Bauble display

Instead of tossing my pins and brooches in a drawer,

they are displayed on the wall.

Old frame + linen over batting over foam core = easy

Shiny Stuff of the Week 10

I love shiny stuff, diamonds, stainless steel, galvanized aluminum, you name it.

Once, upon exclaiming how pretty brand new stainless steel appliances look, my dad told me I was part-Crow.

"Crow Indian? That is in our bloodline?"

"No, like the bird. You like shiny things like a crow."

Oooooooooh, got it.

He had no idea how much I would embrace the notion of a shiny lovin' bird.

You may hear me one day, screaming "Caw! Caw!" when something wonderful catches my eye.

And I have taught all my friends my little short hand word for "get your ass over here and check it out: something shiny, I tell ya!"

Please to enjoy, my little crow tableau.

Vintage zipper

Check out this vintage zipper packaging!

Water meter cover of the day

Night light glass cover

BARoness gives me stuff!

My good buddy BARoness HOOKED ME UP with some craft supplies!! Looka, a whole mess of wood balls and some wood plaques. Oops, forgot to take a photo of several small frames.
What will I do with my bounty? The wood balls go on my decoupaged cigar boxes but look forward to doing something fun with the plaques and frames.
Thanks BARoness!

Elizabeth gives me stuff

Elizabeth gave me a stash of wooden spools.
(I use them for narrow ribbon storage.)

Ernest gives me stuff

Looka! 2 meters of waaaay pricey black pinstriped wool!!

Chrysanthemum gives me stuff

My buddy Chrysanthemum doesn't bead anymore so

she gave me a fabulous cigar box full of beads ~~ fabulous beads!

Napkins for a kindergartner

Nephew needed more napkins for his lunch box and it was kismet, I found exactly enough fabric remaining from Ernest's table leaf bags (made from a tablecloth). Yay, fabric from Trixie!

Cut the scraps into 4 and stitched Nephew's initial to each.

Easy, fast and cheap - just like you.

Hang it up

Pant hangers are great for craft organizing.

Craft paper and freezer-paper-reinforced pattern pieces
(You know the freezer paper trick, right? You iron it on your pattern for more durability.)

Multi-color pack of gift tissue paper

Trixie gives me stuff!

Fabric, men's neckties and yoyos

Lots o' ribbon

Ya wanna know something strange?

The more ribbon I get, the more I hoard it.

Before wrapping a gift, I consider whether the recipient is "ribbon worthy".

Decoupage project

My church bud asked if I would craft a "door prize" and I was stumped. Wandered the aisles of Hobby Lobby and dang, you cannot swing a dead cat in there without hitting a cross of every ilk. Okay, wooden cross went in the basket.

Painted the unfinished wooden cross with terra cotta acrylic paint.

Decoupaged front with a printed vellum sheet from my craft stash.

Painted cross edge with gold glitter paint.

Mixed some gold glitter paint with Mod Podge and washed it over the vellum.

Wrote a door Scripture on card stock and glued it to a glass "rock".

Glued that to the cross. Outlined rock with gold glitter glue.

Whew ~ done!

Cross stitch smart ass-ery

Just for the hell of it

Stinky fabric solution

I now pre-wash my fabric before sewing to avoid shrinking or fading surprises. Found this $2 a yard brown eyelet at WalMart and noticed the dye fumes were pretty strong when I got home. Machine washed it once and it still stank! Washed it again with some Molton Brown shampoo ~~ it's perfect now!

Monkey of the day

Spied near the SLUT and VIRGIN lip balms.

Shower curtain from a drop cloth

At least 12 years ago I purchased a huge paint drop cloth from Helm Paint & Supply to make a custom shower curtain for my New Orleans apartment's 10' high ceilings. Folded the top and sewed a curtain pocket - easy, cheap and fast.
Moved to Houston with a typical ceiling height so folded over the the top to make a wider heading and learned how to install grommets.

Every once and awhile a guest will comment on the paint drop cloth shower curtain and say, "You know, you could paint on that curtain" and the idea has never appealed to me. I love the rough linen-like texture and simpleness but this year opted to mix a little refinement with the humble and added a monogram.

Making do with a 12 year old shower curtain,
I am,
SkitzoLeezra

Water meter cover of the day

My friends know I love the New Orleans water meter cover image so have received a few gifts inspired by the graphic beauty of the humble cover.

This medallion seems to be cast from a water meter mold and looks like glass but is lightweight opaque plastic.

Piero on Velcro

Have always loved Piero Fornasetti images even before I knew who he was. A couple years ago I attended an estate sale and spied a set of very Fornasetti-like coasters and managed to keep my cool until I could get across the room and snatch them up in my greedy hands. Sure enough, the coasters were genuine Fornasetti, probably vintage 1950's era.

Brought them home and wasn't sure if I where/how to display and finally put them aside. Came across the coasters recently and before I knew what happened, they were Velcro'ed to my kitchen cabinet doors.

I painted my refrigerator

with black chalkboard paint. The refrigerator was white but running fine and brand new stainless fancy schmancy 'frig isn't in my immediate future so what's a girl to do?

Lightly sand the slick white surface and paint the sides with 2 coats and the front with 4 -5 coats of leftover chalkboard paint and a mini roller. Oh My Lanta, wish I had a photo of the first coat. It was na-asty! So don't freak out if you try, just keep on keepin' with your bad self.

Helpful tip of the day: don't clean your mini roller after each coat. Wrap it tightly in cling wrap (Saran), stow inside a ZipLoc bag and store in your refrigerator until the next coat dries.

After reinstalling my white plastic door handles, I realized they looked like a turd in a punchbowl. Brought those to work and sweet talked the guys into bending some aluminum for me. The handles look like stainless and I love 'em!

HERE's why I had chalkboard paint in the first place.

Go HERE to check out more painting projects!

Neato keen-o

My favorite thing to do is to use items for other than their intended purpose. And I am so impressed with this use of random unrelated needlepoint canvases. I found the image on a French blog Nain de Jardin and can only read every other word but still unable to understand the text. Oh wait, there is a Google translator. Eh, it was more fun when I couldn't read it.

Take a look at the blog to see some adorable baby clothing made with vintage linens and napkins.

Stuff I Didn't Even Photograph

Ernest has been ON MY ASS to stitch up 2 table leaf storage bags since February and I had no problem promising him I would do it but there was always something else calling to me from the SkitzoLeezra Studio. After sending his first spawn a box full of baby stuff, he reminded me AGAIN about the bags. Well, even if I had 6 months to make them and I procrastinated the entire time, I hate feeling rushed and under pressure. I envisioned 2 matching lined sturdy bags with nice closures and perhaps a carrying strap. CANCEL

Instead I pirooted through my fabric stash and found I had enough denim to make one bag and not enough (appropriately heavy) fabric for the other. Trixie to the rescue! She gave me (people give me stuff!) a heavy weight tablecloth with a slight stain and ~~ahhh~~ it was the perfect size! 2 super long bags with boxed bottom corners and I was finished! A buttonhole was stitched to top so a fold-over flap would be formed. The table leaf storage bags were packaged with the second baby loot box and shipped to Connecticut. And guess what? Ernest loved them! I was kinda ashamed of the simplicity but he was happy to have them. Eileen tells me that he liked the simple bags more than the baby stuff. MORE than the things that took me weeks to make.