Front door Spring decor...vintage umbrella floral arrangement

Happy Spring everyone!  I so look forward to this time of year.  Charlie and I were just out in the flower beds, digging to see if we could find new little plant sightings.  Sure enough there are lots of new, green sprouts peeking out.  

With Spring comes a time of renewal, a change to change things up and start fresh.  Ever since I saw this umbrella floral arrangement on the cover of a Midwest Living magazine I've wanted to find an old umbrella and do the same.  I believe this is the cover photo but I'm not exactly sure...pretty close if not.  This photo is pinned on my March Inspiration Board: Going Green. 

Pinterest source

One day while out junking I found a vintage umbrella with a beautiful ivory looking handle.  I knew it had to come home with me and I knew exactly what I wanted to make with it.  A trip to Michael's for some fake florals and I was good to go.  The girls helped me select these flowers.  I love that they selected colors that just happen to coordinate with my color kit that I've recently been using for my Color Studio class assignments.  Large peonies are always a favorite flower of mine and these look pretty realistic. 

Here's my finished umbrella on my front door.  Pretty simple in nature and I added in my old chippy chair, suitcase and watering tins for a fun photo shoot.  

Such pretty colors and a fun welcome to our guests.

I just tucked in the florals, using a few grocery sacks for stuffing here and there.

My tried and true favorites, my watering cans are like old friends to me.  The suitcase?  I jokingly tell friends that I keep it packed with a few of Eric's things....just in case.

I'll be filling these up soon to water those first pretty flowers of the season.

Bright and sunny and so welcoming.  Bring on Spring...I'm so ready for you.  

Now.....I must go dig in my flower beds a bit more.  The girls made their first big outing in their new truck today with a friend.  They ventured into town for some Orange Leaf yogurt.  I worry.  Like all mamas do.  I worry more now.  I know they'll be okay.  But I worry....

Workspace Wednesday...Inspiration Photo on my Table

Today's Workspace Wednesday post is all about what's currently sitting out on my work table.  After the girls' accident, I wasn't feeling very crafty there for a while.  I can say though that just sitting at my work table and staring at my pretty things brought me some much needed peace.  I think that when you surround yourself by people and things that you really love, life is just better.  I've learned it's best to keep your favorite people and favorite things close to you.....the rest (people and things that clutter your life) can go by the wayside.  

So here's my workspace today.  It's looked this way pretty much all week as I tend to work in spurts with certain products. 

I've been loving my watercolor palette and have recently acquired some new brushes.  I'm testing them out and will giving a review of my favorite watercolor products here soon. 

This fun color kit that I created for a class assignment has been seen lots of attention this week.  Creating a kit like this is a fun way to focus on just a few products from your stash at a time.  

These papers have all been cut into and are now scattered about my table. These are some of my favorites that I've been hoarding but I finally took the plunge and started using them. 

Here's a little something that came about from fiddling with my color kit. 

It's the little tidbits of Washi tape, buttons tied with twine, machine stitching, little flowers and stamping that all add so much detail to a card.  I grabbed some Medium White Parcel Tags for easy sentiment placement. I'll be sharing how I used dollar store flower bundles on my cards in a future post.  It's a new fun find that I'm loving lately.

Thanks for stopping by today.  I'd love to hear what's on your work table that is inspiring you.  

Card from inspiration photo + altering patterned paper with watercolor paint

Yesterday I shared an inspiration photo from my March Pinterest Board: Going Green.  

I also shared this color kit that I created for a class assignment for the Color Studio class at Studio Calico.

Today I'm sharing a card I created with my kit contents.  I started with this beautiful patterned paper that you see with the white background below.  I had fun altering the look of the paper with some simple watercolor paints.  If you look at my inspiration photo by the aqua flower you'll see a pillow with yellow flowers and a blue background.  That's the look I was trying for with my patterned paper.  I love the results. 

I trimmed off some of that beautiful paper and created a thank you card for a dear friend who stayed with us the entire day in the emergency room the day of the girls' accident.  

I used lots of items from my color kit you see at the beginning of this post.  I also added a Medium Manila Parcel Tag and some stamps.  The thank you is from a Studio Calico kit and the other is from a Papertrey Ink set..Signature Greetings, I believe. Dainty Doilies can be found here.

