Night Garden Blog

New in My Etsy Vintage Shop

2012-01-27T09:28:00.000-08:00

I found a couple of really nifty treasures over the past couple of weeks. Namely, some really lovely mid-century dishware sort of fell into my lap while I was out thrifting for a pair of Converse for my husband. I had my Commando (phone) along to help with a bit of on-the-spot research, and so I came home with the lovelies below . . .

Broadhurst Ironstone by Kathie Winkle. Five pieces in this pattern, Viscount, are currently listed in my Etsy Vintage Shop, Night Garden Vintage. Kathie was a designer at Broadhurst for a few decades, and was one of the first designers to have her signature on the back of pieces she'd designed. Now sought-after by collectors, folks are gathering large collections of her machine-stamped, hand-painted pieces to mix and match.

Also found, one small saucer in pattern 1506.

I have scoured the web to find more information about pattern 1506, but haven't found any other images of this pattern. The closest I've seen is Kathie Winkle's pattern "Safari". I've linked here to someone else's Flickr page.

As you can see from Louise's Flickr photo, the pattern is identical, but the color is different. Possibly "Safari" was available in more than one color-way? Possibly the plate is an early prototype? Possibly this colorway was simply known as "1506"? I don't know.

Next up, this serving plate by Stetson China Company for Mar-crest's Nest Stone line. The pattern name, according to website Modish.net, is Diamond Carousel, by designer Alfred Dube. The pattern is a ring of elongated diamonds and starbursts around the rim of the off-white dish, very retro-modern.

My assumption is that this is a serving piece; the only other plate in this pattern currently for sale on-line (as far as I've found) is listed as a dinner plate on eBay, with a 10-inch diameter. This is one and three-quarters inches larger.

Visit my Etsy shop to check out more photos and details! I have some pieces in Franciscan's Pomegranate pattern I'll be listing in the near future, so if you like that pattern, stay tuned!

Artsy Stuff at the Harrisburg Museum

2012-01-25T23:04:00.000-08:00

This past summer I had buckled the kiddo into the car one afternoon and gone off hunting for a nap. I picked a direction, then drove and drove . . . through a couple of towns . . . through scenic pastures full of sheep . . . for about half an hour, until I decided to turn around before I got lost, and ended up in the parking lot of The Harrisburg Area Museum.

Besides a room full of newer and antique tractors and farm equipment, the museum features several additional outbuildings full of local history and artifacts, as well as a tiny church and a tiny schoolhouse decorated with historical finds.

We didn't have much time to spend there the first time we discovered the museum (we'd arrived a half hour before closing time), but we've been back a handful of times since then and spent a bunch of time exploring. The kid is totally into the museum for the farm equipment; nothing quite like massive tractor wheels and exposed engines for this guy. I'm kinda into the handcrafts, like these huge button samplers . . .

this quirky "Aristocrat Sign Maker" stamp kit . . .

and these nifty scale models of buildings designed and built in a local woodworker's garage as a hobby.

(Please excuse the foggy photos; it was cold out on our most recent trip, and the lens kept fogging up . . . )

We really recommend it. And if you happen to be there during a slow period, museum curator Leethra will treat you to a guided tour upon request. That woman possesses an incredible wealth of knowledge and passion for local history. And she's really sweet to little kids, too.

It's Dangerous to Go Alone . . .

2012-01-19T00:07:00.000-08:00

I'm deep in party-planning mode right now for the little dude's 2nd birthday. The hubby has made a special party theme request; here's an Etsy Treasury dedicated to some great Zelda inspiration.

Thanks for reading my 100th post!

Nostalgia

2012-01-04T14:59:00.000-08:00

FOUND: vintage 1960s Fisher-Price chime ball, just like the hand-me-down one we had as kids. The chimes, when it's floating in the tub during the kiddo's bath time, sound softly, reminding me of the chimes on our old front porch in hot, hot southern Oregon summer, barely moving in the hint of a breeze.

Purchased for $5 at the thrift store a couple of weeks ago; it still had the $2 garage sale tag on it too, a good reminder to hit more yard sales this spring.

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Christmas Snack Boxes

2012-01-03T23:26:00.000-08:00

Here's another use for bakery boxes, adapted from this idea for an ice cream sundae kit (originally pinned on Pinterest).

After giving it some thought, I came up with the idea of a Late Night Snack Kit. Look! Here's one now!

It still has the waffle cones and toppings for sweet cravings, plus popcorn and popcorn flavoring . . . and chocolate-covered GIGANTIC MARSHMALLOWS!

I made several kits this year for gifts, and they're a pretty cool gift option, whether or not you're trying to keep your holiday spending in check. For starters, it's:

#1: Useful. Everyone needs a late-night snack once in awhile, right? Or a mid-afternoon snack? Food is always useful.

#2: Doesn't depend too much on a person's aesthetic taste. Unlike a sweater, a framed print, or a Chia Pet.

#3: Doesn't add to a clutter problem, or require dusting. Because it's consumable and/or mostly recyclable, this is one gift that won't sit around indefinitely. At worst, the recipient can use it to fatten up some hungry non-migratory birds.

Start with some of the same bakery boxes used for this project. (Alternately, you can go to grocery store bakery and buy some cake or donut boxes. They might not be quite as cute, but the woman at the counter let me buy some for twenty-five cents apiece, so it's a budget-friendly option you can fall back on.)

In late September, I picked up two bags of gigantic Campfire marshmallows at an end-of-season clearance at the local grocery store. They don't sell these everywhere, and they don't sell them all year, but the expiration date on my bags is for February 2013, so I knew they'd keep fine through the holidays. Of course, if you're using this idea for birthday or hostess gifts throughout the year, you can always use regular-size marshmallows.

Put some semi-sweet chocolate in a double-boiler and melt it down, stirring till it's nice and smooth. Be careful not to get any water in it, not even a drop, or you'll ruin the batch (like I did the first time through)! Stick a jumbo mallow on a lollipop stick, dip the bottom in some chocolate, then into some sprinkles, then put it into a cupcake liner and let it cool until the chocolate sets. I put four jumbo marshmallows in each box; you might be able to fit six or eight regular-sized mallows depending on how much space your cupcake liners take up.

I re-packaged some waffle cones in treat sacks tied with baking twine, six cones to a sack, one sack to a box. For the ice cream toppings, I bagged up some Reese's Pieces, chocolate chips, and a couple of different types of sprinkles for the ice cream toppings, in little candy sacks also tied with twine.

The unpopped popcorn and popcorn flavorings came pre-packaged from Target in such cute little bottles that I just let them be. You can find them in the snack aisle, alongside the regular popcorn, or you can repackage regular unpopped popcorn and salt (a less-expensive option).

Tie up with baker's twine and pretty tags, and you have a fun Late Night Snack Kit!

Cost breakdown for four boxes:

* bakery boxes — approximately 4 for $5 (or 4 for $1, if you go the grocery store option)
* bakery twine — had on hand, but you can use cotton crochet yarn or source the twine through the other bakery box posting
* plastic treat sacks — $2
* plastic candy bags — $3
* sack of Reese's Pieces — $2
* sack of semi-sweet chocolate — $2
* sprinkles —$2
* cupcake liners —$2
* waffle cones — 2 boxes of 12 for $3
* popcorn — 4 for $8 (or buy one large bag for $2 and divide)
* popcorn seasoning — 4 for $8 (or use regular salt, or Nesquik powder, divided)
* jumbo marshmallows (on sale) — $1.13 (or use regular marshmallows)

It breaks down to about $11 per gift for four. Of course, you'll have enough sprinkles, candy, and marshmallows for more people, so these gifts get less expensive per each if you make more.

Have fun with it! If you can think of other snacks you'd like to include, there's no reason why you shouldn't. I added boxes of tea to a a couple, and a salted caramel chocolate bar to one. Just remember to list the ingredients on the tag, and note that mallows (especially large ones) can present a choking hazard.

Enjoy!

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Decorate!!! Celebrate!!!

2011-12-31T01:13:00.000-08:00

Aaaaand this is where I let a little (more) of my nerd show.

Every year, for the past twelve Christmases, my husband and I have given each other tree ornaments as gifts. Usually, the ornament has something to do with some important event or inside joke from the preceding year; occasionally, they're just pretty.

This year, I wanted to make a little ornament representing a sci fi character that has been trotted out constantly for jokes for quite awhile now: a Dalek from BBC's Doctor Who.

(photo credit)

If you read the Wiki I've linked to above, you'll think a Dalek is a strange choice for a Christmas ornament. "Mutant cyborgs from outer space?" you'll ask. "Capable of feeling only hatred, and bent on genocide?" you'll query. Well, okay; it's admittedly weird. But, on the other hand, the way they roll around screaming "Exterminate!!! Exterminate!!!" lends itself to lots of everyday humor.

Like when we spotted these fire hydrants in Anaheim and Shawn immediately thought, "Saturate!!! Rehydrate!!!"

Hilarious.

. . . Anywho, here are some photos of the little Christmas Dalek with the big ray gun.

Made of: a little bit of cardstock, felt, fluff, wire, glass-head pins, dimensional fabric paint, thread, and lots and lots patience.

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All - Stars

2011-12-28T18:28:00.000-08:00

I found a little pair of Chuck Taylor's at the thrift store which were just the right size, but not the right color. We don't really wear much pink around our house, so I made them into these sweet little day-and-night Chucks for my kiddo as a Christmas present:

These were in practically new condition, as lots of second-hand kids' things are. You can see how the inner soles look pristine.

Even the laces were still pretty new-looking.

Enter Tulip Soft Fabric Paint.

(photo credit)

They come in teensy little one-ounce bottles, which is plenty for little projects like this one, with enough leftover for a bunch more projects. I bought four colors (Yellow, Glacier White, Marine Blue, and Platinum Metallic) for a little over a dollar each; I had the turquoise color left from those baby onesies I painted awhile back. You could also use regular craft acrylic paints; they're colorfast, too, but can be a little stiff. These come out nice and flexible, which is great for stuff kids are going to wear.

First, I painted one shoe solidly Turquoise for the "Day" shoe. I let it dry for about an hour, then added some puffy white clouds with the Glacier White and a tiny little bird with the Marine Blue.

Next, I used the Yellow to turn the "All-Stars" logo into a little sun.

For "Night", I painted the other shoe in Marine Blue, with accents of the Turquoise for depth and the appearance of galaxies.

Using the Glacier White, Yellow, and Platinum paints (alone and in combination) I dotted in stars of varying sizes, and painted in some starbursts, dashed lines (resembling those on a star map), and a little moon near the logo.

My little dude looks pretty darn cute running around in them.

This is a really fun project that can turn out to be pretty time consuming, depending on the complexity of your design. On the other hand, if you were to start with a pair of shoes that was already some shade of blue, it would go faster.

