Upcycling En Masse

Elsie Flannigan and Rachel Denbow are about to kick off a year of repurposing, remaking and renewing old, worn or damaged items. In other words, they have tapped into a passion of mine: Upcycling. Join in the effort here...Project ReStyle - A Beautiful Mess

Go against the grain of New Years exclamations of Out with the Old and In with the New. Embrace a new resolution of In with the Old and Who needs the New!

Making Merry Revisited

During this time of year when, in general, women all over the world are busy doing, going and buying for others (and quite happily too), I invited Rosemary and Kim over to put the breaks on the Christmas crazy and spend an entire day Making Merry. What better way to recharge and refuel in the midst of the Christmas season than to indulge in a bit of top notch retail therapy and ultra creative play?

We went to one of my favorite places to get decorating inspiration, Chartreuse and Company and then we stopped in at a new store down the street from my home, Wild Rose and Co. that also does an amazing job of merchandising the goods.

Then it was back to the house where we said hi to the City Chicks and then got down to the business of creative play...

Rosemary had brought the motherload of Christmas stashes (I want to go shopping in her studio!) as we embellished wine boxes. We were so proud of our accomplishments that they all got an impromptu photo shoot (mine is on the far left).

I decided to give mine away to my mom (She never reads my blog, so I'm safe. Did I tell you about the time Mom went skinny dipping with my Dad when I was a little kid? hehehe) and put some very delicate, breakable Christmas ornaments in it. Voila, perfect vehicle for a fragile gift.

Then we stopped for snacks, nom, nom, nom. There shall be no art without serious carbo loading.

After that, we started on my very long, very messy project. Let's just say that cotton batting, cotton balls, glue and mica make incredibly gorgeous finished clouds and snow scenes, but the process is like you gave a kid a roll of duct tape and a bottle of paste then told them to go to town with it. The final result was a snow laden cloud with a vintage Christmas light to lead the way through the dark night with a vintage goodie laden tin in tow (or that's what I hope it looks like).

The inspiration were some vintage cotton batting ornaments, some 'travel' related ornaments my children have the involve zeppelins, or cotton batting sail boats and another project where someone used a vintage tin as a balloon basket. (I've come to the conclusion that a truly original idea, if it should ever suddenly hit me, will probably happen long after I've gone gray and senile) After all that creating, we were wiped out, so it was dinner time! Tim, otherwise knowns as Pizza Boy, took our orders and made us homemade pizzas which was followed by more carb loading because being covered in glue and mica burns serious, um, brain cells?


For our final creative endeavor, Kim taught Rosemary and I how to make flowers from ribbon. Both Rosemary and I kind of shivered with intimidation until Kim guided us through beautiful petals, leaves and more. Seriously we had no idea how cool it could be and all of the amazing projects that can be done with ribbon flowers!


Of course, I don't have a photo of mine because we didn't finish. Our spirit was willing, but our bodies were weak. I've had my pieces in a basket by the sofa so I can slowly put it all together, but I think Kim enabled us to explore yet another new creative outlet!


(And I think we ate some more as we packed away all of our projects. Who are we to waste perfectly good carbs?) As we hugged each other goodbye, cries were heard of Making Merry to all and to all a Good Night!

Egg-static, lol

Today we had our first 'real' snow that stuck to the ground. All in all, it was maybe 1/2 inch, but it was enough to cause several accidents and cancel all after school activities.

This also meant the first snow for the City Chick(en)s. I went out to check on them and they were all cowering inside the coop, hovering around their pop door looking out at me.

I meant to tempt them with some sunflower seed and a few brave girls ran out for about 10 seconds to gobble some up before running right back inside the coop and scolding me loudly as if to say "You half-wit woman, can't you see the sky is falling?"

They returned to their vigil of hovering around the pop door and clucking about the end of the world that was surely nigh.

Biology got the best of them and several still layed their lovely little eggs.

We are getting a kick out of giving away fresh eggs to neighbors and friends. I suppose if you had a highly developed palate, you might say "Dayum, these are downright amazing eggs." I'm not one of those people. But I can tell you that their yolks are brighter & sturdier than any store bought egg. I can also say that I've been told because our chicks eat a well-rounded diet that their eggs are healthier than their store bought counterparts.
And, by golly, they are pretty! Each day going to collect eggs is a bit like Christmas morning. Or maybe I'm just incredibly easy to entertain. :)

The Circle o'Vintage

My old house has something that often foils my attempts to hang things on walls: loads of windows and plaster. I am determined that this beauty IS going up this year rather than languishing in obscurity. I may be scaling back, but I still love the shiny (oooh, shiny). Sweet angel on her cloud...Love this bell! Full of vintage love. It will go up. I may crack some plaster, but it's one of my projects for the day. And I carved out some time to play with Opus Gluei for their current "Getting Frosted" challenge. It was like carved out while watching Jimmy Fallon late at night carved out, but I was having too much fun for sleep.

