The Studio is CLEAN!

A "before" picture first. We had tried to sell the house a couple of years ago. Literally, we put it on the market one week before the bubble burst and ended up deciding we would stay a few more years. We had packed up a LOT of stuff and had it in storage. I have picked bits out little-by-little, but this summer we took it all back to the house and I just got around to really getting re-organized. I like to look at everyone else's creative spaces and thought I would take pics and share mine with everyone also (during the 2 minutes it stayed clean!)

Viola! a few hours later and it's ready for the creative juices to flow again! I actually enjoy the process of organizing. I can't stand it when I can't find something, so I LOVE my labeler! My Mom and daughter also use the space down here sometimes and I try to make it so anybody could find what they're looking for. The box on the floor is used for spray inks like glimmer mists, so it is actually there on purpose even though it's not pretty. I would love to change the color of the walls, but we had just painted the entire basement bright white for the sale of the house and it was a pain in the butt, so I really don't want to paint again right now even though it is rather uninspiring. I also need a new office chair desperately!

This is the other side of the room. My stamp storage and larger punches and some of my embellishments/ribbons. The bookcase houses most of my magazines and books on varios crafts - beading, scrapbooking, cardmaking and general papercrafts. The shoeboxes on top are holding some of the many cards I have made and a bleder I kept for papermaking (even though I still do not have a deckle yet!) The stamp shelving is a bookcase I got for free from work when they did a little re-organizing there! Always remeber it never hurts to ask! They can only say "no"! I sold StampinUp! stamps for a few years so most of my stamps came from there and many of my embellishments and inks also. I have also slowly aquired many other company's products as well and love having the options. I felt a little obligated to use only SU! products and now feel like I have more freedom in my choices. The closed closet door is where Mom's stamping/scrapping products are as well as some of my stuff to use: cans, jars, bottle, boxes, etc to decorate and/or keep my stuff in.

A closer look at my desk area. I am the type that needs to SEE my stuff or I forget I can use it. Or even HAVE it! I have a very high concentration of stuff right within reach at my desk and the wall units I have managed to find are SO great without taking up ANY space, really. Just a few inches off the wall. The ink holder I bought off of a website from someone who makes them. The octagon thing is a shadowbox I bought years ago and just put up when I did this clean-up. It was an ugly shade of gray/black and I spray painted it silver. The main cupboard/shelf is from Making Memories and I bought it at Hobby Lobby with my 40% off coupon (NEVER pay full price for your bigger-ticket items!). I LOVE it because it holds a great variety of things right in front of my face to keep me inspired. I think the carousel was Making Memories also -got it at Archiver's with my 30% off coupon! :0) The towel bar and buckets I won at a SU! meeting but I know they came from IKEA. The presentation was on ways to organize your craft space - LOL! S-hooks hold the scissors. On the right of the desktop is a silverware tray to hold my double ended markers that need to be stored flat and on the left are my inks and embellishments from SU! The filing cabinet houses all my 8 1/2 x 11 paper and is metal so magnet clips work great for displaying ATC's and cards/etc. The desk itself was a FANTASMAGORICAL find at Jo-Anns - it is 2 bases and a desktop - which I got piece-by-piece using my 40% off coupons - and the bottom drawers hold 12x12 paper!! (("aahhhh!" -> that's the angels singing)). The nice shallow drawers -3 on each side- are great for my ATC cards and smaller pieces of paper, stamp cleaner pads, cutters, embellishments etc, etc -you know what I'm talking about!

The tiny drawers are from the tool aisles at Wal-Mart and house some of my beads. I haven't been doing much beading and really want to get back into it SOON. Hopefully now that I am re-organized...! I also have one of those great handled-suitcase travel tote thingy's by Crop-in-Style that has the rest of my beads in it. (bought at Jo-Ann's with my coupons - of course!) The cart with drawers is an old medication cart from the hospital where I worked. They used to have a "garage sale" in the summers and I bought 2 of these heavy-duty, wheeled carts for $10 each one year!! I think they are my favorite thing down here because they speak to who I am so well -a nurse, a crafter, a bargain-shopping recycler and an organizing junkie! This one houses my smaller punches in the shallow drawers and adhesives and BigShot/Cuttlebug along with the folders and dies in the deeper ones. The other cart holds all my glitters, embossing and mica powders, watercolor paints, wheeled stamps, lightbox, etc. The closet at the left (also seen above) is full of small drawers and Iris carts with yet MORE embellishments, paints, fabrics, sponges, blah, blah, blah. I keep one Iris cart on wheels that I can pull over to my work area that is just full of the paper scraps that can/should still be used. I don't keep them by color, like many people do, but buy the size of the scraps. The really big scraps (like half sheets) DO stay in the file cabinet with the full sheets. I am a big recycler and a couple of the drawers hold parts of packaging that I have kept -Many chipboard packages are very pretty -Kleenex boxes, to name one. I keep them to use for backgrounds. Maybe I'll do a post about recyling while I'm "stuck" in the house. Yes, there is a MAJOR BLIZZARD going on right now and I'm loving it right now! Ask me again when it's over and I have to dig out!!

OK, Back to work. I am participating in a tag swap with one of my Yahoo groups and this is what I was working on right after I finished cleaning. I have since changed it up a bit and will post those pics later. Hope everyone is inside, safe and warm and being creative!.

Enforced "playtime"!!

