Project: decorate hair.

As some of you know, I like to make funky, bulky, colourful & different hair accessories.  Slight problem!!  I am bored with my collection of goodies.  Time to source some new inspiration and get a making!! 

Thanks pinterest.  I have put links to each of the images cause I don't have my very own pinterest account yet.  I'm waiting on them to get back to me.  I have been fighting the pinterest urge, and have now given up.

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Getting back to normal

Hey folks.  Well the move is over.  Here is the basic overview of what went down:

- I packed 90% of the boxes, and unpacked 95% of them
- I probably spent about $50 on packing tape
- I spent $0 on boxes though!!  Thank you Good Guys cardboard bin.
- I threw out alot of stuff
- We had planned to hire a moving truck to make everyone's lives easier and do the move in one go.  BUT, we couldn't, because our unit complex is annoying and we couldn't bring the truck inside the gates and so it would make it MORE work to walk everything outside the complex to the truck. 
- We moved by trailer.  ONE trailer.  Thank heavens we didn't have to go far.
- We took loads over every day and every night for the 5 days leading up to the official moving day.
- I did several loads on my own, thus killing all the muscles and bones in my body.
- I managed to unpack my craft room in the new house before the actual moving day.
- Moving day was hard work.  I lifted things that I shouldn't have, because they were way too heavy.
- I had no strength left in my hands by the end of it all, and kept dropping things.  Luckily nothing broke.
- I hate going up and down stairs.  They were on BOTH ends.  They were the death of my legs.
- I made a Beef & Vegie Casserole in the slow cooker, which was our lunch.  Plus I made 2 pumpkin pies the night before and they went down like a treat too.  Have to feed the troops so they keep on helping!
- Take away food was pretty much all we ate that week.  I am SO sick of take away.
- It takes a whole lot of brain energy to figure out where everything is going to go, when we are in a smaller space now.  More things need to be sold.. doh!
- There is no easy way of storing dining room chairs.
- Not having your fridge and pantry in the kitchen is kind of annoying.
- Spending two days straight cleaning the old house makes you grumpy, especially when one of those days is a public holiday and I am not doing something fun like everyone else.
- Scrubbing kitchen tile grout with a toothbrush will cause tail bone pain after a while.
- The property manager did his inspection after we handed in our keys etc, and decided that everything looked fantastic.  BUT.  There was a cracked tile under the stairs in the cupboard and it needed to be replaced.  What?  You are kidding me right?  It's under the stairs, out of sight.  Get a life!!!!  We didn't even crack it either.  The previous tenants did, but we missed it on the entry report, so WE got stuck with fixing it.  Mega annoying!
- Husby and Dad spent 4 hours replacing it on Saturday.  It also ended up costing husby $170 to buy a tool to cut the $45 brand new diamond cutting blade off of dad's old angle grinder which broke and had the new blade stuck on it.  Then dad bought a new $200 angle grinder.  Plus the grout, tile and glue that needed to be purchased, it ended up costing about $440 to replace a tile.  Oops. 
- Good news is, we got a FULL refund of our bond, much to the displeasure of our property manager.  His face was classic when he realised there was nothing he could fault us on and had to return our bond.  I get the feeling he doesn't often return it all.
- Our bedroom is my childhood bedroom.  It's kinda weird sleeping in a bed with your husband in your childhood bedroom.
- Oh, did I mention we moved back in with my parents?  It's super strange.  But we have a fairly good space to ourselves.  We have the whole upstairs which is 3 bedrooms, a loungeroom and a toilet.  Bathroom is downstairs, and we share the kitchen and laundry.  Thankfully mum has a huge kitchen bench so we can both cook at the same time.
- We will save tonnes over the next year.  Our rent is substantially lower, so we will save $30k alone in what we aren't paying in rent anymore.  Yes Americans, we pay the earth in rent every week.  We used to pay $340 p/w ($1360 p/m) for a dump hole.
- I hate moving.

