My first table redo

I thought for sure I had a BEFORE shot of the cute little side table I found at the local Habitat ReStore, but I must not have. I hate when I forget to do that....it happens a lot. Sorry.


Anyway, I discovered after doing just a little research online that the little table is a bit of a collectible. It was only made in the 50's, so it's not really old or highly prized and it's not even one of the prettier designs, but it's still kinda sweet looking. It was a darkened walnut color originally, but I sanded the top down to the bare wood and just loved the wood grain design.



Here is the finished product. I decided to leave the top natural and do a distressed chalk paint finish for the rest. I have been seeing this all over so many blogs lately and love the look. The hubby doesn't care as much for the distressed part, but loves the top! The top has a French postage stamp design on it. I got the idea from . . . . Drats! I don't know what blog I found this inspiration at, but she did hers as a coffee table and she used a projector to hand draw her image onto her table and then she painted it. Ummmm....not this chick! Instead, I found a super easy technique that hits the 2 most important categories for me 1) EASY & 2) CHEAP! You use wax paper to print your design (reverse your image) on the waxy side of wax paper that has had the paper side adhered to a regular piece of paper before running through your printer. You then place the "wet" image onto your project and viola! You have this! 
 
A couple of views of the cool postage stamp image I transferred onto the top. I would have liked for it to be bigger, but I still love it!!





 
 








 Kinda the side view. Boy do my photog skills need some help!




































I just love the grooves along the sides.




 Some of the corner detail.



































This table is going to my craft show in Nov. if it doesn't sell before then.


I hope to have another post for you again tomorrow with another project that uses this same technique, but it's a smaller home decor item made from a wooden handled box that I picked up at the Goodwill store. Again, I think I forgot to take a before picture, but I'll have to check.


God Bless and have a great day!




I am linking this post to Miss Mustard Seed's Furniture Friday.

The Parade Sign for our tractor

With the Labor Day weekend just about upon us, sending the subtle reminder that summer is soon on it's way out, there is a local festival here in my small town of Plymouth, Indiana USA. It's called the Marshall County Blueberry Festival & it has been a huge deal around here for 45 years. Every year on Labor Day, just after the Blueberry Stomp runners and walkers hit the road in search of the finish line, the Blueberry Parade starts its route through the downtown.


After a few reminiscing stories that my husband told our 7 year old daughter about his 3 times of being in the parade in his younger days, he promised her that he would get his 1949 International Harvester Farmall Tractor running and repainted so that she could experience being in the parade as well. It's been a daunting task for him trying to get all that accomplished with some trying set backs, and much of his regular duties have been pushed to wayside just trying to get it all done just right, but on a small budget, but he's pretty much got 'er dun! Unfortunately, they're calling for chances of rain and cooler temps, so we'll see how this all pans out in the end.


Hubby asked me if I could make the signs needed for both sides of the tractor. Well, you don't have to ask me twice to go into my craft pile room and use my Cricut bug! It made it even easier to make the perfect design using my laptop with the Design Studio program! Yes!




 Now my husband being a guy and all, didn't want any extra stuff on the sign. I wanted to add some Texas stars on either side of the date, but he said to leave it alone, so I did. I did sneak in a couple little flourishes on the word "Owners." tee hee!


However, I will confess that I made a previous sign and I didn't do so good on that one. It turned out decent, but I forgot the special method for adhering the vinyl and it had static cling and ended up sticking to the sign before I was ready. I was able to salvage most of it, but I screwed up on the outside border at the bottom. Tried to fix it with no luck, but as it turned out, I had to completely redo the sign anyway because I didn't realize how he was hanging the sign and I did it upside down. I guess that gave me a clean start to make it as close to perfect as I can get it anyway. Since I didn't have enough vinyl to do the 2nd sign anyway, I ordered enough to do another and one more extra piece...just in case. you know. I screw it up again. I have a tendency to have to do everything twice, for what ever reason. (rolling eyes)


And nothing to do with the sign, but with the Cricut Design Studio. I knew that when I would finally be able to use the Design Studio program that I paid for, it wouldn't be long before they'd open up the online FREE version to EVERYONE. Sure enough. I was able to get on it today & use it. I've only been using my paid-for version for 2 weeks. I guess that's OK because I bought mine over a year ago when it was on clearance and as unpredictable as Provocraft is, who knows if their system will get overloaded from all the users and crash.


Oh! I did finally finish a small end table that I found at the local Habitat for Humanity ReStore earlier this year. I'll have to do another post on that. I thought I took a before shot of the table, but I can't seem to find it.