You can also adapt this project for a ton of other designs, as this company does. How well they turn out will totally be dependent on your artistic ability, but a simple Day-and-Night design should be pretty easy to accomplish with decent results.

Total project cost here was under ten bucks, including the sneakers ($4) and paint ($4.50, with lots left over).

(Linking up for a Link Party!)

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Skyrim Birthday Cake (Delusions of Grandeur, Part 2)

2011-12-26T19:54:00.000-08:00

My husband made a special request for a birthday cake based on the video game Skyrim this year (cue slow exhale). Talk about being in over my head.

Awhile back, I made a Fallout-themed cake, which got his hopes up. I, on the other hand, was pretty sure this was going to be a big fail. In the end, it was kind of a mixed bag.

To start, I know my dragon sculpting needs work. And, this was my first time covering a cake in fondant. But for a first go, I think this kinda turned out pretty well, really, and I discovered I really like the part of the process where I cover the cake in the nice, smooth, fondant. It's actually kind of relaxing, at least on little cakes like this one. My friend recently made a gigantic cello-shaped cake for her daughter's birthday, covered in fondant, and I can't imagine the fortitude necessary to get one big, smooth sheet like that. Though to hear her tell it, it's pretty simple!

Anyway, here are the photos!

I built up the hillside on the top of the cake using the cut-off bits of cake leftover from the cake leveling, stuck together with buttercream.

I used the cheap-and-easy-to-make marshmallow fondant found on allrecipes.com to cover the cake. I don't know how it compares to working with regular fondant (having never worked with regular fondant), but I found it very workable, and really inexpensive by comparison. Highly recommended.

Most of the little decorations including the Viking helmet, bones, shield, and rocks, were made with gum paste. The dragon was sculpted from homemade modeling chocolate (which I found very hard to work with) and gum paste. All decorations are painted on with food color.

Finally, around the base of the cake, I piped in some grey-blue buttercream icing to look like boulders, and to disguise the fondant edge.

I'd love some feedback/hints/tips on this one. My kiddo's second birthday is in February, and I have a Zelda cake to put together for the party. I'm hoping to get some more practice in before then, so any advice is welcome!

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Cupcake Box Baby Shower Gift

2011-12-21T19:55:00.000-08:00

A few months back, I posted here about some little baby clothes I'd printed for my step-sister's baby shower. Because I sometimes like to make the presentation of special gifts look outstanding, I started shopping for ideas on how to package the gifts.

Cruising Pinterest, I found several pins about baby shower gift boxes available on Etsy (and other places) made to look like bakery boxes full of cupcakes. (Try here, here, and here for examples.) Since I already several little onesies printed and ready to go, I just needed to buy a few more things to pull together my own cupcake box, which makes a really lovely alternative to the ubiquitous diaper cake.

Here's how you can put one together, too!

Start with a window-topped treat box, 3 for $4.99 at Joann (buy them with a coupon, and you'll get 40% off).

Also pick up some king-size white baking cups. They come in a package of 24 and you'll pay somewhere in the neighborhood of $2 for them.

You can buy fancy baker's twine here too, but it's expensive. I had some left from a project a couple of years ago, so I just used that. Make your own using this tutorial, or buy a big cone here for about $10, to avoid feeling like you're overspending for string.

At Target, I picked up a three-pack of elastic headbands for babies for about $3. If you're building a cupcake box for a boy, you can use rubber bands or the same twine listed above. You'll also need four pairs of baby socks (or, if you're really trying to budget, four socks {two pairs} total, but baby socks can be found at Target or Old Navy for $1 a pair) and four onesies or baby t-shirts. My cupcakes were made using onesies.

To make: if you're printing your own onesies as I did, wait for them to dry and heat set them, of course, so you don't mess up your hard work. Fold in the sleeves, then fold each onesie into thirds, lengthwise.

Take a pair of socks (or a single sock, if you'd prefer) and place it at one end of the folded onesie or t-shirt. The toes of the socks will look a little like cherries in the center of your cupcakes, so keep this goal in mind as you roll the socks up inside the onesies. When rolled, make sure the onesie will fit inside one of your king-sized baking cups, then bind with one of your headbands or some baker's twine.

Repeat for all four onesies, then place each inside a baking cup. Place all four cupcakes into your assembled bakery box, then tie the box with baker's twine. Add a tag, and you're ready to go!

This one is packed and ready to ship inside a priority mail box, surrounded by crumpled construction paper.

Happily, you'll have enough bakery boxes, baking cups, and baker's twine leftover for a couple of more gifts, so if you find you suddenly have a baby boom among your friends (or at your office, like we had at mine!), you'll be set to put together a couple of more on short notice.

Of course, I have a couple of other tricks up my sleeve for ways to use these cute bakery boxes. Stay tuned!

(Linking up for a Link Party!)

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Gingerbread House

2011-12-16T16:37:00.000-08:00

We built this cute little gingerbread house using a kit from Wilton. I think we might pick up a kit from Trader Joe's next year, as they're a few bucks less and a little more unusual-looking, but this one came out pretty cute, with the addition of a ton of chocolate chips. Babies are not awesome gingerbread builders, but they do make decent tasters!

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Pajama Pants from Old Pajama Pants

2011-12-15T22:32:00.000-08:00

My husband picked up a cute set of Nick and Nora flannel pajamas for me at Christmastime a few years ago, featuring flamingos and Airstream trailers in the snow. Loved them. I wore them even when it wasn't Christmas, even when it was early summer.

But, as happens with flannel, they wore out, wore through (in some places), and basically started looking kinda trashy. Considering that I wore something featuring both flamingos and trailers, you can imagine how bad I let these get before finally making that call.

With plenty of soft places left that remained hole-free, I thought these probably needed a second life as a pair of (much smaller) pajama pants for the bebe.

Using a pair of his existing pants as a pattern, I cut the shape of one leg from a part of the old pants. I cut the new leg on the old side seam, so that I'd have a little less sewing to do; the old leg's side seam became the new leg's side seam. I did the same thing for the second leg.

Here's a shot of the new pajama leg unfolded and spread out.

The next step was to fold it back over (this time with the patterned surfaces together), then stitch along the inside leg seam. That's the part that runs from the crotch to the cuff.

I used an overcast stitch on the first pass, then did a straight stitch to reinforce. I turned one leg right-side out, then tucked it into the other leg with edges matched up. This became the center seam, also overcast then straight stitched.

At last, I turned the entire pair of pants inside out, hemmed the cuffs, created a casing for the elastic, and finished them off, just in time for bed! The bebe loves them, and they're holding up well so far! Here's hoping for a nice second life for these pj's!

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" Christmas in the Woods " Etsy Treasury

2011-12-07T22:03:00.000-08:00

Sharing the Etsy love with a woodsy Christmas treasury you can find right here!

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Honeybees for Heifer International

2011-12-05T10:14:00.000-08:00

Once again this year, I'm donating my entire commission from this December's sales of my Honeybees for Heifer International fabric collection (both the vintage and modern styles) to Heifer, a non-profit organization that gifts families around the world with livestock, beekeeping equipment, and trees. These gifts help farms become profitable and keep people out of poverty and starvation.

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These two images are two samples from the collection, the large modern and vintage worker bees. There are twenty coordinating fabrics in all, ten each in vintage and modern finishes.

To purchase fabric from this collection, you can visit my Honeybees for Heifer International collection page by clicking here. Thanks for helping me support a great organization!

Pioneers of American Industrial Design Stamps

2011-11-28T09:10:00.000-08:00

I'm very fond of this recent stamp release from the USPS, featuring beautiful examples of industrial design.

The works and designers featured in this stamp set proved that form and function could be perfectly married, and the stamp set itself has a nice, clean, modern design.

Other reasons to pick up a few sheets for your holiday cards: they're great for using after the holidays, too; they're "Forever" stamps, so they'll cover the first class cost of mailing a letter indefinitely (stock up!); and they speak to a vintage design aesthetic that's very current, making them a great choice for designers' business mailings.

* I'm not compensated for my reviews of various design products; I just like to call attention to things I think are beautiful.

Photo credit: USPS. Photo is used here for the purpose of review, and links back to the purchase page for this stamp set.

New Chairs for Thanksgiving Dinner : Under $25

2011-11-26T00:52:00.000-08:00

Our beautiful dining room table was wedding gift from one of my sets of parents. It has now filled two too-small kitchen dining spaces with its gorgeous girth.

When planning to have the in-laws over for Thanksgiving dinner this year, our lack of comparably solid, beautiful chairs became more noticeable. Up until now, we've had a folding chair and four little Ikea Stefan chairs I bought on clearance three years ago. Cute, yes, and mostly serviceable, though as a salesperson pointed out, built to support the weight of your average Swede. A climbing toddler can topple one of those suckers without even trying (although he does try, and frequently).

I headed to the Habitat for Humanity Restore and the Goodwill (toddler in tow, for topple-testing!), and found two solid-wood-constructed, heavy-duty chairs. Both were half-price on different sale days, and they didn't match. Different upholstery, different wood finishes and different builds. My mission? To make them look a little more like a "set".

Before: Stained upholstery, battered finishes.

After: New upholstery, new finishes.

To replicate this project:

1) Remove extraneous padding (like the back pad on the first chair, which was held in place with staples and hot glue) and toss.

2) Turn your chairs over and remove the screws that hold the upholstered seats in place. Set aside the screws, and take the seat off of the chair

3) If the chairs have been previously re-covered, remove the excess layers of fabric and staples. Set aside the seats and the screws.

4) Stretch new fabric over the seats. Turn face down, fold fabric edge under to prevent fraying, and shoot a few staples along that edge of the new fabric, making sure the staples go through all layers of fabric and into the wooden seat bottom. Pull tightly, and tack down the opposing edge in the same manner.

5) Repeat for other two edges. At corners, some people use a "package fold" but I don't prefer the square-ish edges this leaves. Instead, I make about a dozen tiny folds and overlaps, sort of gathering the fabric with my fingers as I staple. Set seats aside.

6) Sand or de-gloss the chair frames outside, then paint with a spray-paint/primer in one, using even strokes and building up several light layers. These dry more quickly than a single, heavy layer, and also leave a nicer finish.

7) Let dry / cure / air-out for a couple of days. Then bring back inside and reassemble to the newly upholstered seat bottoms.

Ta-dum! New dinner chairs. The kiddo loves them, and so do I!

You can find the fabric here, courtesy of Spoonflower (more about that in a future post). It's meant to be a stuffed animal kit.

The spray finish is a color called oil-rubbed-bronze, a brownish black with a very subtle gleam of metal flake. It's a satin finish.

Any questions about my process? Leave them in the comments section below and I'll do my best to answer.

