I'm Baaaaaaack!

Life has been so very busy that I have been living it much more so than blogging about it!  It is cold, very, very cold here in Wisconsin and so I spent some time in doors nursing a cold last week and fiddling with some beads.  I love the color combination of red/black/tan/ turquoise and when I worked in some antique brass I found the inspiration to make a multi strand Boho Chic necklace.  I had so much fun working on this necklace and am happy with the result.  I know that I have a looooong way to go but for a nubie I found this to be a wonderful way to spend the day!  I hope you like it too ;-D

I am not sure who I am going to gift this too yet.....it was actually super fun and very "freeing" to not have someone in my mind when I was making it.  I am trying to rediscover my enjoyment of crafting by just doing what I like when I like it.  I know that sounds like it should be natural but I have been making so many thing lately with someone in mind or specifically for someone because they have asked me too that now just making what ever tickles my fancy is kind of a departure!  And, it is fun....sooo fun to just play with colors, textures, patterns---seriously, whatever strikes me at the moment.  I found that with this particular necklace I stopped and took the beads out and rethreaded many times before I found what was most pleasing to me and that was somewhat of a revelation to me. In cardmaking, which I still LOVE, mistakes are often "fatal" to the project and must be discarded but beads are very forgiving :-D  Beads let you push them around till you get just what you want!  Anyways, I doubt I have any more followers now that I have been off the "net" for so long but I think I am going to just go ahead and post for my own enjoyment!

Be well,
Sheila

Jewelry on the brain....

I have been messing around some more with jewelry making and I have to say that I really like the added time it takes to craft a piece in relation to the time it take to craft a card.  I am finding that I have needs for different types of crafting and that has been a very fun discovery this summer!  So on to the piece I made over the weekend.

I have been noticing so much jewelry out there with an "anything goes" type of attitude and I really like that!  I enjoy the look of a piece that appears to be very handcrafted and made with bits of other perhaps broken jewelry pieces that might be found around the house or at a second hand store.  I love the varigated chain look that mixes different types of chain and findings to come together in a new look.  I am learning still but having fun in the process!  I uses a Spellbinder's bezel and filled the bezel in with Iceresin.  Other than that I just let loose and filled the bezel with bits of rhinestone, pearl, flattened marble, paper, glitter...actually a little too much "stuff" found it's way into this bezel.  I believe that the next piece will be less cluttered as I try to learn creative restraint haha!

Here is a close up of the bezel...the iceresin really makes the "innards" of the bezel pop!  I am trying to learn how to better create dimension within my bezels too.

This is the necklace in it's entirety and it falls just below the breast bone.  While it looks heavy it is actually very light!

I also tried something new with this (my second) necklace by creating a necklace that "converts" from long to a shorter, choker style.  It really looks lovely on!  And this is a style that I think I will come back to again and again so the recipients of these necklaces have more wearing choices.

Thank you so much for stopping by!  I always appreciate the visits and the comments!

Be well, 

Sheila

Spellbinders/Creating A Gilded Life

I am going  to attempt to post this entry using my phone from the end of our dock at our cottage.....I don't have super high hopes haha!  Better to try and fail then never to have tried at all right? I want to enter  this into the Spellbinder's/Creating a Gilded Life contest under the Fabric Arts section. I decided to try something new and very "out of the box" for me. From my A Gilded Life stash I pulled several faux vintage photos and decided to try to put together something that reminded me of my Grandma Bessie. I was lucky enough to have overnights at my Grandma's house when I was little and it was always such a special time. One thing that made it special is that Grandma was a crafter and so there were always so many cool tschtkes to look at. I remember going into her bedroom and feeling like I was entering another world.  I loved the smell of her perfume and talc. I loved opening her closet and burrowing into her fur coat.  She would let me try on  her jewelry and pretend to be a queen in her high heels and white gloves.  Lastly, she would let me dust and rearrange the top of her dresser where all sorts of treasures rested.  One particular "treasure" was a gold painted picture frame that framed some lace covered satin.  This elegant frame then became a repository for all sorts of curiosities. There were faded pictures of people from long ago. There were baby pics and pics of her as a young girl as well as a wedding snapshot.  She used this frame to catch her hat pins . There also was an old religious medal hanging from a broken chain .  If she found a button that was particularly elegant that often found its way to this board. A pretty ribbon or bit of Irish lace might also be included . And finally,  there was always a letter or postcard....so I included a letter that I crumpled and distressed as tho it had been read, tossed and then retrieved and saved . What I remember is a feeling of faded elegance and faded memories. I plan to enter this into the fabric art section of the Spellbinder/Creating A Gilded Life contest.