I am home from work today even though I was going to work on my day off (NEED the $$$!). My boss decided she could cover the hours because the practice needs the $$$. :0( HOWEVER, we also have a " once in a lifetime" snowstorm coming and I don't expect to work tomorrow either since it is still supposed to get WORSE, so I am planning to have lots of creative playtime!! I have actually been quite artsy lately (still getting used to calling it ART and not Craft - I have to own it and not belittle myself or what I do! I call everyone else's ART, why not my own?!?) I have joined a couple of new groups to trade ATC's with and have already joined in 3 swaps this year! I plan to make several posts over the next few days/weeks because I love to say "LOOK WHAT I CAN DO!". Even if no one cares! ;0)

I have discovered a couple of new techniques and have even gotten brave enough to do one ATC for swapping that is COMPLETELY hand-drawn! (gasp!) So get ready to be impressed! -with volume if not talent/execution! I also have finally unpacked and put (back) away everything in my studio and I took pictures -it was clean for a minute anyway. I think I'll start there even though it's not chronologically correct.

Lastly, one of my kitties is not well. She is going on 17 years old and I think we may be getting to the end. I am just trying to keep her drinking, eating a little and comfortable. She just wants to sleep and hasn't left my closet in at least 2 days - it is nice and warm in there. Please say a prayer that she gets well soon if she is going to, or goes peacfully if that is God's will for her. Thanks.

Pic of the (week?!?)

They keep me young!! Happy 2011 to all! ;O)

I'm ba-ack!

I have been doing some art here and there. Some photography and ATC's and cards, but just haven't been "jazzed" to share. Not sure anyone even looks, but who knows, maybe someday I'll be famous and you all can gawk at my "early work" - LOL! Any way. I recently did a fairie ATC swap and would like to show you the card I made for the swap. I liked her!

Spiders!!!

This is 1 of 8 ATC's I made for another swap with my "ATC's anonymous" group. The theme is "Ghoulish" and my Mom saw them and said they weren't ghoulish at all - they were pretty. I had a TERRIBLE time trying to photograph them. They way the light bounces off different parts isn't consistent. Parts are shiny and parts are sparkly, and they are on different levels. The thread I used is a multicolored metallic and it's kind of hard to see in the pic. It was inspired by a pic I took last fall (or was it 2 yrs?) of a spider in his/her web by by front door. Thus the title of this one is "Spider By My Front Door" (I know! - How imaginative!, right?)

Here is the picture of the real one!

This is a card I made for the group leader, Lynn, to send the ATC's to her IN. I was just playing around with the idea of dripping blood and this was what happened.

This was discovered outside my bedroom window this morning and inspired the entire (almost) blog entry to be spider-inspired. (say THAT 10 times, fast!) If you click on the picture you can see it full size and you can see the tiny little hairs on her! Once again, it's a macabre love-hate thing I have with bugs!! (She is no longer outside my window in case you were wondering)

Garden pics

Just wanted to also post some pics of the garden this year. It has actually been pretty neglected since all the work we did in May and early June.
My trumpet vine has really taken off this year and has started to really bloom. This one even grew this bizarre bean pod thing which I have never seen before!The natural shading in this sunflower makes me think of all the copic tutorials I've been seeing. Now I need yellow copics! (Cha Ching!$$)Harley hurt his ear this spring and he looks old and grumpy in this pic. Kind of how he really is getting. He IS 14 years old this October!Just pretty. And one of very few garden pics I took this year :(
Yeah, neglected. I never got out and stalked butterflies and bees this year either!
I liked how this sunflower looked like it was giving the Japanese beetle the finger!

I got some Mums put in around the Cherry tree. It looks like fall! Where did summer go!?!!
A nice macabre image to leave you with! I actually think these images are really interesting and cool. Nature just fascinates! The bug at the top is another dead one. I can just imagine the spider hiding down that tunnel looking back at me with malevolent intentions!

Summertime fun ATC swap

I also entered a swap with the theme of "Summertime Fun". Not so much detail this time. Not so sure how much everyone wants to hear about my thought processes! Bad enough I think out loud, now I'm typing it out too!

It was really hard to get a good pic of this one. I may try to scan it instead, Scans just never show sparkle. Although it would give me a chance to get the dog hair out of the picture!. (Ignore that please!)

I used my Tattered Angels glimmer mist and a glimmer screen of a dragonfly for this one. My first time! Again, it's really hard to get the subtle shimmer to be seen in a picture. The rest is just various dragonfly stamps I had.

New SU! stamps! I liked the grunge look of this one. Made my own ink wash spray with reinker.

More of the new SU! stamps. Cleaner image this time. Not sure which way I like better.

My nephew, Dallas. "Bingo Blast" technique on the background. If you guys haven't heard of Technique Junkies, ya gotta go! Pat Huntoon runs a website and an every other month technique newsletter. Go to patstamps.com to check it out. It's not free for the newsletter, but so worth it and there are some free tutorials on the site to whet your appetite!

A little paper tole with a $1 stamp from Michael's I bought about 5 years ago on a background of the shaving cream marbling technique. I made a ton of cards for a large SU! swap last year and used the marbled paper (shaving cream and reinker-and plenty of paper towels! FUN!) but I got a little carried away and made LOTS more marbled paper than I needed. My favorite ice cream is vanilla with stawberry topping and
when I looked in my stash for an "ice-creamy" background, there it was! It's very subtle in this picture.

This background was a TJ technique also. Stamped the image first, then masked and did the BG, Colored with SU! markers and shell attached with Crystal Effects.