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Fun with Baking (Wedding Cookies, c. 2003)

2011-11-25T00:07:00.000-08:00

In June of 2003, I married my awesome husband at a mostly-handmade wedding a few miles from our home. Friends and family filled first a quonset hut for the ceremony, then the field and wooded area just outside. A couple of years ago, the quonset hut in question was torn down (we happened to be there one day, and salvaged one of the original nails), replaced by a beautiful wedding and reception hall.

But, though buildings come and go, the leftover cookies I made (with help) remained . . . in my freezer . . . for the last eight+ years.

Okay, cards on the table: the leftover cookies actually moved with us from our old house to our current house about six years ago. Yes, it's true; I moved stale, leftover wedding cookies from one house to another.

They held up remarkably well in appearance, but the flavor and texture were horrible. (What, you mean you wouldn't taste eight-year-old wedding cookies from your freezer?)

I snapped these photos before tossing them.

At the time of our wedding, they were delicious; I followed a Martha Stewart recipe for citrus sugar cookies, similar to the one linked here. They're decorated with a royal icing like in that recipe, too. Time consuming, but they looked really nice on the dessert table next to the wedding cake and the groom's cake! These photos show them on a wooden cutting board gifted to us by a co-worker. On the big day, they were arranged on a silver-plated serving tray, one of seven I collected at thrift stores and consignment shops in the months leading up to the wedding.

Now that it's Christmas time and I have an eager baking (tasting) assistant (21 months old), I'm thinking about making up a new batch, but with reindeer and trees instead of wedding cakes, flowers, and moons. Hopefully, there'll be no leftovers this time. My freezer is completely full.

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Sweater Better

2011-11-15T20:18:00.000-08:00

I've had this cute sweater in my closet for awhile; I picked it up at a thrift store and wore it once or twice, but it was a little short on me and never fit right across the chest (a constant issue with me and clothes).

Last week, I noticed this tutorial over at the I am Momma Hear Me Roar blog and pulled the sweater out of the closet for a quick re-make into a cardigan.

Success!

Now I can wear it way more often. Gonna keep on the look-out for other spare sweaters to make better, too! Awesome project tutorial, Delia. Thanks so much for the inspiration!

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Leftovers

2011-11-12T20:27:00.001-08:00

Whenever I finish a project, there are usually leftovers of one kind or another. In the past, I have just boxed things up and stashed them away, but the recent clean-out of the spare room may just have cured me from that habit. New habit I'm trying to form: using the leftovers to make another fun project right away.

Saving things for later seems like the right thing to do, but when you have as many different kinds of hobbies as I have, and when you tend to forget down the road where the leftovers are or whether you have them at all, you end up buying new stuff each time anyway. Wasteful. Makes storage areas messy, too, and then when you're pulling stuff out to donate, you start adding up in your head the money you spent . . .

The Halloween costume project this year meant leftovers of several kinds: felt and fake fur, most obviously. With Christmas coming up, I thought I'd take some of the stuff and make something cute with it for my kiddo.

Voila! Monster pillows!

To start, I cut the largest rectangle I could from the leftovers of a remnant of faux fur used for the tail of my son's Halloween costume. The pillow pictured is made with a piece that measured about 13 x 25 inches. (Folded in half and stitched, it made a nearly-square pillow approximately 12 x 12 inches.)

Next, I planned the face, and cut face parts out of leftover red, orange, ivory, and charcoal gray felt. I stitched the layers together, then planned where they should go on the pillow (not too close to the edges, and not to close to where the fold would go at the top of the pillow). You can pin your pieces in place; I just free-handed, because I wasn't too picky about having the face end up perfectly placed. I think it looks a little sillier slightly off-kilter.

Using my machine, I stitched around the face pieces close to the edges, attaching them to the fur.

Then, I clipped my threads, made my fold so that the furry sides were together, and stitched around all of the open edges, leaving a space open to turn the pillow right-side out and stuff it. I stuffed it full of fluff, then hand-stitched the opening closed.

I may have a hard time keeping this guy (and his soon-to-be siblings!) out of sight until Christmas. He already looks quite at home in the nursery chair.

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Once Upon a Time . . .

2011-11-10T15:11:00.000-08:00

. . . I ran a bookstore. And I used to make elaborate displays with box cardboard and packing paper, and signs on chalkboards. I found these photos the other day, and wanted to share. These are all free-hand and took between one and three hours each.

From the last book of a Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket:

From a display of new summer books:

To advertise a book club discussion of Suite Francaise:

From the side of a magazine rack near the children's section:

To advertise pre-orders for the final Harry Potter book:

From an appearance by PETA founder Ingrid Newkirk, to advertise her book Let's Have a Dog Party:

To celebrate our second anniversary at the store:

To advertise a shelf of books by our favorite publisher of quirky books:

To advertise our book club meeting for Neil Gaiman's Anansi Boys:

To announce the party celebrating our store's closure after three years:

To make the chalk boards, I used a quart of chalkboard paint, painted over foam core board (in the large frame) and on repurposed bare wood shelving for the smaller board. In three years, it never chipped or flaked; good useful stuff! I'm hoping to use it again soon to put some chalkboards on the bebe's bedroom door.

Have you used chalkboard paint in any unusual applications? Share links in the comments section below.

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Felt Circle Curtain

2011-11-07T16:00:00.001-08:00

I haven't decided yet if this is permanent, but at least it offers semi-privacy to the bathroom window since I took down the paper roller shade that got ruined (Ahem. Cats.).

It's made from circles of felt leftover from this year's Halloween costumes, via this recent Pin from Pinterest:

It took a little under an hour this morning, partly because I'm pretty certain my circles are larger than the ones in the original tutorial. Whatcha think?

(Former Pinterest inspiration posts: here, here, and here!)

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Pinterest Challenge — Max + Wild Thing Costumes!

2011-11-03T20:11:00.000-07:00

Pinterest Challenge time, sponsored by the Young House Love blog and the Bower Power blog, joined this month by Ana White and Erin!

When it was time to get started on a Halloween costume for my kiddo this year, I started searching Pinterest and the web-at-large for a pattern or tutorial to make a copy of Max's wolf suit from the book Where the Wild Things Are. My search turned up this:

a free, downloadable BurdaStyle pattern in exactly the right size—2T. Thanks, SuzeB! I'm almost certain that the poor rating on this pattern isn't a reflection of the pattern itself (it all fit together just fine), but the result of dim bulbs like me trying to click on the bubbles to see other people's ratings, and thereby giving it a poor rating accidentally. The pattern is great. Here's my kiddo wearing it now, up to mischief of one kind and another, as the story goes.

I started with an ivory-colored, slightly stretchy, minky-feeling, polyester faux fur instead of the recommended polar fleece, because I don't really dig the way polar fleece pills after washing—even the "no-pill" kind. The lovely, bushy, furry tail is made from a quarter-yard remnant from JoAnn Fabrics.

Other alterations to the pattern: I made the hood very slightly deeper and made the front closure a velcro closure so that the sewn-on buttons are purely decorative (I like a quick-release one-piece costume for diaper emergencies). No need to get too in-depth on the alterations; SuzeB provides a nice tutorial on how to put the suit together. I just left off the front facings and folded over a narrow hem on the front edge, then stitched in the velcro. Easy peasy.

That's them at the library, right before Halloween story time. Which brings me to the other part of this costume: my husband's Wild Thing. Not something I'd planned on originally, but then I came across this:

while looking for a "quick" way to make a Wild Thing costume head. Hah!

The directions Seamster provides with his Instructable remind me of the way I crochet: intuitively. You see what you want the end result to look like, you get out some materials and a basic set of directions, and you interpret and innovate where necessary. Voila!

A couple of weeks later, you have this guy.

Now, a couple of people on the Instructable commented that they started this project mere days or hours before Halloween, and finished in plenty of time. I guess I forget sometimes how quickly things can get done when a person has all their evening hours free! For me, working a couple of hours a day a few times a week, it took a little longer than anticipated, which is how I ended up at the mall on Halloween in my Where the Wild Things Are t-shirt (or, as my husband called it, my "cloak of invisibility") instead of a matching costume. Never mind. The boys were instant celebrities.

We were sitting at the table, just like this

eating dinner in the food court and cooling off, and still had people coming up to compliment the costumes and take photos. While we were eating. Back off, paparazzi! I'm trying to eat my enchilada!

As for alterations to the Seamster's Instructable, I started with felt instead of polar fleece, this time for cost concerns as well as to make the Wild Thing have more of a Muppet-like appearance. The base is made as described here, except I enlisted my husband to cut it in a 18-inch diameter circle since his head is larger than a child's head.

I used 4 mm newsboard for the base, then, for the step in which I built up the hat base, I used cheaper, more flexible kraft board attached with tape and hot glue.

In the next step, in which I sewed the dome out of felt and attached it to the base, I followed the advice on measuring and cutting the fabric (felt, in my case), but the part about using trial and error stood out to me as being time-consuming . . . so I did this instead:

After stuffing the bubble with polyester fluff, I folded over the saggy parts and used a whipstitch to hold them down. I made sure to keep the whipstitching where I knew it would be out of sight under the Wild Thing's fur. It made a nice, relatively smooth dome shape, without having to rip the thing apart and re-machine sew + stuff a half-dozen times.

Since the whole thing is made out of felt, I also left off the step about stitching together a facade of felt for where the cheek lines would be, and used an alcohol-based marker to sketch those lines in instead.

I followed the instructions for shaping the nose and eyes from newspaper and masking tape (!) which are not materials I would ever have thought of using for this . . . kind of like dry paper mache. Once covered in felt, I was really impressed by how nice and smooth + solid the pieces turned out. I attached them as directed, accented around the eyes with the alcohol marker, then sewed the horns out of the same felt and stitched them on before beginning to hot glue the fur in place.

Next alteration? Instead of gluing down the teeth on top of the red mouth felt, I cut slits through the felt as I was attaching it so that I could poke the teeth up through the felt, concealing the little tabs. Because I have just a touch of the crafting OCD.

I finished the lower jaw mostly as directed, but I used a piece of foam pipe insulation instead of a 2-inch x 3/4-inch piece of foam. The curve presented some challenges, but in the end it looked pretty good, I think!