That's pretty much everything.  Over the weekend I had a little spare time and made a few things, which was so nice to do!  I haven't been able to create for a few weeks.  I hope to share later on this week, and I really really need to put more stuff in my shop!!  So much catching up to do!!!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Featured!

I popped onto Madeit this morning and was pleasantly suprised to see this!!!

My doily table runner has been handpicked to be on the front page today!!  It has lifted my sad, sorry and sick mood substantially!  Thanks Madeit!

Moving & stress relieving card making

As you may (or may not) know, I am moving.  Moving day is in 9 days!!  Lucky for us, we can take smaller loads of boxes and fragile items over to Mum and Dad's place (where we're moving) and start organising them there.  Moving day should then only consist of furniture items, if we get all the other things over there ourselves in the meantime.  It's been really hard figuring out what to pack in which box, because this isn't your typical move.  Husby and I will be sharing the kitchen & laundry with my parents.  So this means we won't be needing quite a few items, as we will use theirs.  SO, we have gone through the kitchen a few times and had to figure out which box the item went into... the donate box, the storage box, the unpack box, or the try to sell at car boot sale box.  Things that are being packed to be stored, I am packing very carefully, with lots of newspaper, and ensuring there are firmer items at the top of the box to create a steady base for the box that will likely be stacked on top of it for a year!!!  

We have three bedrooms and a small lounge area to ourselves.  We are going to use husby's study room to store most of the boxes, which will be stacked up a few boxes high, so I really need to be careful how I pack.  Each box has a packing sheet taped to it, which has the room it belongs to, whether it is a storage or unpack box, and all of the contents written on it.  I am glad I do packing sheets because I have had to open 3 boxes in the past week looking for things I had prematurely packed and I needed!!! 

I am also INCREDIBLY, stupidly, ridiculously, crazy busy at work at the moment.  I work in an Accounting firm in the Reception area and it is Tax Season!!!!  Kill me now!!  I barely have time to go to the loo!!!   It's incredibly stressful and fast paced.  Just the way I DON'T like it!  

And to top it all off, I am once again sick!  This time round, I have tonsilitis.  It's been about 3 weeks now.  I am on antibiotics but they don't seem to be doing the trick.  There have been a couple of moment in the past few weeks where I wanted to rip my tonsils out myself!  I even had trouble breathing and swallowing one night.  Horrendous.  

So this is why I need stress relief people.  Sick, moving, over-busy work.  

I was smart when I packed up my craft room.  I left out all my card making supplies!  

I have been making cards just about every night for the last week and it has been great.  As usual I don't love every card I make, but I figure someone out there will.  Only problem is, I've had no desire to clean up after each card project.  So my desk now looks like this...

It's gonna be SO FUN to tidy up when I get around to it hehe!!  Here's what I've made in this past week...

I've made several of each card design, so I have a nice stack of cards to add to my stash.  I've been having fun using my new stamp & paper sets that I have recently ordered from Stampin' Up!  Notice that most of the cards are sewing themed?  Awesome huh!!  They came out with a whole bunch of sewing themed stamp sets and a paper set in their latest mini catalogue.  I had to buy the lot.  And I'm thinking of buying more paper before it becomes unavailable too!!  Something I found out, is that they have made the patterned paper into fabric in the USA.  Jealous!  I think I'm going to have to try and get my hands on some.  It is simply divine!!

Well that is what I've been up to lately.  Back to packing I think!!

Mind confessions of a crazy packer.

