A Creative Space

Art by Celita Perillo (don't you love her name?!). I won this paper cut, entitled, "Wilderness Beauty", in her latest blog giveaway and today I found out that she is published! I am SO excited for her!

And now for photos of my summer palace (aka, "the back porch"). It is only truly functional when the outdoor temps are about 65* F. and the sun is shining. This is the southern side of the porch so we get this lovely greenhouse effect and there is no place better for lunch and afternoon tea.

And a little reading and art-ing.

I have a studio space elsewhere in the house, but this space on the porch is my new getaway.

You can't have too many retreat areas in your own home!

It is furnished with flotsam and jetsam, literally; the weathered shelf coming from the last auction I attended. (I will share more of my acquisitions in future posts). The clip boards are from thrift stores and will display art. They look pretty good empty too!

I probably shouldn't tell you that the pile of suitcases are TRASH PICKED. Really! I wouldn't lie about something like that! There was an estate auction in town and no one bid on these beauties (can you imagine?!) so the auctioneer left them. He didn't want to haul something back to his shop that no one wanted. Later in the day, the cases sat neatly in a row, on the curb by the house and I nabbed them before the rain got to them. I thought about resale, but each case needs refurbishing on the inside. In the mean time, they look fabulous piled in the corner of the porch.

I've added a few more items to the wall since I took these photos, but the atmosphere remains the same.

Warm, inviting and unhurried.

Time stands still on my back porch.

Even doing nothing here is time well spent!

Where is your sanctuary?

Heavy Metal ATC

Of the three "reduced paper" ACTs I've made, this one weighs the most. You see, the Key to the City is quite a large award to be given.

Yet, somehow she manages to hold it with just one hand!

If you look closely, you can see which city she got the key to! hee hee

I have to show you how lumpy this piece is too. The industrial sized clothing hook up near her head stands a good 3/16" up off the canvas. I sifted through a lot of metal sewing bits and that hook is the only thing that would "do"! At this angle, the honoree is dwarfed by the size of her award. That giant paper clip is nothing to be messed with either!

At this angle, you can also see that I've wired the key on. The paper bits are hotglued on, but the wire and metal bits are all wired (with "thread" from the screening- so it's got perfect patina) so I don't have unsightly adhesives gooping into view. The paper clip is merely clipped, but it's not going anywhere.

I've temporarily come to a halt after this one, but know I will do more (need more inspiring photos). Maybe I should also update my tetnus shot...

75% Less Paper Than Your Average ATC

THESE ATCs ARE SO MUCH FUN!!!! I even submitted my sewing machine to a little torture by forcing it to stitch the zipper onto the screening. The needle threader was some corroded piece of junk I found on the sidewalk once (or in a junk box, dunno, but I knew someday I would have a use for it!), but the little loop was missing. Can't have a needle threader without a threader thingy, so I took a piece of wire from a scrap of screen (like pulling thread from a frayed piece of cloth) and fashioned a threading loop myself-- and stuck it back into its holder. I like the bits of green paint stuck to the wire. I rubbed some paint onto the handle of the threader to give it a green patina (no, not original- but looks authentic, doesn't it?) since I had the color naturally occurring elsewhere.

I have one more of these "reduced paper" ATCs to share! Tune in tomorrow.

85% Paper- free ATC

The other day, I had this hare brained idea to make up non-paper ATC kits to sell in my etsy store. Hmmm, better try making a non-paper ATC first myself. I liked the way it turned out, SO much, that now I'm thinking of making a bunch of mini art to sell. The kits will come later.

But no, maybe I should first try sending the piece (and others, yet to be made) to Somerset Studio to see if I can get published. The painted up fly screening (salvaged from an antique pie cupboard) makes this piece, I think.

You would never guess I was a pack rat, would you?

hee hee hee hee

My Own Anthropologie

I was enjoying a pot of tea while flipping through the Nov. 2009

Anthropologie catalog, when suddenly I looked to my right and saw that one of models had jumped from the pages and brought a snowball with her.

I asked her if she would mind posing for a few pictures since I liked how she planted the snowball on her teacup. So well photo styled! She must be a designer as well as a model.
She immediately obliged with a series of cheesecake poses that needed no encouragement from me.

I kid you not, this girl knows how to schmooze to the camera!



A master of the runway model "pout".





A candid moment.
By this time, I was just snapping pictures, not watching for a pose to happen.

Like all good models, this bite was staged. She wasn't about to eat a carb-laden prop! She has her figure to watch!

