Anthropology Inpired DIY Fabric Flower Necklace

I get the Anthropology catalog, I have a store very close to me that I wander around in, I never buy anything.  because it's too pricey for my budget (o.k. I'll give them credit for some good sales).  Wandering around upscale stores, thrift stores, even hardware stores for inspiration and then going home to make it, yeah, I'm that person. In high school I fell in love with some bait in a fishing tackle store. They were adorable little painted wood fish with feathers on them. They became earrings.
This charming little piece of eye candy was made by hot gluing rolled fabric flowers to a felt backing. Hung with a gorgeous piece of seam binding, subtly died with Heidi swaps Color Shine Sprays.

Here I am wearing my new favorite necklace.

Rubber , Acrylic Stamped Easter Eggs

At first I tried clear embossing and then dying the eggs, Craft Fail! The embossing powder did not stick to egg, it just melted off when I used the heat gun, and the heat gun made the eggs crack.
Soooo, I old fashioned dyed the eggs with the Paas dye, and then used Staz On ink to acrylic stamp them.
The Staz On was the ONLY ink that would dry and stay on the egg. The clear acrylic stamps were need because I had to kind of roll the inked stamp onto the egg very slowly and carefully and had to see where I was stamping when I double stamped a second color over the first.
What do you think?

Spring Memory Jar

First I would like to say THANK YOU to my friend Elise who asked why I hadn't posted in a while. I had no idea that I had any regular followers because blogger doesn't show me people who signed up to get the blog post as an e-mail?? So, I'm sorry to anyone else! The news is that I have been so busy creating samples for the classes I will be teaching at Michaels this April, and I'm not allowed to post pictures of those.
However, I did make time to do a little home decor for Easter. This project has a sweet memory and story included. The memory jar idea was inspired by an episode of My Craft Channel click here for link to show

Meet "Mr. Peeps".    This adorable little stuffed bird in the jar has magnetic feet, and was given to my son when he was about 5 years old.   He would stick him on something, and who ever found him would move him and stick him on something else.   This game has been going on now for over 14 years!   It's a sweet family memory that I wanted to display for our Easter get together.   "Chickie" is a hopping chick that joined in the game a couple of years after Mr. Peeps' arrival.

To make a memory jar like this, I used a jar that I purchased for a couple of dollars at Goodwill. I added paper grass, made from shredding green paper in a paper shredder. 

I added One artificial flower from the Dollar Store.

I decorated  two standard tags, and  tied them together like a card so that I could write the whole story on the inside of the tags. 

The ribbon is actually white seam binding colored with (click here for link to Heidi Swapp )Color Shone spray (can't get enough of the stuff!) then it's scrunched and dried crinkly. Of course I had to add a bit of bling to the bow as well. 

Thanks again for following me, and leave a comment if you are able.  I'll work on posting more often! -Sheila

Mr. Tweet (T.P. roll recycle challenge)

My Craft Channel posted a "What can you do with toilet paper rolls? " challenge a couple of weeks ago. This is one challenge where my imagination took flight. (Pardon the pun). Anyone remember the Tiki Room song from Disney World? "In the Tiki tiki tiki tiki tiki room,  in the t.p. t.p. t.p..." kidding.

So I started with a couple of cardboard toilet rolls, craft paper, wooden spools, scrap trim, 3 in1 glue, hot glue, Heidi Swapp Color Shine, chopsticks, washi tape, baker's twine and some google eyes.












1) Cut 2 strips of paper into 6 inch long, t.p. wide strips.
Cut a third color for the beak, half as wide, but 6 in long.

2) Glue paper to cardboard rolls with 3-in 1 glue or a strong craft glue. Hold paper together with paperclips while waiting to dry.

3) Punch holes in the bird/animal (horse?) where the hanging strings (baker's twine), neck and legs will be. Depending on the weight of your construction, this spot may change, so you can test if it hangs right by using a bit of washi tape.(It is re-positionable).
The length of your marionette's neck and legs is up to you. If you want to make a four legged puppet, you may want them shorter.

4) Cut, fold in, and hot glue the beak in place, then the back of head in place.

5) Color Shine in Fuscia and Gold Lame was used on the tail feathers which are an old cotton tassel, and on the feet which are wooden spools.

6) Hot glue on the tail "feathers" and "plumage, the eyes, and the spool feet. I used small tassels for plumage as well.

7) Put dots of hot glue or 3in1 wherever the strings and hole are to give it a solid hold during active play.

8) Attach the string to two chop sticks by tying in place, then holding in position with washi tape (you will need help from someone for this). The chopsticks in this picture have been wrapped in matching washi tape just for a bit of color.

DON'T MAKE THIS MISTAKE, I forgot to punch holes and put string through before sealing up head and body going back to do it later was kind of messy.

Can't wait till the little guy comes over to play, he will love it!

My First Badge!

So happy to proudly display my new badge...

Melissa Francis Give Away!

My Craft Channel and Melissa Francis have a contest right now to win $200 worth of beautiful Melissa Francis things!
Just click here to enter, and check out her "how to" episodes while you are there.
MelissaFrances_Giveaway

Ceramic Dragon Incense Burner, Bowl, and More

This past summer, my son asked me (yes, he really asked ME) if I wanted to take a ceramics class with him. A chance to spend a couple of hours every Sunday with my 17 year old? Of course! I couldn't imagine anything more fun.
Here are a couple of the finished works.

Rupert with A Book of Runes

I can't take credit for the idea of a dragon incense burner. I saw one at the Bristol Renaissance Faire.
This next project took so much time to figure out. I wanted to re-create a honeycomb paper decoration. You know, the kind that come packed flat and then you open them up and attach the two sides together. They come in bight tissue paper colors. Anyway, very challenging to recreate in clay.

 

During the class, I remembered why I never liked throwing on the wheel back in my art school days. It's HARD!
I do like glazing. And I enjoyed carving a design around the sides of this bowl.

Finally, I was attempting to make this piece look like it was very ancient, dug up from under a lost city. The technique was fun because I simply pressed a wood cut block into a slab. The I cut the slabs and pressed them together. It's actually not glazed, it's stained with a brush-on, wipe off technique.

I haven't posted my son's work here, at (his request) He is so talented at this, his work is really amazing. You can see it on my Pinterest page. Just click on the "Follow Me.." tab at the top of this page.