month and 16 days before losing my first grandparent--I think that's a pretty good run, don't you?  My paternal grandfather passed away last Wednesday as we were driving home from our visit to Utah. I'm so lucky that I had 32 years, one month and 16 days of my life to know him. Monday morning we loaded up the car again (didn't even bother to put the suitcases away from the Utah trip) and drove four hours to southern Colorado for the funeral events.

My Papa with a teeny-tiny newborn Maren

His passing was bittersweet for us all: I'm sad at the knowledge that I won't get to see my Papa Morgan again in this life--it will feel strange to go to my grandparent's house and not find him there with a big hug, smile and kind words for me. At the same time, he lived nearly 87 years, has children, grandchildren and even a few great-grandchildren; he lived a long, full life and he deserved to rest. His viewing was Monday evening and the funeral services were Tuesday around mid-day. Every single one of his descendants was there, and I can think of no greater way to honor him than the fact that we had a genuinely good time being together, despite the circumstances.

The Mister had to be back for work on Wednesday morning, so unfortunately our trip was a quick one and we returned home late Tuesday night--there wasn't even time for small-town thrifting at my favorite haunts or a guacamole tostada & tall Dr. Pepper at our favorite little hole-in-the-wall Mexican food joint. Yesterday I ignored the piles of laundry & suitcases and met some friends at the science museum for several hours so the kids could play, which meant today I finally had time to begin to get this house back into some semblance of order. I've still got work to do but I think I can finally think about blogging again now that we have some clean clothes and the kitchen table isn't piled six inches deep with mail and newspapers.

All the long hours in the car recently means that I've gotten to read a lot of magazines. In the October Martha Stewart Living there was an ad for this wreath:

It was created by Emily Morris and is the winning entry in a contest put on by Martha & The UPS Store and honestly, I thought it was the most interesting thing in the whole magazine! (Usually the October MSL is my favorite but this one was a total snooze). There are step-by-step instructions over here on Martha's website, as well as a leaf template so you can make your own. I've already made two different book page wreaths this year and this one might have to be #3! I'm going to be good and make myself wait until the rest of the laundry is done and we have some groceries, though!

Porter at 1 year

Somebaby has a birthday today!

My gosh, a year has gone quickly for this little boy. His hair certainly has improved with time, hasn't it?

I guess you don't seem like a baby for long when you learn to crawl at 6 months...

And walk at 9 months...

It's funny now that people used to remark on how mellow Porter seemed. He sat happily in his little bouncy seat, quiet and watchful.

Now we realize he was merely biding his time and plotting, because "mellow" and "quiet" are pretty much the last adjectives you might use to describe him. He is still happy, however.

He's also determined and persistent, a good problem solver, and strong-willed. Any thoughts I entertained of him being my "quiet" baby; the one I earned after dealing with Maren's toddler years? Gone, baby, gone. He's a lot more like this:

Short, speaks in a series of grunts and gurgles and leaves a trail of destruction in his wake.

 Not a fan of chocolate cake, it appears

Maren was...shall we say...challenging as a toddler. We adored her, but there was a real reason that we waited four years to have another baby. Porter is on track to outpace her in the "challenging toddler" department. Pray for me.

 All those people who told me when I was pregnant that boys are just SO different from girls? I scoffed at them. Now, I believe them! But those brown curls, kissy lips and pretty eyes have this mama smitten, even if I do have to follow him with a broom & dustpan. I look forward to getting to know Porter more as he grows and shows us more of his personality.

Happy Happy Birthday, Baby!

It's been a while, hasn't it? Last night I returned from nearly two weeks spent visiting family in Utah. I don't think I've been away from home so long in six or more years! Maren goes to a year-round school and is now off-track and we had a few other things scheduled, so we decided to pack up and hang out with the grandparents for a while. It was really, really lovely--we did so many fun things and it was nice to escape from my real life here for a bit.

Now I'm home and faced with unpacking bags and boxes and mold in the laundry room and no food in the fridge, so until I'm organized enough to post photos of my own, you can check out one of the things I did while I was in UT by clicking on any of the links below:

Liz

Rhonna1
Rhonna2

Yep, it was as magical as it looked...

Estate sale finds

Don't have much to share today, I'm afraid, other than a few more items I picked up at the bad vibe estate sale.

I love this blue and red floral fabric--it reminds me of aprons and printed tablecloths. The number card is aged to that perfect shade of creamy beige. The squares are all perforated and must have been used for pricing or store signs or something. I like it just the way it is--no intentions to tear it all apart here.