I hope you enjoyed this little stroll down memory lane with me.

Be well,

Sheila 

Spellinders/Creating A Gilded Life: part deux....

I had another idea for another entry into the  Spellbinder's/Creating a Gilded Life contest.  I love to make altered boxes.  I mean, give me something in a sturdy well constructed box and you can bet your bottom dollar that box will have another life as a small jewelry box given as a gift down the line!  Recently my daughter and I both had to get new phones and the boxes that the phones came in were so nice...in fact too nice to waste!  So, another project for the contest was born! And this project will be entered into the MIXED MEDIA category. So, here is what I started with....I picked out the paper that I was going to use....I picked a more vintage-y looking paper as I want it to go  on a night table in a spare bedroom that we have.  I alway like to have little places for overnight guests to put their earrings in when they come and stay the night.  Also my other daughter was talking to me about Marie Antoinette the other day and I just had Marie Antoinette on the brain!  So, I tried to create an over the top Gilded Life Marie Antoinette type curiosity box.

After cutting the paper and Mod Podge-ing it to the box I went to The Gilded Life stash that I had and pulled out this piece of pearlized white leather.  I embossed it with one of my favorite Spellbinder's embossing folders.

                                                 

Then added ink.

Then added more ink!

Next I cut out two "Shields" from the Spellbinders/Gilded Life and then embossed them with this embossing plate from the same line.

Colored them "gold" and they became the back plate for my knob!

Then I colored yet another shield with nail polish, sanded it when dry...

and then added some gold to the sanded areas.

This will now fit inside my bezel so nicely!  To which I added some necessary bling.

  

I also had this cool flower finding....it actually is a "clasp" for a necklace but I felt it fit nicely here.  Again I used my trusty nail polish!  Please excuse that atrocious crusty looking thumb!

I then pulled out my  Iced Enamels for a little grunging up!

Finally I pulled out this cool metallic netting that I got from Spellbinders/A Gilded Life and made a little unecessary but oh so cool backdrop for my flower.  I also added a small case "h" typewriter looking embellishment that I iced enameled gold....our last name is Hnilicka sooooo you can figure that one out!

Here is a close up of that lovely bezel.

Here is a shot of the top of the box....you can see how nicely the leather embossed and colored!

And finally, (are you still awake?) here is the finished box!  I just love it!  Actually, I am pretty glad that I decided ahead of time to keep it!  Fyi...those are chains that I glued to the perimeter of the box lid.  This was my first time working with leather and truly I didn't know how to finish it off.  So with the jagged leather edge = necessity became the mother of invention/creation!

Thank you so much for stopping by today and plowing thru this post ;-D

Be well,

Sheila

Spellbinders Creating a Gilded Life Contest!

     So, I saw that Spellbinder's/The Gilded Life was having a contest and I  thought that I would have a go at it.  This is an area of crafting that is somewhat new and unfamiliar to me but hey!  Crafting is crafting right?  And I love to mess around with different pieces and parts of old new so I decided to have a try!

I scrounged around my house for a bit and came up with a small pile of broken or worn items....who knew I was such a pack rat?  The first item that I found was an old hand held mirror from my mom's dresser.  I remember she had a comb, mirror and brush set laid out nicely on a try on top of her dresser. This mirror has long ago lost it's brother brush and sister comb!  The mirror itself was in fairly good shape although the back of it was missing all of it's decorations!  Perfect item to alter!  I also remember using this mirror as a child during games of dress up and make believe...sort of a fairy mirror that was a magic portal into another world....so, I decided that this "remade" mirror would become a true magical fairylike mirror!  The products of The Gilded Life work perfectly for this type of idea and once I picked the colors of pink and cream I was off and running!-(crafting!).  I decided that I would enter this into the category of "Home Decor" .