College Move-In day for my son

So, the day finally came that my first born went off to college on Wednesday. Since he is a Freshman, he moved in one day earlier than the upper classmen.


You had 20 minutes to get your vehicle(s) unloaded and moved out of the parking lot. But, they had teams of volunteers from the different athletic depts. to help you move. Thank goodness because it was just me and Jordan there and both of our vehicles filled.





















































This is the athletic dome, aka, "The Bubble" as it's called on campus. It was just finished this summer and is very cool! We got an private tour from my son's room mate's cousin. She is the Ladies Assistant Basket Coach, so she gave as the run down and such on this. As it turns out (for reason unknown to myself and I forgot to ask) this will be the practice field for the NFC Champions that will be in the 2012 Super Bowl!! Pretty cool, huh? The bad part is that the field and surrounding areas will be in total lock down while the team is there, including the building with the cafeteria. So, the students will have to find food elsewhere during those 3 weeks prior to the game. My son is hoping to get a glimpse of something, since his dorm is directly across the street from the Bubble.
























Here is my son (on the right) with his first year room mate, CJ. They seem to be hitting it off really well and I met his parents, and even though they must be divorced, seem like wonderful people.

 

In this picture, Jordan is texting as he's sitting with CJ's father and grandfather as we're all waiting for CJ and his mother to get back from getting his schedule.

















In this picture, Jordan and I look a little rough, since we just walked back from the Bubble in the 97 degree heat and then walked up & down the FIVE flights of stairs to his room to drop off his books. Needless to say, we were hot and sweaty and a bit tired of the MANY trips up and down those stairs that day. There is an elevator, but it's really slow...when it's working, that is. I sure hope I got at least a little benefit from all that exercise! ;^)


We have been told that there's a condition with first year college students called the Freshman 15. That's where the Freshmen gain 15 pounds in their first year of school. LOL! If my son has to keep going up and down those stairs, that may not be a problem, but he's a big boy to begin with as you can see. My boy has a Monster gut instead of a beer gut (so far anyway).


His room is in a good/bad location. It's directly across from the elevator and the showers. It's good because he's so close to both, but bad because they'll hear all the traffic that comes from those two spots. I liked his dorm room better than the ones we seen on the tour back in June at the other dorm. Since it's probably a slightly newer building than the one we toured, it was more updated in appearance.


I called him on Sunday to see how things were going so far. Classes don't start until today, so he's had some time to meet new people. He had been playing ping pong when I called. Funny, I never pictured my son being very interested in ping pong before.... but then again, he's never been interested in dancing either, but they lured all the kids to the bubble for a dance and since everyone was expected to dance, he did. I don't know if he danced alone or with someone, but I'm just impressed that he stayed and did it. LOL!!


God Bless and have a great day!

A quick project

Since I have been able to get a laptop (FINALLY!) I have been able to install my Cricut Design Studio program (FINALLY TOO!) After all the hocus pocus to get the program up and functioning properly for actual use, I decided to give letter welding a try. That's probably one of the easiest functions in the program. I tell ya, I can't wait to start making my own image designs on that when I get some free time, which at this point won't be until after the holidays - seriously. I am pretty much into full craft show production mode right now. So, I made this little decorative sign for the show. I got my inspiration for this picture from an older Country Sampler magazine that I've saved for at least a year now. The picture I clipped out was pretty small, but it showed the design with white letters and no burlap background. To be honest with you, I really love how mine turned out - actually even better than the inspiration. Hmmm....I should have taken a picture of the inspiration image. I'm seriously not great at blogging and I know I could not make a living at it.

This is just a regular 5x7 picture frame that I found at a garage sale. Oddly enough, it had another picture frame inside this frame. That frame was one of those cheapo metal frames like from the 70's and 80's. I don't know if that was how it was meant to be or if they modified it themselves to give it a little brass accent to the inside of the frame opening or what. I popped that sucker out, gave the metal piece to the hubs and told him to add to his scrap metal collection and I saved the glass. Then I just sanded the wood a little for that trendy distressed look. I'm almost tempted to keep it for myself!

It's pretty bad that even though I just made this, I can't recall which cartridge I used for the font, but I think it was Botanicals and the star cut is from the George cartridge. The word is cut from black vinyl and it's on the inside of the glass so you can still clean the outside without worrying about the vinyl peeling off.

So, that's my project for this week and I'm linking it up over at Funky Junk Interiors Saturday Night Special this week for the Farm/Western Things category. If the burlap doesn't fit in the FARM category, then what does? ;^)






Also linking up with House of Hepworth!

