Lazy Susan

Thought I'd share with you a project that I've been working on for quite a while that I just finished. The wood lazy susan was handmade by my brother for me to woodburn and paint. I love starting with a blank slate of wood that I can put whatever I want onto! I learned how to woodburn about ten years ago, and it definitely took a while to get the hang of. You would think that it would be similar to holding a pencil or brush, but you actually have to move your hand quite differently and it takes a while to learn how to get smooth lines, especially the ones that are curvy. For this lazy susan, I decided to draw flowers in the center that I remember seeing in my mother's garden. 

In this photo you can (barely) see the pencil lines of my drawing and I have a little of the woodburning done.

A little more woodburning done :)

All of the woodburning done.
Next I stained it with water-based oak and walnut stain, mixing a metallic gold glaze in with the oak. I wish I had took a picture of it like that because I considered leaving it that way. It really shows the detail of the woodburning more than when its painted. I'm kind of thinking that if I do another one this detailed I will just stain it and leave it. Anyway, I decided to paint this one because I kept envisioning all of mom's pretty flowers in color. Here is another photo of the finished product.

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September Newsletter

I have three words for you: Hot. Apple. Cider. I can’t wait to make some! Aren’t you excited for all of the wonderful things fall brings? We are! Lots of new fall and Halloween craft supplies in; crocheted scarves, winter headbands, and fingerless gloves in with more on the way; and Halloween tutus! So excited for fall and all of our upcoming classes too!

September 15^th: Make Your Own Stamp Class! 2:00-4:00pm.

September 25^th: 6-10 year old Children’s Art Class! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm (last Tuesday of every month except on holidays)

September 27^th: 4-5 year old Children’s Art Class! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm (last Thursday of every month except on holidays)

October 11^th: Milk Resist Class! Learn techniques for using milk resist and spray inks to create beautiful images that can be used for artwork, cards, gift bags, tags, backgrounds for scrapbook pages, etc. Class includes a wood mounted stamp, 2 bottles of spray ink, and various papers and materials for creating different projects. $30.00. 7:00-9:00pm

October 20^th: Art Board and Frame Class! Create one of a kind custom frames for special photos and/or unique pieces of artwork for your home. You may bring your own photos to use, otherwise all materials provided (wood, glass, nails, picture hangers, paint, paper, glue, and embellishments), $26.00. 2:00-4:00pm

Our DIY this month are the cute treat bags we have had for sale in the shop in the past. Great for a small gift to cheer up someone’s day! First step: Pick out cute paper for your bag (the inside will show, so it’s nice to use double-sided cardstock). Step 2: Lay down the paper with the back side up, a piece of carbon tracing paper next, and finally the pattern on top. Step 3: Trace around the lines on the pattern (you can tell we’ve used this pattern a lot J). Step 4: Cut the outside edges out and the inside of the handle. Step 5: The other lines are your fold lines. Fold in along those lines. Step 6: Glue the side together and the flaps on the bottom. Step 7: Fill with delicious chocolates!

P.S. We also custom make these for party events, Valentine’s Day, etc. Filled with Ghirardelli chocolates, they are $6.00 each.

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Custom Fall Wedding Order

So, a large part of our extra time this summer was spent on a custom order. We put a lot of hard work into this and are very happy with the results. It involved a door installation, 8 cake table centerpieces, a paper flower bouquet, and of course tissue poms. The door installation consisted of half tissue poms and different sizes of fan-fold medallions with vintage button centers.

The cakes were covered with old book pages, embellished with vintage ribbon and fan-fold medallions, and topped with a half tissue pom. 

The flower bouquet was made up of paper roses, origami flowers, and fan-fold medallions with a light/natural colored burlap wrapped around it.

We loved the fiery fall colors our clients chose and were so happy to be able to do this for them. Thanks so much, Peg, for believing in us and giving us so much freedom in our design decisions. You're awesome!

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Board Image Transfer

Just finished a big custom order that I've been working on for months, yay! (will post photos later)  So I rewarded myself today by making something just for fun. I decided to do an image transfer of my fall Smith Falls photo onto an 8x10 board that we had left over from the class last night. Instead of using matte medium, I used iron on Transfer Artist Paper(TAP). Definitely a different process and I had to experiment with it. This is the one I liked the best :) I like the look of the natural pine wood of the board with this photo. Just wish the aged crackly effect would have been more around the edges of the photo instead of in the center :-). Still pretty happy with it though.

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August Newsletter!