     Here are pics of the items that I started with.....first of all the mirror!

  As you can see at one time this was a very glamourous and beautiful mirror and one that would certainly play into a child's imagination.  I loved dressing up and holding it like a fairy princess!  Thank goodness my mom understood the  joy of imagination and allowed me to play with her beautiful possessions.  I next picked out the color pink that I wanted and used simple 80lb cardstock for this layer.  I went with a real candy pink as I decided that this mirror was going to "belong" to the Sugar Plum Fairy!  So, I traced a template of the mirror with vellum and cut out the pink.

I then pulled out some of The Gilded Life goodies that I ordered and they had included this perfectly sweet piece of lace!  I just love it!  It is so innocent and girly and just the perfect lace for my little imaginary Sugar Plum Fairy!  I fit this over the pink and then I actually "ModPodged" the two together.  I wanted the finish to be durable for any little hands who might want to pick this up and play with it at my house.  

After the Mod Podge was dry I fit the template onto the back of the mirror and glued it into place.  I ran a line of glue around the the perimeter of the mirror and finished it off with some scrap lace and toy pearls and beads.  The next step was to "dress up" the mirror and that took the help of some Spellbinder/The Gilded Life products.  I first used this die to cut out some lovely scrap paper to put into 

the middle of this gorgeous die!  I mean have you ever?  This just struck me as the absolutely perfect bezel to use!  A heart with wings and "crowned" with a warriors crown!  Just the powerful type of icon that today's little girls need!

After filling it with paper I went to my stash of buttons.  Okay...type for some embarrassing disclosure here.....I don't sew.  Even remotely.  But, when I see cool buttons I snap them up because I find that they are often more beautiful than any other embellishments and I love to add them to cards and such.  So, I found this card of buttons in my stash and thought COULD ANY EMBELLISHMENT BE MORE PERFECT TO FIT INTO THIS BEZEL?????  I mean seriously, this fairy girl  is so perfect with her long flowing hair!  The only problem is that the button is pewter rather than gold :-(

No worries though!

I often change the color of my "metal" embellishments this way!  After the fairy was fitted into the bezel I "outlined" the bezel with pearls. And more pearls.  And even more pearls!  I wanted an over the top look to this bezel.  I also used Guilder's Paste in white to "age" and "frost" the bezel and the mirror.

Next the bezel was glued on and it along with the pearls around the mirror received a healthy "gilding" of magical gold and platinum Stickles!  Then I added ribbons that I aged with gold ink and Voila!  The Sugar Plum Fairy's Magical Mirror!

I am SOOOOO pleased with how it turned and my two little girls...(ages 24 and 21) are calling "dibs" on it already!

Thank you for stopping by thru this long, long post!

Be well,
Sheila

A Wedding Card Kind of Summer...

It has been a super fun summer this year.....since we bought the cottage I have tried to spend every minute possible out there/here.  My problem is there is little to no internet and so blogging and posting is almost impossible!  I do want to post a card today though as I would like to enter a challenge with it!  It is thehttp://thecardconcept.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/challenge-16-create-wedding-card.html The Card Concept: Challenge #16 A Wedding Card and I was really struck with the lovely inspiration photo.  From that photo I was most taken with the color's/shades of blues and whites and also the lovely flowers.  My photo however does not show how soft the blue is that I used.  In reality it is a lovely perewinkle blue that I also dyed the ribbon to match the cardstock.  I decided to go with the "Clean and Layered" look for my card.  I used Spellbinder dies throughout except for the wedding couple which is part of a larger die.  I just cut the die and then further cut out the couple to use.  Both the couple and the lattice work dies are multiple mounted meaning I used three dies stacked on top of each other to gain dimension.  I hope you like this card!

                                                 

Be well,

Sheila