Went and took the son shopping for clothes and the rest of what he needs for college next week. So exciting and a little sad to know he's going so soon. He's a very good kid and a little short on the common sense end of life and quite a bit naive...and no, I'm not being naive about what his knowledge of things. He's not used to a big city like Indianapolis, so I worry about his safety. His room mate is from Indy, but gives my son the impression that he's been quite protected even more than my kid. I hope they end up being good friends and look out for each other.

That's it for now, God Bless and have a great day!

A Chalkboard Project

I have been finding all kinds of awesome looking chalkboards out there in blog land that are being made out of old mirrors, frames & just pieces of wood! If you check out Donna's Funky Junk Interior blog, there's lots of great inspiration there to see! They are just so cool. I did redo one for my hubby on his Coca-Cola board, because the existing chalkboard surface was worn smooth, but that's not on here today.


So, in my garage saling searches for goodies to put in my fall craft shows, I came across a picture (sorry, I am so bad at before pics because I get overzealous to start on my projects when the inspiration strikes!) that I thought it would make an awesome sized chalkboard! But let me tell you, this design was a royal pain in the @$$ to get done and there was more than one attempt at just about every aspect of the project. I'm pretty pleased with the end result, even though the lighter color is not exactly what I wanted, it's what I had to resort to......long story, I won't bore you with the details of that. It's actually a cream color frame & corner design with a chocolate brown chalkboard. I would like to paint a line along each side between the decorative corner designs, but I'm afraid it would just emphasize that the corners are not exactly placed. Who knows? Maybe I'll change my mind and do it after all.


































Is this not a good sized chalkboard? It would look so impressive on a door.






And I thought it looked pretty durn good on our mantel too! I think I could get into making lots of chalkboards and I like how they look with the designs too, but it's not my favorite part of working on them. This was my first one to try the stenciling on, so I learned lots of things, so maybe others will follow and be better to make.

 

 Now about some non-crafty stuff: I'm dealing with some major stuff with my mom right now, some of the chaos she created, but some of it involves dealing with protecting her against someone who is apparently taking advantage of her & the situation, so I'm working on getting Power of Attorney over her, but the damage may be done. In that, case legal recourse will be MY next action, if I even if I don't have a leg to stand on. In speaking with others that understand the responsibilities of people in this person's position, there is STRONG cause for serious concern, so I'm not just being overly protective.


I'm kind of frustrated that my mom wouldn't give me POA years ago when I tried to get it. I don't know if she realizes what has happened and even though I haven't spoke with my mom in 2 1/2 years, I still don't want someone taking advantage of her either. It's not their right.


I've been dealing with a lot of frustration in crafting as well as my personal life. I hope it all has a happy ending for my mom and myself.


I am linking this project up on Funky Junk Interior's blog for the Saturday Night Special (SNS) for FJI Inspired projects.





God Bless and have a great day!

Finally got some goodies!! - long post

So Sat. was my 46th birthday. I decided that we should make a day trip to Indianapolis to help my son get more accustomed to the drive and the area. He's a real country bum'kin when it comes to driving. He's not one to venture very far from his comfort zone. He was NOT happy with me when I informed him at the last minute on Sat. Morning that HE was doing the driving. Oh yea....he tried all kinds of things to make us change our minds. Sorry dude, ain't gonna happen. For one, I know that he didn't want us to know his driving habits. He hadn't had much training with an adult before he got his license. Just with me. He used to do better then. Would you believe we almost had a collision with a police officer's vehicle along the highway before we ever left town???!!! Yes. would have made my most memorable birthday EVER if that would have happened. Don'tcha think? Thank the Lord above that it didn't. He did OK most of the trip, but breaking and acceleration left much to be desired. cough cough e'hem. We had some issues with directions & that would be my fault. I forgot to google directions before we left, so I was going by the blown up image of the city on the atlas. Not good. It didn't help that they were doing restoration on the Market Square Tower in the very center of downtown, so there was a detour around it & that threw me a curve. It wasn't as simple as it sounds, really. Between the one way streets and the street events going on, it was confusing. I didn't really have any trouble getting us back on the street I thought we needed to be on, but that proved to be a misjudgement. We should have got on a different street than the one we came into town on. I just love city driving too. However, we were able to get to the college in a round about way with no issues. It just didn't help my son get to know a reliable route to get there. He could take the interstate around the city, but 8 lanes of high speed traffic would totally freak him out. I let Alan take over at that point because I wanted to go to Archiver's scrapbook store. I haven't been there in a few years. YAY!!! Birthday's are good!