When I make stuff purely from old stash I start to feel bad about shopping for new goodies.

I mean, really, really guilty bad.

For about a minute.

And then I'm over it. :)

But, I do quite love pulling together a project from old stash and creating something new.

This wintery, frosty card uses old Heidi Swapp, Ranger, Martha Stewart, Making Memories, Basic Grey, vintage flowers and I used vintage tinsel to make a nest. If you figure out how to removed my camera covered face from the reflection, let me know. I'm not fluent in Photoshop, so it'll stay there for now. ;)

We Need A Little (Smaller) Christmas

right this very minute...

My poor husband. After years of careful training on my part, he has finally learned to fully embrace that Clark Griswald Christmas spirit while his wife is beginning to recite 'edit, edit, edit' in her head.

What does this mean? While Tim is wandering around the attic and trying to hand me every single Christmas thing we own (and it's a lot), I'm yelling up "Not this year." Hence the grumbling and muttering from up above as he tells the rejected items they are going to the cast-off corner.

I'm not getting rid of anything, but I have been trying to pull back, refocus and refresh our decorations for the season...without buying anything new unless it's living like wreaths or swags. My BFFs might faint dead away when they read this that has been typed by my own two hands: There can be too much of a good thing. (Thud heard in MA, I know)

Instead of putting out every single snowman I own, just a few came out to play this year. Instead of spreading out our Christmas trees into several areas, I grouped them in a miniature forest.

I like it. It's not the heavenly displays from Anthropologie or Kate's Paperie, but it seems...new...even though it's all old stuff.

I did give in to dressing up the chandeliers a bit.

And Sozo kitty was overjoyed to see her annual December napping spot return again. The minute that tree skirt went down, I swear she was sprawled out on it in less than a minute.

Tim will thank me for all that editing later when he's not carrying all that stuff back up to the attic. ;)

Opus Gluei Challenge

Yeah, I managed to squeak in another Opus Gluei challenge this weekend! I probably went off the color palette a bit by throwing a blue in there, but when it feels so right, how can it be wrong? :) I pulled from MME, Heidi Swapp, 7 Gypsies, Ranger, Basic Grey and Target $ Spot for this one. It's not too complicated, but it is cute (I hope).

How was everyone's Thanksgiving? Wonderful I hope! Now on to....

Christmas Crazy!

Ok, if you've been here before you know I get totally geeked out over Christmas. I'm insufferable really. To that end, I have put the Christmas playlist back up on the bottom of the blog. If you don't like it, mute it. If you do, turn up the dial and sing along!

And, I'm losing sleep in the name of merriment. As in Making Merry! A couple of friends and I are getting together for a little holiday experiment. If it works out, we may expand it to other holidays as well. As it is, I'm can't wait to share my project with them; a little vintage chic with a bit of a nod towards Steampunk style (Loved that Steampunk storyline on Castle a couple of months ago!)

Time to get back to decking some halls...

Merry Inspiration

I think it's fairly evident by now that Christmas is upon the horizon. I knew it was here the moment I polished off my first bag of Candy Cane Hershey's Kisses (drat you Hershey!). When the Cadbury Mini Balls showed up at Target, I nearly had a happy seizure (Did you know in Canada, they have these all year round? Dude, no fair!)

Just a few links to get you in a merry mood...

Inspired Ideas, The Christmas Issue OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS, this online issue is full of Christmas love. I know at least one idea that I'm tweaking from this and about 10 more ideas that are on my 'must-do' list!

Holiday...with Matthew Mead Seriously, I danced a jig when I opened my mailbox to find this gift in it this evening. A flippin' full on jig, I tell ya! (while holding eggs in one hand too) I haven't even gotten past the first few pages and I'm already salivating at the joy contained in the pages of this lush magazine. Only 'magazine' isn't the right word for it. It's a revelation of Christmas pleasures supported online by links to patterns, recipes and more. You can only get it by ordering online or from a store that specially ordered a box of this goodness.

