Christmas is already over?

The winter holidays are so greatly anticipated and planned for it seems like ages until they actualy arrive. And then sitting there on your couch surrounded by stockings and new gadgets it hits you, the holidays are on their way to being over! I wasn't able to attend to many crafts this season due to a busy final schedule for school, but it was worth the effort because I earned another 4.0! The crafting I was able to manage were some simple ornaments and decor with real cedar branches from my parent's yard. I also made a wreath this year from trimmings and a grape vine frame found at Michael's. For cards this year my husband and I just did the photo cards from Walgreens, simple but fun. I hope everyone had a holiday that made your hearts cozy and the future bright!

 

 

Flying Time

Our one year anniversary is coming up! Looking back, it has been a fast, eventful and wonderful 12 months. This life with my adventure buddy is sure going to be a swell ride.
Also looking back at our wedding, I wanted to share some of the little touches that made it such a special day. For our wedding I was able to get my sister to help me and add some personalization that were pretty easy and inexpensive to make. We had a relatively small wedding which made things easier on us as well.

BOUQUET

This bouquet was fun to make the day before the ceremony, I stuck it the fridge with some water over night to keep it fresh.  Making it took some fiddling to get the right balance of the flowers but turned out just the way I wanted. I used off white roses, orange gurber daisies, and cedar sprigs for filler and aroma! The stems I secured them with a rubber band then wrapped over with brown ribbon leaving some of the stems sticking out the bottom for a casual touch. I tacked the end of the ribbon with pins that had nice pearl like tips on them.

FLOWERS IN OUR HAIR

My sister was my maid of honor and to tie our looks together I made these cute hair clips. I used synthetic flowers and feathers from Michael's and big sturdy bobby pins. I needed to cut the flowers off their stems so that I could get enough surface area to glue to the pins. I still wear mine! I use the feather to wrap around my ponytail because it has a wire vein which is handy.

FAMILY THUMB PRINTS

This was my mother in law's idea actually, and my sister was the one who painted the brown trunk and branches of the tree using watercolor. At the reception we had it setup on a table as our guest book with a few shade of green ink pads. Our guests got to stamp their leaf print and sign it with a thin felt pen, marvelous!

THANK YOU GIFTS

For gifts to our guests we wanted to give something that wasn't going to be tossed out when they got home. My husband came up with small plants for them to keep and enjoy. My mother wrapped the bases in paper bags and tied them with orange ribbons. The cute tags I picked up from a yard sale and had my amazing sis write the two sides.


CAKE
My favorite part! My gramma who designs and makes cakes in Prescott AZ came and did a fabulous cake for us! I told her the colors, how I wanted fresh flowers and of course the flavor. She did an amazing job don't ya think? Grammas rule!

Fresh butter cream, yummy! And fresh flowers, oh so pretty!

All the pieces came together so well for our day and we couldn't have done it without the creative staff that is our talented family!

Our Loving Family

Happy Haunting

My costume is finally finished, after days of ironing and sewing and pinning and trying on and adjusting, I am a complete harlequin! To go through some of the process here are the photos I remembered to take along the way...

My initial sketch,

I got the idea from these amazing jewel tone rainbow diamond tight found on amazon.com. However I couldn't bring my self to pay for then and ended up wearing solid orange tights instead. My sister and I rummaged around my local salvation army thrift and found the wonderful paisley patterns and velvety solids I needed to complete the outfit, five in all.

The top in progress

This was pretty much two top halves bonded together with iron adhesive. The diamonds are iron adhered as well, super easy and quick. The puffy sleeve was a bit tricky, but well worth it!

Now for the bloomers, the begining process was taking a pain of lounge shorts that fit me nice and comfy and tracing a pattern from them. I left room for the hemming but forgot to take into account on the elasticity of the shorts material. To fix the problem I undid the outer seems and added more inches to go around my thighs. Once they fit well and had proper length, I took an old sweater sleeve and made the waist, nice and stretchy. I also incorporated elastic bands in the legs so I could scrunch them up for that billowy look. To finish the bottoms off I ironed more diamonds from the other fabrics.

And here is a final picture! I made fabric flowers from left over material and sewed another strap to keep my business secure fro the partying to take place. My makeup is mostly done with acrylic paint, if you try this make sure to test is you will have a reaction in a small area first. I like it because of the vibrancy of the colors and I have a nice supply already. The paint also washes off easily with a little soap on a cloth.

Accompanied by Magenta from The Rocky Horror Picture Show (AKA my sister) and our friend the zombie nerd

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Now for a picture process of my husband's PipBoy 3000 for his Fallout vault 101 dweller costume. I used a plastic water bottle, shopping bags, scotch tape, cardboard and acrylic paint.
One of my reference pictures

.....finishing touches

The final product!

Sean, who was very excited, wore his costume most of the day and of course all night.

Hope you all had a great haunting halloween!

Inspiration from a Mug

My mother has a cup with graphic cats upon it that looks something like the one below. Even since I was little that would be the cup I would use for my teas, hot chocolate and milk. I wasn't sure who it was by until my honeymoon when I saw the second cup below. The artists name is Laurel Burch and she is one of my favorites! She uses such bright and rich colors that catch your eye instantly. Even though her images are simple in a way, the colors make them pop out at you. And the way she layers the colors and figures adds to the complexity of the pieces. . .  

Inspired by her work, and in need for some pizazz  in my bathroom, I did a homage to the color and energy by doing my own painting. I had to choose a few components from the design on the cup and enlarged them for more impact. The flowers have such great texture and fanciful shapes, not to mention the brilliant bird! Because I wanted the bird to stand out more, I altered the sun's design excluding the face. I used acrylic paints after I sketched my design on canvas, then outlined with a gold paint pen for extra sparkle. . . and here it is;

Fleur de Lis

I heart fleur de lis motifs!

My husband and I, plus the beasties, often go up and visit his family on weekends. They have a spare bedroom that has pretty much become our room. My mother in law was redecorating and I offered to do some art for the walls, and below is my contribution. The overall style of the house is traditional with a lot of metal work designs. I was trying to get these fleur de lis to look like hammered metal, without the cost or effort! The green and purple colors I took from the bedspread which she already had. I chose a poem in french about spring because the sun is so beautiful through the window and fleur de lis is a french term!

I started with three canvases of equal size and painted them with green and tan spray paint. Then I added some texture with a sponge in the reddish purple. The inscriptions are done in a brown sharpie, I also put the english translation on the backs just for reference. My scrip writing is casual at best! The fleur de lis them selves were sketched and then cut out of brown paper bags. I then took my white school glue and did the contouring. When the glue dried I sprayed over with the brown spray paint. To highlight the ridges of glue I sponged white heavy on the tips and lighter towards the centers. Spray adhesive on the backs of the motifs secured them to the canvas, and there ya go! They were so light that pushpins were all we needed to hang them.

I like sets of three, not only because of the number, but because you can arrange the pieces in multiple ways for style or function of your space. The triangle way she hung these above the bed makes a bigger headboard.