AND AGAIN, AND AGAIN, AND AGAIN...

How many of you are tired of seeing new projects for my house, a show of hands please?


Well too @%#*ing bad because the projects will continue until I get a house- one way or the other!


(As a side note/explanation... the "old man" and I have been beaten out by another buyer on the house we wanted and our newest prospect is looking grim before we have even make our offer so morale is low. On the bright side it gives me more time to torture my readers with new projects of the mundane and horridly Martha-esque!)


The first is my Martha-esque pictures made from household plant cuttings and some reused picture frames. I found a few frames of roughly the same size and scarred the existing finish with some sandpaper. Next I used some gesso for a few base coats before I applied several more coats of white acrylic paint. Finally I took some plant cuttings and pressed them in heavy books between scrap paper before placing them in the frames with some white card stock as a background. The result:

The next project was to replace our bedside lamps with something a little more... interesting. Lucky for me I was able to talk my hubby into a brown, green and white color scheme for our bedroom and our wrought iron and red lamps simply would not do. Instead I made new lamp shades (which he has promised to wire for lights, although who knows how long that will take) out of some basswood sticks and white vellum I found at the craft store. I cut, glued and sanded the sticks to make the frame which I then painted brown before giving them a coat of spray varnish. Then I cut and glued vellum to create the shade. I may end up using different paper for a smoother result, but for now it works fine...

The final project was probably the most fun I've had in a while and I must give credit to Art Fiend for telling me to just "go for it." You see, as much as it shames me to admit this, I have never actually painted on canvas as I found it rather intimidating, but when you see canvases on sale at your local craft store you must realize that someone, somewhere, is trying to give you a big kick in the ass to try something new. So I did. I painted this to go in some future living room (which we have planned to decorate in burgundy, black and white.) Please try to imagine this framed in a lacquered black frame that has a slightly Japanese flair which I hope to commission my father to make for me. I actually like how this came out and unlike most of my paintings I think I want to display this in my main living space!

That is all for now.

-Lyzard

HOUSE MANIA

In my more lucid moments over the last two weeks I realized that I have been seriously lacking in the blog department. Normally I would beg the forgiveness of any faithful readers, but because I know that my “faithful readers” mainly consist of those few to whom I speak on a daily basis I am sure they already are aware of my all-consuming mania regarding The House.

For those of you who have blindly stumbled into this blog (and will probably just as quickly depart these pages) an explanation is in order… Last month my husband and I put an offer on a house in the town in which we rent. Since then I have been living in a surreal fog that drifts between feelings of paralyzing anxiety, benumbing lassitude and rushes of complete frenzy.

The frenzied moments are definitely the most useful of all the conflicting emotions since I have completed several projects for The House in a whirlwind of activity where I am more productive than usual.

Before I succumb to another bout of lethargy I thought I’d submit the projects I’ve completed over the last few weeks.

The first project was to fill a favored frame with some intriguing pictures for a dining room. I dug out the set of as-yet-unused silverware, my digital camera and a white tablecloth and headed outside on an overcast day to work some magic. These three pictures were the result and I must say they look rather fabulous in the wrought iron frame:

While packing away some odds and ends I stumbled across a veritable mountain of my dearest’s unwanted jeans that I had vowed (at some point in a long-forgotten past) to use in some creative way. Over the course of several evenings I cut, tore, tied and finally crocheted my way through that mountain to make a rather raggedy rug. While it in no way compliments the furnishings we have for our main living area I thought it might make the perfect addition to the Blue (and a do mean BLUE) upstairs bathroom or perhaps the laundry room.

Not quite as big of a deal is the silver table that we have had buried under electronic equipment for ages. It’s a nice table, but didn’t quite go with our black, burgundy and white theme. Spray painting it with a matte black finish really made the table pop again. While I was already committed to busting brain cells spraying noxious paint I decided to paint a couple of brass candlesticks that were destined for the donation bin. I actually like them again!

Yet another project has intrigued me for a while- crocheted pot scrubbers. With the consistency of steel wool these nylon scrubbers are awesome on nasty dishes, especially cast iron pans. It took me a while to figure out what those funny little things were made with until one day a purchased one began to unravel and I found out they were made with coarse tulle! Ninety-nine cents a yard later I have several scrubbies in my preferred color.

There are several more projects waiting in the wings including some handmade bedside table lamps, framed fern fronds to match our bedroom décor, a revamped cabinet and a cut-out worth framing. Hopefully all coming soon to a blog near you.
-Lyzard

Attack Of The Button Monster

Recently I came into a bunch of buttons, many of them decades old. Now sitting there staring at this collection, all contained within a few baby food and pickle jars, awoke a demon within me. I’ll refer to him as my “Compulsive Organizing Bug”. He especially likes to bite at times when there are more important things to be doing. Certainly more important than organizing hundreds of little buttons into proper color and material groups…

Despite this glaring reality I relented, rather easily, and spent hours sifting and sorting and satisfying ol’ COB.