Here's one more of the boys in the wild (the kiddo's crown is something I sewed out of wool felt and dyed golden yellow):

Materials list:

Max's Wolf Suit
1 yard of 72-inch wide furry stuff (from JoAnn's with coupon)—$7.49
3 large plastic buttons (on-hand from Grandma's button box)—free
1 package bargain velcro (from JoAnn's)—99 cents
1/4-yard faux fur remnant (from JoAnn's)—$1.30

Wild Thing Head-Piece
1 30x48" sheet of 4 mm newsboard (from Oregon Art Supply)—$5.50 (with enough left over for a couple of other projects)
1 24x36" sheet of kraft brown tag board (from Paper Plus)—45 cents
1 9x12" yellow eco-felt rectangle (from JoAnn's, on sale)—25 cents
1 9x12" orange eco-felt rectangle (from JoAnn's, on sale)—25 cents
1 9x12" dark grey eco-felt rectangle (from JoAnn's, on sale)—25 cents (or use a scrap of something you have on-hand)
1/4-yard red 72-inch wide eco-felt (from JoAnn's, on sale)—75 cents
1 yard antique white 72-inch wide eco-felt (from JoAnn's, on sale)—$2.99
1/2-yard "Grizzly" black fur (from JoAnn's, on sale)—$5.10
elastic (on-hand)—free
masking tape (from Jerry's hardware store)—$2.29
20 extra-strength long glue gun sticks (from Jerry's hardware store)—$4.99
1 32-oz. bag polyester Fiber-Fill (from JoAnn's, with coupon)—$5.00
alcohol-based marker (on-hand)—free

Wild Thing Costume
1 heathered-red long-sleeved t-shirt (from Target, on sale)—$6.00
2 yards beige flannel (JoAnn's, on sale)—$4.78
acrylic paint (on-hand)—free
alcohol-based marker (on-hand)—free

(Other Pinterest inspiration posts: here, here, and here!)

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Wonderland Part 8 — Summer 2010

2011-10-18T01:00:00.000-07:00

In which the blogger adds a glut of photos never-before-shared from the Roving Park Players production of Alice in Wonderland, summer 2010.

I wish I had taken more photos of a bunch of this stuff; in the time crunch leading up to the production, I didn't pause often enough to take photos of completed projects. I'm regretting it now, because some of the props and costumes really did turn out beautifully. Also, it's my policy not to publish photos of other people's children to the blog without permission, and since most of the cast was under age 18, I can't currently show many photos of finished costumes. Here's a link, though, to the Roving Park Players website, where you can see a few more photos of some of the costumes and props we all made, including a turtle shell from a garbage can lid, several nifty pairs of animal ears, the Queen of Hearts' laboriously constructed beauty of a dress, and Alice's dress, stitched from a button down shirt and some white muslin by Stacie W (who actually did a whole lot of really nice sewing on several of the kids' costumes).

Here we have wo different horse heads I made of foam, spray paint, faux fur and plastic animal eyes. These were worn on top of the girls' heads like hats. The foam, purchased in sheet form, has one side with a smooth "skin" on it, which is the side I spray painted.

This next set are images of the Queen of Hearts' deck of cards tabbards. I cut a large stencil from waterproof poster board for the card backs, based on a drawing of the red queen from the original publication of Alice. I applied the stencil to some plain painters' canvas (drop cloths = cheap!) using red spray paint. The fronts are hand-appliqued felt that Lisa S-B painstakingly stitched onto separate sheets of canvas.

The tree in the garden was portrayed by an actor in brown clothing. His canopy is something I made from an old umbrella. Using several shades and coats of spray, I stenciled several different kinds of real leaves onto the umbrella to make an easy-to-transport tree canopy.

These next shots show two pocket watches (one for the Mad Hatter, and one for the White Rabbit) in the early stages. These are Trader Joe's chocolate tins with little plastic windows (still taped off, in these photos). I drilled holes and attached hook-eyes for chain attachment, then spray painted the tins using a hammered metal and antique bronze spray. You can see what a nice texture the hammered metal gives the watches, while nicely hiding text, scratches, and dents. I later filled the tins with all sorts of gears and watch hands and charms, and attached them with some simple hardware chain.

You can see here, across the Mad Hatter's vest near the bottom, the chain of his watch. The coat is the same one I made for Captain Hook in the previous season's production of Peter Pan (and it was used this past summer as the Wizard's coat in The Wizard of Oz. I can't wait to see where it turns up next!).

This is a first sketch of Frog's outfit. The pants ended up being made from a striped thrift store sheet, and the actress portraying the frog stitched up her own vest from some other sheet fabric leftover from the Caterpillar's coat. Oh Rosalie! I wish I had a photo of you in your wonderful costume!

Caterpillar's fez, made of a buckram base I stitched together, then handed off to Lisa S-B, who did an amazing job covering it in felt and trim.

Caterpillar's coat, which the actor really liked. The volunteer who stitched this together for him, Miss Phoebe, hadn't previously tackled such a complicated pattern. I was SO PROUD though, of the way she stuck with it and eventually finished it. It turned out so beautifully, and really does credit to the character of the Caterpillar.

The actress to the left there is not Phoebe; it's actually the beautiful and talented Misty, trying on her costume for the Red Queen. Here's a better shot of her costume during a performance. The dress is one I thrifted, with a skirt I altered to Misty's preference. I also added a sash at the waist and a scarf/capelet thing to the back. Her felt hat was commissioned by the director from an artist whose name I'm afraid I don't know.

Here we have the wire frame for the Queen of Hearts' crown. I made it from twisted floral wire . . .

. . . then covered the wire with one layer of white, then several layers of red and yellow tissue paper soaked in Elmer's glue.

The result is an inexpensive (under $2) lightweight crown that catches light beautifully, though it may be considered a bit fragile for normal wear-and-tear. I admit I was led more by aesthetic and budget than practicality on this project; though it lasted the length of the show's run, the heart ornaments at the top required careful handling. Overworked wire has a tendency to break.

I think I might have shown these before; Phoebe made several pairs of ears for this production from a tutorial over at Threadbanger, and some furry felt (awesomely useful stuff we also used for the animal mitts and various other projects) These ears belonged to the March Hare.

And one of the Tweedle's hats, hand appliqued by Lisa. I loved the way these looked with the boys' striped shirts onstage.

Again, I'm so wishing I had better photographs! Though I'm currently retired from the theater, if I were ever to work another show I'd certainly take more photographs of everything.

Thanks again to the Volunteer Fabrication Department who helped put together a bunch of props and costumes. If you're the parent of one of the child actors from Alice and you'd be okay with me publishing a few photos from the production, please get in touch! And if you're a costumer or props person who'd like a little more info on how we fabricated some of this delightful stuff, I'd be more than happy to give you some info. Shoot me an e-mail or leave a comment below!

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Free Printable Letterpress - Style Poster

2011-10-02T09:05:00.000-07:00

I made this to put in my kiddo's room, and decided to share the love! Feel free to print for personal use. (conditions appear after the jpgs)

If you post on your blog, please link back to me and give credit. Selling electronic files or prints of this design is prohibited. Basically, be fair, be honest, respect others' work!

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Printing Onesies with Vintage Wooden Type

2011-09-17T22:22:00.000-07:00

I'm 99% sure this will stay secret from the intended recipient here, but just in case, if you're related to me and expecting a baby, this is your first and only spoiler alert.

Is she gone? Great! Then here's the low-down.

I have a collection of vintage and antique wooden type blocks that I pull out for letterpress projects now and again. I wanted to print some onesies for a new family member, so I pulled out a box of type . . .

and printed these up, with some hand-painted accents.

Of course, this one is all hand-painted.

A fun afternoon project you can pull off during naptime!

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New Coupon Code for Night Garden Etsy Shops!

2011-09-15T14:24:00.001-07:00

I'll be adding a ton of new stuff to my Etsy shops over the next several weeks; to thank you for your continued support of my endeavors (and my little boy's eventual college education), please use the coupon code FRSHIP11 for free domestic U.S. shipping now through December 25, 2011.

This code will work at all three of my Etsy shops:

Night Garden Design

Night Garden Vintage

and

Night Garden Supplies

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Baby's Day at the Beach — Spoonflower

2011-08-26T20:21:00.000-07:00

My new collection of fabric, Baby's Day at the Beach, is now for sale on Spoonflower!

The Baby Sandcastles print features a pencil sketch of my bebe playing in the sand (although in real life, he smashes castles faster than I can build them for him!):

I included five colors of this umbrella print (my favorite); honeysuckle, quarry, teal, sand, and storm:

and an all-over print of this apple juice bottle (my husband's favorite!):

I'm considering adding a different colorway, and maybe including a print that features this little hermit crab, who didn't make it into my final design:

Click on over and take a look!

These images are copyright protected, like everything on this blog. Please ask before using them!

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Legen - Patio - Dary

2011-08-16T20:31:00.000-07:00

Call me crazy, but the Petersiks from the Young House Love blog made their paver patio look so easy that when it came time to make a little spot for the bebe's pirate sandboat to moor, I thought, "I can do that!" (Note: it's hard to tell how hard a project is by looking at photos on a blog.)

Initially, we'd planned to add just a little 5x8' paver patio addition, kind of off to the side of the cast concrete patio we put in about five years ago. After a little more thought about the logistics of digging it all up, compacting everything, and getting the new segment to line up seamlessly with the eventual total patio re-do (not to mention considering the possibility of renting a compacter and a paver saw multiple times), we decided to just do the whole thing all at once.

Sadly, my camera went missing for awhile, so I have no photographs of the prep work. You'll have to trust me that it was EPIC.

PREP STEPS:
* Pulling out the old cast concrete patio
* Piecing the old cast concrete bits together to widen the pathway from the backdoor to the patio
* Tearing up the sod
* Digging everything down to a depth of approximately 6 inches
* Trying to level the dug-out space (a fool's errand in a backyard that isn't level to begin with)
* Laying down weed barrier
* Shoveling, spreading, and compacting gravel
* Shoveling, spreading, and leveling sand

This list took the better part of two weeks during the bebe's nap time and in spare minutes when he felt like playing in his sandbox while his dad and I worked nearby.

I did get this photo of all of the rusty nails and screws I found while I was digging up the sod. These had likely been down there since the house was built in 1961.

This next photo is what you get when a paver company accidentally sells your special order of pavers to another customer from Jerry's hardware store (mistaking the other customer for you), but promises that when a new pallet arrives, it won't happen again because your name is on the new pallet.

That's right. Instead of hubby's name, they wrote "Jerry's Customer" on the new pallet of pavers. (*Sigh*)

Now, this is where we veered sharply off course from the Young House Love blog. We started by laying a circle.

We made it bigger and bigger.

The "soldier row" was added around the perimeter of the full patio.

We nailed in the Snap-Tight border. A second circle was added, and all of the "pattern" bricks that didn't require cuts were laid in around the circles.

I measured and marked, and hubby made more than a hundred cuts on the paver saw in the course of one afternoon. I can't express enough how glad I am that we rented the paver saw. The rental cost $50, but the alternatives (chiseling them apart or using the tile saw to make shallow cuts on both side, then breaking) would have been really time consuming, and the edges would not have been so clean.

