I have been a busy bee! This is just maybe 2/3 of the beuatiful things I’ve been gathering for you in my new “millinery lovelies” area of the shop. Check em out:
All of this GORGEOUSNESS is available right now in the shop. These are newly made and from a milliner that has been in the millinery business for over a century. They are made with old-world methods. You will find NO plastic here, no polyester, no rubbery petals or leaves, only authentic materials such as cotton, silk, linen, velvet, chiffon, organza, and other quality, dressmaker materials. These are the real deal, stems are wrapped wire, some of the flowers and petals are hand shaded, just as their vintage counterparts were.
These are not like other repro flowers. You will see a difference when you hold them in your hand. The velvets are very velvety, the silk roses have a movement to them, a drape, not stiff. The forget-me-nots are large (relatively!) and lush. You’ll see the quality.
I am so excited to bring you this new source for beautiful millinery. I have a few more things to list, more flowers and some butterflies, but my kids are tired of waiting and need to get in some quality slip-n-slide time, so this will do for today.
I finished another page in the Marie Antoinette International Round Robin I’m doing with Heather, Natasha, and Ginny tonight and thought you would like to see it. Didn’t it come out really pretty? This was so much fun and I was surprised by how well it turned out.
Here’s how I made this. It was so easy (if a little time consuming). First, I cut out the shape of a crown from the left-over chipboard drink carrier from Sonic today. Yes. I use these all the time! They’re the perfect thickness and they’re free, plus I hate the idea of throwing it away if it’s useful. You could also use thick artist paper, watercolor paper, even posterboard. Anyway, I cut out the shape. Then, with hot glue warming up, I cut shapes out of satin loosely in the same shape as each section of the crown, but I cut them about 3 times as large. Then I hot glued it to the shape, gathering and smooshing as I went. I did this for each section, which gave me the outline to glue my flowers onto. I used the tiny paper forget me nots (some new and some vintage). Everyone is always asking me where I get those. Well, usually I have to fight and bid on them on ebay, but now that Andrea sells them in her lovely shop, I am happy to have a renewable source for them! Also, the fine pure silver glitter is from Heather’s beautiful shop. It’s not glass glitter, it’s pure silver shavings! Anyhoo….. After I glued the flowers on (and velvet ribbon to the bottom), I plucked the stamens out of some of the flowers and glued in swarovski crystals instead, to give it some sparkle. Then it’s just some vintage rhinestone bits and bobs and viola! A 3-D crown fit for a fantasy. I just hot glued the whole thing onto the page. I love the look! Isn’t it cool?
I still have 3 more pages to do in Ginny’s book, then I’ll do Natasha’s and we’ll finally be done. Sometimes I think we bit off more than we can chew, doing four huge pages in each person’s book, but I know when we’re all done each book will be a treasure trove of art. I can’t wait to get mine back!
If you’d like to see all the pages done in the books so far, visit the flickr group Heather set up. It has all the pages completed by each of the artists in there. Some gorgeous stuff in that group, lemme tell ya.
I’ll be back with some news about new things in the shop soon. Some neat-o stuff.
Hello friends. Sorry I’ve been AWOL lately. On Mother’s Day night I was up ALL NIGHT horribly ill! Violently, awfully, sick. It was so bad that I thought I’d had food poisoning, but nope. The virus worked it’s way through the whole fam. It was a lovely mother’s day. ha ha ha…. But, all better now. Whew!
I’m working on several special orders right now and also still working away on Marie Antoinette round robin I’ve been working on for longer than it took to make each of my CHILDREN. BUT…… we’re on schedule now and so I’ll show you the new pages I’ve been working on next week.
I’m also doing some fun new original art. I don’t have anything completed yet, but the picture at the top is a sneak peek of some of the things I’m dreaming of and working with. I love the vintage wedding toppers, don’t you? Especially the dark haired gal in the pink gown. Come on! How do you not love a petal pink wedding gown?!
The expressions are always so funny. The chalkware groomsman…. ha ha…. I can’t decide if he looks suave or just nauseous! He’s hilarious.
My oldest son’s last day of school is next week and I’m SO looking forward to summer. Ahhh…. summer.
I’ll eat my words in July when it’s 105!
I’ll show you some more cool stuff later this week. Have a lovely Sunday!
