all done

July 18, 2008

Finally!  I’ve completed the last two pages in the last book for the Marie Antoinette international round robin that Heather, Natasha, Ginny and I have been working on for almost a year.  This was a big project.  We each did four elaborate “pages” (more like collages, really) in each person’s book.  That was a LOT for me.  But, I think they turned out to be really wonderful books.  I can’t wait to get mine back.  Thank you, girls, for inviting me to participate.  It’s been so much fun.

You’ve really seen similar designs to these before.  I repeated most of them at least once and some 4 times.  It was too much to think of something unique for 16 pages, plus a cover!  So, I won’t show you a million photos, but just to get an idea, here ya go.

Whew.  Now I get to try to somehow BIND these huge, fat books of mine and Natashas!  That should be interesting.

I’m off to the grocery store, which is such a joy with two boys who are in an arguing phase.  Just poke my eyes out right now, would ya?

xo

flea market loot

July 14, 2008

I hope you all had a lovely weekend.  I enjoyed mine.  Played with the kiddos, watched my two year old learn how to ride a big boy bike with training wheels, went skating and did not fall (the same cannot be said for afore mentioned two-year-old who did a kamikaze dive off the bleachers onto his head. ugh), went swimming, had a lot of fun.  I also managed to sneak away sans kids to the flea market, which is always fun.  Here is some of the loot I picked up.  All of the stuff in this picture I picked up at the same booth for less than a total of $20.  The hats are hard to see but they’re loaded with velvet flowers!  Woo Hoo!  I love those vintage jewelry boxes with the ballerinas and this one works great.  Of course vintage bling and birdies are always a fun find.

But the star of the show in terms of flea market loot is this amazing vintage prom dress!  Isn’t it beautiful?!

This sweetheart has only a 20 inch waist!  Who could have worn such a thing?  Perhaps it was a JUNIOR prom dress?  I love the little details.  I’m going to hang it as art.  I have another pink ruffly prom dress that I’ve shown you before, but after I get my studio all pretty I’ll take pictures of both of them displayed and show you.

So that was my weekend.  I hope you had a lovely one and are enjoying the carefree days of summer.  Now, I have to go take some boys outside to ride bikes before the have a meltdown!  Have a beautiful day.

well hello there!

July 11, 2008

 It’s been a fun and full week around here.  This week, my husband was on vacation so we did lots of fun stuff with the kids.  Today we went swimming and tomorrow it’s ROLLER SKATING at Skate Fever!  ha ha…. I’m sure that will bring back memories…. “the duck”, “couples slow” and “switch directions”.  Memba that?  So funny.  I can just picture Xanadu in my mind right now.  The kids will have so much fun and I’m sure I’ll fall and look like an idiot, but it’s all good!

 This week was also our 13th wedding anniversary.  Lucky Thirteen!  We’ve actually been together 16 years and it’s really weird to realize that babies born when we first got together are now old enough to DRIVE.  Geesh.  I’m so grateful to be married to my wonderful husband.  If you look closely at the comments in the last post, he snuck one in there.  He is such a blessing.  He is not just a fantastic husband, but a wonderful father, excellent provider, a lover of God, a keeper of promises, he keeps the cars running, builds me beautiful furniture, lets me decorate however I want, encourages me, is the smartest person I know, sends me to Silver Bella, and he can dance a mean two-step.  Plus he’s so darn cute.  Oh yeah, he rocks, and I am blessed.  My cup runeth over!

Also, my beautiful little sister was in from California this week.  Gosh, I miss her so.  We had fun cooking out, playing with the kids, doing summery sister stuff.  It was lovely.  I miss her so.

So that’s why you haven’t seen much of me lately.  But, today I have some pretty things to show you. 

Check out the millinery gorgeousness that’s new in the shop today:

Don’t you just wanna dive right in?

LOOK at this.  It’s a CORSAGE, people!  A CORSAGE!  A beautiful blushing pink corsage.  Doesn’t it just say PROM to you?  It is a lovely open rose with yummy crumpled petals in the center that make it look so real, surrounded by 4 trailing smaller roses and 2 trailing buds, as well as fabric loops and vines and 3 mossy green velvet leaves.  It’s stunning.  I’m keeping at least two of these to use on lampshades and one for jacket lapels.  I’m SO wearing one on my pink cordoroy blazer when I go to Silver Bella this fall!  It’s all made up for you already and finished nicely on the back.  It will come with a pretty corsage pin so it’s ready to be pinned to any lampshade, jacket, curtain panel, basket or anything else you can think of!

I also added two new colors of the gorgeous velvet open roses.  A beautiful buttercream color with pretty pinkish lavender stamens:

as well as this sugary snowy white with black stamens.  Love these.

You can pick these up in the Millinery Shoppe.

I also did two pages in Natasha’s Marie Antoinette book.  You’ve seen these designs before so I won’t bore you with tons of photos, but I did do them in different colors so thought I’d show you.

Here is a close-up of the crown.  I love the caviar pinks in this one.  I think it needs some crystals in the centers of the flowers, so I will add those, but you get the idea:

And here is a close-up detail of a millinery flower on her other page. I was so excited to find a pale pink flower with pink and seafoam green stamens!  It just screamed Natasha.  I love it.

Well, I think that’s about all the news I have for today!  I am going to the flea market tomorrow so I should have some pretty things to show you this weekend.  I know I missed the Flea Market Friday this month.  With the holiday it was just too hectic.  Maybe I’ll do it next week.

Have a great weekend, dear friends!  Enjoy the last half of summer.  Drink some lemonade, run through the sprinklers with your kids or grandkids, buy some tomatoes from a farm stand on the side of the road and just relax.  The chill of fall will be here before we know it.