We compacted the pavers with a rented gasoline-powered plate compacter (another time-saving tool I wouldn't have wanted to tackle this project without, though we did make sure to use an old piece of carpet to keep the compacter from chipping the pavers), and added layers of polymeric sand (compacting between each layer), then misted, and voila!

Here are some close-ups of the finished pattern of pavers. As you might be able to tell, the sanding is a really important step. It disguises all the gaps and helps the patio look uniform and cohesive.

We're still working on adding a garden bed and making the path meet the edge of the patio, so there'll be a few more photos between now and "DONE"; in the meantime, here's a photo of me putting in the original cast concrete patio way back in 2006.

I'm determined to make this the last patio I put in for quite awhile, but as I remember, I swore the same oath the last time, and we all know how that turned out.

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Rainbow Tie - Dye Birthday Cake

2011-08-15T12:59:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday to Me!

I saw a similar cake on Pinterest awhile back and wanted to replicate it, but the only recipe I found was pretty wild, including diet Sprite and diet pudding mix. Since I avoid artificial sweeteners when possible, I chose to go a more straight-forward route.

Pretty simple; mix up a box of white cake mix according to package instructions. Scoop out a cup or so, dye it red, add raspberries. Divide evenly and dollop in the center of two prepared pans. Scoop out another cup or so, dye it orange, add mandarin orange bits. Divide evenly and spoon on top of the two red dollops. Repeat for yellow and green, without fruit. Help mounded batter settle by striking the side of the pan with your hand.

Repeat for blue, indigo, and purple, mixed with blueberries. Once settled evenly in pan, bake in pre-heated oven. Cool, remove from pans, frost with confetti frosting.

I want to try it with cupcakes next!

(Other Pinterest inspiration posts: here, here, and here!)

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Re - Design : Spoon Sunburst Mirror

2011-08-01T09:47:00.000-07:00

Young House Love's Pinterest Challenge was issued last week, and it was just the motivation I needed to get off my duff and get a project started!

My Pinspiration:

Pinned by a Pinterest user a few weeks back, from Marie Claire Idees (although I've since seen it on the Country Living website as well).

I nixed the plastic spoons, backed a small mirror with a galvanized pipe collar from the hardware store, and surrounded the mirror with silver-plated spoons and forks from the thrift store.

The mirror (6 inches) is attached to the 3-inch pipe collar using mirror adhesive (3 inches is the measurement of the hole on the pipe collar; the actual disk is approximately 12 inches in diameter). The silverware is attached to the pipe collar using epoxy and wired through drilled holes. Total cost of this project is under $20.

It doesn't really look anything like the original pin, but in a way, that's what I like most about it. I let the original materials inspire me to make something similar, but really different and completely my own.

If you want more specifics, leave me a comment or shoot me an e-mail, and I can walk you through the steps. If there's enough interest, I may just post a follow-up blog. Thanks for reading and looking!

Penguin Classics

2011-07-22T22:23:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, I daydream about illustrating book covers like these, from the Penguin Classics collection.

This one, for Huck Finn, is my favorite. I love the sunny color palette and the quartered layout, which neatly divides the cover. But the line drawings are just charming, and that's what sells it for me. I've already read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, I already have a copy, but this is one I'm thinking of picking up for the kiddo because of the cover art. See? Cover design is important!

Here are a few more lovelies from the series:

Spoonflower Love

2011-07-08T19:17:00.000-07:00

A really cool e-mail came the other day from another Spoonflower user named Julie, who recently purchased some of my Mums-Red print. Seems she made a nifty little handbag from it, and wanted to know if I'd like to see a picture! I did! She agreed to let me share it; I'm always so pleased when someone makes something cool from one of my designs. Thanks again, Julie! You rock!

Lampshade Re - do ( with upcycled milk jug )

2011-07-04T20:53:00.000-07:00

Awhile back, one of the cats knocked down my very tippy lamp, breaking the amber glass bowl shade. I never could find a replacement with a properly sized hole, although I'm sure they exist somewhere.

I thought about getting a bowl and a glass-cutting hole bit for the drill and just cutting my own to fit. WIth cats still on the prowl, I figured at that point I was probably just begging for another broken shade. Instead (inspired by THIS article), I decided to use the translucent plastic of a plastic milk jug to make my own.

I didn't create a polygonal shade like the article describes, but drew inspiration from the use of materials. I really thought that my lamp needed to be a glowing flower (the stem!).

Here's how I did it: From a piece of the milk plastic I cut a petal shape that was approximately the size I envisioned for the lamp. My petals vary in size from 4-7 inches long and from two to four inches wide (but yours could be narrower and longer for a daisy or chrysanthemum!).

By tracing the nut that held the old shade in place, and with some trial and error, I cut one end of the petal to fit in place around the lamp socket.

Keeping this template in mind, I cut 12 petal shapes from milk jug plastic (from two milk jugs). I avoided the sections with hard edges, but cut a nice combination of flat and gently curved pieces.

Using my template, I traced the socket-compatible end onto one end of my petals. I used a hole punch to start the center holes, then cut around them with scissors.

I fit several of the flatter petals over the lamp socket.

As I worked around the center, building my flower, I added the more-curved petals so that the flower would cup upwards toward the center.

Lastly, I replaced the nut to hold all of the petals in place, and put in a new (very low wattage) bulb.

Ta-dum! A lamp that looks like a flower!

After the fact, I noticed how strongly it resembles a book cover I designed awhile back at Wipf and Stock:

Funny how an image can stick to your subconscious.

If you use these directions to create your own lampshade, I'd love to see!

I think this project would also work really well for small pendant shades; just make sure to use very low-wattage bulbs. Materials used in commercial shades are rated for use near lightbulbs, but when you make your own, from whatever material, things can become questionable. That said, I've had a milk plastic shade on my lamp for over a year, without incident, because I use a teensy little low-wattage bulb. Enjoy!

July

2011-07-03T23:38:00.000-07:00

Happy unbirthday, Alice. Wish you were here.

(photo credit: HERE)

Cozy Coupe Gas to Electric Conversion (free dash sticker download)

2011-06-30T00:30:00.003-07:00

There's nothing quite like an early morning garage sale to get you going! The bebe and I ended up going across town to this one because the Craig's List ad promised lots of kids yard toys. I had my eye on a Radio Flyer wagon (which turned out to be a different model, and more money, than I'd been dreaming of). Instead of the wagon, we hauled home this sweet ride, a turquoise and orange Cozy Coupe with a $5 price tag. One of these was on my wish list as well, and my little guy LOVES it!

Ooh, I had a ton of fun cramming it into the front seat of the car.

It had been outside a bit, so the dash stickers and warning tag on the back were peeling and flaking. Not something I wanted the kiddo putting in his mouth (and you know he would).

It was the perfect opportunity for a Cozy Coupe gas-to-electric conversion! I did a bit of research to see what the dash of an electric or hybrid vehicle looks like, and then put these new dashboard displays together.

And of course, because there was a half sheet of sticker label paper left after designing the dashboard displays, the kiddo also got this "I'm Great!" Oregon license plate!

I added a line on the bottom edge of the plate sticker that has some of the safety warnings of the original sticker, just so that we remember the weight limit and the ban on steep hills and whatnot.

Download your own sticker label sheet here:
Cozy Coupe Dashboard Stickers

For best results from home, print on 8.5 x 11 inch, full-sheet label paper, using a laser printer. Or have a print shop print these for you on vinyl for truly weather-safe labels!

Have another idea in mind for dashboard stickers, or need a different license plate? Contact me for details.

Marketing 101

2011-06-29T12:17:00.000-07:00

Wonderland, part 7 ( summer 2010 )

2011-06-21T09:49:00.000-07:00

A little more from last summer's production of Alice in Wonderland. These terrible photographs show a little of the process and materials I used to make the rose bush costumes, from the scene in which the Queen's cards are painting the roses red.

These are inspired by these dandelion hats from Pushing Daisies.

I sewed the base hat from the same vintage pattern used to make the hats for the Children of Hearts, but with the crowns extended to be over a foot tall.

This is so that the hat could conceal a half of an eight-inch foam ball. The ball was held in place with a little hot glue. Later, a circle of green felt was stitched over the exposed styrofoam inside the hat to keep foam bits out of the kids' hair.

The hat base. The chin strap secures in place with velcro, necessary because of the height of the hat.

Cut individual flowers on stems off of a few fake rose bunches. (If I hadn't been on such a tight budget, I would have more than doubled the number of roses per hat. As it was, between the three hats, I used a total of five dollar-store bunches of each color) The pin was used to poke pilot holes through the felt and into the styrofoam, so that the stems of the roses would go in more easily. Poke a hole, place a rose, repeat over entire hat.

The leaf mitts are the easiest part of the costume: trace around the hand in the shape of a leaf, making sure to make it extra-large and including some seam allowance. Cut 4, two for each mitt. Make a simple cuff with a doubled-over rectangle of felt that, with seam allowance, fits fairly snuggly around the wrist.

This would be a fun project to try with other kinds of flowers as well, or with feathers for a strange bird hat, or maybe mini feather-dusters for the dandelion look in the inspiration photo.

Progress

2011-06-11T21:16:00.001-07:00

Promised: shots of this room in progress. I'm not always awesome about updating the blog on a project from start to finish (there are still, for example, a few dozen Alice in Wonderland shots from last summer that I keep meaning to post), but I'm really excited: a) to have the back room useable (the kiddo loves to wrestle pillows on the bed, and bounce, and read Heedley Pecked Me in the Eye for the umpteenth time); b) to have completed such an insurmountable task as cleaning the space out; c) to be able to have visiting friends and family stay with us when they visit, as opposed to a hotel, a campground, or someone else's house. Have I mentioned how grown up that makes me feel at age thirty+? Really, really, really.

Here is the earlier "in progress" shot from a few weeks ago. The headboard is a cut-down old door from Bring. The bedframe came from Craigslist. No, we did not get robbed at gunpoint.

And here is a current "in-progress" shot. The room isn't done yet (is any room in our house ever done?), but you can see, we'd now be comfortable hosting guests here.

The sheets, dust ruffle, and white curtain panels are recent Target clearance. The name-embroidered pillow is a re-worked wedding present with fabric from Ikea and Troismiettes. The coffee sack bolster is made from the remains of the coffee sack I recently blogged about here. The small rectangular pillow is a Target clearance item from four or five years ago, unearthed in The Great Clearing, with added vintage button details. The grey tweed wool on the square pillow came from the Assistance League of Eugene thrift store shortly after I moved up this way. The finger paintings are the work of my favorite baby boy, hung with vintage wooden pant hangers.

This next photo shows a close-up of some really cute little tiki shot glasses from Archie McPhee, repurposed as tiny planters for some hens-and-chicks and baby tears (don't succulents have the best names?). You can see these in the previous photo as well, on the headboard.

Shown here is the night stand vignette, also still in progress.