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 Mess.  Chaos.  Brain overloading.  Boxes for storage.  Boxes to be unpacked.  Craft supplies to sort, cull, sell, giveaway.  Wrapping breakables in newspaper.  Is the box too heavy?  Did you reinforce the bottom with enough tape?  Where is the tape anyway? Crap we ran out of tape.  Where are the packing sheets?  I can't find a pen.  Where the hell can I put these boxes?  We ran out of newspaper.  Do you think that the other tenants in our complex will notice I've stolen ALL of the newspapers for the last two weeks?  I'll be stealing them for another week or soo too.  Where's the Sharpie?  Crap, ran out of tape again.  Will there be enough room to store all these boxes?  Listing furniture for sale online.  Oh crap, the couch sold 3 weeks earlier then expected.  What are we going to sit on?  Hand in notice of intention to leave to landlord.  Waiting for list of 'what to clean and fix' before we leave.  Crap I packed all the cleaning rags already.  What box are they in.  I can't find them.  Idiot!  Oh well, just rip up some towels and buy some new ones to use.  Crap those new towels were expensive.  Crap, I say crap alot.  I need another box.  What?  We ran out of boxes.  You guessed it... crap!  "Hey can I still have all those moving boxes you were getting rid of?", "you're a legend!".  Make a cake.  Open cupboard to get out baking tin.  Crap, I already packed it.  Unpack tin, bake cake, wash and dry tin, pack it back away.  Good thing I am OCD about writing contents of boxes on packing sheets.  Where are the Fragile stickers?  Where are we going to store the dining room set?  Ooops, it's 7pm and I haven't cooked dinner yet.  Should we throw this out?  When is the piano removalist coming?  It's going to cost HOW MUCH to move????  Think = go jump.  Say = sounds good.   Eat all the food in the freezer and pantry.  I'm sick of eating canned food.  Keep eating canned food.  So, wanna eat pasta every night for a week?  Wash the black ink off my hands from the newspaper for the 20th time tonight.  Who wants to buy my microwave?  I don't know either.  Crap, we ran out of tape again.  Dreaming about packing.  Living a life of packing.

We will start moving some things into Mum and Dad's starting up this weekend.  We have already run out of room for all the boxes that are packed thus far.  We will be storing ALOT of our stuff for the year we are going to be living with them.  We don't have much room.  We're selling alot, giving away alot, throwing away alot.  The whole process is making me crazy... incase you didn't notice.  So nothing crafty and delightful today, and I can't promise anything fabulous for at least a few more weeks.  One good thing though, I'll still have my own craft room.  Bliss!  Wish me luck!




Stuffed shirts.

One last post to show you what I've made in preparation for my demonstration on Thursday night.  3 cushions covers made from men's shirts.  

The circle cushions are both (obviously) made from old button up/collared shirts.  The square one is made from an old polo that husby was throwing out.  I almost stopped breathing when I started to cut into that Ralph Lauren shirt (top left), but my dad assured me he would never wear it again and I could cut into it.  

I did my first button hole on the square cushion cover!!  It took me a good 20 mins to figure out how to even attach the appropriate foot on the sewing machine, but I got there in the end.  I probably could have made the hole a little smaller, but I am nonetheless pleased with my effort.  

I'll have to remember to take photos on Thursday night of all my demo items and display.  Husby also mentioned that he thinks the round cushions looks like old mens round bellies, and I have to agree.  Funny!  See ya!

A quick table display.

Once again, in preparation for my demonstration this week, I have something to share.  Today at church I was asked to do a table display promoting the upcoming activity this week.  I am really annoyed at myself that I didn't think to take a picture of my little display, but I didn't want you to miss out so I ended up setting it up at home to take a photo for you.  It looked great and I got lots of compliments from people who were looking forward to what I was going to demonstrate at the activity.   

And here are closeup's of all the elements.

That is the table runner that I told you about earlier in the week.  I just used some scrap fabric to tie around the vase, and spray painted some sticks with red & silver spray paint.

My first attempt at bunting!! I just chose some scrap fabrics that co-ordinated with the table runner and whipped it up in under an hour.  I am super pleased with it and will be making some again soon because it was so simple!

And then for the cutlery frame.  This one took a little more work.  I just painted a thrifted frame black.  Then I traced my cutlery placement on the frame backing, and drilled some nice narrow holes using the husby's electric drill.  

Next was to spray paint the wood.  I did it silver, but I think if I did it again I would use a more contrasting colour.  White, green, blue or red were some of husby's suggestions.  Next time!

