The Viking

This past weekend, Winnipeg held it's first-ever "Free Weekend". Residents were encouraged to drag their unwanted household items to the curb, where they could be scooped up by passers-by. I made a couple of great discoveries. Here's the story about one of them - an antique Viking radio cabinet.

This is a close-up of the aformentioned cabinet, which is now residing comfortably in a corner of my living room. The cabinet had pretty much been gutted and all that remained of the "guts" was the radio itself (though disconnected and probably not operable) and a piece of the glass that covered the tuner. In the interest of prettying it up, I made a tiny collage to fill the space.

Keeping with the "radio" theme, I used vintage sheet music, some pretty patterened paper and a couple painstakingly cut-out branches and a little song bird. The whole thing was put together and then varnished for durability before the glass was attached with super-duper strong double sided tape.

Talk to Strangers

This past weekend, I went out for breakfast with a "stranger". Ok, that's not entirely true. I met her when she purchased a trio of pins from me at Ciclovia. She contacted me a couple days later to order 20 more pins (yay!) and we communicated back and forth via email a few times over the next week. Once her order was done and ready for delivery, she suggested that we get together for coffee and a chat.

We agreed to meet at Stella's in the Village on Sunday morning and ended up talking for close to two hours. It was a wonderful time and I'm sure we could've had a 6 hour conversation without running out of anything to say. We mostly talked about our art/craft (she's a poet and amazing quilter) and the challenges that come with trying to get our work "out there". It was so nice to talk to someone with as much passion for creativity as I have and such a positive, optimistic attitude.

I hope that we will get together again soon. She belongs to a couple of craft groups and has promised to bring me along to a get-together sometime, which I thounk would be totally fun. I miss the days of "cropping" with the girls at Remember Me in BC. Scrapbooking, knitting, quilting, gluing stuff...I don't think it much matters what you do, it's just nice to do it together sometimes.

Let's twist again!

Sometimes, when it comes to customer service, you just gotta go the extra mile. Case in point: I recently made this mirror for a very nice girl on the Etsy. She had seen a similar mirror in my shop and decided to order a custom for her friend's birthday. She had asked me to use Monopoly, Clue, Life...and Twister, if I could fit it all on there. Well, I tried and I just couldn't get it to work. It was just weird to have something so out of scale with the rest of the bits. Anyway, I could tell that she was a teensy bit disappointed that I didn't get it the Twister onto the mirror, so I offered to make her a birthday card to include with the mirror. Here's how it turned out:



Isn't it cute? It even has a little "spinner". Srsly.

I really hope she likes it...and her friend, too!

Fresh from the worktable...

This is just a glimpse...a tease, if you will...of a frame that I made to go with my new 50s pin-up picture. The girl in the photo is wearing nothing but a blue hair-bow, black heels and black lace undies. I used flocked paper and a few little tricks to make the frame look *just* like her skivvies and I absolutely LOVE the effect.



The frame itself, incidentally, was a $3.50 find at Michaels. It looked like it had been dragged behind a bus, so I asked for a discount off the regular $39 price. Yowsa! (If there's one thing that I learned from working in retail it is that you can usually get what you want if you are *nice* about it. So, be nice and you'll get the deals!)

Next up is a collage that I stayed up way too late to work on the other night. I have been doing customs and getting stock ready for sales for weeks and weeks and weeks, so it was nice to create something just for the sake of creating something.



The title of this collage is "When life gives you lemons..." and it's probably pretty obvious why. It's the first in what is going to be a series of "kitchen" pieces. I have a stash of vintage cookbooks that are just itching to get put to a good use. And, after flipping through them in amusement/horror, I can assure you that this is the best use for them.

Note: Yes, the photography in this post sucks. It was the best I could do with my BlackBerry in the middle of the night. Sadly, my creative bursts never seem to happen in concurrence with good, natural lighting. Better pics to follow...I promise!

Feelin' Folky

Yay! I just got word that I have a table in the Winnipeg Folk Festival Christmas Craft Sale on December 5th. I have heard that the Folk Fest sales are known for their high-quality of vendors and good turn-outs. Let's just hope that the same is true for this year, as well!

Mark your calendars!
Winnipeg Folk Festival Craft Sale
@ the Folk Exchange
211 Bannatyne (at Albert)
Saturday, December 5th
11am - 5pm
cash, debit & credit cards accepted!

Love Life

If there’s one thing that I have learned from making these game-themed collage mirrors, it’s that even in this age of video games and the internets, people still love board games! And, it seems that games like Monopoly, Scrabble and Yahtzee are the secret to a delightful courtship and a happy marriage. The couple that plays together stays together. Who knew?

This is the latest in my series of “Love is a game…” mirrors. The “people” from the Game of Life car aren’t pictured, because they are safely attached to the back. By request, there are two girls for the front seats and two boys for the back. That’s what I like to see – sistahs riding shotgun!



I have one more mirror in the works and just received an email regarding a potential order for another one. It’s a good thing that I have a seemingly limitless supply of game ephemera in my secret-special stash.

Interesting fact: so far, I have taken three of the custom orders from girls named Emily.

Webster's Pages

I am all about the vintage/distressed/collage-y look to begin with, but these papers by Webster's Pages are nothing short of drool-worthy. I have been stalking them online for a week or so and finally gave in when I discovered them at my local SBS. I was restrained, though, and only bought one "petite pack" (pictured below). And a couple 12x12 singles. But that was IT. I swear.

new in the Etsy shop!

I love these new domino pendants. It took me forever to source the bails and actually get around to putting them together, but I am so glad I made the effort.

This is the first batch of them (more to follow!) and I think they turned out pretty good. The funky paper helps, of course. Once I started playing with the designs, I know that the arrows had to point at the user. Except for the one that reads "Play". That one points down. ;-)

Buy "Fabulous!" here.

Spotted at the Cre8ery...ME!

Yup. That's me in the black dress and kicky, ankle-strap shoes...and striking nametag/arm band. I was volunteering for the "99 Pieces of Art on the Wall" opening. Jordan had me selling raffle tickets, which turned out to be a fantastic way to mingle and meet lots of people.

you are entering a no-doily zone

Fingers crossed for the upcoming "This Ain't Your Grandma's Craft Sale" at the Park Theatre. I sent my application in yesterday for the December event and I'm (literally) on pins 'n' needles waiting to find out if I'm in. We're supposed to know by Oct 3rd (ish), so stay tuned.

I am really excited about this one...and not just because I have been really super-choosy about which sales to go into. I like being surrounded by the cool kids. ;-)

But, seriously, doesn't it seem weird that we're already heading into the Christmas Season?? Gah. I still need to paint my deck...and fix my rain barrel...and I haven't taken my new patio umbrella out of the box yet!!