For someone who doesn't sew, I'm turning into quite the little fabric hoarder lately. This was from a shirt box full of old fabric scraps. Once I saw the little bunny prints I knew it was worth the $2 price. Don't know what I'll do with it, but it's darn cute.

We're headed to Utah to visit family for a while as Maren will be off-track (she goes to year-round school, and starting Monday has a three-week break). We have some fun things planned so maybe I can blog a bit while I'm gone. Hope you all have a lovely long weekend!

Stuff I've made: Quick-change corsage necklace

This is a project I did months ago but I never showed it here. When I saw this Quick Change Corsage Necklace project over on The Polka Dot Chair, I knew it was something I wanted to make! In fact, I invited a few friends to make one with me and we happily crafted for a few hours while our kids played.

I used Melissa's tutorials for making the necklace, so I won't reprint that here. I used chains purchased at Michael's (they had a much better selection than JoAnn's); they're fairly inexpensive but they frequently go on sale or you can always use a 40% off coupon to make them an even better price.

I used a different method from Melissa to make my flowers. I used my Big Shot die cutting machine and this Bigz Flower Foldz die from Stampin' Up! to cut flowers from fabric and stacked them up and stitched through them to make the flower. The big white flower in the photo is actually a silk flower from the craft store--I simply removed the plastic stamen thingy and replaced it with a gorgeous pearly vintage button instead.

I gave my necklaces and flowers away, so now I need to make more for myself. Maybe some fall flowers in wool felt, corduroy, tweed or leather? These make great little gifts! They're easy and affordable and it's fun to be able to change out the flowers to match your outfit. Because the flowers have a pin back, they can also be worn without the necklace as well. Thanks to Melissa for a great tutorial!

Vintage shipping tag birth announcement

Thank you all for the sweet comments about my laundry room. Now that it's done, I have a grand total of two fully decorated rooms in the house. And we've lived here for 6 years. See what I mean about nothing getting done around here? The only rooms that are DONE are the laundry room and the guest room, which are not coincidentally small rooms that we are rarely in and that I have total design control over, without having to satisfy anyone else's desires or sensibilities other than my own. The rest of the house is a lot more challenging.

Today I wanted to share a bit of ephemera. I picked it up at the bad vibe estate sale from a few weeks ago. The woman who lived in this house must have literally saved every single letter or card she had ever received--I've never seen anything like it. Her husband was a pastor and therefore must have known a lot of people, many of whom sent cards and announcements and I think they kept them all. An ephemera-lover's dream, that was. It was really overwhelming to go through all that old paper but I did find this little treat, the cutest darn birth announcement I've ever seen. Here's the address side:

And here's the information side.

So cute, right? Be sure to click on it to enlarge the picture so you can read it. It really is on a normal-sized shipping tag!

You could do the same thing and it would be just as cute today, 56 years later. Of course the USPS wouldn't be thrilled to have you send a shipping tag with a string attached through all of their machinery, but you could slip it into a clear cellophane envelope and send it through the mail to delighted recipients. Maybe for my next baby? I didn't send out announcements with the first two, but this idea is so darn cute that I might not be able to pass it up! (and no, I'm not expecting!)

Laundry Room redo

The computer situation got worse before it got better. By Wednesday night, I'd successfully installed my camera software so I could download my photos. I also clicked an "Okay" button before reading the contents of a dialog box completely, resulting in a glitch that made it so that every single .exe program on my profile (that's most of them, friends) tried to open in Adobe Reader. Thankfully The Mister's profile was untouched and I was able to figure it all out after a few days of (again) mourning the loss of all my bookmarks. Seriously, this computer thing has been one ridiculous frustration after another. I still haven't figured out the iTunes problem and right now I just don't have the brain energy to Google all over the place trying to figure it out.

The good news is that after I got things fixed I was able to successfully reinstall the camera software and download the pictures that had been languishing on my memory card, so today I have photos of my laundry room redo to share! (apologies up front for the wonky colors--the laundry room is in my basement so the lighting is always bad. I tried to tweak the photos so they're closer to true colors but I'm not sure how successful that was.)

I was inspired to redecorate my laundry room by this:

This is the fabric on my ironing board cover. Isn't it cute? My mom gave this to me for Christmas two years ago and I was delighted to receive it! You wouldn't think an ironing board cover would inspire such joy, but I find that many of my favorite gifts are things that I never would have thought to buy for myself but that I am tickled to have. A cute ironing board cover falls squarely into that category for me.

Last year sometime I decided I needed more laundry baskets so I took a trip to The Container Store to find something fun. While there, I remembered my cute ironing board cover and decided to look for something to match. I couldn't remember the colors in the fabric other than pink and green, so I chose turquoise blue for the third basket.