I seen so much cute stuff & wanted SOOO much of it, but I knew I had to be pretty good - birthday or not. Brooke came in with me to do her shopping. ;^) I'm not sure what happened, but somewhere along the line, she lost a $5 bill in the store. I counted her $$ in her wallet in the sticker section. I saw all of it & counted it. She did not get into her purse and I didn't take the money out of her wallet when I counted it. One was not folded in half either. We didn't take much longer after that until we were ready to check out. Just not really sure how only 1 of the 3 $5 came up missing. Anywho... This is what I managed to get my sticky fingers on!



 Sorry the photo is so bright on the upper left side, but if you can tell over there, the 3 pieces of cream/yellow/black floral papers are just a small sampling the new Authentique brand of paper in the "Blissful" line. Let me tell you, this is some excellent quality card stock! I wanted it all, but figured 3 pieces would be a fair start. It's not like I need another sheet of any paper ever again, but I've been on a dry run on new stuff for over a year now. I picked up some of the cute pink and black discontinued Heidi Swapp paper to try to finish up that graduation mini album I'm still working on. I'm getting low on papers to finish it. This paper has a little flap of cute little tags attached too. Nice.


Then, I got some simple papers from Graphic 45. I could have easily gone overboard on this stuff too (surprise) but only got what I could think of using up on specific projects right now. I picked up a few sheets of October Afternoon's Near Mint collection - again limiting myself to only 3 sheets - oh! the agony!!! I got 2 pieces of Bo Bunny Timepiece collection because I seen a page that I want to lift and they used this paper (front & back). Then, I got a couple pieces of Basic Grey striped paper that is also discontinued from the Curio line. It has that vintage Christmas feel to me and I had to have it. I did learn one thing at Archiver's . . . . discontinued doesn't necessarily mean discounted. Humph! Glad I only 4 sheets.


Then, the good stuff doesn't stop at paper, oh goodness no! I got me some of those really cool kraft glassine pockets from Tim Holtz. I wanted to buy one of everything in his section along with the stuff in the 7 Gypsies next to it! I only got one of his things and no 7G's. I did manage to pick up a little pkg of Making Memories garment pins though - stinkin cute! I drooled over all the pretty different flowers but picked out the mixed pkg of paper & crochet flowers by Prima and those too darn cute tiny daisies!! I peeing my pants when I seen them online when they were released. Of course, I had to pick up a bottle of Glimmer Mist in Copper. I hope I like it because it looks pretty orange to me, but not a color I have. Last, but not least was those cute pkgs of colored twine! I have been drooling for those for quite a long time now. They had more colors, but I limited myself to 4. I was kind of wanting a more baby blue one too, but they were probably out of that one. Maybe I can use the coupon when we go back down there for Jordan's college move in day on the 24th? ;^)


But, as exciting as it was for me to be able to go to Archivers, the real exciting present was my shiny new LAPTOP!!!! Finally! It was a better one than I had picked out at Christmas & now it was $50 cheaper, plus I had a $5 off birthday coupon from Best Buy! That baby was MINE!! My sweet hubby made sure we hunted hi & lo until we found a store in Indy that had one. I like that it's a shiny silver one that I can try to decorate up with vinyl using my Cricut and I can finally load the Cricut Design Studio and be a little more creative with my machine! Of course, those of you that may have been waiting for ProvoCraft to make the official release of their FREE online Design Studio, that will probably happen now that I can finally use my purchased version. LOL!


Well, I've had a chaotic day today and I think I've written a long enough post today & yet nothing inspirational for you all to see. I just don't want my blog sitting idle for too long. I lose what few readers I get when I do that. LOL!! I promise that there will be some scrappy stuff to show in the somewhat near future, just hang in there with me - K?


God Bless and have a great day!

No new inspiration to share - sorry!

But I have a somewhat interesting story to share, at least I find it interesting to ME! You see, I was working on a chalkboard and wanted to dress it up a bit with some stenciled designs. Needless to say in my previous post, it didn't work out. So I sanded down the bad painted stencil job and I needed to mix more paint to cover the sanding (got a little carried away with the sanding too - go figure) but I wanted something to mix my paint with beside trying to do it by hand again. I seen on another blog that this lady used one of those immersible hand blenders. PERFECT! Only...I don't have one. :( So I did some looking online to see how much one of those would cost me at Wally World. It looked like $20 was the cheapest one and that was fine enough for paint! I hated to think about spending that kind of money on a blender, for all things - paint. So Brooke and I head out to fight the awful road construction that is going on right in front of Walmart this summer.