Besides, it was "too sticky", so she removed the offensive prop, drank up her tea (still in the cup) and the photo session was over.

A Good Day at Auction

I can never have a bad time at an auction. Even if a bunch of the stuff I want goes for far more than I am willing to bid, I thoroughly enjoy watching the action and am entertained by what some people are willing to pay for things I deem truly JUNK. I may be a pack rat, but I am a discerning pack rat.

Last Friday I went to a rare weekday auction (most are on Saturdays when I work at the post office).

This table of books caught my eye immediately, not to mention the ugly rooster lamp. The lamp barely got a bid, then shot up to 3 whole dollars (or maybe the winning bid was $2.50?) Anyway, the whole room chuckled when the item sold. The winning lady looked a little embarrassed but put a brave face on it. Who wants their taste in decor to be scoffed at? I might have bid if the base was anything other than a chicken-- too main stream for me!

The books ended up going for $5.00 "choice" then later $10.00 for the whole lot that remained. Since I have more books than I need right now (many I get very cheap, or free), I did not join in the bidding. The telephones were very tempting- especially since some were wired as lamps, but again, were too rich for me. Did I mention that I was cheap, er painfully frugal?

All of these items were sold in lots- a bunch of items were arbitrarily assembled (by the auction house staff) on a tray and sold as a group. The Coke collectibles went on forever. Eventually 6 lots of Coke stuff was sold, for pennies on the dollar. Many items were still in their original packaging. Hint to collectors: if it says, "collectible" on the packaging, don't buy it. Everybody and their brother will keep it "mint in the package" and it will NEVER have any resale value. Prime example. ANYTHING advertised by the Franklin Mint or those other clearing houses for painted plates, china dolls, thimbles, shot glasses and etc. Yeeesh! AccckkKKK!

You pay $65 per plate, but when you're hard up for money, you will be dang lucky to find a buyer who will give you $12.00.

Moving on....

This auction seemed to reveal that even small town auction goers had gotten savvy in their buying. This box of hardware went for over $18.00. That's a bargain in California, but not in Missouri. At least, not in my part of Missouri. :)

The one book I would have liked to have gotten, if I could have remembered who won the lot. It's okay to approach someone and say, "can I buy [such and such] from you?" I bought one item this way at the auction without buying the rest of the junk in the lot. And I only spent 50 cents.

The one that got away. I stopped bidding at $17.00 and should have bid higher. It sold for $18.00. A beautiful antique quilt with great resale potential. The quilt collectors hadn't shown up to this auction so all of the quilts went cheap.

Three and a half hours into the auction, I was starting to think about the pre-school party I needed to attend soon and was losing my focus. Many of these items sold while I only gave them a passing glance. I had also already spent over $35 on other stuff and was needing to haul it out to my car.

A unique lemon squeezer. Don't know what it sold for.

I left a proxy bid for this huge safety pin of keys, because I had to leave before the auction was done. Another example of what I used to get for cheap, selling for a lot of money (to me, anyway). The lot of keys and other dangly things sold for $13.00. Yikes! That means the skeleton keys I already own are worth more than I thought!

I will never know what the plastic container of gumball prizes went for. If it went for cheap, I don't want to know!

This lovely whisk broom also went for more than my proxy bid. Final price, $8.00. Oh well, I have plenty of treasures I did win. I'll share them in future posts (they are still hiding in the trunk of my car until I can slowly sneak them into the house!)

More Prompt Journal ART

My first installment was unintentionally heavy in subject matter (Oct. 27 post). It was very theraputic though and I could then get on with my daily domestic drudgery with a lighter heart. Laundry waits for no one! It just keeps piling up!

This next prompt, "A Pear by Itself" I took literally and obviously. Why not? This pear stamp by Stampington is one of my favorites and I have a current fixation with harlequin patterns. Voila! I have stamped this combination on many envelopes to friends and now I have my own version to keep long after I may sell the rubber stamps to make room for more (not real soon, but it could happen!)

I love letting original lettering show through.

The pear was stamped on an alphabet patterned scrapbook paper
I had tinted with watercolors.
I just love the date stamps on these library cards.
I try not to cover them up if I don't have to.

If you have purchased one of my prompt journals or
packs of pocket cards (or even gotten one in a swap),

I would love to see what you've done with them.
Send me a link to your blog or
email me a picture and I will post your creation on mine
(with a credit line).

If you haven't gotten around to trying anything...
consider this your prompting to do so!