French Blooms

Bon Jour, Ladies!

Hope you all are having a great day!  For those of you who were hit by that snow storm over the weekend, I hope you are staying warm and safe! It's hard to think of snow this time of year!

Today I thought I'd share with you some of my latest flowery creations.

I've been having fun searching for picture frames that I can transform.  Several months ago, I picked up some beautiful decorative paper with an all over lavender flower pattern.  I didn't know what I'd do with it at the time, but I knew that eventually inspiration would hit (and something tells me that same thing happens to you creative ladies, too!).

 Anyway, I painted three different shaped frames Heirloom White, then added the lavender paper, along with gorgeous French labels from the Graphics Fairy, to two of the frames.  I thought the paper was so pretty by itself, that I just used it solo in the smallest frame.  The label above is one of my very favorites!

 Isn't this copy of a vintage lavender print just beautiful?  I simply mounted it atop the lavender printed paper.

 I'm so happy with the way they turned out!

 Another fun project was added a label (courtesy of the Graphics Fairy, of course!) to this giant galvanized flower bucket.  I adore the French rose perfume label, and thought it would be perfect added to the bucket.

 I love the wooden handles.

As much as I love it, I've added it, along with my lavender framed prints, to my Etsy shop.

 I also added this pretty vintage pedestal bowl too.  I painted it cream, followed by some distressing and antique glazing.  This Graphics Fairy French soap label is another one of my favorites!  Don't you just love those jasmine flowers?

 I wish that I'd remembered to take a before shot of this lovely.  It was pretty sad looking, with a very shiny varnish over the wood, which was stained a very icky color.  Ugg!!!

 One of my trademarks is adding vintage sheet music to the inside of the pedestal bowl.  This sheet music just happened to be both in French and in English, so was quite appropriate for this project, I think!

You can find them all in my Etsy shop, if you care to take a look!

Now go and find something that you can transform!!

Fluffing My Booth!

Hello Ladies!

Hard to believe that another week has flown by!  Seems like there is just never enough time to do everything that needs to be done!  Or should I say "things that I want to get done"!  I feel so fortunate to be able to stay home and "play" in my workroom, creating treasures for my Etsy shop, and now for my booth!  Yesterday I took a few things in to the shop, so I thought I'd share a few photos with you.

 I made the Parisian themed banner as a fun decoration, not to sell.  I've hung it from twine with mini clothespins.  Love!  Another one of my favorite things is the tall rust colored flower bucket you see on the left.  I've added a beautiful French label from The Graphics Fairy to it. Actually, quite a few of my creations involve the Graphics Fairy!  I'd be lost without her!

 Almost everything in my booth I've painted or altered in some way!  The challenge is to continually find treasures that I can transform!  But, I am loving every minute of it!

 Still hoping to sell this gorgeous vintage Queen Anne dresser that hubby and I painted.  It is super heavy, so we definitely don't want to have to haul it home!!

 I love this pretty light blue plant stand that I painted.  It was a very boring dark brown when I first discovered it!  Perched on top is a galvanized bucket (I adore galvanized anything!), that I've added a Graphics Fairy French label to.  Behind it on the wall is the same label, and an additional one, that I've added to a black frame with a neat linen like matte.  Tres chic!

 The black framed corkboards were another one of my latest fun projects.  I brought them with us from Michigan, and spruced them up with a fresh coat of black paint, as well as pretty wooden floral appliques.  The piece de la resistance is pushpins that I made out of little tart tins made in Germany (another thrift store find, of course).  I just love them, now I want to make some for myself!!

 And here is my cute little curio cabinet that I told you about the other day.  If any of you are ever in the Marysville, Washington area, I would love to meet you at my booth, at Sasafrass & Company!

Have a great weekend!  Now I need to pay all of you talented ladies a visit!

Cute Curio Project

Hello Ladies!

It's a cold rainy day here in the Pacific Northwest!  So it's a good day to cozy up inside by the fire, and work on a bunch of fun projects!

Today I'd like to share with you a cute curio makeover.  Of course I was a bad blogger yet again, and neglected to take "before" shots!  Let's just say that this cabinet didn't start out life looking very pretty!

But this is what she looks like now, after several coats of Heirloom White (what else?!), and some decoupaging.

