a fun way to use your fabric scraps

Dear friends,
I was cleaning out my small cupboard full of fabric what nots. I found a piece of old lace that I'd painted with rose acrylic , unwashed, harden [and forgotten] tucked in the back. This little lace, inspired me to create a tiny fabric love notebook which I like to share here. Armed with 4th-grade sewing, I set to work :).

The lace, painted in acrylic and left dried for maybe months :). It feels hard like a 'crepe' or a 'soft' taco shell. Perfect as book/journal covers.

This tiny fabric book measures about 4" X 3" in size.

I hand-stitched everything, each page, every little hearts and all pages to the lace cover. I think it's more organic & romantic that way, with frays and all. [Yeah, need to get that sewing machine fixed!]. 

I took two small rectangle fabrics, stitched them two-by-two on the corners for extra thickness. I made seven sets of these, so I would have 28 pages in total. [28 days of February?]. Arranged them like pancakes onto the lace cover (on far left end of the lace). Sewed in the middle [with running stitch) so that they would open like a book. Then sewed & tied a ribbon for closure. You can opt this out, and use buttons or velcro instead.

Here are some pages in the fabric book;

It's fun to add beads or button on the hearts too :).

I have yet to add little notes to these pages;

Key to my heart :).

I can't help to make the letter 'S' kissing!.

I crochet a circle and add to a heart.

The last page.

I have to show the edges. Does this not look like the yummiest lasagna? LOL. 

I guess, LOVE is in the air :). My first Valentine project for the year!. This should be a cheap project, since you may already have all the materials handy :). Hope you'll try this too. HUGS.

how to age a wooden box

Sweet friends,
I got a wooden box from the flea market over the weekend. I altered it into a shabby white box and thought I'd share a tutorial of it today :). 

This is just another way of making a box looks old. I first glued brown tissue paper all over the box, and let it dried.

Tissue paper still wet with glue.

The original box.

After tissue paper has dried.

Then I dry-brushed some gesso all over the box, with a single objective to get imperfect brush strokes, LOL. Just go crazy, left a patch here and there :). I dried this first before moving on painting inside the box. [That way you won't leave finger prints on the wet gesso].

Painted the inside with leftover gesso.

I then, sanded off the surfaces and all the edges. 

In doing so, I partially torn off the tissue paper, do you see it?. Think I like that :).

Further distressed the box by inking all the edges with Timber Brown Stazon.

Then I stamped some butterfly & flower motives on multiple sides. You may add word strips, or decoupage or layers of collage with ribbons and fabrics for more colors and texture. 

The front.

The back.

I even stamped the inside edges.

And that's it. This is the new home of my winter ATCs!. Hope you'll give this a try. Hugs.

shabby winter ATCs

Hi there,
After a fun blog-walk through the snow with Dawn around her backyard, I can't help myself but to create something white & shabby. Oh, Dawn your home is so beautiful!. LOVE LOVE the snow. Since I crave a quick art fix tonight, ATCs would be the answer;

I used white gesso for texture and later finger-smudged with blue, coffee bean & taffy acrylic paint. When dried, I stamped, distressed, sprinkled some glitters and collaged to my heart's content. I love that they're quite chunky. 

This one is my favorite!. I filled tiny bottle with white sparkling 'snow' for fun :). 

And glass beads as icicles. 

I made 'tracks' and heart patterns with an artist knife while the gesso was still wet. Was trying to mimic all the fun tracks seen at Dawn's backyard :).

I loved snow-covered bulrush. [well, snow-covered everything]. Here, I used twines to achieve that organic look.

I used plenty of lace, fabric, pom poms, gauze and buttons to give that shabby look. I'm keeping the colors cool and earthy. And a dash of blue for the sky. 

There you have it, first ATCs of the year!. Hope you'll hop to Dawn's blog post to check out how I interpreted her beautiful surroundings!. Have a good weekend :). Hugs.

what I do besides 'art'ing

Hello friends,
Ever since I have my cats, I don't keep plants in my home anymore. And I made sure all fresh-cut flowers safe in jars on high places. I'm not a green thumb and sadly it seems, the plants would die if I ever touched them. I LOVE LOVE to do this more.  

I've been keeping little potted plants out on my tiny verandah, trying very hard not to touch them. [As you can see, they are still in their store-bought plastic pots!.]. Being too careful.

With lots of water, LOVE, talking and singing to the plants, they live!. I can't be happier, my experiment works :).

And the cactus are happy too, despite all the rain we have here almost every afternoon. 

I think now I could move on to grow flower plants and herbs. Should be fun!. Wish me luck. 

To end this post, I like to share a 'singing plant' video that I found a while ago. I'm happier now when I'm outdoors in nature, deeply knowing that I'm hearing their songs :). I am a believer. You can read more here as well. Till then, HUGS.