During difficult times you sure find out who your true friends are.  It's only fitting to let those dear people know just how much they mean to you.  A simple card with a handwritten note is such a nice gesture.  I've got lots of cards to send out which means my family is so blessed with good friends.

Have a great day everyone!

Creating a color kit from inspiration photo...

Hello friends.  I want to thank you all for your kind messages to me about the girls.  They are doing great and are enjoying the start of Spring Break today.  The girls are healing physically although we found out that Josey tore some tendons in her shoulder.  They both are quite impressed with their own doctoring skills...Josey removed her stitches by herself and Jordan dug a piece of glass out of her head yesterday.  Me...I'm a little scatter brained lately.  My attention span is pretty short and I can cry at the drop of a hat.  Time will help us all though and getting back to "normal" is our goal. 

In the crafty world, I did take some time to treat myself to a fun class over at Studio Calico called Color Studio.  Lisa Truesdell is doing a fabulous job of teaching the class and I'm finding the refresher/reminders about the color wheel to be very inspiring.  One of the first class assignments was to find an inspiration photo full of color.  I chose this photo from my March Pinterest Inspiration Board: Going Green. Happy St. Patrick's Day, by the way!

Pinterest Source

Another class assignment was to create a color kit inspired by our chosen inspiration photo.  This was right up my alley as you all know I love to assemble little kits.  A goal of mine is to revisit some of my older supplies so I made sure to do some rifling through my older stash of items.  I started with some wonderful patterned papers that reflected the patterns in the pillows.  I love the cottage-like colors and patterns. 

Next I went to work on fitting some crafty items into a vintage green utensil drawer.  I thought the green was so fitting for my Going Green Pinterest board theme.  When assembling little kits like this to work with I like to limit myself to a particular sized container.  Otherwise I could pile my whole craft room into a kit. 

I chose little bits & pieces from some Gossamer Blue kits....my vintage green typewriter Instagrams...and some die cuts from leftover kits.

Next I chose some spools of thread...Washi tapes....dimensional flowers....and jars of buttons.

I had some ideas for painting some clothespins so I grabbed some of those along with some acrylic paints.  I spy two of my new watercolor brushes tucked in there too.  I'll be sharing my favorite watercolor supplies in a new post soon. I also purchased the new Studio Calico Color Theory inks.  I'm impressed so far and am looking forward to inking those up more soon.

I've been dabbling a bit with some cards and I need quite a few thank you cards....so I'll be posting some creations made from my color kit items soon.  

Thank you so much for visiting.  It feels good to be in touch again.  

Feeling blessed.....

I want my blog friends to know that I may be absent from my blogging a bit here and there.  Last Friday my girls were in a roll over car accident on the way to school.  Jordan called me shortly after the girls left home for school and very calmly told me that they were okay but had went off into the ditch.  Upon my arrival to the scene of the accident I saw this and Josey was covered in blood....

My heart just sank but I knew that I had been blessed this day.  A mother of the girls' classmate came upon the scene and took care of my girls until I arrived.  She had them standing and waiting to see me so that I would know my girls were alive.  The girls hit some black ice, fish tailed and rolled their Trailblazer at least twice into a steep ditch and landed on a fence in a field.  Please take this as a reminder that seat belts save lives and that many accidents happen close to home.  Please buckle up.

As I was driving my girls to the emergency room, my dad called and said that my mom was sick and something was wrong.  He had called the ambulance to take her to the emergency room also.  So we spent all day Friday with my mom and my girls in the ER.  The girls had every x-ray and scan done to make sure there were no broken bones or internal bleeding.  They ended up with severe whiplash from the seat belts, a concussion, black eye, stitches on her hand and a ripped fingernail for Josey. Lots of bruises, bumps and very sore bodies for both girls.  My mom was treated for dehydration from some medicine she was recently prescribed.

The girls and my mom were released Friday afternoon. They will all be fine but my girls are dealing with some expected emotional issues.  It's been a rough few days but I feel we had an angel watching over my family on this horrible day.  We are so thankful that my girls and my mom are okay.  Time will heal the physical wounds and hopefully with lots of hugs and love and chats the emotional parts will heal too.