I have followed Matthew Mead's creative trail for years and he's assembled a fabulous team that has put together "Holiday" so thoughtfully that you won't regret getting a copy of your own.

Joli Paquet Back for another Christmas with free tutorials (and these are GOOD tutorials too) and teasers about their famous kit sales from a group of talented artists, make sure you don't forget to check Joli Paquet often.

One Pretty Thing Here you will find ideas, inspiration and free downloads on a daily basis. If you can't get excited about something on this site, the Whos from Whoville need to grow your Grinchy heart a size or two.

Opus Gluei, the Gratitude Edition

I hope Rosemary and Jana haven't kicked me off the rolls for Opus Gluei. I know I've been a bad artist. Having my entire studio flooded and torn apart for months really threw me into an art funk (in a bad way). It's still not completely put together, but I had to get in there and do what I could to pull a Tim Gunn (make it work). (And I will digress here and say this about Project Runway: Mondo got robbed. Humph.)

Then, to just totally throw me for a loop, my trusty camera went kaput. It began putting out images that looked like negatives from the film reel for the original Excorcist. I don't care what Tim Gunn says, I could not make that work at all. I frittered away for months using only my camera phone to capture shaky images.

When dear hubby and I were about to leave for vacation, I stomped my little feet (or long, wide, plantar fascitis plagued feet) and announced via text message whilst at Costco, that I WAS getting a camera before the trip. Remind me of my behavior next time one of my teens gives me attitude. Who was going to believe I was viewing lava if I didn't have the proof? (Uh and I still don't have proof. They wouldn't let us that close to the lava. But I do have a 'Beach closed. Shark sighting.' photo!)

So folks, I hope this means I'm back in the business of creating and occasionally participating in some Opus Gluei fun!

Their latest challenge was Attitude of Gratitude. Someone recently went above and beyond for me, so I wanted to give her a little somethin' somethin'. She loves herself some good chocolate. That can be had from the store, but it needed some presentation, some panache, a little something extra. I pulled from the gorgeous fall palette for color inspiration and glued a lush Prima flower that I'd been waiting for the perfect project to use it because it was THAT special to a golden organza bag.

For a card, I did several scalloped circles held together by ball chain embellished with a glass leaf charm, a silver letter charm and some vintage seam binding. Then those teensie circle letters from Jenni Bowlin nestled into the little scalloped to spell 'Grateful'. I wrote her a note of thanks upon the circles and will be giving it to her this weekend. Since she never reads blogs, I think I'm safe in showing it here in advance. I hope!

Egg-citement!

So, no comment on the long, uncomfortable silences on this blog. Same story women have told for ages...

Last weekend, the hubby and I were running around doing errands and it occured to me that Maryland at this time of year is wildly beautiful. The colleges deftly schedule their tours to coincide with the perfect scenery. Numerous fall festivals and craft shows abound. Most importantly, our chickens have started laying!

Yes, the previous freeloaders are slowly beginning to come off scholarship and earn their keep. Surprisingly, the first little layer was Peanut, our black silkie and the tiniest of the flock. Peanut is our youngest daughter's personal chicken, so young daughter is especially proud that her chickie is the chickie who could. (We all need to start refering to Peanut as a she since we've previously called Peanut a he. Our apologies Peanut!)
Peanut lays the cutest, half-size bantam pullet eggs.

The next little chickie on the production line is Duckie, our Buff Orpington and acknowledged chicken public relations ambassador. Duckie is the calmest, most inquisitive little lady who enjoys attention, so she is the one to comfort and reaasure those who view chickens negatively.

And most recently, Patches, our pretty Easter Egger with a funny, floppy comb has begun laying a lovely blue-green egg. She sings her quirky egg song beforehand, arranges the nest box just so and then puffs up before dropping off her contribution to the egg carton.

We do have a mystery layer who hasn't figured out that dropping your eggs willy-nilly in the chicken run isn't so wise. We are hopeful she will watch her chickie sisters and follow their lead.

Most of the others show signs of joining the production line soon including one little white silkie who I was quite sure was a rooster and it now most assuredly a little lady with a really odd comb.

So, soon quiche, omelets and angel food cakes will abound! If it begins to get too crazy, we'll resort to tossing eggs in unlocked cars and leaving them anonymously on neighbors porches (must like our practice with zucchini and tomatoes in the summer).

Don't even ask hubby how much that first egg cost!

A Product of Their Times

Yes, yes, yes, this blog has been collecting dust for months. Sorry if you sneeze! No promises that it'll get any better, but who knows?

