Ideas and Quilling

Well, here I am with my very first paper tole "homework" finished. Only a week late. As I am so far behind in my crafting, I am really proud that I finished it this soon!

I have to admit that it was much harder than I thought it would be. As you can see I do need a lot of practice. Getting those twirled strips of paper to behave is like getting my 2 year old grandson out of a tantrum. I did the leaves last and for the most part, they all came out the same. Only 1 gave me a hard time which is the top left one.

For the "homework" the "teacher" gave directions for making a card with these flowers. I did not like that idea since the flowers are quite big. So I decided to make what I have wanted to do for quite some time. An idea book.

Another thing I changes was the center of the flowers. They were supposed to have a tightly wound strip for the center. I did not like the way it looked as it stood out to much for my taste. To make it more to my liking, I used some tear drop pearls and a tiny orange pearl for the center.

The hard bound notebook was in the $1 bin at Micheal's months ago. I certainly know why it was only $1, it was REALLY ugly. Figuring I could cover it easy enough, I purchased one certain I would do so really soon. Ha ha ha, it was not meant to be. The notebook was meant to be used for this very project!

Here is the back side in which you can see the paper I used quite well. I had purges 2 piles of paper about 6" tall each when I redid my craft room. These papers were among them. I have no idea why I remembered these 2 papers out of the hundreds of papers, but down stairs I went to find them.

The burnishing of the back did not come out very well because I tried some plain card stock before this paper popped miraculously into my head. It had begun to dry by the time I decided to pull it off so some of it stuck to the back. This made burnishing the paper over it a bit less than smooth. BUT since it is for me, I really don't mind at all.

I also covered the inside since the original color was kind of a cream/orange mix, yuck. The front page was the same color so I simply used my craft knife to cut it out. I also gave it my very personal touch by making it upside down. You can see the bottom line should be the top line. That is sooooo me!

 I have had these self adhesive letters for years. I used them once and that was it. The problem with buying stuff like this is that you use some letters all the time and other practically never. Though they came with 2 of each vowel, I still just couldn't find enough left over letters to make a proper word. Low and behold, there was actually one of each of these letters.

Since they were cream or vanilla (which ever you like to call it) I patted my Certain Celery SU ink pad over them and it ended up matching perfectly.

I separated the pages into 5 sections and made small tabs for each one. One section each for ideas I think of (that is a small section, tee he he), ideas I glean from blogs, tips I glean from blogs, my ideas for egg art and the last section is for ideas my mother has for egg art which she asks me to remind her of (ya, right!)

HUGS,

Finally Finished...Well Almost

I have a couple of small things left to do, but I am basically finished. I can not believe how LONG it took. My gosh, I would have never guessed when I started. A week and a half! And that is just one room. My mother is trying to organize 2 rooms and a cellar full of items she has accumulated over 15+ years. I only had stuff from about 7-8 years. It is going to take her forever!

I am sooooooo excited to have time to visit blogs again. I missed it so much. I love seeing and learning from them all. And leaving comments too, I enjoy leaving them as much as I enjoy recieving them :o)

Here are the results of my craft room :o)

That is my doxie wondering if he can get away with attacking the recycle bin, lol. He thinks I am to busy to notice right now, lol

No more baskets and clutter under the tables :o) One of the things I have left to do is the basket on the far right. It is full of scrap papers and tutorials and such that need to be filed. I hope I can be disciplined enough to get it done soon, not leave it waiting another year or so, lol

Here is the over flowing cabinet that is no longer over flowing. Forgot to get a photo of the inside, but as you can see, the doors are completely closed now, lol. I pulled all of the excess "stuff" off the front. Pulling the tape and Velcro off left spots on the outside where the brown stuff (I have no idea what that is called, lol) got pulled off too. That's OK, I certainly can live with that.

The closet no longer has doors on it. It is deep enough that I can stand in front of the book case to get what I need. The top shelves on the right still look a bit cluttered to me, but I can get things out without it all falling on top of me, tee he he.

What's to say, lol, no really pretty, but it serves it's purpose. The little yellow tin is full of stamps waiting to be cleaned...one of the small things I still need to do. The top shelf is full of cards I made that I kept. I actually threw loads of them away from when I first started crafting. Two of the boxes are full of envelopes, one clear ones, the other has white envies to go with the cards.

Finally have a place to put the Cricut I bought months ago and had no place to put it so I could actually use it, lol.

Thank you for sharing my "organizing" journey with me!

HUGS...Sandy O

Craft Room Day 2

Do you want to see how far I have gotten so far? Well, I did get something done...

I got these Copic desk cubes which arrived last week. Ohhh...I really like them now that I have them on my desk! Each tower is 3 sections, stacking on one another, of course. I spent a lot of time going through my markers by color and # (at my kitchen island) and got them in. Then...dropped the towers 2 times while trying to move them. Sheesh :o( I finally decided to pull out my scor-tape and attach each section with it. Worked great...after about 2 1/2 hours of work, here they are! If you decided to get these, they are quite expensive, but worth it I think, make sure to use your scor-tape BEFORE adding your markers!!!

