Rainbow Birthday Party

At Relief Society tonight we had a birthday extravaganza ... we learned to make this beautiful cake ...

... and we made this banner, or I will have made this banner when I finish it up ...

Cute details, don't you think?

Here we all are hard  at it ... at least those who were more interested in finishing than in getting to bed at a normal time.  :-)

We also made this colorful Birthday Crown ... there are felt numbers that attach to the front too.  This was not the picture I meant to get of Andrea, its below, but this one just made me laugh ...

Yum, and pretty pin wheel cookies too ... Best Birthday party ever!! and most colorful too, even it no one had a birthday! Thanks to Jill and Andrea ... I love crafting classes!

Steampunk Valentines Wreath!

 In the Facebook group I belong to, Reclaimologists and Other Craft Chics, we received a request to make a Steampunk ValentinesWreath ... I have always thought that the wire wreath frames looked sort of steampunkie when naked, so I set off to make one.

Of course I dived into my piles of cool metal stuff, and came up with a 'love plaque' that I quite liked.  Then I found some loose elements and wanted a bit of a charm bracelet look, and made up the top embellishment.

This is the result, though I must admit I thought it looked a little bare.  The customer thought so too, and asked that I fill it in with deco mesh ...  I had seen the stuff, but didn't know the name of it.

Shannon, our prime Reclaimologist,  told me where to buy it, and I checked out a couple of tutorials on line, and voila!  

It has since been tucked into a specially made box and is on its way to New Mexico ... Enjoy!

One Word Focus 'Gracious"

Yep, another Gracious sign to remind me of my one word focus for the year ...  I decided to be  a little whimsical and use an old idiom that includes the word 'gracious'  This sign I made using an 

antique door header that I found at flea.o.logy with its original finish.  I loved the aged patina and wanted to preserve it, so I decided to use my Hazel and Ruby reverse stencils so the letters would be the  nice old wood color.

Here you see that I put down masking tape to help me align the letters.  These letters are great, they are sticky enough to withstand painting over, but can be peeled up, washed off and reused.

Next I took off the masking tape that kept the letters straight and then masked the top and bottom of the header so I could have more of the nice patina left.  The water in the jar is to drop the letters in after peeling them up while the paint is still wet. As soon as they were all in the jar, I left the header to dry while I washed off the letters and laid them out to dry.

This is where I hung the header, over the window so that I see it when I come into my room, great reminder, eh?

I am having so much fun and I am also learning a lot about peoples ideas on what t means to be gracious ... you will probably be hearing all about that in a future post.   Feel free to leave your ideas about what graciousness is in comments here, I would love it!

Valentines Rosette Banner

So, like many of you I saw the Valentines banner made from the hearts cards of a deck of cards ... and  having wanted to do an all rosette banner (without pennants) I decied to combine the project ...

I was pretty happy with how it turned out, and learned a lesson too ...

Don't used glitter glue ... fail ...  I couldn't find my red glitter when I was gathering goodies to make this lovely ... so I grabbed some glitter glue I had bought in a moment ofignorance, nope, never again.  I usually put down a bead of tacky glue, then add glitter... this suff not only took forever to dry it also looks pretty bad, as you can see.  Alas, I still like the banner and will use it.

Since we are now in the Valentines mood, I thought I would also share the booth of another dealer at the antiqe mall, which is all decorated with pink and red loveliness.

Love the vintage Valntines ... we seem to have a lot of them at Treasures Antiques this years, at least 5 dealers have them for sale ...

... and how cute are these valentines kits hung banner stye across the doors!?

I am definitely getting in the mood for the holiday of love, are you?

Antique Displays Done Right!

This week, when I was working at the antique store, Pam, a favorite former dealer, came in to shop ... we got talking about displaying collections, somehow, and she mentioned that her husband had recently made her cabinets to display her antique hat collect ... she invited me over, and actually I was bowled over .... such amazing displays!!

 Here are the cabinets he built ...

 This is another display in her bedroom ...

 Her kitchen was bright and cheerful ... and I was amazed at her use of space ... so clever!

 This little cupboard occupies the space that once held a built in ironing board.  She said when they bought the house it was an open alcove ... yep her clever hubs added the door and glass shelves.  How cute is this?

This is a close up with the door open ...  I loved the whole house.  Its amazing.  The first picture is a shot of her laundry display, which I am sure you gathered already.

We will be revisiting her house in the future so you can see her adorable, tiny, well organized craft room.  

Flea.o.logy at Olson's Garden Shoppe for 2014 is History!

 Here we are at the sale, above is a distant shot of my booth, with me talking to my friend, and sometimes flea.o.logy dealer, Jennine, if you have sharp eyes ..

To the left is a detail of my booth ...

Here is this darling man in the moon mirror that I painted this past week ... loved how it turned out! ... and so did someone else ...

 ... and as promised, in came the bird cages and birds that inhabited my window shelf in the kitchen for several years ... yep, turning over a new leaf, just not sure what will go there with my kitchen remodel ... in fact I can't wait to see what I do!

 Here's the line, filled with friends and sometimes dealers ... there is Wendy, first in line (outside the doors, there were another 20 folks crammed in the vestibule), behind her is Brenda of 'Just a Bed of Roses' fame ...

Second in line above, are Jennine and Debbie!

 ... and here we go.  This shot shows about 10 percent of our sales area ... lots of old friends have come to call.

 We had some fun features this time, including a professional photographer, shown left ...

...and our favorite face painter was back too, doing free face painting ... thanks Liz.  This is my grandson Titan pouting in his spidy face, in the arms of my daughter Becca.

We also had a Bistro Truck from Cravings, a gourmet grilled cheese sandwich place that has been in American Fork, but look for its move to Pleasant Grove ... their sandwiches are beyond the best grilled cheese you can imagine.

 Here are some flea.o.logy vendors, in fact even our photo bomber, Kelli, has been a vendor at flea.o.logy.  The other two are Shannon of Reclaimologists and other Crafty Chicks, and Christine of Vintage Yard Sale Utah ... You just meet the nicest people in this business!

But all good things must come to an end ... Mr. P was there at four sharp to help me take down ... and it was time to drag the old flea.o.logy sign back home to hang over our next show on May 10th ... and I can hardly wait!

Displaying Tiny Smalls in an Antique Mall Booth

 So what do you do, when you sell antiques, but keep coming up with really cool, but tiny stuff?

This Morton Salt pen clip is a great example.  If you put these tinies in a display, it makes them look cluttered, pieces get lost, or they get broken.

That is when I came up with the idea of bagging them, which protects them, and keeps pieces together, then pricing them with a header ....

 This is what the headers look like ... fleabits explains the small size ...  These fleabits are going with me to flea.o.logy this weekend .... 
As  you can see I made the headers to match the sign I made a couple of months ago to hang in my booth of small crafting items ... this is the blog post that shows the booth.  I have lots more tiny goodies to add ... but I started with 50 I bagged today.

I am using this great rusty reproduction wire shopping basket to display them until I get a nice hanging rack.  Is anyone else fascinated with tiny stuff?