I was on a forum the other day and there was a discussion of products our mothers bought (or prepared) when we were children that we now despise. I remember my mom used to buy imitation chocolate chips for her cookies. Not only that, but she would double the cookie recipe without doubling the chips! Not just one crime, but two; especially to unwavering chocolate lovers like me. I don't know that they even make those chips anymore or perhaps that my eyes refuse to register them on the shelf.

That wasn't the only bizarre food choice in our household when I was growing up. When my mom was expecting my little sister, she craved sardine sandwiches with mustard. Guess what we had for lunch a lot? A whole lot.

Sometime in the late 70s or early 80s (I think) was when generic foods came into existence. There was a warehouse store that was totally foreign to me. You bought these enormous boxes of food, but all the packaging looked the same; either white or yellow with a checkmark and plain black font. Duh, all the food tasted the same too; like crusty sock fungus or remarkably like the cardboard boxes they were packaged in. I know several store brand foods are quite alright now, but back then, it was social death to have a friend glimpse into your cabinets to see a flash of plain boxed puffed rice insta-dinner.

Now, if I go further back a generation as it related to me, I remember the meals my grandparents made and their attitudes towards food. My maternal grandparents had a large garden each year (and still do though they are both well seasoned in years) and canned many, many vegetables, fruits, jams & jellies. Prize winning cans in fact. My mom has groused on more than one occasion that Nana cooked the vegetables to mush (true a lot of times), but at least Nana knew where they were grown, what they were grown with and what they were grown without. Though her cinnamon squash will go down in infamy (because it most certainly did not go down my gullet), Nana and Papa approached food in the same way they were raised with food.

Surely they've all grown. Nana now buys store bought pies and several convenience foods. My parents are once again growing much of their own food and have farm fresh eggs from their motley crew of chickens.

What am I a product of? Pretty much an unhealthy amalgam of what was first taught to me in school as the 4 food groups. Now it's the food pyramid. And a lot of the food on the shelves in the grocery come with ingredients lists that are longer than the ingredients list on my eye shadow. Now that's freaky. And I can't pronounce the ingredients either.

We've swung back and forth between low-fat/no-fat, sugar free, high fiber, no carbs, good carbs, omega-3s, whatchapeas, etc to the point where frankly I think most of us are more confused than not about healthy eating.

The author Michael Pollan tells us it might help if we shop the aisles of our local grocery and only buy things our great-grandmother would recognize. That would pretty much cut out all the interior aisles. Not to go label crazy, but if my Great Grandma Rae wouldn't buy it, then I should think about leaving it on the shelf myself.

As Richard Dreyfuss tells Bill Murray in "What About Bob", baby steps. What are my baby steps right now?

Today I picked fresh peppers, cherry tomatoes, my first 'big' tomato (a Cherokee Purple), burgundy okra, basil and Italian flatleaf parsley. I also dug up all the sweet onions.

Oh, and I fed these little girls watermelon rinds which they gobbled right up. Should be weeks though before they are off 'scholarship' and start earning their keep by laying eggs.

The first girl is LaVerne (we have a Shirley too). She's a Silkie bantam which means she's like a miniature poodle prissy poodle chicken. The second girl is Cream Puff who has a lovely feather pattern of a red head cascading into silvery blue tail feathers. She's an Araucana (or Easter Egger), so she'll lay blue or green eggs.

Now Back To Our Regularly Scheduled Programming: Summer!

Happy Lurve Day!

Once again that day of the year again that is sure to inspire thoughts of love or sure to bring sad & lonely disappointment is here: Valentine's Day. My hubby is out of town all weekend, will be home for only one night (a late one at that) then leave to go to LA for the rest of the week (poor baby, his team has a rented beach house, lol), so I won't have much Cupid-like activity. I do have my 3 children home for Valentine's Day though, a rare treat since 2 of them are halfway out of the nest already. As usual, in the morning, they'll find a few surprises waiting for them.

I made this lollie (above)after being inspired by a tutorial on the House of 3 Inspiration blog done by Rhonna Farrer. She also did a great tutorial on making blossoms with coffee filters, so when hubby gets home, he will need to run out and buy more. Whoopsie! Hey, I got carried away! To make our Valentine's weekend more festive for the kids, I hung a few banners and paper lanterns. All of the pink even catches the light and reflects a soft, romantic light around the rooms; an unexpected bonus.