Wow, summer just flew by. I can’t believe it’s already time for school to start! We have an awesome Back to School Sale going on right now in the shop: 30% off of all papercrafting and office supplies! Paper, punches, embellishments, ribbon, scrapbooks, stamps, tools, the list goes on and on. We also have 30% off Papaya and Iota bags. It’s a great time to pick up any craft supplies that you’ve been needing or that the kids might need for school. We also have some exciting things planned for August and September:

August 23rd: Art Board and Frame Class! Create one of a kind custom frames for special photos and/or unique pieces of artwork for your home. You may bring your own photos to use, otherwise all materials provided (wood, glass, nails, picture hangers, paint, paper, glue, and embellishments), $26.00. 7:00-9:00pm

August 28^th: 6-10 year old Children’s Art Class! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm (last Tuesday of every month during the school year, except on holidays)

August 30^th: 4-5 year old Children’s Art Class! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm (last Thursday of every month except on holidays)

September 15^th: Make Your Own Stamp Class! Learn how to carve your own rubber stamp, the possibilities are endless! Can be used to make personalized cards and stationery, embellish scrapbook pages, in artwork, or on anything you can think of :-). Depending on the type of ink/paint you use, stamps can be used on paper, fabric, wood, and even sheetrock. 2:00-4:00pm. $35.00, includes carving tool, tracing paper, rubber blocks, ink, wood, and corks. Because we have to order in so many supplies for this class, we are asking that you sign up and prepay by Sept. 5^th.

Our DIY this month is a sweet jar garland we have for sale in the shop. There are soooo many things you can do with Mason jars, and about as many things you can do with paper ones! We cut out jars from “Twinkling Lights” Dear Lizzy paper, punched holes in the lids, and strung yarn through them. Next we had fun embellishing them with buttons, rickrack, baker’s twine, and fabric flowers. Finally we cut strips of material and tied them in between the jars. Makes a simple, but sweet garland for the end of summer:-).

PS For those of you that do not live in the area, we are adding more and more things to our Etsy shop, and will be updating our website soon with more information about custom orders.

Thanks!

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Hammerpress

Absolutely loved visiting Hammerpress in Kansas City! It's so awesome to get to see where you order product from. And although they didn't have the presses going, they have big open windows from the retail area looking in to the presses. So awesome! I love the handcrafted quality of letterpress printing. So much I wanted to buy, but I narrowed it down to a few essential purchases :-)

Can't wait to order from them again!Tweet

Best Mom in the World

So I have the best mom in the world. You may disagree, but I'm pretty convinced. Not only has she done more for me than seems possible, she is also crazy creative. She looked at the flywheel on the bottom of this lamp and dreamed up the lamp to go with it. Then, with a little help from my uncle, she brought it into existence. When she saw this table with car axles at an auction, she knew she needed it to go with her industrial lamp. After a lot of work cleaning, sanding, staining, and polyurethaning, it was ready to find its place next to the lamp. I'm pretty excited to have some cool industrial pieces in the shop, and it just gives me one more reason to think that I have the best mom ever :).Tweet

July Newsletter!

Sure is hot outside and we have some hot new projects for you this month! Super excited about our upcoming classes and events.

July 19, 24: 6-10 year old Children’s Art Classes once a week for the month of July! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm

August 9th: Art Board and Frame Class! Create one of a kind custom frames for special photos and/or unique pieces of artwork for your home. You may bring your own photos to use, otherwise all materials provided, $26.00. 7:00-9:00pm

August 28^th: 6-10 year old Children’s Art Class! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm

August 30^th: 4-5 year old Children’s Art Class! $7.50 per class per child, $6.00 per child if you have more than one child in your family taking classes, all materials provided. 4:30-5:30pm

 Our DIY this month is super simple and fun. It’s a great way to repurpose any large old frames you might have lying around. I wish I had a photo of one of the first frames we did like this because it was more ornate, and the more ornate the better for this project. First, you take an old frame and sand it a little. Then paint it with good quality paint in a fun color (I used paint that is premixed with primer already in it). This worked great for the ornate frame because there were places where the plaster was falling off, but once painted you could hardly tell. Next, choose a color coordinating ribbon and tie it across the frame in double-knotted bows. If there isn’t a hanger on the back of your frame, just get a D-ring, hanging wire, or sawtooth hanger from your local hardware store, drill holes and screw them on. Finally, clip cards or photos with tiny clothespins across the ribbon. And you’re done! With a super cute display to show for it.:-) 

We’ve been getting a lot of custom orders in lately for party banners, centerpieces, wedding decorations, and wedding hairpieces, so if you are thinking about getting some cute and affordable custom-made decorations, get your orders in soon!

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Treasuries: Etsy Love

So every now and then I reward myself with wasting a ton of time creating Etsy treasuries. Anyone else do this? Its kind of like being able to curate your own themed museum/art show of handmade and vintage items. A lot like Pinterest, but maybe a little less utilitarian. Anyway, I just created a new red, white, and blue treasury for the 4th that I thought I'd share: just click here. And if anyone is interested in looking at my other treasuries, you can click here.

Would love to look at your treasuries too, so if you have created some please comment and link to them!

One more confession, I keep taking the Etsy taste test over and over again just for fun...Tweet

Collage Fun

Excited to be working on some collages today. And happy that I finally get to use some of the Crate Paper we ordered in about a month ago. I hope it sells well because I'm in love with this company and would love to keep ordering from them! I'm all about vintage and vintage-inspired modern and as far as I can tell so are they. And, their papers work great with old book pages, one of my favorite materials to use. Ok, now back to some collage fun...Tweet