 I found her a few weeks ago at the thrift shop, just begging for a transformation!  The poor thing was a really ugly wood tone, and had a horrible, super shiny varnish on!  Ick!  After lots of sanding, followed by priming and painting, she was feeling oh so much better!  I distressed a bit around the edges to give her even more character.  I knew as soon as I spotted her, some vintage sheet music had to become part of her makeover.  Luckily, the entire back portion was easily removed, so I was able to decoupage it with some vintage sheet music from my collection.

 I'm taking her to my booth tomorrow, but today we had fun doing a little photo session with some of my favorite treasures!

 The Eiffel Tower makes me smile each time I see it, as it's a wonderful reminder of a trip to Paris!  The little cream porcelain dish behind it is from a girlfriend, and the cute vintage hobnail pitcher was also a gift.  The little boy you see on the right is actually a pin that my sister gave me years ago.  I really love it.  It's covered in vintage buttons.  To the left of the little boy is a mini tart tin from Germany, another thrift shop find (hmm, I see a pattern here.....).  I've been transforming some today into magnets, but thought for now it would look cute perched on the shelf!!

 These sweet little birdies were found at another thrift shop.  Can you believe that I spray painted them, too?

Yep, I just couldn't resist!

 I think she is so much happier now with her new look!  And I am, too!

Tag, You're It!!

Hello Ladies, hope you all had a great weekend!

I know that many of you love paper crafting.  It's one of my favorite things to do (when I'm not busy spray painting and glittering everything in site!).  So I thought I'd share with you some of the decorative tags that I've recently made.

  I always like to tuck a little surprise in with all of my Etsy orders.  So many customers of mine receive tags that I've made.

 Vintage sheet music from my collection, a sweet birdie rubber stamp, as well as a few Frenchy stamped images, and a pretty hydrangea blossom make up these tags.  Oh, I just had to get the glitter in somewhere, so I generously glittered the silk hydrangea blooms!  Crinkly taupe seam binding adds a pretty touch.

 Of course I love making French themed tags, and created this one from a snippet from a vintage French book, some of my favorite French themed rubber stamps, and topped it all off with twine and a rhinestone atop the Eiffel Tower ('cause a girls gotta get her bling on!!!)

 The tags all started out as this:  boring manilla shipping tags!  I bought a huge box (there were at least 1,000 tags!) at a garage sale a couple of years ago, for just a few dollars.  Yeah!

 I always begin by tea dying the tags.  A bit time consuming, yes.  But so much more interesting, I think!

 I like storing and displaying the tags in my pretty aqua vintage pots.  Who said storage had to be boring?

I also like to add my tags to some of my finished creations.  Below I've added it to a sweet little decorative birdcage that I just sold in my shop.  I never permanently adhere the tags to the items, that way the recipient can easily remove the tags if they wish.

Glass cloches are very popular in my shop.  I often add my tags to them as well, like the above one that I sold awhile back.

The tags are so much fun to make, and one of the best parts of all is that I usually have everything on hand to make them!

Have a great week!  Now I am off to visit all of you creative bloggers!

Another Rough Day at the Office

Hello ladies!

Today I'd like to introduce you to my assistant and faithful companion, Emily.  As you can see, she is hard at work!  The lower level of our home is a walk out, so there is plenty of light, making it the perfect spot for my workroom.  I love wicker, and have Emily's my white wicker love seat and chair down here.

 So, we both enjoy spending alot of time here!  I snapped these photos the other day when Emily was hard at work, helping me on my many projects!  Ok, maybe not helping too much, but she is a good supervisor!

 She even has her own little baby blanket!  Do you think she is spoiled?  I tried my darndest to get her to look at the camera as I was snapping away. The only thing that worked was when I said to her "say cheese!", as she knows what that word means!  (she loves cheese!)

Ok mama, just let me get back to sleep, er, I mean work!!!!

On a different note, I have a little request.  Tomorrow, Ralph, the husband of my sweet friend Cindy over at Cindy Adkins Whimsical Musings, is having surgery.  Many years ago Ralph lost his arm in a work accident. Tomorrow he will undergo surgery on his other arm, which means he won't have any use of it for some time.    You can read about it here.  If you could please keep both Cindy and Ralph in your thoughts and prayers, that would mean so much!  Let's pray for a quick and speedy recovery, and strength for them both!  Thank you very much!!!