Up the road we discover that there is a garage sale. I only have a couple of bucks on me, but we stop and look anyway. What. do. I. discover? Yes. An immersible hand blender exactly like what I was heading to get at that moment!! Just like it was MEANT to be! But, ummm...it has no price on it. I ask the lady how much it is and she starts out asking me how much I thought it was worth, then she questions me if $5 is ok. I ask if $3 would work & she says sure! Of course, my little Brookie spies a silver satin clutch she feels she needs for $1. Oh, but wait. I only have $2 on me. The lady said she'd hold them for me until I came back with the $$. And so, after a trip to the bank and a few other garage sales later ;^), we return to pay the lady. And she asked me how much we agreed to and she says "$2?" as she's holding up the blender. And I was being honest and said no, it was $3. So she only charged me $2 for the blender AND $1 for the purse! :O) OK, at this point, I'm done talking and letting her charge me whatever discount she feels is necessary. LOL!! If I would have known that she was asking me $2 for BOTH items, I might have just went with it and it would have been an even better deal! It works beautifully as far as I can tell. My only concern now is that once my husband sees it, he may want it instead of the cup style blender he has for making his fluffy eggs for omelets. What to do, what to do.... ;^)

I made some stuffed primitive shaped stars yesterday for my craft show. I only got 5 done because I was just using up a scrap piece of fabric I had left over from a chair I'm recovering. I don't think I'll be getting anything crafty posted between now and Sat. since the 6th is my birthday and we're planning a trip down to Indianapolis, partly so my son Jordan can test the waters for making the drive back and forth to college there & Alan can see where the college is. He didn't get to make the trip down for the orientation. Jordan is a small town kid and not used to driving in bigger towns, let alone a big city like Indy. This will be interesting, for sure. *sigh*...

I'm hoping to hit one of the Archiver's while we're down there. Haven't been to one of those in a couple of years. I'd like to find another scrapbooking store down there too. Surely Indy has more than just Archivers for scrappy needs!

Well, I have some picture frames I need to go work on and a chalkboard that needs attention - again. Enjoy your weekend!

God Bless and have a great day!

In the words of Charlie Sheen....

WINNER!!

Okay, so I'm not that good about updating my sidebar of my blog and it's just filled with lots of outdated info & I haven't updated it with blogs that I check out just about every day that I can. Some are scrapbook sites and some are repurposing junk sites, but there is one site that I get some amazing junk repurposing inspiration from and that's Donna William's Blog called Funky Junk Interiors. Some day I'll get around to updating my side bar.





Now, about that whole Charlie Sheen - "winner" thing . . . . . over at FJI, Donna was having one of a couple FOLK magazine subscription give aways. As it turns out, my comment post was selected by the Random number picker thingy for the first chance! ;^) It must have known my birthday was coming up this weekend and finally wanted to do something nice for my the occasion. {*snicker!*}

Donna is an amazing sign artist and puts those talents to good use, but she really shines when she starts digging through old wooden pallets & working with found junk. It's no wonder magazines are calling her up wanting her to write articles for them. Take for instance, a new up & coming magazine called FOLK. They're brand spanking new & their first edition will be out on Sept. 1. Donna was asked to be a contributor with her article called Junk Fix. She was and still is having a give away on her blog for a FREE (yes, you read that right - FREE!) 1, ONE, UNO, SINGLE whole year's subscription to this magazine!! Just check out THIS post to see how to enter.

FOLK - "We are a magazine that debuts Fall 2011. We are all about the country, sweet tea, indie music, antiques, roadtrips, small towns, comfortable homes, artists, locally grown and locally made, one-of-a-kind art, open spaces, photography, and the little things."


I know I'm excited for the first issue! It looks to be a down home kinda read!

On to other stuff . . . . Worked on a painting project yesterday and totally ruined it. It would have looked awesome too, but I was trying to do a stencil project and cut contact vinyl with my cricut and even though I was trying to be careful & use light coats, the paint still lifted the edges of the vinyl & bled - BAD! It looks like I'm sanding it down trying something else. I didn't want to have to use regular vinyl because of the cost, but when I try it the next time, I'm only doing one image instead of all of them. That way, if it doesn't work, I'm not fixing the whole thing again. The bad part about this happening is that is sort of takes the wind out of my sails and I get discouraged and don't want to do it anymore. This was a craft show project, and I have purchased other pieces to make as well, and when takes so much effort & then it doesn't turn out on the first one, the other stuff just ends up sitting around and all I can think about is how hard it was to make the first one & I'm not motivated to try it anymore.

CRAP!! OK, so I had additional stuff that I originally had on here (& saved!), but Blogger just eliminated it & it's your lucky day that I'm too lazy to try to remember what it all was & where corrections were made above. I've heard other blogger's complaints about having issues with Blogger eliminating posts and such, but I don't blog every day, so I never had those problems, until now!


And so with that, God Bless and have a great day!