Funky Find Friday: Halloween

For this installment of Funky Find Friday, I thought I would feature some great Halloween themed items.

First up is piece more geared toward fall in general. It's a beautiful pumpkin silk scarf from Ocean Avenue Silks.

Gorgeous!

How about some simple but cute cake decorating ideas from Country Living Magazine?

These ideas actually come from Chef Mary Maher of Chicago's Cakegirls bakery. I love her on the Food Network!

Check out this awesome coaster set w/ storage tin that littlepooky made over at Craftster.org.

Then there's this cute fabric banner from Addiebugs.

I love it!

All this Halloween goodness makes me want to throw a party even more. That's probably not going to happen this year. *sigh* I'll have to settle for decorating my house anyway! ;)

Happy Crafting!

Junk Bonanza in Review

Junk Bonanza was awesome! There were three huge buildings of booths. Mom and I got there around 10:00 am and left at 5:00 pm. We were really rushing to see everything in the last building at the end of the show too! I do have some pics. They are not great ones because I forgot to bring my actual camera, so these are all from my cell phone. Today I'm going to highlight some of the cool booths and neat items I saw. I'll show you what I actually bought tomorrow.

Great display of camp items:

Awesome giant sign letters:

A pretty display of primitive white and silver items:

I love this vintage tin trunk that's been printed with names of streets and other landmarks from around the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.

Hall tree made out of an old door:

A random crowd shot also showing some cute pumpkins made out of chenille:

There was so much cute stuff that I'm kicking myself for not getting pics of. There were peace signs made out of vintage ceiling tin, vintage roller skates used as wine bottle displays, and lots of fabulous junky furniture. I'm already dreaming of next year!

Don't forget, tomorrow for Inspiration Tuesday I'm going to post the stuff I got and unveil all my fabulous plans for it!

Happy Crafting!

Funky Find Friday: ATCs

No tutorial yet this week. Everything has been crazy. Tuesday was my birthday, Wednesday was a friend's birthday, etc. Haven't had much time to do any crafting. *sniff* But for today's post, I thought I would show you my newest craft: ATCs. What exactly is an ATC you ask? ATC stands for artist trading card. According to Wikipedia, "Artist Trading Cards (or ATCs) are miniature works of art about the same size as modern baseball cards,[1] or 2 ½ X 3 ½ inches (6cm X 9cm),[2] small enough to fit inside standard card-collector pockets, sleeves or sheets.[3] The ATC movement developed out of the mail art movement and has its origins in Switzerland.[4] Cards are produced in various media, including dry media (pencils, pens, markers, etc), wet media (watercolor, acrylic paints, etc), paper media (in the form of collage, papercuts, found objects, etc). The cards are usually traded or exchanged rather than sold." Source

Source

I have recently started making a few of these fine creations. What do I do with them? Why trade them with other artists of course. Where do I do that? No other place than Craftster.org, of course! I am currently in the ATC Swap over there and loving it.

Source

There are so many different techniques people use to make ATCs, it's just amazing. If you want to check out some of these great techniques, head on over to this Craftster post or just check out their ATC Board generally. Another great place to check out ATCs is over of Flicker. I just did a search for ATC and this is what came up. So much great stuff. ATCs are also great for scrapbookers who have lots of little bits left over and nothing else to do with them.

Happy Crafting!

*None of the ATCs picture are mine, but I am planning on uploading examples of my stuff later.

Inspiration Tuesdays: Mosaics

I love mosaics. Whether, glass, tile, found objects or whatever, I love seeing projects where people take stuff and make it special with grout (That's right, grout makes stuff special!). So today's inspiration comes from several mosaic projects that have caught my eye recently.

First is a twist on the gazing balls made from recycled bowling balls. But instead of marbles, Kathy Stantz, a contributor for JunkmarketStyle made this great ball using seashells and sea glass.

For a crazy good picture mosaic, check out vixenmeowmeow's street inspired art piece I found over at Crafster.org.

I love this wall fountain made with broken bits of china and a teapot by Diana Bodwell, a.k.a. pl8buster and found in her Flickr photostream.

Or how about this great tray from Vintage Butterfly 94's Etsy shop. I love that she used all the labels from the back of various pieces of china.

Well I don't know about you, but I'm sure inspired! I have a box of broken and chipped china and I've been meaning to do this kind of thing forever. Tonight seems like a good night as any as hubby will be "working late" (actually he works a couple of towns over and is staying to help with the food booth at the town fair. Read: drink beer.) But that's okay, it will give me time to craft messy and in peace. *Contented Sigh* I love when that happens.*

Happy Crafting!

*Don't worry, I'll show you anything I get accomplished (or whatever I come up with if it's not an accomplishment!) ;)

Funky Find Friday: Art

I have always wished I had the talent to paint and draw. My father has that talent, as does my brother, but somehow it skipped over me. As such, I admire those who can do those things and I thought I would show you some art I've come across both on Etsy and Craftster.org that I especially thought was great.

First is this painting of mailboxes in Peacock Garden's shop.

I love the rual setting and the colors in this one.

I love, love, love the watercolor sailors by Kat Martin. This is one of my favorites.

Her Etsy shop Weigh Anchor is closed right now while she's moving, but you can check out more of her artwork on Craftster.org.

Does any one else have an unnatural obsession with Bob Ross and his happy trees? No, um..okay. Wait a minute...bonesaw over at Craftster.org just painted a Bob Ross inspired delight

Look at all those happy trees for the happy little squirels and birds to live in. *sigh* Check out bonesaw's original post (link above) for some great in progresss shots!

For a medium that's a bit different, milesapart714 painted Alice in Wonderland inspired clothing right on pages from the book!

Check out the post to see all the other great clothing she painted! Plus check out more artwork in her etsy shop, Limette.

Got some great art you'd like to share? Contact me through my profile on the right

Happy Crafting!

Fellow Etsyers

Today I decided to feature some Etsy sellers who have just started up and/or have yet to have a sale. I used Etsy's "Pounce" feature to find these artists. I'm going to feature five sellers who have quality work that I like.

The first one is Sarah Murray Photography 'N Things. She has some beautiful photography. Her pictures are in both black and white and color. She sells jewelry in her shop as well.

Second is PDXCraft. She sells beautiful crochet and hand knit items including slippers, aprons, and sandals.

Third, is The Butter Flying. This store features artist Sylvie B., who designs mobiles, garlands, and wall art.

Fourth, is a supply shop called Melangerie. She has beautiful beads and jewelry supplies for sale. Many of the beads are in bulk lots for low cost.

The Fifth and final featured shop of the day is Tsunrise Designs. This shop has beautiful folk jewelry made from fused glass and antique silver plated forks! The designs are truly unique!

Hope you enjoyed this discovery of new artisans and shop owners with me! Check out some undiscovered artists yourself on Etsy.

Happy Crafting!