Giant Turquoise Fork & Spoon

Hello and Happy Monday!  Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

Today I'd like to share with you a recent fun makeover of mine!  I've transformed several sets of giant wooden vintage fork and spoons, but had never found a pair as unique as these!  The details are amazing, and feature a heavily hand carved design that I think is so pretty!  Of course, they didn't begin life looking this good.  Oh no!

 This is what they looked like when I first discovered them a few weeks ago.  Ok, but destined for fabulous!!  I was nearly jumping up and down with excitement when I first spotted them in the window of a thrift shop one morning.  The shop hadn't opened yet for the day, but when it did, I made a bee line for these babies as quickly as I could!  I immediately knew that they just had to be painted turquoise!!

I love mixing various colors of paint til I come up with just the right shade.  While it was rather tedious painting these by hand (I've yet to find a turquoise spray paint!), I am really happy with the results!

Some distressing, and my favorite Ralph Lauren antiquing glaze, and viola!  They have gone from drab to fab!

And here is the big reveal!  These puppies are really big, measuring over 2 1/2 feel long!

They now reside in my Etsy shop, but in the mean time, I am admiring them!
Have a great day!  Now go out and find something to transform!

I'm linking up with Donna over at Funky Junk for SNS

Tres Chic!

Bon Jour Mon Amis!

Do you love trays as much as I do?  Well, I am always thrilled when I discover an interesting tray that I can transform in some way.  Today I'd like to show you my latest tray chic creation.  (get it, tres chic?!!!)

 I always like to begin by showing you the "after", as I'm afraid that I might scare readers off by showing them the "before first!!   Anyway, the tray began life pretty enough (below), but has some water spots or some sort of damage to the finish. Too bad, as it could have been pretty!  I knew that with some paint and decoupage, I could give it a new lease on life.  I fell in love with this sweet birdie image over at the Graphics Fairy, and thought it would be perfect for my tray.

 I began by painting the tray white (by hand, which is oh so much more time consuming than spray paint!!), and followed by with some distressing and Ralph Lauren antiquing glaze.  Then came the hard part, trying to figure out how to enlarge the birdies to be large enough for the tray.  Since the tray is almost 2 feel long, printing the image onto a standard 8 1/2" x 11" piece of paper would be way too small.  So, it took quite a bit of finagling, but I finally figured out how to print it out into 4 separate sections.  I then cut the images out and decoupaged them to the tray.  I really love the colors and their sweet little faces, too!

 The tray has a great curvy shape which I also love!

 While this project was very time consuming, it was alot of fun, too!

 I've put this in my Etsy shop, though it is so tempting to keep it for myself!

Now I need to find some other use for this image, as I think it is a new favorite of mine!

Hope you have a tres magnifique weekend!

Upcycled Spindle Candle Sticks

Hello ladies!

Hope you are having a great week!

Today I'd like to share with you one of my latest projects, a set of candle sticks made from wooden spindles.

For this project, I enlisted the aide of my handy hubby, who put the candlesticks together for me (as well as cut the wooden tops!).  Anyway, I'll show you what they started out life as, but first let's take a look at the final product!

 When I first spotted a bunch of these new unfinished wooden spindles at the thrift shop earlier this summer, I quickly snatched them up!  I just knew that they would be the making of a fun project!  Candle sticks were the first thing that came to mind, as they are one of my very favorite things to transform.

 I just so happened to find three unfinished wooden bases at another craft shop and thought they would be perfect as the bottoms of the candle sticks.

 I really love the shape of these spindles!  The shorter two are identical, and the taller one is of a different shape.  I think that just makes things a bit more interesting!  I didn't have anything to use for the tops of the candle sticks, so hubby bought a new piece of  wood for me, cut them to size, and assembled everything with screws and wood glue.  (so glad to have a handy guy around!!)

 I then painted them all a nice crisp white, and distressed them to further enhance their curves!

I love the look!  I have several more of the shorter spindles, just waiting to be transformed!  This set is now in my Etsy shop, if you are interested.  

Have a great day!  Now go out and find something to paint!!

I'm linking up with Kathleen over at Faded Charm for White Wednesday,
and Debra at Common Ground for Vintage Inspiration Friday,
two of my favorite days of the week!