I am happy how it turned out regardless!

I still have a couple of things to show you.  Hopefully I'll have some time this week to share it.  

TOPIC CHANGE!!  I am moving!!  Our lease is up next month and we are moving in with my parents for a year to save money towards buying a house.  So I am already madly going through the house deciding what to do with all of our stuff!!!  Some we are already attempting to sell, others we are putting aside to sell at the local car boot sale early next month.  Then I need to start looking at what do we put away in boxes for a year, and what will we still use while living at mum and dads.  We are going to have ALOT less room, so I need to be brutal and part with alot of our possessions.  Alot of the older electrical appliances will be going, a few bits of furniture, including our couch!  It's gonna be fun!

Decorative Balls - Christy style!

This is something I've been working on in my spare moment over the past week.  I am super happy with the outcome - better then what I had anticipated, and a hell of a lot cheaper then what is available in the stores.  And let's be honest, the ones in the store are nowhere near as funky as these!!

  Although this is a new addition to my dining room table, I actually made it to show at the class/demonstration I am doing this upcoming week on how to decorate your house on the cheap, or using what you have at home, at an activity my church is putting on.  I googled "homemade deco balls" and sifted through tonnes of great ideas, and this is what I put together.

Took the piccie late at night on my phone (lazy), so you can't see the full effect of how amazing it is.  BUT here is all the balls laid out so you can see all the different colours and textures and sizes.

They were all easy to make.  Some fiddlier then others, but only because I kept getting my fingers stuck in the glue!  I used a mixtures of polystyrene & plastic golf balls to make all of my pretty balls.  Here's what I did:

• Thumbtack balls - you just go around once through the centre of the ball, and then continue on overlapping each layer slowly.  Just keep going around and around until everything is covered.  I found it necessary to put a little hot glue under the last few tacks to keep it all secure.  Then I spray painted them.  That took forever!  They needed about 3 coats on each side.  I think they sat outside being sprayed for about 4 days!
• Lentil balls - just bought a few bags of 'soup mix' lentils and picked out the two shapes and sizes I liked best.  Luckily one of the beans was already green so I just hot glued them down and was happy with the colour and left them.  Nice and easy!  The other I just glued down and then spray painted white.  After that dried I watered down some green paint and went over them - which gives it a rustic look.  Really happy with those balls.
• String balls - the fiddliest of all.  I just did a knot in the string and used a pin to secure it at the beginning.  Then just put a little bit of hot glue down and just keep going around and around.  Super annoying if you have fat fingers like me!
• Fabric balls - I did a couple of different techniques with these.  Some I cut up little chunks and decoupaged them with white glue.  Others I cut strips and used pins to secure the ends.

I love how they turned out.  Now I just need to demonstrate all these techniques to these women along with all the other things I want to demonstrate in 10 mins.  Should be interesting.....

One last thing.  A good friend of mine has launched her store in Madeit.  Pop on over and check out her amazing talent!

A new use for those old nasty ties!

I was in an Op Shop quite a while ago that was doing a HUGE cleanout of their stock and had their ties marked at $1.  I went to town!!!!  I think I bought about 10 or so.  Some were really fantastic.  So fantastic that I didn't get to keep all of them for my own upcycling use, because husby stole some!  I then put the word out amongst friends that when they do closet clean outs, to give me all their toss worthy items and I would see if I could use them or not.  Soon after a friend gave me a huge bag of old ties her husband has been meaning to toss for some time!  I was super excited. 

Now, I have been asked to do a demonstration at a womens church activity on how to decorate your home using the things you already have, or on the cheap.  I am pretty excited about doing this and have been whipping up a few extra things to demonstrate.  I will be showing some of these ideas to you over the upcoming week or so! 