Friday night, I took my daughter, her boyfriend and I went out to see the new movie, Valentine's Day. It was frothy and cute. No big, deep life lessons, but I got to hang with my girl, get to know her young man better and laugh at the crazy parking jobs in the snow around the theater. The government had declared a state of emergency, schools were out and our mail never arrived, but by golly, that theater was packed to the last seat. Cabin fever had everyone aching to get out!

Look what was outside of our 'cabin'...a supersized and scary couple of icicles. We have very tall windows, so these would be lethal should you be under one the moment they decide to break loose from their perch. Had a bit of a "Psycho" shower fright when I opened the curtain to see those! Maybe, just maybe, at this rate the icicles and snow may melt in time for summer break. I hear we're supposed to get more snow on Monday. Noooooooooooooooooooo!

So, it's snowing. Yet again. :P

The artsy craftsy pictures were going to be on the bottom of this post, but blogger won't let me move them, so here they stay. I made this heart banner after being inspired by a project on Teresa McFayden's Paper Romance e-zine.
The necklaces below are little surprises for some special people. The card the necklaces are mounted upon is simply cardboard that's been masked and Glimmer Misted to within an inch of its life. Up close, they are dripping in shimmer. To make the "Beautiful One" word strip, I cut patterned paper down to the width of Dymo label tape and ran it through the Dymo. Then I swiped a fairly dry Old Paper Distress ink pad across the letters to help them show more clearly. I hope they like them!

It would've been a disservice to any of the few readers of this blog to read me waxing eloquent upon the evils of snow. Yet here I am, to wax eloquent upon the evils of snow while it is (no surprise) snowing out with blizzard (sometimes hurricane forces) winds.

School has been out and will be out for the remainder of the week. Fortunately, I live in a little town that is managed with a velvet-covered iron fist, so our roads are usually fine. Unfortunately, the hubby hadn't been further than the local grocery store (honestly, one we could walk to if we needed), so he thought the rest of the state had to be fine (he also works from home). This sheltered view led to him expressing disbelief when I told him that the rest of the state is, indeed, not fine. That major roads aren't quite clear and many neighborhood roads are nearly impassable. Traffic lights are flashing which leads to replays of Drivers Ed in our heads as we battle the 'polite driver' vs the 'I'm first and I don't give a rip about the rules driver' and me, the 'did all you people forget basic drivers ed?!? driver'.

Enough of my whining (but, seriously folks, why do they not issue frequent customer cards for liquor stores?), life goes on, right?

A couple of weeks ago, I won a fabulous prize on Heidi Swapp's blog, Still Me. A necklace made by Lisa Leonard Designs. This is the necklace I won: lluminate and I was able to choose what I wanted stamped onto the necklace. I chose "Walk in the light" in reference to a few things. 1 John 1:7, Matthew 5:16 and jumping off of this performance by artist, Tobymac (turn off my music player at the bottom of the blog to watch if you'd like):

Apparently the mail carrier went through the snow because it showed up at my home yesterday and it is beautiful. A big thanks to both Heidi Swapp and Lisa Leonard for such a generous gift! I will wear it often as a reminder to not only talk the talk, but to walk the walk.

Here are a few pics of our lovely snow from last weekend without the addition of the snow we're getting today...

1) Our garage

2) The view down our street

3) My car is under there somewhere!

4) Ash & Jack galloping down the street

A little fun, a little creativity and a lot of frozen toes

First, there are a couple of birthdays coming up, so I spent a few late nights in the studio. Mostly just communing with pretty paper or supplies, but I did manage to create a couple of cards for special birthday people.

Most importantly is my daughter who turns 14 tomorrow. Wahhhhh! This kid is talented in so many areas that if I weren't there for her very first birthday, I'd swear she came from some other super amazing set of parents. She can jump tall buildings in a single bound, run faster than a locomotive and has a deep empathy for others. I'm so proud of my baby girl. This one is for her, my little blizzard baby...Though you can't see it, this one is full of shimmer. I used glimmer mist and in person, it is full on sparkly. I don't know if anyone remembers wayyyyyy back when I glittered an entire package of Basic Grey chipboard & put it all in a bowl for ready-made embellishments? The 'snowflake' is one of those pieces.

