White Christmas

Dashing thru the snow here finally in New England! If there isn’t a white christmas outside I certainly have one inside. Here are some of my pics of my White Christmas….

And my Yorkie “Macho” wishing you a Merry Christmas!

Vintage Sepia Book Pages

I have seen countless uses for old book pages and decided to give it a whirl. I have an old cabinet that I painted white (natch) and filled with all kinds of shabby goodies. However it was still lacking a little va va voom. I thought of painting the back a delicious hue of pink or blue but could not decide, perhaps mirrored ( then I would see the backs of things which I did not want), and finally decided on old book pages. Their warm sepia hued pages were just what I was looking for.

These are 2 shots after I glued the pages up, I did not get a before as it hit me after to get shots for my blog, kudos to all those who have the foresight to get pictures before!

This pic is after I started adding my shabby goodies

This pic is after I added my goodies and I hot glued lace to the shelf edges

A final note to those who use old book pages for projects: Be careful to note what the pages say, for instance I was using old dictionary pages and almost put up a page that would have highlighted the word and definition of rectum. Yes it would have been amusing for all of 30 seconds, then after that not so much. So remember :details , details , details! Happy Crafting!

Haunted Hilton Asylum

What do you get when you put together a twin size headboard , black paint and a gold sharpie?
A Haunted Hilton Asylum sign. I saw a small plaque at Micheals craft store that read Haunted Hills Asylum and adapted it to Haunted Hilton Asylum because we live on Hilton street. I added dollar store plastic skulls for additional creepy effect……

Duely note that I added a fleur-de-lis to it as well…..=)

Halloween on a dime

Vintage Ball canning jars are abundant & cheap, often free. To make use of some of the hundreds that I have (really hundreds) I decided to make pumpkins with them. You read right…pumpkins. First I cleaned the jars I selected, varying sizes look great, then I spray painted the inside of the jar orange, and the top green.

Because the paint is on the inside it is weather proof. I used a black paint pen to free hand draw pumkin faces and Voila!

On the above pic you can see my mouse shilouette. I just used craft foam sheets in black and did a free hand outline of a mouse and hot glued it to the bricks, they stick,are weather resistant and will not damage the brick when I remove them.

On this one I used and old square glass jar and painted it green on the inside and with a black paint pen did a free hand face and scars. Any glass jars can be used, great recycling project!

“Sew” Scary Cute

Just whipped up my grandson Johnnys Halloween goodie bag today. I couldn’t wait to get home from JoAnns to start sewing. I got the iron on letters from the dollar store and added those to the top. I will add all his goodies inside before I send it to him next week. Here is the result:

I heard it through the grapevine…”Grapevine Wreaths” that is…

What to do , What to do when you roadside find 30 some odd plain grapevine wreaths…..hhmmmmm.
Well I can show you what I did! I spray painted them orange, added some eucalyptus on top and some faux
leaves (compliments of same roadside find) and Voila…Pumpkin wreaths.

Ok so this is not a pumpkin wreath but he is as cute as a pumpkin…my yorkie Macho!

Bibbity, Blogity…BOO!

It’s that time of year, Fall-o-ween! I am sharing some of my favorite pics of fall-o-ween decorating with, you.
You can click to enlarge any photo.

I actually made this book-o-lantern my self (not the ones pictured) and the page folding was actually quite fast, not as mind numbingly long as you would expect.

Loved this very creative & clever use of architecture!

And THE Queen of Halloween, Miss Martha Stewart

Here are some early 1900’s halloween pics of children in costumes…so cute!

Farewell Summer

Deep sigh, closed the pool the other day…Summer is officially done & children are back to school. Deep sigh, yes I know I already did that but it bares repeating so I repeated. On to the fun stuff that Autumn has to offer. I created a new desktop calendar for you for free.
Click on the image to download

Enjoy!

Just Beachy….

I re-did my bathroom off my kitchen recently. Of course it was beachy before I just gave it an overhaul of beachy.LOL. I attached tons O’ shells to an old dresser mirror, so much better than any medicine cabinet. My light switch cover cracked and I was looking at replacements and found plain plastic ones starting at $9 bucks a pop…being El Cheapo that I am I wanted somethink more snazzy for ALOT less…hmmm I thought…what can I put on the old one
…paper..nah….
fabric…nah…
shells…too bumpy…
glass mosaic…YES!
so I mosaiced the cover with some left over stained glass from another project and Voila! Snazzy & cheap…

I even did my shower stall with white subway tiles myself…tres beachy cottage!

I may not live near the beach but I can pretend….

After the rain…

It has been raining practically non-stop for over a week, wreaking havoc on my strawberry plants. ***deep sigh** Well late yesteday it stopped and today is a bit drier so out I went to check on my garden and flowers. Here’s what I saw this morning:

A single tiger lily..so big & beautiful…

a really pretty purple flower (sorry don’t know the names ) the petals curl and open at the tips…

My grapes are growing & spreading like wild this year!

My blackberries

Miscl. flowers around my yard

My lavender is huge & smells soooo good too…

One of the few non-rotting strawberries

My hydrangea making their appearance of buds…

I lined my tree belt with hosta and mulch, much easier than mowing the little strip & much better looking

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These are tiny sunflower shoots that take over the tree belt in the fall with giant sunflowers…so gorgeous when they are in bloom! Bonus bird food, feeders that I don’t have to refill ….

Finally a curbside find, love the rust on this….

I may live in the city, but I try to cram as much country & seaside details (note the cedar shingles ) as I can into my home.