Even though the blue wasn't actually in the fabric, it was a great jumping off point for some other decor. I purchased a pair of inexpensive shelves at Target to hang on the big empty wall above the ironing board.

I also purchased a cute vinyl floral design from Stampin' Up! that was in the perfect colors to match the ironing board cover. My intention was to put it on the wall above the lower shelf so it looked a bit like it was sitting on the shelf. Except--in my laundry room the walls are heavily textured, and the vinyl wouldn't stay adhered to the wall. Boo!

(Sidenote: This is a prime example of what seems to happen with every home improvement project that I try--I get all excited, start, and then get sidelined by some stupid problem that is going to be SO much harder to fix than the project would have been in the first place. Happens EVERY time, I swear. Which is why I started this project months ago and am just now getting finished. And why nothing else ever gets done around here.)

My original thought was that I was going to have to cut a piece of wood, paint it, and then put the vinyl on that. Which meant finding a piece of wood, and someone to cut it for me. Which meant that it didn't happen. I was talking about the problem to my mom, who wisely suggested that I try putting the vinyl on an artist's canvas instead. Brilliant! Now why didn't I think of that in the first place? I bought a huge canvas at the craft store and spray painted it turquoise--Krylon Blue Ocean Breeze, to be exact--with a can of paint I had leftover from another project, and happens to match the turquoise laundry basket. The vinyl applied easily to the painted canvas, and then I remembered that I had some large thrifted frames in my stash and most serendipitously, found one that fit the canvas perfectly! It got a coating of Rust-oleum Berry Pink to match the hot pink vinyl flowers and the pink in the fabric.

While I was rummaging through the frames, I found another large one that I thought might be fun on another big empty wall. This one got a coat of the Blue Ocean Breeze and I set about to find something to go inside it. I looked through my old magazines and found a really neat old Tide ad, but the page was an odd size so finding a frame would have been impossible. I remembered a vintage advertising calendar I saved from a few years ago (I save all our family calendars--I figure they're a good reference and kind of like a diary). There I found an ad for Dash detergent and better yet, the bright pink and yellow in the ad were a perfect match to my fabric! I trimmed it out of the calendar and hunted through my house for a frame. I only found one that was the right size and it's not my ideal, but it was free and once I sprayed it with Berry Pink it did the trick.

Now that I had art on the walls, the next thing was the window. My laundry room is in the basement so the only window is below ground and there's a window well right outside. Covering up the window to keep out the light or provide privacy wasn't a requirement but I thought a valance would be fun to soften the hard edges and add more color. I looked through my collections to see if I could find something fun to use: aprons, vintage tablecloths, even hankies, but nothing I had was in the right colors. I didn't want to make anything or spend much money, so I hit the thrift stores and found the perfect bright pink homemade valance--it even has white ball fringe on the bottom! It's lined too, and for $2.99 I couldn't have made anything that cute. I hung it on a black curtain rod that I took down from my bedroom--since I'm redecorating in there, the black rods won't be needed. I did have to buy two sets of black ring clips but found some on clearance at JoAnn's for $2.99 per package.

For the window, I used a vinyl bejeweled chandelier from House of 3. I've had these for a while too--they won't stick on my walls either (blast my stupid orange-peel wall texture!) but they adhere perfectly to glass! Who doesn't wish for a little bit of glam to dress up the mundane task of laundry? As an added bonus, they distract the eye from the dying aspen suckers and dead spiders in the window well.

The last thing on my list was finding something cute to hold my laundry products. I love these big lidded Anchor-Hocking jars from Target so I bought the largest one to hold my Tide and the middle-sized jar to hold my OxiClean. I found another middle-sized jar at the thrift, so that one now holds my Borax, and I'm holding out hope that I can find one more matching jar to hold the Biz I just bought because I've heard it's great for getting stains out of vintage linens.

To dress up the jars and keep from getting them mixed up (all those white powders look the same), I ordered vinyl lettering from my cute friend Amy at Words and Wisdom. It was so easy to put it on the jars and I love how it turned out! A little tip to keep the letters straight:

I used a ruler and a dry-erase marker to make dashes at a uniform height around the jar. Then I stuck the vinyl on, keeping the bottom edge of the letters on the lines. When I pulled off the top sheet, many of the marks stuck to it but any that remained easily wiped off with a tissue. To scoop my powders I use brightly-colored vintage aluminum measuring cups that I thrifted at some point.

I am pleased with how the room came out, especially since I was able to use things that I already had around the house or items that were thrifted or purchased very inexpensively. I'm not going to go so far as to say that it makes me want to do the laundry, but having a cute room to do it in definitely makes the task more pleasant!