The night stand is the first piece of furniture my father's parents bought together after their wedding: a sewing machine table. Inside the hinged front panel is where Grandpa, an electrical engineer, attached the foot pedal to the wall of the cabinet so that Grandma could use her knee instead of her foot to operate the machine. This was probably VERY helpful with little kids around; I've discovered how much my kiddo likes to go after the pedal of my own sewing machine when it's sitting on the floor. Being able to keep it away from little hands while in use as well as when put away is pure genius.

The little spatterware pot is something I picked up at the Olde English Flea Market last weekend. Great for holding the watches and earrings of house guests. The book is the aforementioned Heedley, which is well-loved around here. The lamp is a piece of red cedar we kept from our old rental house when we left. The mister cut both ends flat and sanded off all potentially splintery or pokey parts, and I attached a lamp kit.

The search for the perfect shade has turned up this St. Vinnie's drum shade ($2.50). It's not quite right yet, but I'm still considering how to change it into something fabulous.

The window wall. The clock was on the wall for thirty+ years at the BookMark, the first bookstore to ever employ me. There used to be a large sign over it that read, helpfully, "CLOCK". I still have the sign somewhere, too. The barn star only looks old; it came from the craft store. The tin "Days o' Work" art is actually an antique chewing tobacco mold that came from the Salvation Army's local antique/vintage store, Tea & Crumpets. It's a regular old Salvation Army store now, but for awhile it held a pretty awesome collection of 1920s-1930s inlaid British wardrobes, old photographs, and glassware.

Our Ikea chair folds out into The World's Most Comfortable Cot. People have been sleeping on this in our living room or {former} office for years. Now it makes this room perfect for guests with kids. The corduroy pillow is a Fred Meyer clearance pillow (from six or eight years ago) that I tufted with some buttons. The coffee sack pillow is blogged here. The pillow covers on the seat of the chair were purchased with the bedspread (see bed photo) at Value Village. More about that in a minute.

One of my favorite collections, rediscovered in this room a couple of months ago, is my collection of vintage rackets and paddles. You can find these inexpensively at almost any thrift store, but one of these is my hubby's high school racket. Can you spot it? It's the one peeking up in the bottom left corner.

This is the first racket I ever bought, back in high school. The Salvation Army used to run a salvage store in my home town. Maybe they still do! You could buy clothing there by the pound, and I did. I think I paid a buck for the racket, too. Everything was way underpriced, even by thrift store standards. I later used the racket in a college tennis class, and the PE teacher thought it was awesome. Still strung tightly, with lots of bounce. The Scrabble letter sign (from a vintage 1970s set found at Value Village) takes on a double meaning when displayed with the rackets.

There are a million little details I'm still working on, and I'm saving the closet makeover for another post, but this should give you an idea how things are progressing. It's been so much fun arranging little treasures in here, and we've spent more time in this room in the past couple of months that we have in the past five years. It's been like increasing the size of our house by 10%, and we love it.

One last note, and a nicely lit bed view: The bedspread you see here came from Value Village, together with the two pillow covers you saw on the chair seat. They were a deep charcoal gray when I bought them. Too dark, I thought, for the room, but I liked the texture, and the size and price were right. So, despite knowing better from years of textile and surface design classes in college, I decided to try and fade the color with bleach.

Bleach doesn't just fade black. In fact, if you soak most black textiles in bleach, you'll get some variation of yellow, brown, or orange, not white. I ended up with a bedspread that was Beaver State orange. Over-dyeing with Black Velvet and Jeans Blue Dylon dye turned it chocolate brown. Not at all what I'd intended, but it'll do for now. Sometimes dye accidents aren't the end of the world. In this case, it goes nicely with the reproduction Swiss army blankets from Mills Fleet Farm.

There you go! Consider yourselves updated!

Mega-Score at the Thrift Store

2011-06-09T15:39:00.000-07:00

As the kiddo starts stacking and building, I've been thinking about adding to our small collection of MegaBlocks and Duplo.

And then it happened: we were at St. Vinny's looking for a lamp shade on a day when all green tagged items were fifty percent off. High on a shelf in the toy aisle, a clear plastic bin was tucked back. The green tag on the top of the bin said "Leggo's $7.99".

The box includes a couple of horses, arches and turrets, several Megablocks cars, and about two dozen animal and people bricks.

I think after they're sanitized, some of them will need new faces due to sticker peeling.

Others might need new faces due to general creepiness.

New Stuff for Sale at Night Garden Vintage

2011-05-27T11:19:00.001-07:00

I recently listed some new items for sale at my Night Garden Vintage shop, including this sweet vintage red bowling bag that I rediscovered during the clean-out.

It was, soon after, added to someone's treasury list, but still remains for sale. Snap it up using the coupon code from one of my previous posts, and it can be yours for a steal!

Burlap Coffee Pillow (designer diy)

2011-05-27T10:16:00.000-07:00

I've been seeing some cool burlap projects (also called coffee sack, grain sack, or feed sack projects) in magazines (here), on blogs (here), and on Etsy (here).

These are just a few examples; you'll find tons of others with a quick on-line search, including about a ton of pillows, some in the $50 range and up. I've had a coffee sack hanging around the house for a few years now, and in fact, just dug it out of the spare room during the recent clean-out. It's possible I'm at the tail end of the New Depression trend on this one; I don't know. I still think it looks pretty graphic and cool. So I took an unattractive old cushion/pillow (also dredged up from the spare room) and stitched this nifty fitted cover for it.

Before:

After:

Instructions: Find a cushion and a burlap sack. My coffee sack came from a local coffee shop. I believe, three years ago, I paid $2 for it. You can also find burlap (about $2 per yard)and stencil your own designs (here's a recent tutorial that explains that process).

Wash and dry it.

Cut apart your sack so that you're working with a single layer of burlap at a time. Iron it flat.

Place your cushion over the part of the coffee sack you'd like to feature on your new cushion cover. Cut around the cushion, leaving an extra inch of seam allowance.

If your cushion has a defined side, measure it. Add two inches for seam allowance (one inch for top, one for bottom).

Using your cushion as a guide, pin and sew the two short ends of this piece to form the sides of your cushion. Leave seam on the outside.

Smooth the piece cut for the top face down on the cushion, and pin to the side, making sure the cover is taut.

Remove and sew.

With seam allowance still on the outside, put the cover back on your cushion, and pin the back piece most of the way around, leaving enough of the seam open to remove your pillow.

Remove and stitch.

Reinforce all seams with a row or two of zig-zag.

Turn inside-out, iron, and place on your cushion. Hand-stitch the opening closed.

Of course, simple, rectangular or square pillows are easier. Just cut two same-size pieces, stitch right-sides together, insert pillow, and stitch closed. I have some of the coffee sack leftover, so I'm thinking that, when this room finally gets done, I'll make another one.

Wow. Just, Wow.

2011-05-06T22:19:00.000-07:00

You like this? This is a cute little vintage "treat pedestal" available on BHLDN by maker E. Isabella Designs. It is an astounding $78.

This is an article from ReadyMade Magazine's MacGyver Challenge a year ago, telling you how to make the exact same thing. For $78, you could make more than a dozen, and have them on every table at your wedding. Things like this are why some people spend $20,000 on a wedding instead of on a downpayment for a house.

If you really need to buy something like this, because you don't like to use glue or have an aversion to DIY, you can buy a similar item on Etsy for between $12 and $20.

Tabula Rasa

2011-05-05T00:32:00.000-07:00

I'll be posting more pictures of this soon, but this photo here represents about a hundred hours of work spread out over a month. More if you count the time I spent a few years back stripping the paint off that door and patching and sanding it. That was back when we'd intended to use it for a door.

So the reason for all the hours, for such a "before" looking image? This room, a few weeks ago, was packed to the brim with bins of art and craft supplies, childhood mementos, display items from my former bookstore, and theater leftovers. It's taken a monumental effort to get to this photograph: a clean slate, painted a soft, silvery gray, with the beginnings of a door-turned-headboard on the wall.

I've lost count of the trips to the charity store's donation drop-off. I've given a few things to friends. We held a one-day yard sale that paid for the bed frame and paint. And there's plenty stashed in the studio, and some stuff on my kitchen table ready to get the boot. The recycle and trash bins fill faster than Sanipac can haul it all away, so a friendly neighbor called the city to report us a couple of weeks ago. I frequently feel overwhelmed by the task at hand, which is essentially sifting through and getting rid of so much of my old self in order to have a clean, quiet space. One that we're intending for a guest room, but which the cats are pretty sure is really just for them.

Anyway, I'll go into more detail about the process later. That's all for tonight!

A Tree Grows in the Nursery

2011-04-24T21:55:00.000-07:00

I've been planning this project since before my sweet little bird was born, and finally decided to go ahead and finish it!

While I was pregnant, a friend who stayed in the room for a few months chose the sunny yellow wall color; I decided on a blue tree.

I first drew the tree on the wall in pencil, then filled it in with zero-VOC primer. I found some soy-based acrylic paints at the craft store, which have a matte finish and a lower environmental impact. Once cured, the paint seems to adhere really well to the wall.

The tree continues from the wall onto the ceiling.

The two little blue jays are guarding a little nest with a pretty speckled egg.

An assemblage on the facing wall.

Curtains, a chair slipcover, and a Boppy cover made from some fun origami-print fabric from Ikea, and a stripe from a woven tablecloth.

Recycled Mailers

2011-03-25T11:43:00.000-07:00

I love Nikki McClure's work, so I've had a hard time getting rid of this beautiful calendar . . . from 2008. This week, cleaning out the back room, I found it again and decided to use it to make recycled mailers. Here's how:

This photo shows the fold lines. Basically, fold one side towards the center. Barely overlap by folding the other side.

Fold up a thin strip on the bottom, and a wider strip on the top.

Trim excess from flaps. Use double-sided tape to seal.

Etsy Treasury

2011-03-24T00:11:00.000-07:00

I posted a new Etsy Treasury this week. Feel free to let me know what you think!

Spring!

2011-03-16T21:08:00.001-07:00

The kiwi vines are starting to sprout, and the grass is gaining height DAILY. We had a crazy storm the other afternoon, too. All the signs are pointing to spring!

Stop by one of my Etsy shops; use the coupon code COMEONSPRING for 25% off your purchase . . . which will help wonderfully with my attempts at spring cleaning. I'll be adding new items to each of the shops every day for the next week, so keep checking in! There are some really lovely things I've been meaning to list for awhile.

Night Garden Design (handmade modern + vintage)

Night Garden Supplies (fabric remnants + orignal prints + new-to-you craft surplus)

Night Garden Vintage (unique found objects)

Design Work

2011-03-16T01:09:00.000-07:00

I threw together this interactive PDF portfolio of some of my graphic design work about a month ago. It includes cover and flier designs from my work at Wipf and Stock Publishers, where I still work part time from home. Enjoy!

