sparklythings

I love me some Valentine’s Day and I’m very excited it’s almost here. You know my rule – Valentine’s Day works just like Christmas: it’s not about how much you get, it’s about what you give. Hate the horrible commercialization? Do something about it. Personally, I am very pro- a holiday that’s all reds and pinks and hearts and lurrrrve!

I did two Valentine’s projects with something I really luuurve, the ol’ Cricut.

These were mailed out to very special Surface To Air Media fan club members in perfect little blue envelopes. (I adore  the red-pink-blue combo for Valentine’s!)

Inspired by papercutting artists such as Julene Harrison – but lacking the amazing talent – I cheated with the machine. (It’s hard to tell in the picture but the letters are negative space.) My original design said “Happy Valentine’s Day” but that was a bit too detailed for the Cricut to do in a 3.5″ x 5″ space. Laid out in photoshop using the fonts Campanile and Hearts for 3D, then imported into Sure Cuts a Lot.

The second project was for work. I knew I wanted to hand out cinnamon hearts somehow…but I couldn’t find them  ANYWHERE. I ended up using Hot Tamales which are quite tasty, too. (Good thing I bought extra!)

I started on these late so I had to find containers locally, not online. The plastic hearts are actually from the wedding area of Dollar Tree, not the seasonal section. The flame motif came to me after I bought the containers but worked really well with the hot cinnamon candy.

I modified characters from the pyrobats font because if I drew my own flames I would have spent the entire time tweaking them instead of actually cutting them. Of course, cutting these only took about 5 minutes total with the machine (amazing!) so I was free to spend my time gluing them and popping Hot Tamales.

Bonus: because they were el cheapos the heart pieces fit together a little too loosely, but closing the paper tab  inside the lids made for a perfectly tight seal. I’m pleased with how they turned out!

The good:

I got pretty much exactly what I wanted: a solid 60’s style cabinet with clean lines and glassed-in shelves.

I put everything I wanted to in there and there’s actually some room left over.

It does remind me of my parents’ cabinet in the feel of the wood and the latch hardware (though the styles are radically different!)

We freed up a good amount of space in the kitchen, so we don’t have to re-arrange things every time we pull out a bowl to make dinner.

The bad:

It’s BIG. Real big. I measured it out, looked at it in person, yet it seems so much bigger in the house.  I am concerned about it’s scale within the dining room. I’m worried that when we put the leaves in the table there’ll be no room for people to walk around. My hope is that when we switch out the light fixture some of this feeling will go away…and some of it is just getting used to something new. But wow!

It’s a few shades darker than the table. I thought they were at least close, but put next to each other the cabinet looks way darker. I hoped maybe there was a way to cheat a refinishing job…like those shampoos that slightly tint your hair. I don’t want to go all out on a bleach job, I just want to tone it down a little, ya know?

While putting the dishes in there I had to come to terms with just how much STUFF i had. I mean, I still have a kitchen full of mixing bowls and bakeware that I use on a daily basis. Well, you know…when I cook, that’s not exactly “daily.” I think I’m just having issues with practicality vs. a collection mentality, and hopefully they’ll pass. It’s definitely time to get back on etsy and put some pyrex in the store!

The Ugly

Oh hayel naw. There’s no ugly here! I’m still arranging it (over and over again, I can admit it) but i’m keeping the lime dinnerware on the bottom, assorted other greens in the middle and I’d planned for the top shelf to be dynamic and seasonal. But that blue looks durned good in there, and you know what…there’s not much else to go in there other than a handful of pink and red pieces. Please Lord, help me keep it that way.

I found the cabinet on craigslist after a long search. The sweetest woman in the world was selling it – she was getting a new set, something more traditional and curvy. I was so happy to finally find something, and it was so nice to talk with the seller that I made a card+envelope to tuck the money into. I dug into my stash of old books for the image and cut links from an old necklace to embellish the door handles. It’s been a LONG time since I’ve done that and it took me a while, but I had a good time.

I mentioned previously that I joined my company’s holiday party planning committee for the first time. Last year’s party was at the Alligator Farm in St. Augustine, because my company always tries to find something interesting and non-denominational. Of course, I’m terrified of alligators so I actually opted to have my wisdom teeth removed that day instead of go to the party. After I healed up I realized i had no right to complain about the party if I didn’t participate…plus, with no weddings to plan I was getting itchy.

This year we selected a luau theme and I had a lot of fun with it. My first task was invitations; I knew I wanted something with some texture to it, and flipping through some old magazines I latched onto the idea of a card-n-pocket kind of style.

I thought a tiki bar would fit this format perfectly. I found some textures on iStock and used them to build my tiki template – the design goes all the way around on both sides of the pouch and the insert. Our cranky printer at work prints really well when it wants to, and I was very happy with the way these turned out. One of the good things about being on a committee is that I didn’t have to cut out, score and glue 150 of these all by myself!

