The Little Bluebird Diaries is hosting a Share Your Studio Saturday with the theme being organization. I have to admit that I do have a couple of those plastic organization bins in my closet for rough items like china shards for mosaics, but I much prefer storage items with a vintage look. To store paper scraps for decoupage and collage, I made this box. I purchased a wood file box from a craft store and painted it inside and out in a chocolate brown. I decoupaged an image of a woman spinning flax onto the lid and glued two layers of ribbon around the edges of the lid.
For the sides of the box, I cut scrapbooking pages into panels and decoupaged them one at a time, trimming them to an exact fit with an Exacto knife after the glue had dried.
I dropped a piece of gold embossed scrapbooking paper into the bottom just to pretty it up a bit. Most of the time it's hidden by all the paper scraps, but I like knowing it's there.
This little chest of drawers came from an antiques market. I think it was cobbled together by some guy in his home workshop years ago. It was roughly done, with circles of wood for drawer pulls. It had been painted over several times in red, blue and a dirty cream color and the sides of the drawers were covered in graphite. I spent a lot of time sanding, painting and waxing it.
The rose drawer pulls caught my eye at another antique market and I decided to use them on this project. There were 4 smaller ones and 2 larger ones and they were probably supposed to be used in pairs, but I used one centered on each drawer front.
I wanted decoration on the sides that echoed the design of the pulls. After much searching at my local hardware stores and then online, I choose these appliques from
Rose Blossom Cottage. They had a very similar motif, were the right size and worked with my budget. The appliques looked like clay when they arrived and were steamed over a pot of water to a pasta-like consistency which activated the glue. Once dry, they painted up nicely.
I decoupaged some toile tissue paper inside the bottom of the drawers. You can see that the drawers were originally grooved for dividers, but they were missing and I did not replace them so I could have larger storage areas. This drawer holds an assortment of ribbon and trim odds and ends and the others store items like stamps and ink pads. This still shabby little chest of drawers sits on a vintage folding table that serves as my work space. Now I'm off to gather ideas from the rest of you--I've found that as my interest in blogging and collage grows, so does my stash of tools and supplies!
During a recent visit to a thrift store, which had been squeezed between other family errands, one of my teenage sons said, "Look, Mom," and pointed to a high shelf. He had spotted a pair of lamps with figurines that looked just like the people in the toile patterns I love. The man was missing a hand, but the woman appeared intact down to the tiny, sculpted roses in her apron.
At first glance, I thought the lamb's leg was broken, but it was just tucked under. The figurine and base certainly needed some cleaning, but the price was so right!
I spent about an hour cleaning the lamp with a damp terry dish towel and Q-tips. (Some old things have a patina, but others are just plain dirty!) It cleaned up beautifully--no permanent stains, just a lot of dust. I found a silky shade for $7.99 at Tuesday Morning, and for safety's sake, I will probably rewire it. I've heard it's a pretty simple DIY project with a kit from the hardware store, so I may even try it myself this time instead of asking my husband to to it.
In hockey, when you "light the lamp" it means you scored. For those of you who don't have a family of hockey players like I do, the phrase comes from the red light behind the net that is lit up when a goal is scored. I think I should be able to borrow that phrase for this vintage score, don't you?