This card is for someone I've known since he was 'this high'. Now he's all grown up with a daughter of his own (daaaaaang, I'm old). This one also fits right in with the latest challenge from Opus Gluei to use a star. And yes, I glittered an entire package of crusty old Lil Davis chipboard stars way back thinking that I might get around to using them on a project. :)

You know how it's been colder than a Siberian work camp the past couple of weeks? I'm NOT cut out for the cold and anyone around me knows it because I complain at top volume. Hubby and I are in a constant battle over the thermostat. He turns it to something dreadfully low like 60 and I crank it up to something reasonable such as 68.

I don't know what possessed us to travel to NYC during one of the coldest weekends in 40 years, but that's what we did last weekend. I'm still working to regain feeling in my pinky toes. It was cold. Wicked. Freezing. Cold. Even the subway stations were bone chilling. The rats had headed South for the winter. And they were wearing their little rat scarves.

Oddly enough, people still lined up for free samples at the Coldstone Creamery we passed.

As a Christmas gift to each other, hubby and I went to see the newish musical Memphis. Due to the cold, I had been thinking the trip wasn't worth it, but after the show, braving the freezing temps was so worth it. If you are in the market to see a newer show, strongly consider this one. I'd see it again. I'd see it again especially if it were summer and I felt up to standing in line for a Coldstone sample. ;)

To Save A Life

For several months, I've had this little sidebar on my blog with a link to a movie called To Save A Life. Last month, I had to the opportunity to watch the movie with some fellow youth leaders and we all agree that it gives a realistic portrayal into the lives of our students and the problems they face daily.

Last fall, many of you are aware that my own son went through some terrible struggles and it hit our entire family hard. I have to ask myself, what I could've done differently or if I could've seen any signs of what was coming. Hindsight is 20/20, but I'm doing my best to save other families from going through the same thing.

This movie addresses social division in school, bullying, self-injury, alcohol abuse, some drug use, teen pregnancy and divorce. I believe we are at our best when we are open to helping those around us who are hurting. If you have a teen (or will have a teen, this is happening in middle school too), know a teen or know families with teens, To Save A Life is a movie I believe you need to see.

If your family is involved in a youth group or church, I hope you are planning an event to get your students & families to this movie. If there are no plans, then visit these sites, TO SAVE A LIFE - OFFICIAL MOVIE SITE - In Theaters January 22, 2010 and To Save A Life Leader Resources to help you make plans for seeing the movie and providing opportunities for followup conversations. The leader site has resources for youth leaders, pastors, parents and student leaders.

Your life matters. The lives of our children matter. What are we going to do about it?

The Big Clean

Once every several months, the urge to superclean the studio hits me. The recent flooding episode added to that urge. Fortunately, the mess hasn't been that horrible to get under control since my past supercleaning challenges have kept supplies to a manageable amount.

I will be donating many supplies to two places. One is the school of my friend's daughter where they host a Jingle Bell Fair for the students every December. The other is Hope Alive Ministries for their children's ministry. This is a wonderful ministry that does more than provide a bed for women & children. It creates a home atmosphere, provides love & security as well as dealing with the issues that led to homelessness and working towards moving these families into independence.

I'm also sending out a few items to Jennifer for her Etsy website which raises money towards fighting cancer. These cards were made with an old SEI line that is so happy to work with. Normally, I'm not an orange or peachy color lover, but with the frigid temps we've been having, these were a sunny getaway to play with.Other supplies used were Heidi Swapp flowers, bling, Ranger Distress ink, American Crafts rubons and Bazzill cardstock.

I also played around making some tags from this massive bunch of tags I bought at an art supply yard sale (where I was selling and had no business buying anything). These will be going to Jennifer too. On these, I used Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist, Tattered Angels masks, Basic Grey rubons, decorative packing tape, Making Memories tickets, bling and vintage lace. (the ones on the right are what are headed Jennifer's way) Lastly, being the holiday freak that I am, my eyes are already turned to Valentine's Day. :) Fortunately, thus far, it's only in the artsy, creative department and not the local grocery holiday candy department (where someone told me that Cadbury Mini Eggs are ALREADY in stores. is there no diet justice?!?). To keep my paws off the candy, I may be making a lot of these little collages. This one is already hanging from the Hoosier cabinet. This is truly a hodge podge of different supplies. I've already asked someone to bar the doors should I attempt to enter with any more Valentine's supplies (vintage ones excepted of course!). The silver key is actually a Christmas ornament. Being so focused on Christmas, I'm not sure how my brain disengaged from Silver Bells long enough to think "Key To My Heart" valentine, but it did and I kind of like it. It's a jumble.

All of these meet the challenge from Opus Gluei for the week of use what you got too, so check them out if you want to play along!