First I want to show you what I did with some of my awesome old tie collection!  I was sitting on my craft room floor a few nights ago and spread all my awesome ties out in front of me.  I had no idea what I was going to do with them, but I knew that if I stared at them long enough, inspiration would EVENTUALLY strike!!  I was laying some of the co-ordinating ties by each other, thinking over some of the tie creations I had seen in the past - dresses, bags, skirts - and it hit me!!  A TABLE RUNNER!!  I picked my favourite colour combo and got started.  Husby thought I was nuts!  Here is what I ended up with.

Even husby liked it once I had finished it all off!  I am loving it too!  I think it's just fun and different and colourful.  Not to everyone's taste, but that's ok!  I'll be back soon with more fun stuff!

Bad blogger.

I have been slack and selfish.  I have been reading lots of blogs, finding new talented people to follow, taking note of their fabulous ideas, and not bothering to return the favour with producing regular eye candy on my blog haha!!  My apologies.  My attitude stinks towards anything that requires effort due to my ongoing health issues.  Poor health really does mess with you... sigh.

BUT onto brighter and happier things.  I have stuff to show you!

I made my husband some house shorts!  I was bored, and just went and got a pair of his basketball shorts out of his drawer, traced around them, and hoped for the best hahaha!!  They turned out pretty good considering.  After I finished sewing them (and after many a sigh and unpick and grunt) I had husby try them on and they only needed minor adjustments.  He's worn them pretty much every night since.  They're pretty funny if you ask me though!

(apologies for all the photos, they were taken on my phone as I seem to have temporarily misplaced my camera)

Then over the weekend I didn't have much on, so had a go at making another patchwork gypsy skirt.  I love how it turned out, even though I had a different idea in mind originally.  

I was able to overlock/serge all the edges before sewing my panels together.  After much grunting and sighing and unpicking, I was pleased that it came together nicely.  On a side not, I noticed something while I was cutting up my panels if fabric.  It was the writing on my selvage of the floral fabric.  It is cut off a little so isn't 100% clear, but I consulted my Facebook friends and they came up with a few other suggestions.....

I see "Fabric for Satan".  I laughed and laughed when I saw it.  Other suggestions were "Fabric by Sotan", "Fabric for Sotex".  I decided I'd stick with Satan for the entertainment factor.  What do you see??  

I had plenty of scraps and thought to make a nice headband to match also.

  

I was at my sisters house the other day and my sister insisted on practising her face painting skills on me.  I thought I'd show you for entertainment factor.  She asked why I wasn't terribly enthused.  My response was that it might have something to do with the fact that I am an adult....

And lastly, I have been doing some hairdressing jobs lately and have a nice bundle of cash waiting for me to spend on crafty goodness!!  I have been putting together a delicious Stampin Up order of punches and stamps... I can't wait!!
  

Until next time!

Front Door Decor

On my week off last week I had an urge to make my home look nicer.  I bought a new mirror for the entrance, I framed a picture of husby and I that was printed, hmm... 6 months ago?  Ooops!  Then I thought it would be nice to make something for my front door like all you Americans do :P  Afterall, husby is American and would probably appreciate it!! 

The frame was thrifted for a few dollars, and I got the letters from a craft store, I think the big one was about $3 and the littlies $1 each.  I needed to do about 10 coats of the paint to get the coverage I wanted on the frame.  Once I was happy with it, I smudged some brown paint over the wood markings and it gave it a more aged look, and then sprayed it with a sealant.  The small letters were simple.  Some white glue, some pretty scrapbooking paper, and some sand paper to tidy up the edges.  I attached them to the frame with some white glue... I hope it holds... I couldn't find the proper wood glue!  I actually sprayed the sealant over the small letters also.  Big mistake!  They left awful white cloudy patches on my letters.  I ended up sanding off the sealant and just painted over the top with some white glue to protect the paper against the weather.

Lastly was the F.  I just painted it up with white glue and wound and wound that gorgeous twine around it until it was all covered and I was happy with the design.  I coated the back of the F with white glue to secure all the string in it's place.  I noticed that some of the string shifted while moving it around.  The glue looked funny when it dried so I just did it on the back to secure everything.  I bought some hook and eyes and it hangs from the top of the frame.

