Halloween Lantern

I know, it's not quite October yet, but I just had to work on a little project for my hubby. He was going to put one of his old lanterns in our garage sale a few weeks back, but I decided to set it aside since it was a nice lantern. It's only meant for a candle, so it's not electric or anything. I thought I might put some vinyl on the windows of it. Since he's usually a fan of Halloween, I thought I'd make it to fit that holiday. Here is how it turned out. I had to put some yellow tissue paper in it with a color changing battery operated tea light to help take the picture, but it really made it look even better (IMO). The photos show 2 sides at a time so you can see all 4 sides of one lantern.

The cuts were from the ProvoCraft Cricut Oct. 31 cartridge. It is really cool for just being a solutions cartridge & worth the money, but I found it on sale, so that makes it even better! ;-)


























Well, it's a quick post tonight while Alan is working late this week. It's giving me more time to get my craft projects done for my shows on the first & 2nd weekends of Nov. It doesn't really leave much time . I'm glad I got a good jump start on my stuff, but not nearly as good as I'd like to be at this point. Oh well.....whatcha gonna do?

God Bless & have a great day!

OMG!!! OMG!!! OMG!!!

Did you hear me scream OMG???? I received the most wonderful news on Tuesday evening.....I'm getting published in a real paper magazine!!!!! For anyone who knows anything about my paper crafting, & it was just mentioned in my previous post too, I've had one goal for a few years now, & that was to get published in a hard copy periodical for scrapbooking or paper crafting. I finally DID IT!! I received my email on Tuesday night telling me that I've had not one, but TWO projects selected for a special publication coming out sometime around Feb. 2011 by Northridge Publishing. This is the company that prints some of THE BEST idea magazines out there. If you scrapbook or do any kind of artsy creating, then you've no doubt heard about Scrapbook Trends, Cards, Beads or Simply Handmade magazines. It seems as though they're coming out with a specialty publication just for projects created with the Provocraft Cricut die cutting machine & their cartridges. How cool is that?? I think the magazine will be called "Create: Cricut" & I have to say, I don't think I could create anything now without using my Cricut Expression. It has changed the entire way I create now. I'm so anxious to see what all this magazine will have in it. I love seeing all the cool stuff that others do with this machine, so I can't wait to have an entire book full of nothing but Cricut designs!!

I hate to toot my own horn & then end this post, but I have to get more stuff ready for the 2nd day of our 3rd garage sale & it's Brooke's bedtime, plus it was my dad's 68th birthday today! It's been a busy crazy week for me with a death in the family earlier in the week too. It was so sad & tragic even though I didn't know him well, since he was an older 2nd cousin on my husband's side.

So God Bless & have a great day!

I must have lost the few viewers I had since my summer break from blogging...not sure what to do to lure you all back or find some new ones, but I have really been busy crafting, but ya know, I'm doing a few craft shows & have still been trying to get something published somewhere on paper. So I don't want to post things that I don't want copied or have to remove later. Although, it would be fun to have to have a little sticky note that says it's Out For Publication. ;-)

I have been trying to get something published with a few of my favorite mags for over 2 years now & it may be even 3, but I've lost track. I can get published with online magazines with no problem, but those hard copy paper ones still elude me. My most recent attempt is with a publication that the Trends magazine lines (Scrapbook, Cards, Handmade) must be coming out with for Provo Crafts Cricut machine & cartridges. I submitted several items for their review, but I seriously doubt that I will ever hear from this company. But, like with my first marriage, I'll keep trying until I can't take it no more. ;-)

Now, for some other pathetic creativity for my garden art. I've seen people making tipsy pots, & although I've seen some variations of this design that I could like, it's just not really my thing. I've dabbled in the glass totems, but grew weary of that quickly after just the first one. I've made a couple of the gazing ball bowling balls & still like those. But, I've found a new little love that is really simple while being somewhat elegant & still having a bit of whimsy. I don't do cutesy, so that's not going to happen with my creations, unless I'm selling them. But first, let me show you what I picked up a couple garage sales last Friday.




















I picked all these glass pieces up for $1.25 and here's what I did with them!






















These are made to look like mushrooms!! I just think they add a bit of something extra to the garden scene. I haven't figured out where I'll put them, but you can bet it's gonna be in my new garden shed garden.

I have finally gotten some of my fall planting started. I've done really well this year with getting my stuff planted in a timely fashion, but when it got so hot, I held off & just tried to keep the stuff alive in the pots until now. I still have some things left to plant, but where they end up is not ready for them. I did find the prettiest color of Hyacinth at Menards this past weekend. It looks like an orange or Apricot color! I've don't think I've ever seen this color for a Hyacinth, but it's called Gypsy Queen.

Well, this drug on much longer than it needed to. Sorry to continue to anyone who is actually reading this. LOL!!!

God bless & have a great day!

Garden arbor finished!!

I think I forgot to post a photo of the storm door arbor in my last post, so I'll show you the before shot here.


















Here is the finished product of the storm door arbor painted white. I thought it turned out fantastic!! I am so thrilled with the results, I can't believe it worked out so easily!! And what an impact it makes to the front of my garden shed. I can't wait to show you all the reveal of that little endeavor too, but DH still have some work to do on that still & it's full of his junk in the front at the moment.


















I think this is a pretty good excuse for not having any other paper crafting projects complete, don't you think? Actually, I have been working on some stuff, but either forgot to get pictures or I don't want to reveal them at this time.

We've also been working on a couple of garage sales that were so desperately needed & we still have one more before we're done for the season. It almost doesn't seem like we made that much of a dent, but we have to be! I know that we are, because we finally found the floor of our daughter's room! Yep! The carpet is still red! LOL!!

I also have to say that I can't believe that my little girl is growing up.... she's been talking about nothing but Justin Beiber all week! I even had to buy her her first Teen Beat magazine yesterday! She's not even 7 yet, OMG!!! Oh well, I was in love with Donny Osmond & Tony DeFranco (do any of you remember Tony???) when I was her age.

Well, this is a brief posting, Alan will be coming home for lunch shortly, so I better look like I'm doing something more than sitting at this PC.



God Bless & have a great day!!