The girls are back at school with the loving care of our wonderful school counselor/family friend.  It's good for them to be back with friends and continue their normal activities.  Spring Break is coming up and it's a short week this week.  We're looking forward to the time off and just relaxing around the house.

I have some projects to share that I've already had completed so I'll pop up on the blog when I can.  Otherwise it will be hit and miss as I take this time to be with my family.

Workspace Wednesday...Sewing Station

As I make my way around my craft room, I'm slowly but surely making progress on getting organized. While working on my sewing station a quote came to mind that a college professor shared to me while I was studying Interior Design.  I was sitting in her office one day as she was my advisor also.  She said, "A place for everything and everything in it's place." She was referring to this in the design sense when laying out floor plans, office cubicles, furniture, etc.  However at that exact moment she opened her desk drawer and pulled out a 2 liter bottle of Diet Coke.  I kind of chuckled and thought to myself, "Not exactly the place where most store their Diet Coke but whatever works for ya." That moment always stuck with me and the Diet Coke scene added to my belief that our spaces are about whatever works for our specific needs.  

So my approach for starting a major reorganization in my craft space goes something like this....I just started digging in with specific areas.  First I realized that indeed each group of like items needs a place.  While working on my sewing station I could have sworn that I had about 10 spools of thread.  But when I collected all the spools of thread from drawers and little nooks and crannies, I came up with over 100 spools of thread. Who knew?! So this is when I realized that one of the first big steps to organization is collecting all like items in a pile.  

Then I started sorting out what I wanted to keep and purged the rest.  I either throw items away, recycle, sell or donate my supplies.  I'm being really ruthless and if I'm not going to use it, it goes away. For example, many of these threads are new but most of them come from bulk boxes of stuff that I got at auctions.  Spools of thread are always thrown into boxes with quilts and the like.  I finally took the time to trim all the thread, wind them up nicely and sort by color.  

Just look at the rainbow assortment I have now.  To think I was just making a list of new colors I needed.  Not anymore.  I organized all of my spools of thread in this one drawer that's in the sewing machine stand table I use.  It's full so my rule now is no more thread until there is room.

This is the space where I sew which is directly behind my work table.  My Baby Lock sewing machine sits atop this vintage cabinet which I think was used previously for a beauty salon station or in a lady's bathroom.  The inside smelled of stinky powder, had lots of bobby pins in it and the paint on an inside shelf had lots of rings which makes me thinks bottles and such were stored in there.  I was  attracted to the colorful Formica, speckled top and the 2 drop down leaves.  Upon further inspection at the antique shop I found a metal label that had been painted over.  It read "Hoosier" with a town in Indiana which made Hoosier cabinets.  For $20 bucks I thought I better take it home with me.  I've yet to find a similar cabinet like this online but I am very curious about it.  I'm thinking maybe it's original use might have been a small, kitchen island but who knows.  It's a sewing cabinet now in it's new life.  :)

So I have one more area in my craft room nice and organized. My goal is to make my way around my entire craft room and get everything in it's place.  Then I'm going to step back and evaluate the big picture.  I'd really love to get rid of some white storage units and replace them with a vintage, wood storage system of shelves and cubbies and lockers. I'm not sure just what yet but I'm hoping that Summer 2014 is my lucky year for junkin'.  Also, my dream find is a giant, vintage artist easel.  I know one's out there waiting for me in all it's painty goodness. I'll keep you in the know.  Have a great day everyone!

Green typewriter cards....inspired by Going Green Inspiration Board

Today I'm jumping right into using my March Going Green Pinterest Inspiration Board as inspiration for some cards.  You can view the Going Green board here.  For inspiration I created a collage using the Pic Collage app on my iPhone.  I then printed my collage onto a sheet of 8.5 x 11 glossy photo paper.  I also created a smaller collage of some of my cards that I've created that I like to use for card sketches.  I was inspired by the cell phone cover with the typewriter sitting in the grass.  I took a photo of my typewriter, changed the color to green and printed a mini Instagram sheet.  These will be available in my online shop soon. 