For the string it hangs on, I just braided some ribbon and crafting rope and stapled it on the back.  You can't see the lovely colours of the braided ribbons and rope in this photo which is a shame.  And lastly, to make sure I didn't scratch up my front door with the staples at the top and with the frame, I stuck some of those sticky felt squares (that you put on the bottom of your chairs so they don't mark your tiles or wooden floors) all across the back of it.  They work a treat.  And husby doesn't mind it either :) 

Flowerpress Brooch Swap - what I made.

I took part in Flowerpress' Brooch Swap this month.  I haven't been lucky enough to receive my brooch yet but am still excitedly anticipating it's arrival soon :)  I did a sneak peak of the brooch I made a few weeks ago.  Figured it was time to show you the whole thing!  It wasn't the most complicated intricate brooch to make, but my swap partner is so bright and positive and I know she has a love for buttons, so I thought it would be fitting to do a rainbow button brooch. 

I hope she likes it and I hope it got to her safely! 

Celebrations & promotions

I've been busy listing in my Craftumi store again today.  I'm really excited to be on top of things in my neck of the woods.  I haven't been this organised in a while.  I also have a reason to celebrate.  I am up to 90 followers!!  I am super excited about this.  Welcome to my new followers, and thank you for all those who have been sticking around for quite some time now!!  I appreciate you all!

Here's a sneak of what slipped into the store this morning...

So to celebrate my organization and awesome followers, I decided to do a little promotion!  For the remainder of the month of June, if you make any purchase in my Craftumi store, or Madeit store, I will send you an extra thank you gift for your support.  All you need to do is tell me in the notes that you are a follower of my blog (and be a follower of course).  I bet you want to know what the thank you gift is don't you?  Well folks, that part I am going to keep a secret!  You'll just have to wait and find out when you receive your little parcel in the mail!!

Hope everyone is having a delightful day! 

Weekend Craft & Listings

I've had a super productive weekend in my craft room which makes me super happy!  It's been refreshing to spend so much time in here.  I sewed a patchwork gypsy skirt for myself some time ago.  I decided yesterday I needed to make myself another!  Now this is a skirt pattern which I drafted myself and have no instructions.  I thought it would be best to practice on a smaller scale first, and I made a child's skirt. 

It turned out well, and I have started selecting the fabrics for my new skirt.  I hope to make a start on it this week.  I am excited that I will be able to overlock/serge all of the edges before sewing it together this time around.  Santa Clause was so kind to me last year :)

Today the sun was shining, for the first time in about a week so I took advantage of it and took some pictures of goodies to go into my Madeit store and Craftumi store outside on the back patio.  I spent the afternoon editing and listing.  Here's a sneak of some of the things that made it in there.

And tonight I have been busy photographing, packaging and I'm just about to start editing to list a bunch of awesome stuff into my Craftumi store.  Die cuts, punchies, and cool stuff like that.  It feels great to have been so productive today!!  

What did you do today?  Anything productive?  Or did you relax and enjoy the sunshine?

I love getting parcels in the mail...

I got into work on Wednesday last week, and sitting on my desk, was a beautiful parcel.  It was addressed to me.  This can only mean fabulous things.  I look on the back to see who it's from, and instantly know what it is...

It's an awesome gigantor pincushion from Wendy over at The Textured Leaf.  I won a giveaway on her blog a little while back, and she sent me a pincushion as my prize.... except, it went a missing in the post!!!  So she kindly made me another and has sent it over.  Thanks so much Wendy, I love it and already have it in use!

The funny thing is, when I was transferring my pins over to my new pincushion, I started squeezing my old thinner pincushion incase any needles were living inside.  I popped 12 out.  I was starting to run low on needles and was worried they might have been hiding in my carpet, ready to strike at a passerby foot.  But, they were tucked away safely in my pincushion.  Needless to say, I won't be putting any needles on my new pincushion... I would never see them again if they snuck inside!