lamps and creations

i uploaded a bunch of lamps to the shop this past weekend and am so excited to share my new creations. the one shown above is, hands down, my favorite! sometimes i have a hard time letting go of certain things i make and i imagine i will hold on extra tight before i ship this one out. although the though of it bringing beauty to someone's home makes the separation a bit easier :)

i love when i can find the skinny pipes of vintage lamp glass because they are so delicate that i am sure most have been broken through the years. luckily, this current upload contains 2 lamps with the skinny necks!

but the best part of this lamp is the beautiful floral base. i love the petal detail - it puts a smile on my face every time i look at it.

if you have been looking for the perfect lamp for a certain spot in your home, head over here to see what i have to offer. they are one of a kind creations lovingly put together by yours truly.

thrifting and treasures

the estate sales this past month have been good to me, very good to me. i typically don't find much in my community at garage or estate sales because the houses are just not that old and people have not spent many years accumulating "junk". however, i might need to rethink that after the stash i found last week.

this one house was amazing! i only wish i would have gotten there right when the doors opened. this woman had enough christmas items to fill up an entire room and i snagged a huge box of vintage ornaments. don't you just love the metallic crackling of color that comes with vintage ball ornaments?

this sweet bird also came in the box of ornaments. her tail was broken off and is actually stuck inside her body, but i don't care at all. i might leave her as is, or try to create a new tail out of some vintage ribbon.

i can never pass up these old jello molds. while i have christmas on the brain, i might turn them into some wreath inspired ornaments. time will tell...

and finally, how cool is this old wheelbarrow??? alright, maybe not everyone thinks it is cool, but i think it is AMAZING! the color, the shape, the huge wheels - amazing. we are working on spiffing up our backyard, and i think this will be perfect as a flower planter. so excited and inspired!

napkins and lunches

since the beginning of summer, i have had "make lunchbox napkins" on my to-do list. i guess i was stalling, because i didn't know if my munchkins would think them dorky or if people would make fun of them for having cloth napkins in their lunch bags. then just last week, i read this post and decided to wait no longer.

i have a ton of this men's shirting fabric (like 10 yards each, no joke) that you might remember from these cuties. i think it is the perfect big boy fabric because let's face it, my 6 & 8 year old munchkins are teetering on young adulthood and won't want my handmade goods much longer so i have to use all the tricks i can.

i cut 12 inch squares and folded each end in a quarter of an inch and then folded in once again. then you sew up the hems. perfectly simple and a great beginner project!

original loves and shop updates

festival season is upon us - are you ready? i love the weeks before a festival where it is a flurry of creating and planning, a whirlwind of excitement.

if you are in need of a vendor apron, check out my shop, i have lots of options available and always love custom orders!

biz branding and colors

i hope everyone had a good weekend! i managed to hang the chandelier in the dining room, but sadly, no crown moulding :(

in better news, i was recently interviewed over on oh my! handmade goodness about my love of craft fairs. head on over if you are looking for some tips and tricks to set your booth apart from the rest.

brightening moods and thoughts

happy friday! this weekend has me hanging crown moulding in the dining room, hanging a new chandelier in said dining room, and all over relaxing with the family. oh, and i will most likely have a book glued to my hands, i cannot get enough of reading lately. if you ever need suggestions, check out the book links in my left hand sidebar. i put any book i am reading up there and while i can't recommend ALL of them, most are pretty good.

what have been some of your favorite books lately?

time and lists

are you guys waiting for school to start so you can begin crossing things off your list? my week and a half of quiet days has helped tremendously. i feel like i can see the light!!!

in between my stressing over to-dos, i periodically wonder how we got ourselves into this mess. how did we become a society where to-do lists are mandatory to get ourselves through the day. i tell my husband all the time that i want one day with no lists looming. jsut a day filled with bright prospects of the unknown.

not sure if it was in "before sunset" or "before sunrise" but ethan hawke has an awesome line about all the time saving tools in our present day such as computers and email, etc. but the funny part about it is that we never take an extra vacation or time off. we never say "look at all the time saved by doing xy and z". funny, huh???

safe travels and lamps

i am packing this lamp up for a very important trip this week. it's going as a large "calling card" for me to a very important building that houses the offices for a very special magazine. fingers crossed for me peeps, fingers crossed!

drawings and a new lens

here's another small drawing to close out the week. i am really loving capturing the beauty of a single stem. not sure what these flowers are called, but i have been buying them a lot lately. they are full and colorful and last forever!

on another note, i bought a new lens and holy cow - it's amazing! it is a 50mm prime and while it took a bit getting used to, i think it is going to be my go to lens. my other lenses are all zoom, so my hand keeps grasping the barrel, trying to zoom, but hopefully that habit will die out soon. my favorite part is what they call "bokeh". it is what blurs out the background while making the foreground crisp and clear as you can see on the right side of the photo.