After all was said and done I decided to whip up a little crochet monster to reside among the buttons as a reminder of what happens when a compulsion takes hold.


(To my horror/amusement it ended up looking like a terribly mutated Cyclops Grover, complete with lolling tongue and vacant expression, and a taste for white buttons.)


-Art Fiend

DOMESTIC DORK

I believe that this posting falls under the: I-said-I’d-never-do-it-but-now-I’m-a-colossal -hypocrite category.

This all began when the hubby and I put down an offer on a house. As we are (not so patiently in my case) riding out the interminable time the banks and mortgage companies are taking I have, without warning, become alarmingly domesticated. I am unexpectedly enamored with bed linens and have (may the saints preserve us!) taken to watching hour upon hour of HGTV. I have, however, set up a private firing quad to take me out the moment I finger my first swatch of pink floral decorating fabric with ruffles.
To this end I have been desperately trying to avoid falling into the monochromatic void of suburban decorating. Sure eggshell, taupe, sand and beige are fundamentally appealing to all types of people, but what self-respecting (and self-proclaimed) artist could live in a beige asylum like that? Granted I own the most immense tan sectional, but you got to work with what you have, right? Well a trip to the fabric store took care of the expanse of tan!

Three of the pillows were existing pillows that matched our couch. Those were quickly covered with more appealing fabric in reds and black. To add more interest I made two pillows with upholstery fabric and fiber-fill. On the most plain cushion I tried my hand at appliqué. I cut three leaf shapes from some scrap corduroy and sewed them onto the pillow front with a zigzag machine stitch around the border of each. Trusting myself to fate I went ahead and free handed the twigs as well, using my sewing machine.

This was a very fun and inexpensive way to put more color into the couch!

I thought my little foray into decorating would end there, but I had left over fabric from all the pillows and the sewing machine was still out…

A quick jaunt online gave me a few ideas and before I knew it I was cutting blocks of fabric.

Now I know that quilting is a very exact craft, but I am not an exact person. I just cut and sewed, no measuring and no ironing. Of course that meant that there were a few mistakes and some craftily hidden botches, but overall it turned out beautifully for my first quilt. Who ever said quilts have to be frou-frou concoctions of floral prints in crazy diamond shapes?

-Lyzard

A Few New Creations

I’ve been burying my nose in books lately, so my crafting has slowed down a bit. It doesn’t mean I’ve given my fingers a break, though; in fact, all the crocheting I’ve been doing has them curled up in an achy agony that only blissful sleep can cure. I wish I had a long and proud pictorial to show for it, but time and time again my project attempts are being unraveled to start anew.

I do have a few things to show that have been completed over the past month or two, however.

First up: cabled fingerless gloves.

After making pretty much everyone I know a pair of fingerless gloves this Christmas it was my turn. There was a hard lesson to learn with these things, though: the yarn I used was a cheap brand that was half acrylic and half cotton, and terrible for wearing! Sure, the cable is clearly defined, but that’s the only good thing I’ve got to say about it. They feel… icky. In fact, I’d rather be wearing sopping wet blue jeans. OK, that may be a slight exaggeration, but after the trial and error of getting the design right it was a disappointment.


So on to the next item: more cables…

This piece is actually the shell to a circular knitting needle holder, which I based on a design posted on Craftster.com.

The inside is lined with stash fabric, and the 6 pockets are made with craft felt. That means I’ve got about three more of these to make to keep all those twisty needles in check.


Next: stylish gloves to replace the aforementioned pair.

I love it when I come across free patterns on the web like this one. Punk Rock Corset Gloves from TheKnitteur.com were a lot of fun to make. Plus, I learned how to create i-cord edging.


Lastly, something that was directly inspired by Lyzard’s recently posted crocheted lunch bag made from plastic grocery bags.

It’s a mostly-knit version. Actually, the crocheted top and handles were the result of not planning a design before knitting up a bunch of rounds. It all worked out in the end, and now we’ll see how well it holds up with repeated use.



Ciao!

Disentombment of the Month

A search through our various stashes, piles, and catacombs reveals many timeworn tokens of our artistic pasts. Some are pretty good, some are agonizingly bad, and some are just plain freaky! Still, we can't help but find amusement in their exhumation.



More Photoshop stuff to share. This was the product of a Photoshop class assignment that began with me tooling around Seattle with a cheap-o camera and ended in a dark computer lab where I agonized for hours over composition, layers and photo quality. Of course now the Alaskan Way Viaduct is on it’s way out (someday perhaps) and the Seattle Aquarium has a snazzy new entrance and most importantly this is a total fabrication of the Seattle skyline. Despite all that this was an interesting undertaking.

-Lyzard

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An old art class project: The Fab… Two

I never did get around to Paul and Ringo. Oh, well. I’ll just let it be.

-Art Fiend