It is hard to see, but I finally went through my laundry basket under here and replaced it with this wide draw rolling thing. Sadly all it holds is my ribbon in the bottom 2 drawers and "some" of my jewels/pearls/pin items in the other. That's OK, at least they are where I can get to them :o)

Some good things I found in the basket were:
-my sewing machine directions
-loads of tutorials, 4 of which I want to read/make before tossing them
-packages of items that I traded (on an SU forum) for items I don't use for items they don't use
-my envelope maker, you know, the purple ones
-LOTS of really good paper, my much loved shimmer kind, that I was to lazy to put away at one point
-many other items I had looked for, could not find and was afraid I threw away
AND MOST IMPORTANT--some photos of my Step Dad who pasted away 2 1/2 years ago. Now, how THEY got in there I have no idea!

Here is the "in the process of organizing" mess. So far I have filled the recycle bin, have another bag full of recyclable paper and 2 full garbage bags full of, well, garbage, lol. See 2 of those rolling things that you fill to take to someone else's house/store full of your stuff to craft with them (I don't remember what they are called) they are the black things in the middle of the picture. One was FULL of files from when I sold SU 3 or 4 years ago! I think that is what the recycle bin is full of.

The second one is full of those clear paint cans that were so popular a couple of years ago. I know I will most likely never use them, but just can't force myself to throw them away. :o( What a dilemma!!

On day 0, I bought this shelving unit to put in one half of the closet. Get free shipping from Amazon because we are prime members, but, I decided to splurge and pay the extra 3.99 to get it the next day, which would be day 1. After all, the UPS guy always comes between 9-10 in the morning, I was soooo excited!

Well, don't you know, he must have reversed his route that very day!!! I am making that clicking of the tongue sound but have no idea how to write that, lol. It did not show up until 4!

On day 2, I excitedly put it together and went to put it in my now empty closet. Well, it did not fit. Who would have thought you had to measure the space before buying it, NOT ME! Soooo, as you can see, it is replacing the shelves with the doors. Doesn't really fit here either and is pretty ugly, but I can live with that.

I had no place to put the items that are in the unit with the doors, so decided to push HARD to get it in the closet. After all, I did not want to wait until Paul came home that night to help! I got it mostly in, then it got stuck, of course. I can't even budge it now. AFTER this, 3 thoughts occurred to me
-the closet doors needed to be removed to get it in there
-the doors of the cabinet need to be removed because I will not be able to open them once it is in
-the plastic things that hold the closet rod in have to be removed or the inside will be 2" to small
Now, I have to wait until Paul can help this afternoon. Sheesh, I should have just waited for him to help when he got home from work, it would have been faster.

While I am accomplishing absolutely nothing, my doxie got into the recycles. Here is just part of it. He even chewed the wooden closet rod while I wasn't looking and now it won't be able to be used any more. You can see one of my chihuahua's checking out the doxies booty.
What did I do after all this...I took a nap! I figured I better quit while I was NOT ahead.

Have you made it this far into this boring post? If so, here is some good news. I went through my SU stamp book to see what sets I will no longer use. There are 67 sets as well as some wheels (do people still used these?) I also found a few more items that I will not use either, some even brand new! When I bought them I was "certain" that I needed them, lol

I will be making a page of them as well as other items in case someone else will use them!

THANK YOU for letting me share this with you. Phew...I feel so much better now!!!

Have a super weekend...HUGS...Sandy O

Oh WOW!

I had the last 2 weeks off of babysitting and decided to "CLEAN" my house. I had not done so since my illness 14 months ago. Though my husband tried to keep it clean (dishes and laundry basically) it was a total disaster, to say the lease. I am 1/2 finished with the last room and hoping to finish it today.

What will I do then? Well...here are a few pictures to show you, lol

This wall is not so bad. The problem I have with it is that I have more stamps and such to put here and there is no more room.

OK, this needs no explanation, tee he he. I don't even have the shade on the light, lol. That laundry basket has been waiting for me to go through it for at least 2 years now. It is full of tools, tutorials and stuff. Where oh where am I going to put them? Or, if they have been there so long, do I really need them? I am sure I do, bwaa ha ha

Sniff...look at that floor, if you can see it! The rolling bins in the middle of my craft room are supposed to be under the desk on the left. I have just been walking around them.

The outside of my cabinets. What a clutter I have made on top of them.

The inside :o( the top right cubbie is the only place I have for my egg art items. My mother has 2 rooms and a cellar full, ha ha ha

Half of my closet. What a mess! The shelves on top are so full I dread looking for something on them since loads of stuff comes tumbling down.

The other half of my closet. YIKES! More stuff on the floor looking for a home.

Did you notice all the ripped paper and bubble wrap on the floor. That was my doxie when he got into my garbage barrel. And the doggie beds...3 of them. The doggies just HAVE to be in there when it am. Boy, they seem to take up so much room even thought they are small since the doggies are chihuahua's and a doxie.

What I really need is a Scrap box desk, The biggest one! But, since that is a pie in sky dream, I guess I will have to work with what I have.

How long do you think it will take me? I am hoping it will only be 3 days. I would rather just craft, but as you can see, it really is not an option right now. WISH ME LUCK!

HUGS, Sandy O