what is your favorite lens???

pillowcases and a little trim

hi all! i have another ribbon project for you that can also be found in the tutorial section on the left hand side of my blog - embellished pillowcases.

as you know, i am no stranger to estate sales. i love seeing crafts that were popular during out mothers and grandmothers time. one of my most favorite are the decorated pillowcases and embroidered hankies. they are all so unique and so sweet. i think everyone needs a little bit of unexpected beauty in their lives.

so, this time around, i decided to embellish some pillowcases for my guest room. in our grandmothers time, they would sit for hours hand crocheting or tatting around the pillowcase opening, but in our crazy packed days, many of us don't have that time to devote. so i though, why not use crochet trim where all you have to do is sew it on. perfect!


click here to download the instructions and to start beautifying your room!

sunshine and school

my munchkins just arrived home from school and they couldn't contain their excitement of the first day back. i know, i know, here in the south we start school really early. but remember that we get out early also. it is sometimes a little hard to grasp that the kids have to go back while there is still a month of prime pool weather!

at least for my household, the arrival of school is very welcome. while i love being able to spend time with them over the summer, i like spending time with myself as well and often that has to take the back burner. i feel guilty if i am not entertaining them throughout the day and most of the time, i can't. that's just a fact of life with a working mom, albeit, one who is blessed to work from home. so, with the arrival of school and routine, i breath a tiny sigh of relief. relief that i can balance and manage what i have to do during the day while they are learning and then i can be available at night for homework and dinner.

so for me, back to school is a time for finishing projects that have been lingering. i need to put up some crown moulding in the dining room, work on new items for the shop, scan in some new botanical drawings, etc.... oh, and also work on some graphic design projects for my day job - can't forget what pays the bills!

a quilt and petals

my dining room redo is moving right along. i finally finished the table quilt and am completely smitten. i cut 8 pie pieces out of 4 fabrics from anna maria horner and tula pink. i sewed the pie sections together, then layered it on top of a white sheet for backing and low-loft batting in the middle.

i have not yet mastered free form quilting - instead, i stitched a line along each side of the seams. following along the seam created from attaching the pieces together, gives you a great ruler to ensure a straight stitch. then i measured out and added 2 more lines of stitching within each pie starting on the outside edge and ending in the middle.

once quilted together, i decided to scallop the edge of each section to mimic flower petals. i was worried about the binding going along the curves, but it turned out great.

this room is taking on a much more eclectic style which is so much more me than the formal room i had before. my tastes are always changing, but i think i will love this table quilt forever!

gardenias and sunflowers

something inside of me has been dying to sketch lately. i am craving colored pencils as well as ink which has led me here. these are just some of my doodles of late - a gardenia and a sunflower.

with the kids still on summer break, i don't have much time, so these drawings are under an hour and the perfect little escape in my otherwise crazy days.

what do you do to sneak away from the noise of everyday life?

artful blogging and flying high

i cannot believe i am about to type this, but... my little blog has been featured in ARTFUL BLOGGING! eeek!!!! my excitement is through the roof and i have had a permanent smile all day long. i found out i was selected a few months ago and proceeded to write an article, but felt i would be jinxing myself to let the cat out of the bag that early. i am not superstitious about much, but sometimes, i can't help it.

being featured in artful blogging is one of the biggest goals i have set for my creative life (as you can see in a sample post they printed with my article). i remember seeing a copy of this publication at my local jo-ann's early on and being completely mesmerized. print and web had always been two separate entities, then this publication came out and it made us as artists look at things differently. to combine the two worlds was genius!

what i think is important to tell everyone reading is that this did not come easy for me. they say that you have to work and reach for your goals, and this was no different. i submitted my blog 3 times. yes, 3 times over the course of a year and a half. the publishing world is hard because they get so many submissions, that often you get no response. that leaves you wondering if things got lost in the mail, or if they just didn't like what they saw. but each time i didn't hear anything, i said to myself "well, at least you didn't hear NO." so i gave myself a pep talk and then friends would give me a pep talk and i would submit again. then, something just clicked. maybe my blog has grown and evolved from the fist time i sent it in. maybe they were waiting for a compilation of artists that i "fit" with. all i know is i was chosen and i couldn't be happier. some people would never tell you the back story about how they became published, leading you, the reader to think that everything comes so easy to others which then makes you beat yourself up about not reaching your own personal goals. but all the cliches are true... it takes time, but with a little hard work, eventually you will achieve all you wish for.

so that's my story and now it is also in print :) head on out to your local bookstore and pick a copy up for yourself. you will not be disappointed! every page has amazing eye candy and stories that are equally inspiring.

thank you artful blogging and jennifer jackson for making my dreams come true!