For my cards, once I have an idea of what I want to create I select papers and embellishments to create somewhat of a mini kit to use.  I like to have this little messy pile of goodies all fanned out.  The creativity just starts to flow once I see color and patterns and unique embellishments.  For my mini typewriter Instagrams, I trimmed four of them down to little squares. The patterned papers are from the March Gossamer Blue 6 x 6 paper pad in the Bits & Pieces Kit.  On the right side of the photo below you'll see that I stitched with green thread down the side of some Basics Journaling Cards.  I absolutely must have these in my stash to use for card fronts.  Love them to pieces.  

In my inspiration collage there's a photo of a butterfly on ledger paper (you can see all the photos better on my Going Green Inspiration Board).  I dug out one of my old ledger books and tore out a sheet to cut up for a bottom layer of my cards.  

Here are my finished cards.  I love the office supply feel that the typewriter Instagrams, lined journaling cards and ledger paper lends to these cards.  The color definitely says green too. 

Here's a nice shot of all the layers the cards have.  I just love stitching and stapling pieces of paper together.  

I found plenty of embellishments and twine from the March Gossamer Blue kits this month. Those little daisy brads...oh, I could use full packs of them.  If you're liking the gold and silver twines, I do carry some in my shop.  Silver is here.  Gold is here.  

The little typewriter Instagrams.  I keep adding these to my stash/shop because they just come in so handy for cards and little packaging items.  For the sentiments, I used the "just my type" stamp from a previous Life Pages stamp set from Gossamer Blue.  For the other sentiment I typed those out with my vintage typewriter.  You can also get a glimpse of my favorite product from this month's Gossamer Blue kits.  It's the wood tape from the March Life Pages Themed Add-On.  You can stitch on it, trim it with scissors or a trimmer, die cut it....you really will love this.  And this kit is one of the few remaining over at the Gossamer Blue store. You'll also really love the My Mind's Eye wood dots in this kit too.  Oh and then there's gold shimmer paper, a Brilliance ink pad and the most beautiful journaling cards.  Just a fun, fun kit. 

I wanted to share a fun tip for you to try the next time you work with 6 x6 paper pads.  Lots of times the 6 x 6 sheet will have a border at the top with a perforated line for tearing the sheets out.  When I tore out my sheets, the whole page ripped out.  So I just rolled with it and used the torn edge + the cream border with the hole as the bottom of my patterned paper layer.  And I love it so much.  It just adds texture and a little something unexpected to the card design. 

Thank you so much for stopping by today & I hope you enjoyed my cards.  I really am getting so much inspiration from my Pinterest boards.  I'd love for you to link up your creations in the comments section if you are inspired to create something from my Going Green board.  I'll be back with more projects all month long and be sure to check the shop soon for some new green items + fun kits, etc.  As always, thank you for leaving a nice comment.  They do mean so much to me. :)

March Pinterest Inspiration Board....Going Green

It's time for my next monthly Pinterest inspiration board and for March it's all about Going Green.  You can find the new board here + all of my previous monthly boards for 2014 are available too.  Green is my favorite color and right about now when we have sub-zero temperatures and snow on the ground, it seems I dream of green.  It was certainly easy to browse through my other Pinterest boards to find inspiration with the color green.  I hope you'll give my Going Green Pinterest board a look and hopefully find some fun inspiration for the month.  

Here's a few sample photos from my Going Green Pinterest board.  These lovely crayons, paint chips and a scruffy paint brush all make me want to dive into my art supplies.  

(Pinterest link)

Some day.  Ahhh, I will own an old green pickup truck.  

(Pinterest link )

Jadeite colored vintage dishes and vases.  Be still my heart.  Maybe my Going Green board will prompt a color change with some of your home decor. 

(Pinterest source)

Quotes and lettering.  White ink on a green background would go so well in my home.  

(Pinterest source)

Vintage illustrations of botanicals, birds and butterflies.  Maybe I'll give watercoloring a stamped butterfly a try this month on some cards.  

(Pinterest source)

So many beautiful shades of green.  There are so many fun pairings of greens with other colors in my Going Green Pinterest board photos.  The inspiration really gets to flowing when I visit this board.  

(Pinterest source)

Thanks for joining me today and I hope that you're inspired to Go Green.  I'll be back this month with lots of green creations and some new green shop items.  Stay tuned...