Portfolio

Some Christmas things for Baby

2011-02-11T20:30:00.000-08:00

Here are a few things I put together for the bebe's first Christmas:

A flannel stocking, with his name cut from white wool and embroidered onto the cotton cuff. (The sea anemones poking out of the top were made by my artist friend Skylaar, and are available for sale in her Etsy shop.) The little fireman is from a re-release of vintage-style Fisher Price Little People I scored at Bi-Mart; they were released two years ago, and I bought the last package from the store's shelf right before Christmas.

Two tattooed sailor dolls I made from a Spoonflower fabric kit designed by artist Heidi Kenney. (I admit that the man wears a shirt most of the time; after the dolls were assembled and tossed in a pile together, they looked a little risque with his nipples showing. ;)

The vintage-style box from the red Radio Flyer wooden push wagon . . .

which only took about 45 minutes for Shawn and I to build on Christmas Eve thanks to well-written instructions. I lucked out and got a really, really good sale on-line right before Christmas, just when we were looking for a walker for the bebe.

And this, the BIG project. I thought I had a photo of the finished quilt, but it looks like I only have these three of the quilt top, before bebe's initial was appliqued, and before the backing, binding, and quilting were done. I'll have to edit this post when I get a chance to snap a photo of the finished project.

I'd been working on the quilt for awhile. I collected the fabrics from probably a half-dozen sources (the meadowlark and the douglas fir cone prints are my own designs, for sale on Spoonflower) over the course of several months while I was pregnant, then, last Valentine's day, cut the strips out. It turns out I was in labor the whole night, and gave birth the next morning. The quilt sat unfinished until the week before Christmas! He likes to point at things on the quilt and wait for me to tell him the words. I love that he's starting to communicate with something other than cries. It makes my day.

There were a few other incidentals; the pirate pajama pants I made for bebe and his dad, the handprint Christmas ornaments we made for the family, little odds and ends. It was a busy season, but I was really glad to be able to eke some time out to put together some projects to make the first Christmas a handmade one.

Wonderland, Part 6

2010-07-23T23:39:00.001-07:00

One of a pair of hats made for the Children of Hearts by Peggy H. I had her make these from a vintage pattern, and asked that she improvise a heart ornament on the front.

I sent Phoebe G. home with a sackful of materials and this link to a tutorial from Threadbanger, and she returned a pair of ears for the March Hare and one for Mouse (she's currently at work on a pair for the White Rabbit, one for the Dormouse, and a set for Goat). Phoebe had to create her own pattern for the ear part of the Mouse hat, a first for her, and she accomplished it wonderfully. Phoebe and her grandmother also tackled Caterpillar's coat, which I'll save for a future post.

Brilliant work, everyone! Sewing party tomorrow, and I'm hoping we get through tons more stuff from our list . . . Show opens on the 12th of August! Whee!

Spoonflower Fabric Design Contest: Cut Paper Design Challenge

2010-07-23T22:58:00.000-07:00

This week, when I needed a little "me" time, I made this to enter in the Spoonflower Fabric-of-the-Week contest. The theme this week is Cut Paper Collage.

You may remember that I won their open fabric design challenge one week a year ago; there are a ton of really excellent designs entered, so I'm really angling for the top ten this time around. Vote if you like it! Vote for other cuties too!

Wonderland, part 5

2010-07-20T12:04:00.001-07:00

After many revisions, I'm still pretty pleased with how it came out . . .

And here's a photo of the nifty, simple, fingerless fur gloves that Roxann P. and Autumn E. made from the pattern I created:

Simple Tutorial for Fingerless Fur Gloves:

1) Trace your hand and wrist onto paper. Add 1/2 inch seam allowance.

2) Draw lines across fingers and thumbs marking where you'd like the gloves to end. Cut out pattern.

3) From furry felt, cut two pieces for each glove.

4) Right sides together, stitch 1/4 inch from edge.

5) Turn inside out. No need to stitch edges as furry felt does not unravel.

6) DONE!

Wonderland, part 5

2010-07-20T12:04:00.000-07:00

After many revisions, I'm still pretty pleased with how it came out . . .

Wonderland, part 4

2010-06-22T15:30:00.000-07:00

Vicki provided a bunch of faux breads (and ended up making some butter, too, but that will wait for next time) . . .

. . . and tea cups and saucers and a couple o' pig noses. . .

Wonderland, part 3

2010-06-11T17:59:00.000-07:00

Some stuff the VFD (Volunteer Fabrication Department) has been working on for this summer's production of "Wonderland"; I'm a little less hands-on this season, but I'm having fun designing projects and farming them out to the crew!

Lisa S.-B. rocked this invitation from the Queen of Hearts to the Duchess . . .

(Foam core base covered with white butcher paper and double-sided rug tape)

and went above and beyond, putting a seal on the back . . .

And check out this fez. I handed Lisa a buckram fez base I made and a pile of materials, and she made Caterpillar's fez really beautiful.

(Buckram base with stitched recycled-poly felt, upcycled leopard-print trim, and a tassel from EconoSales fabric store)

I'm so impressed with her stuff so far.

And here's a giant key I made.

It's a wire frame covered in tissue papier mache and sprayed with hammered metal and antique bronze spray paints. I get the impression it might be a bit larger than Vicki was thinking we'd need, so I might end up finding/making a smaller one if there's time . . .

More coming soon. I hear Phoebe's got a couple of hats done, and Sarah's books may be done by the beginning of next week! So exciting to see stuff coming together!

Wonderland, part 2

2010-02-10T09:54:00.000-08:00

"Wonderland" is underway, and I posted a couple of "Wanted" messages on Eugene FreeRecycle and Lane County Pay-It-Forward asking for bits of stuff people might have laying around that could be used for costumes, set pieces, and props.

Several responses, but only three offering useful goods: 1) a woman offering sheets from her niece's hospital bed; 2) a woman offering some pieces of solid-color knit fabrics; 3) a woman offering a stack of her mother's "vintage" blazers . . .

I get a little nervous whenever the word "vintage" is used to describe something. It means different things to different people. What it DOES cleary mean, when not followed by a date, is that you have no idea what might show up.

I asked her what decade they might belong to, and got a little excited when she replied that she wasn't sure, but that her mom had entered the work force in the 1940s, and that she remembered her mom wearing these well into her old age.

I got a whole sack full of 1970s, Sears brand, 100% polyester blazers with nice, wide lapels, like the red one shown here. I'm a creative person, but I'll admit, I'm having a hard time imagining how to squeeze these into a production of "Wonderland" set at the turn of the century . . .

Wonderland, part 1

2010-02-05T10:59:00.000-08:00

Wonderland is coming this summer, and I've got the bebe to think about, but I'm still doing the production design for this one. And I have a budget of $300. That's community theater, folks!

Anyone have any spare:

*fabric (felt, fleece, fake fur, calico, muslin) in 1/4 yard or larger pieces (fake fur can be smaller)

*clothing (black shoes, suit jackets, ties, vests, shirts, long skirts, anything that can look or be altered to look turn-of-the-century)

*large pieces of masonite, cardboard, or foam core board (3x3 up to 4x8) for set pieces and props

*time to spare crafting all of this stuff between now and August?

I can even get you a tax receipt. That's how I roll.

New Year, New Things to Love

2009-12-31T09:28:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd put up a little post about what I've been up to, and one of my favorite Christmas gifts.

I designed these two pairs of shorts (click the button that says "one yard" to see both designs; it defaults to a 1/4 yard segment) for a Spoonflower design challenge: Children's clothing on one yard of fabric. A yard costs $18, and the shorts fit up to a 23-inch waist (with elastic).

I took fifth place out of seventeen entrants; a quick look at the Spoonflower blog will show you the fantastic designs that won the contest. No arguments here! The winning design is lovely.

And here is one of my favorite Christmas presents: a set of measuring cups designed to look like Russian matroyshka (stacking dolls). Both the tops and the bottoms of the dolls are marked for measuring! Aren't they adorable?

Fabulous!

2009-11-25T09:49:00.000-08:00

I like everything about this!

I like the packaging design, I like that it's available in a bunch of colors, I like that you don't have to get messy dye-fingers, I like that there are different formulas for natural and artificial fibers, and I like that I can buy it locally from Oregon Art Supply. Before this, I had to special-order dyes for polyester and nylon.

http://www.dharmatrading.com/html/eng/5590684-AA.shtml
http://www.oregonartsupply.com/

New Designs Available for Purchase

2009-10-27T14:38:00.000-07:00

Fabric I designed are now for sale on Spoonflower!

http://www.spoonflower.com/profiles/nightgarden

Meet Your Maker: Holiday Show!

2009-10-13T11:29:00.000-07:00

The next Meet Your Maker indie craft show will be held Sunday, December 13 from 11 till 5 p.m. at the Fenario Gallery in Eugene! This should be a really great show, and GREAT motivation to get some stuff done. I've been quite lazy at the art lately, but with good reason. Also, my fellow artists and crafters, there are still spots available! If you can find a way to be in town that weekend, sign up soon. Spots are only $30 . . .http://meetyourmaker.net/

Re-Post from Design Sponge

2009-09-18T09:23:00.000-07:00

Saw this twiggy tea ball / stirrer on the Design Sponge blog this morning . . . too lovely for words, so I'll let the picture suffice . . .

Delays

2009-09-08T11:58:00.000-07:00

Sorry I haven't updated the blog in awhile. Not sure who I'm apologizing to really, unless somewhere there's an invisible legion of Night Garden Blog readers. ;)

At any rate, it's been a slow month for art projects, and I'm working on something pretty big right now. Please stay tuned; I'll post something Really Cool soon.

xo

Stacking

2009-08-20T14:30:00.000-07:00

Many thanks to SciencePhotography.com.

A Lovely Birthday Week

2009-08-13T08:58:00.000-07:00

Camping with family at the coast, sand poured in my hair from my little niece, a nap in the car, a glorious photograph, a blinking light, a lunch out, a nap in the living room, a dinner out, a handmade carrot cake, new shoes, handmade gifts, phone calls from family, good luck, friends and family, and the start of a new year in my life. Not necessarily in that order.

Long Hot Summer Nights

2009-07-31T18:59:00.000-07:00

Sitting at the Meet Your Maker Indie Craft Fair here at the Pizza Reasearch Institute. Pizza is selling fast. Books and cards are selling slowly, so I thought I'd take a minute to catch up on the blog.

If you've been keeping up on my Facebook posts the past few days, you know that it's been HOT here. Triple digits hot. And you also know that my office at W&S is un-airconditioned. Not a wasteful person, really, but when temps get above 99, I start needing a speedy cool down, and there are usually three or four days every summer when air-conditioning is a definite must in Eugene. We even turned on the 1970s behemoth air-processor that came with the house. I wish I knew if it was safe.