Hello sweet friends. Wow. I want to thank you so much for all of the sweet birthday wishes. I am THIRTY FIVE years old. My son told his teacher and all his friends at school that I was 43 1/2. Ha ha ha! I love the “and 1/2″ part. I told him not to rush me. I wanna enjoy being 35 for a while before I move on to my 40s!
I can’t believe how thoughtful and sneaky Brian was yesterday. He actually played a little prank on me…. When I got home from picking up the kiddo from school, he told me that someone had messed with my site again. I was in a panic! So I ran over to see, and there it was, the sweet birthday post. That turkey.
I have to give him credit. I’m always telling him that he doesn’t have to buy me things…. I’m not really a “thing” person. I don’t need diamonds or expensive resteraunts, etc. Don’t get me wrong, I like those things, but I LOVE when someone gives a THOUGHTful gift. Like when a friend sends you a package of sweet things she’s gathered that made her think of you, or when your kiddos bring you a boquet of dandelions that they spent all afternoon carrying around in their pocket after recess at school. I LOVE that kind of thing. One of my favorite gifts was when someone noticed that I had had these vintage tables for a long time with no table top. They sneakily measured the tables and went out and had glass cut for them. I was thrilled.
I also think a gift is more special when it’s a bit of a sacrifice. Not a big sacrifice, but you know, something that forces you to really GIVE something of yourself. Either you have to work hard to think of something special, or give something that you really would rather keep. When I give a gift I always try to make myself give a little extra…. one of my favorite millinery flowers, or a special thing that I’ve been hanging on to. Not that I’m so great and self-sacrificing or anything like that, which is why I try to remind myself that the person I love is more important than the thing I enjoy. I feel like we have to let go of things sometimes to be reminded how UNIMPORTANT the STUFF really is. Well, Brian scored major points (not that I keep score… usually!) because it is SO not like him to do something so public. Brian is a man of few “flowery” words. He’s very logical. I call him Mr. Spock sometimes because he is not exactly in tune with his emotional side! But obviously he is more romantic than I thought. Because that was a big deal. He’s really brilliant, actually. I’ve never known someone so talented and smart. Also, he’s SUPER cute! I’ll have to show you a picture some time. I’m feeling so blessed. I can’t believe he did that. I’ll always cherish the look on his face… so proud of himself…. he knew he did something special and sweet. That made it even more special, that he was thinking of me… he went outside his comfort zone and did something for me. That’s the good stuff.
ANYWAY….
I’m having a small little Flea Market Friday tonight. Not a lot of stuff, but what I’m selling I would really rather KEEP! BUT, like I said… you can’t keep everything. Here are some sneak peeks to the goodies tonight.
Holly left to go pick up our son from school so I thought I would sneak into her blog and wish her a Happy Birthday.
I am a lucky man to be married to her. Holly is as genuine and sweet in real life and she appears to be online. She is an awesome wife and a great mother to our kids. Not to mention she is very talented artistically. With all of those traits I can’t believe she has put up with me this long.
Wow. Yep. I’m still here. It has been a crazy week, folks. Have you missed me? Here’s the skinny on what’s been going on with the website. Our (now EX!) webhosting company decided to “upgrade” to a new system. Well, quite the upgrade indeed! When they switched us over to their new system, suddenly our site was redirected to a…well… less than savory site. When we tried to get the hosting company to help us, we were largly ignored. Thank the good LORD that my husband is also my web designer. I called him at work and he immediately took action. It was SUCH a mess, a complete debacle. It was so frustrating, but thankfully my sweet guy quickly fixed everything. We decided right then and there to switch to a different webhosting company, which we have done.
This was so upsetting! It couldn’t have been worse timing, with the gorgeous Artful Blogging article just coming out. *sigh* oh well. All is well now. Wow. What do people do who are NOT married to computer geniuses?
I am SO sorry to anyone who tried to access my site during this time. All is right as rain now, and we’re back in business. However, if you tried to email me during the last several days, I did NOT get your email because in an effort to remove the redirect, my site was temporarily off line, so please write again. I wouldn’t want to miss out on anything you had to say.
I guess all is well that ends well and we’re back in business!
In fact, I have been a busy bee, getting some goodies ready for Flea Market Friday this week. I know it was supposed to be last week, but don’t get me started! LOL
The picture at the top of the post shows some of the things that will be available on Friday, May 9 at 7:30 PM central time. Also this little sweetie:
