May I Have Directions to the Inspiration Station?

Inspiration can come from anywhere. A magazine, pinterest, catalog, a favorite blog, nature, colors and the list goes on. I have had my dollhouse for years. My dad made it for me when I was....hmmmm...maybe 4? Can you guess what it is made from? Hint, it was military issue.

 It is made from an old military green Army trunk. One of these days I will have to show you the back. By viewing the back, you can tell that it was a trunk.

Through the years it was painted a soft pastel green, then yellow, then pink, and I am sure some more colors that I can't remember. I have always been puzzled on how to treat the front "face". That blank space right below the roof line as seen in the above photo. Well...I have conquered that dilemma, finally. Enter Jody of Postcards from Funtown! In her adorable article (with photos) in the issue of Where Women Create, I spied some cutie pie shelves in the background of one photo. They were more like cubby shelves, painted white with a red and white faux awning with a flag on top. Oh my goodness! I fell in love with those shelves and immediately started looking for something to add a faux red and white awning to!! Oh, my dollhouse would be perfect!

Ta-Da......

Easy peasy. Using algebra calculus statistics some sort of math, I figured out how to evenly cut each paper strip so that they perfectly fit the 22" + give or take a few millimeters (secretly I am not that good with centimeters or millimeters this is why I have a cheater ruler, some day I will share that ruler). Now it has curb appeal! Riots are at this very moment ensuing amongst the dolls, but not to fear....I have another house. Presented by Creative Breathing Realities.......

The Marx Housing Development. 

Yes. I won this sweet beauty from Creative Breathing. She arrived yesterday via USPS. Is it not the cutest? The squabbling has finally stopped. All is quiet in the craft room.

Elizabeth is so generous. Thank you so much Elizabeth. Every time I come into my craft room I am going to think of you. I have always wanted one of these little tin houses. Look upstairs to the right. See the little green awning. It has an upstairs patio! How cute! 

The interior. So much vintageness! Zoom in and look at the details! Thank you again Elizabeth. I am so excited to add this wonderful piece to my craft room! Your generosity warms my heart!

Here is a Scotty dog wearing his Irish green. The pattern is here. I just changed Snowflake Scotty to Irish Scotty. Hope he doesn't mind being Irish for a while :)

St. Patrick's Day decorations.

Sweet little pom pom chick. Use Elizabeth's  (of Creative Breathing) instructions to make the body, legs and feet.

I have a tutorial on how to make inexpensive 3D eyes for your characters.

You will need half pearls with sticky back (found in scrapbook embellishment section), a fine point sharpie, black paint, paint brush, mod podge.

Cut out one pearl but leave it on the plastic. You can't see it very well but the pearl is still stuck to the plastic. Now color it with the sharpie. It will have a purplish tint to it. The sharpie makes the paint adhere to the pearl. You could rough it up with sandpaper but I find that too tedious, the sharpie works like a charm!

Now paint it black. Let dry. Paint mod podge onto the pearl. You might need to trim the glue a little with some sharp scissors. The companies are not very neat when it comes to adding the adhesive to the pearls. Now your eye is ready to use.

Now your chicky has some cute, "cheep" (couldn't resist) eyes.

Have a wonderful, crafty, chicky kind of day,

Holly

The Four Leafer

Have you ever found a four leaf clover? When I was younger, my sisters and I would spend hours outside in the clover patch looking for that illusive four leafer. Over the years, we probably found a few hundred or so. We would pick them, bring them inside and try to preserve them by entombing the precious clover in Scotch tape. As an adult, I have found only one of these childhood entombed clover, brown with age but oh so full of memories. The next time you find a clover patch take a second look- Irish eyes just might be a smilin' on you!

For those of us who don't want to look like a fool digging through clover patches no longer have the patience, here's a four leafer for you to make!

He is quite the dapper fellow with that little

 derby hat! And yes....that is Patrick in the foreground smokin' like a chimney!

Lucky's hat is simply cut out of felt and glued to a piece of black card stock which was cut a little smaller than the felt. Only cut one piece out of felt and one out of card stock.

The black hat band is just ribbon and a buckle cut out of card stock, glittered and glued in place. His banner has two four leaf clovers painted on.

Shaker is made the same way as all of the other shakers, using the "Elizabeth method". Cut two clover pieces, one for the front and one for the back. Cut the side strip 30" long x 1" wide. Don't let the deep "v"s (area where the clover leafs touch each other) scare you, you should have no problem with them at all! 

His eyes are 10mm safety teddy bear eyes (found at Hobby Lobby in the doll making area). If you cannot find these eyes, just use the half pearls with a sticky back (scrapbooking area). Color the pearls black with a sharpie and then paint the pearls with black acrylic paint. The sharpie makes the paint adhere. The apply thin coat of mod podge. You might want to glue the "eyes" on instead of relying on the sticky back of the pearl. Hard to see, but he is wearing a bow tie made out of ribbon.

The girls have traded in their Valentines for St. Patrick's Day stuff.

The easiest way to decorate your craft room from holiday to holiday is to just add a Valentine, Four leafer, Christmas card, plastic Easter egg, etc to the arms/hands/laps of your craft room friends. You can make your own paper four leaf clovers by cutting out four hearts and taping them together to resemble a clover. Place a half pearl or half diamond in the center.

Have a wonderful, crafty night, 

Holly

Some Blarney Fun!

I am having to get creative to come up with some St. Patrick's Day decorations. I really don't want to go out and spend lots of $$ to just decorate my craft room. I do have St. Patrick's Day decorations for the rest of the house but my craft room was neglected over the years and now it is time to catch up. I am having so much fun trying to cleverly come up with St. Patty stuff.

I just love vintage greeting cards! Don't these cards look adorable! They are actually scans. Amazing, right! The color is so beautiful and crisp. I just love my scanner/printer. It's hard to believe that it sat downstairs in the guest room for years, unused :( Finally I brought it up to my new and improved craft room and now I use it all the time!

Scan your images and cut them out.

Make a little stand for them and tape it to the back. Do not tape the stand flush with the bottom of the card. Tape it about 1/16" up from the bottom. This will give a little lean to the card so that it does not topple over on it's face.

Hard to see the little stands, but they are there.

Here are some cards for you to print out. The drawing is of the stand. Cut it out, fold it and discard the triangle shaped piece. Tape to the back and now you can make lots of St. Patrick's Day decorations to fill your abode!

Now on to a Scrabble crisis. I know that you have noticed that I love to spell out words with Scrabble tiles. I have accumulated quite a few tiles. I have lots of "E"s, "S"s, "R"s, etc. Each game has multiples of the most used letters. Scarce are the "V", "W", "Y", "Z", and several other letters that are worth high points when you actually play the game and don't steal the tiles for craft projects. 

So.....as I was spelling words around the house, I realized that I needed another "Y". Ok....confession time: I am sure that I have more than one Y but I needed it NOW! No time to look under the rugs, desks, couch, in drawers, and other various places daughter#2 and sneaky cat like to hide things from me. I am not sure why but D#2 and sneaky cat absolutely love those tiles! Well....blarney.....guess I am going to have to come up with a way to make another "Y". I sure didn't want to spend $50 or more on ebay for tile lot that likely didn't have the coveted Y. And I didn't want to make a trip to Target (our Walmart doesn't carry the old Scrabble game) to buy another game. Well.......what about scanning the Y that I have, cutting it out and using mod podge to apply it to the back of an E? 

In this pic the scanned Y looks smaller, but I promise it is exactly the same size.

Look....you can't really tell the difference-of course the one on left is a little bit more 3D-ish.

This is what I had resorted to. Using that blank tile! It looks like I can't spell :(   

There, much better. See you can't even tell that an E is on the other side of the Y. Well, kiss the Blarney stone!! Now instead of 150 Scrabble tiles, I have 300!!! Amazing and I didn't even spend a dime.

Have a super, wonderful, crafty, blarney kind of day,

Holly

Oh Blarney Stone!!

Today I tried to photograph this....

But kept getting distracted by this....

and this..... 

while trying to catch these....... 

Yes. We had our first really big snow this year today. Only 1/2" but I'll take that. As of 9pm it is still on the ground and is suppose to freeze on the roads tonight. Sunday School has been cancelled but the 11 o'clock service is still on. We are going to try our best to get there.

Look what Elizabeth sent me! Don't you just love them! The sweet little girl faces are beyond adorable. They just speak to my heart. And do you see the domestic Valentines? Oh my....I just love them! The vacuum is the cutest. If my vacuum looked liked that I would have the cleanest house in the world!!! And the lovey popcorn bags.....goodness me. They look just like my husband and me. We love to eat popcorn at night while watching t.v.

The bowling Valentine also reminds me of my husband and myself. During college I had to take an elective that was some sort of sport. I wanted to sign up for diving, but the class filled up too quickly. So bowling it was. My best friend, Luann, and I had a blast. During "class" at the bowling alley my future husband use to come and watch me bowl and then walk me to my car after class. Such fun memories!

And look what else Elizabeth sent me. Some beautiful grandmother's flower garden quilt squares. These are so pretty and each one has been pieced by hand. I am going to have to make something special. I am thinking about making a couple of pillows with the flower garden quilt squares in the center of each pillow.

Elizabeth's paper crafts are just wonderful. She always makes each one so special and the attention to detail is amazing. Go ahead....take a look and zoom in closer.

Does this not fit me to a "T"!? I love sewing and sewing on my Featherweight is sew much fun! This sweet little girl is sewing on her Featherweight and making Valentines! I love the crepe paper border and again that attention to detail is amazing.

Here's the back of the Valentines. Look at the sweet little tomato pincushion!

I love this nut cup. I wasn't sure exactly what a nut cup looked like in person. We always used cupcake liners as nut cups for parties. Elizabeth's is so cute. I love the vintage flowers and the adorable pipe cleaner bird. He is holding a sweet little Valentine in his beak.

I love Elizabeth's clay creations. This little bird is so adorable. I love his collar.

Sweetest face!

Here is a card that I made today for a baby shower that I attended......today. Ever the procrastinator..... I used Elizabeth's layer technique and crepe paper fringe. The vintage card was scaled down 50%.

Back. This image was copied from the inside of the card and then cut out.

Here is little Patrick the Leprechaun. He is a sweet little guy that likes to curl up in his chair by the fire at night. Smoke curls around his head as he lights his pipe. His pot of gold always by his side and a small gold coin in his hand.

The smoke in his pipe is just stuffing. His gold coin and pot of gold are made from paper clay as is his pipe.

You do not have to add the smoke. Here he is without the smoke.

Patrick is made just like all of the other felties. The hat band and belt are just pieces of black grosgrain ribbon. His buckles are cardstock covered in glitter. His box is painted real simple. Green top and white bottom. I painted a four leaf clover in gold paint, then added a layer of glue and then glitter. The glitter that I used is a very fine powdery glitter. One little piece of advice while working with this fine glitter....no matter how much you need to cough, even if it is the choking kind of cough....don't! 'nuf said.

I hope that you enjoy making this little lucky guy. I also found out that I don't have a lot of St. Patrick's Day decorations....go figure. I have always loved St. Patty's Day, especially the corn beef, potatoes, carrots and  gold glitter.

Have a gold glitter kind of night!

Holly

ps as for the title of this post.....well.....I just love the word "blarney" :)