Well, as the week has progressed, it has gotten cooler. Tonight, for example, it's a balmy 95. It's all about perspective, people.

Lots of new vendors tonight. I have my eye on a pair of earrings made from pineapple-shaped beads and a crocheted porcupine. I'm gravitating towards the absolutely adorable tonight.

And here's my latest:

It's a ReBound Book, from a new series called the Ghosts of Summers Past. I carve a little spot in the recycled covers for old slides from the 1960s and 70s. This one features the image of a man floating in a pool, and is dated September 1970.

I'm seeing a lot of folks tonight who used to shop in the old bookstore; Alice, John, Jamie, Bob, Olive, Marilyn . . . and that one older guy whose name I never knew, but who always wore a straw hat in the summer. It's my theory (untested) that only very decent people wear straw hats in the 21st century. I guess that theory is partially tested; there are the Amish after all.

Safe as Houses

2009-07-15T21:33:00.000-07:00

I love our little house, and our green yard, and the art studio we've been building out back. I love the picket fence we put in the front and the privacy fence we put behind. I love the siding we're hanging over the old ugly ply board, and the new yellow color, and our plans for a red door. I love every little thing I've planted, everything we've built, and our work has transformed this place. Talking about leaving it is heart-breaking.

So I won't entertain those thoughts. For now we're here, safe as houses. And I'm planning on keeping it like that for some time to come.

Instead, I'll show you some cool stuff . . .

These are my next recycled book boards to be turned into ReBound handmade blank books. Some of these covers are over 100 years old, as you can see by the inside stamp on one: "Princeton Theological Seminary -- 1880".

I used to get sad thinking of these old books being taken apart, but it's really very democratic this way. They get scanned, reprinted, and sold to colleges, universities, seminaries, and churches all over the country. And now that I've found a use for some of the covers, I can sleep a little better.

Here are two I just finished. These are going up in the shop post haste. You can see they're not nearly as old as the upcoming batch, but they're still lovely, don't you think?

This first one is a sweet little thing. The binding came still attached at the spine, so I wrapped the case in this lovely vine-and-berries paper and gave a solid stab binding a bit of dressing up with some cross stitches.

And here's the second one. I used the same decorative paper for both of these, but the bindings are very different . . .

This is a coptic binding, something I'm getting better and better at not muffing up. Sometimes the stitches tear the paper, but my hands are becoming more sure of themselves, as you can begin to see. I think coptic bindings are rather elegant, and have the benefit of opening flat. It makes them perfect to use as sketchbooks or guest books.

And here is my last show-and-tell of the day: a skirt I made recently from some vintage fabric I found at the thrift store on half-price day. I think it looks rather 1950s, and I've been sewing enough recently that I was able to make it without using a pattern.

The buttons, which you can almost see here, are more bakelite, caramel colored coat buttons from that auction lot I picked up in Tennessee last spring. I'll edit in a close-up of the buttons later, as they're too lovely to ignore.

That's plenty for tonight. The two finished books I featured will be up on Etsy; but I'm keeping that skirt. ;)

Sky Blue

2009-07-14T09:07:00.001-07:00

Ah, a sky-blue bike-truck. Pretty, no? I'll give them a little free advert (and considering how few people read this, it really is just a little advertising).

Neverland

2009-07-13T00:24:00.001-07:00

A few shots of one of the major projects I worked on for our recent production of Peter Pan as well as one of me, in my Nana disguise (I made the velvet helmet with ears {a recycled faux fur collar from a Goodwill} and ribbon ties; Rosalie G. beautifully executed a tiny mob cap for the top using leftover recycled-bedskirt-fabric from her handmade Liza apron. GORGEOUS).

This Neverland Map was created over the course of several weeks. Shawn and I built six 5' x 2' canvases out of scrap wood from an old pallet, and one large painters' dropcloth from the hardware store. The canvas was stapled in place, and then I painted this original map of Neverland using acrylic paints and brushes of various sizes. I researched place names mentioned in Barrie's original book, as well as the sequel, but because Neverland is always moving things around (perhaps some inspiration for the Hogwarts staircases?), I was pretty free to interpret the shape of the island and the lay of the land.

To finish, some mesh (recycled from an old mattress) was stapled over the back of each frame, and hinges attached the panels into two 3-panel screens. These were used in the parks as a backdrop and as an exit point for cast members.

On windy days, we tried many methods of keeping the screens upright, especially at our grassy venues. In the end, the father of two of our cast members ended up holding them upright from behind. Someday, I hope to invent a fool-proof method of keeping such things upright in outdoor theatre.

Clickable photos reveal larger versions.

Days O' Work

2009-07-10T09:08:00.001-07:00

I started this project a few months back, taking a photo of myself via web cam everyday at work. As I get older and become for comfortable with how I look, I have been contemplating a series of miniature paintings based on these photos, Frida Kahlo-style self-portraits done tiny.

Here are a few samples from the photo pile. The stack is now more than a hundred deep of these little snapshots of my working life, but this will give you some idea of what I've been working on . . . Now picture them made into little gem-like paintings.

Too self-absorbed?

For Alice

2009-07-03T09:53:00.001-07:00

A very merry unbirthday to you darling. Wish you were here.

I Did!

2009-06-30T08:09:00.000-07:00

Six years ago, I managed to trick my best friend into marrying me. Sucker!

More Desert Photography

2009-06-21T15:48:00.000-07:00

Blue skies, cacti with birds, and a self-portrait of me in the sand . . .

Desert Photography, Part One

2009-06-09T07:44:00.000-07:00

Not to be confused with dessert photography . . .

Spoonflower Fabrics

2009-06-02T10:03:00.000-07:00

Spoonflower is now offering (in addition to the regular quilting-weight cotton) a heavy upholstery fabric and a linen/cotton blend fabric in a tea-stained antique color.

Remember? This is that service that lets you design your own fabric, and they'll print it for you? They host that design of the week contest I recently won.

Anyway, if you have an idea but are worried about the execution, maybe I can hook you up with a custom-made design. E-mail me!

Final Peter Pan Poster

2009-06-01T14:47:00.001-07:00

Sunshine! Oh how I have missed you!

2009-05-19T09:56:00.000-07:00

I spent the day Sunday in the garden, bright sun and 80 degree temp so welcome after months of rain and cold. I moved a lot of earth, built some new beds, planted seeds, and generally got ready for the spring, finally, now that we're only a month away from summer.

I'm soaking some moonflower seeds to go with my sunflower seeds. Moonflowers open at night, along with Night-Blooming Jasmine, which I'm also going to hunt down. I have a flower bed and a trellis right outside the new art studio, which will be perfect for the night garden.

Also saw my dear friend Emily graduate law school on Saturday. I'm terribly proud of her.

Good News!

2009-05-12T08:52:00.001-07:00

I won! Thank you to everyone who voted for my design. You can read Spoonflower's blog entry about my win here. You can also find a link for ordering the fabric from Spoonflower's Etsy site! Last time I checked, they'd already sold 37 yards of my dandyflat design! I'm not sure I can express how cool it is to think of all those people using my design in their projects . . .

Beach Weekend

2009-05-06T23:59:00.001-07:00

View from the campsite.

Shell button book on a driftwood tree.

Stormy day.

Driftwood tree and seaweed with Pacific Ocean in background.

Me and Shawn.

Alex and Kat.

Orion Key.

Huge jellyfish in the sand.

Moving sand.

Peter Pan-sies!

2009-05-05T07:51:00.000-07:00

I'm spending a fair amount of my free time lately making stuff for this:

This is an early draft of the poster. Mostly hand done, with alterations and additions made in Illustrator. After a few more additions and subtractions, I'll post the final result here!

I'm also making a bunch of props, set pieces, and costumes. If you'll be in town during the play dates, please come see! It's an ambitious project for a community theater group (read: no budget), but the cast is well-assembled, and I think the creative energy is well worth the effort.

I'm Finally in the Spoonflower Fabric of the Week Contest!

2009-05-01T14:21:00.000-07:00

Once a week, Spoonflower (a new company that prints made-to-order fabric from your designs!) sponsors a Fabric of the Week contest for independent designers. Winners get free fabric, and their designs are put up for sale by Spoonflower to the general public. Vote for my dandylion pattern HERE!

It's Etsy Day!

2009-04-24T08:37:00.001-07:00

Woohoo! The Etsy community is uniting to make today a huge Etsy visiting day. You can visit my Etsy page at http://www.nightgarden.etsy.com! Stick around and browse other Etsy finds as well!

Meet Your Maker

2009-04-22T11:28:00.001-07:00

Guess where I'll be with a table full of crafty goodness on May 1?

Cupcake is One Year Old!

2009-04-09T20:19:00.001-07:00

Cupcake's first acknowledgment of my presence came when she was just a few days old. She was a tiny ball of fur, less than six ounces in weight, hanging over the edge of a box in our carport. She was so new that her eyes weren't yet open, her ears were folded over, and her tiny little claws were barely holding on to the box; but when I picked her up, she leaned back her head, opened her tiny, toothless mouth, and hissed at me. If the other two cats guessed she was spunky, they kept it to themselves.

For the first month of her life, I carried her in my sweatshirt pouch all day at work and fed her with a bottle of kitten formula every four hours. I worried when she didn't poop, cleaned up when she wet her bedding, and bathed her with a warm washcloth. In return, she helped ease my broken heart.

Here we are, a year later, and at once it feels like she's always been here and like she can't possibly be a year old. Shawn and I are so impressed my how high she can jump, how fast she can run, and by her thousand quirky habits. And we still marvel at how such a tiny little Cupcake has become such a big, strong girl. Happy Birthday, Cupcake!

What If: You're a Beastie and Your Ears Get Cold?

2009-04-06T18:57:00.001-07:00

Ooh look! A Hobgoblin Chapeau!

Delusions of Grandeur

2009-04-04T17:31:00.000-07:00

When I've watched one too many episodes of Ace of Cakes on the Food Network, I get these ideas in my head . . .

My husband Shawn's birthday cake this year was made with a Fallout 3 video game theme. It's in the shape of a bomb shelter, complete with marzipan Vault Boy, Vault-Tec sign, rivets, and rocks; and graham cracker crumb dirt.

This is a close-up of Vault Boy. He's holding a blaster gun, which has the candle's wick sticking out of the barrel.

Hand-painting and aging the plaque with food coloring was my favorite part! Getting the white frosting dyed grey was my least favorite part.

This is the specially-requested Black Forest cake I made for my god-daughter's tenth birthday.

The frosting is actually whipped heavy cream, and I made the masquerade mask and bowling set out of marzipan.