I also assisted with centerpieces – we found a set of these submerged flower vases for a steal. I thought the orchids worked well for a semi-elegant Hawaiian look but also nicely fit our venue of the Garden Club. We also used a BUNCH of pineapples, coconuts, and citrus fruits to fill up the tables, which provided a yummy aroma too!

I made two other arrangements which I ended up using for menus on the buffet table. This isn’t the greatest picture, and it was towards the end after it’d been knocked around a bit, but it’s the only one I have! I can’t believe I didn’t take more pictures of them because they were so fun to do. What was really cool is that they were made entirely from dollar tree and thrifted materials. Is there nothing those stores can’t do?

More things I didn’t get pictures of: the labels I made for the music CD favors, and shots from the presentation I helped assemble for the All-Employee Meeting party announcement. I actually edited video for the first time in YEARS, which is embarassing to admit but I was happy to get back into it, even for a brief time.

And here we are, with Jim looking thrilled and me looking sweaty after running around all afternoon. Or maybe it was that umpteenth frozen margarita sitting in front of me kicking in. Those margarita machines were a terrific idea! I shocked a few folks by donning a dress for the first time in forever; I found it at the thrifts and thought it was quite Hawaiian and holiday-festive.

That picture was taken from the Prince Pele site; they’re a local performing group that does traditional hawaiian dance. I believe they have three generations of family in the show, and they do a lot of the fun audience participation activities just like you’d find at a real Hawaiian resort. If you’re having a luau – at Christmas, in the summer, or whenever! – you’ve got to check out these folks.

So overall I’m so glad I joined the committee, even if Jim kept making “The Office” jokes at my expense. We’ll see what next year brings!

In hopeful anticipation of the dual milestones of 100 sales and 100 positive feedbacks, I’ve got a sale going on at my etsy store. All items in the Vintage Paper section are $1.00! I’ve got lots of these multicolored library cards, matching pockets, decorative Flinch cards and more!

Needed to make some cards for a dual-birthday party today. Not a duel-party, which could be ugly. Anyway, kids don’t love the vintage like I do, they like Transformers! And Elmo! And I aim to please…

You can’t tell from the picture, but I used two different thicknesses of foam to create three levels within the autobot logo, so it looked like it was coming out at you. This was fairly easy – it’s all straight lines, I used an exacto and a ruler – just time consuming. I GISed the image and the font came from a transformers fan site. I used silver vellum in the background for an extra-metallic look.

I have had these rocket ship shapes forever – I got them from Dollar Tree in the school supply section. They’re supposed to be used for classroom bulletin boards, but they’re so fun I knew they’d be great on cards. I picked up the astronaut diecut shapes later on at a teachers’ supply store, and they couldn’t have fit together better. I have been wanting to do this one for a long time! The younger brother is an Elmo fan and it was easy to pop him in the spacesuit. I used more of the foam squares to give it some dimensionality. Elmoooooo in Spaaaaaace!

 

I’ve actually been looking for something just like the latest challenge at Card Positioning Systems. I have so many tiny-yet-adorable vintage images in my collection (oh man, I have a COLLECTION!) This week’s sketch gave me lots of ideas on how to incorporate them. The images on this card came from a old McCall’s softcover cookbook circa 1965. Seriously, how cute are they?!?! 

An independence day challenge from Card Positioning Systems. Red patterned paper from a DCWV stack, blue paper from Miss Elizabeth (Dollar Tree) Star shape from a Fiskar’s template. I wanted texture with simplicity and a smidge of retro, which I think I got. I’ve also been messin’ around with making my own rub-ons by printing on transparencies. I’ve learned that big areas of color work better than finely-detailed images; that you have to let it dry a little so it doesn’t bleed, but not so much that the image comes off too light; and you just have to accept that it’s going to look stamped instead of like a genuine rub-on. But I think that looks cool, and I love love LOVE being able to create my own elements – and on the cheap, too!  

I also thought the quote by Thomas Jefferson was a nice change from all the disturbingly jingoistic messages I’ve been seeing out and about lately. Love those founding fathers!

My first submission to the Card Positioning System weekly sketch challenge.

We got my dad “The Reagan Diaries” this year because he idolizes Ronnie almost as much as he does Bobby Bowden. I though vintage dude (not clipart! Real vintage ad!!!) had an air of Ronald-The-Actor to him. First project with my new Fiskars toys; I got the templates on clearance ages ago but finally picked up the shapecutter tool this weekend. My kingdom for a (hackable) cricut!

More father’s day fun:

Just a few of the cards I’ve done lately.