My creative space.......

Thank you Karen Valentine for hosting such a great event, I love peeking into other creative souls work spaces....as you can see, I love florals but I also love paper, perhaps even more...
I love to store things in see-through hat boxes, what could be prettier? I really like to have my supplies visible if possible, otherwise I tend to forget about them!
My window itself is not a thing of beauty so I hung vintage sheet music from the rod to add some interest...
The frame above was an ugly gold so I painted it white and strung wire across it, propped it in my window, and used baby clothespins to hang revolving items from it...
I became obsessed with dress forms and am lucky to have three of them....love their shapes,
These shelves above my workdesk had doors on them before and when I removed them it's like I breathed a huge sigh of relief, again that whole being able to see what you have thing...it makes a big difference for me...this is where I keep most of my tags and tickets that I make, it's paper central.... 
I love to store things in old cigar boxes and these old file boxes above...it really helped to trim the shelves with pretty crochet trim too....they weren't things of beauty...
The shelf above on the left was ugly when I bought it so it got the wallpaper treatment...the tiny wire hanger is the perfect shade of pink and it's so tiny, I had never seen one that small before.
Items above on my vintage dresser, it stays messy most of the time....
This is a child's crinoline on my first little dress form I bought (not old) at Home Goods....
The cardboard dress form is fun and unique, but they can be found on ebay, I bought mine on the Oregon Coast while on vacation last year...
Glitter-land....
A Vintage banner I made is over the door of my studio....
A magazine rack that I wallpapered has mostly music books in it....
Vintage sewing items above and below...

Lots of vintage bias trim hanging behind my door......these are a few photos of my space, thanks so much for coming by for a visit......can't wait for all the inspiration to come!!!

Gail

Now this sounds like fun!!

Karen from over at mydesertcottage.blogspot.com is having a party for all of us who want to show off our creative spaces....sounds like so much fun, go check it out...there's still time because it starts Friday!!

Gotta go, I've got some spiffin' to do....

Completely and utterly charming.....

Have you ever seen such a thing? I love to find something brand new (that's actually really old) that I've never heard of...I found this charming set in, of all places, The Salvation Army....
It's a reproduction (don't care) of an ancient Parisienne game, 1826 apparently. What you do is hold both pieces of the string, one in each hand, twist them quickly which makes the corresponding image on the opposite side superimpose on the front, kind of like those flip books. 
These two discs for instance, show a circus horse with an acrobat on his back....

This charming one shows three victorian children watching a train come out of a tunnel....


If you google Thaumatrope you'll learn lots more about this unique optical toy...I'm still trying to figure out how it made it's way to the Salvation Army for .95! Lucky for me it did....

What I've been working on........

So I have to admit I've been somewhat of a "slug" lately, more focused on Summer and my dd and dh than my work....and I'm ok with that....I've been working on tags and such for my Etsy shop.  The tags above are my favorites, they have that just right look of vintage about them...
These button card tags are fun too, but not quite finished...they need a bit of aging.....
I've also tried making some bookmarks, hopefully these items will make their way into my Etsy shop before next week when we go on vacation.

My new issue of "Where Women Create" arrived today and I can't wait to sit down and absorb all the goodness inside it! 

Playboy's and bullets.....

O.K., so timing is everything....coming back from Target with my 8yo the other day I saw a sign for a yard sale so I zipped on over to check it out.

This was a very manly sale, stacks of old Playboy's and many boxes of bullets, tools, etc.

The only thing that caught my eye was this entire tablet filled with these adorable hall pass slips used by teacher's. The man told me that he had lots of paper goods earlier in the day (of course, early bird and all that). So I snatched up the last one he had for a quarter and went on my merry way, just thankful that my dd didn't ask, "Mom, why are there pictures of naked ladies on those magazines?"

Guess I dodged a bullet there (pun intended).

I hope you all have a great, junkin weekend, it's so hot here I'm not even sure I'll go outside at all!

What is it?

While shopping in my new favorite shop the other day I came across a bunch of old linens.....

and this cute crocheted item caught my eye, but what is it? It seems exquisitely put together, and has a little loopy handle at the top...inside was the item below that I thought was so charming....little bits of leftover lace with a little thread wrapped around it....seems like there are more than a few of us (thank goodness) who can't seem to throw anything away...just in case we may need it :).
Any ideas on what this little item was originally supposed to be? I've seen them before and not been compelled to buy them, but for some reason the other day, this one caught my heart....
I've also been a bit torn lately about whether I should be just using vintage items in my work, as opposed to sometimes using photocopies....how do you feel about that? Obviously I would always prefer to use an original piece, but if it's a one of a kind, I won't, I'll use a copy. I have printed out so many copies of vintage items, now I don't know if I want to use them in my work.....aaack! However, they are all lovely images, which is why I copied them off in the first place.....I'm sure I'll find a good use for them.

Hope you all are having a great week.....woohoo! it's Friday!!!!!!!

Why I love old paper so much......

Just puttering around my studio "spiffing" it up a bit (I do that a lot!), seems I'm never satisfied, but it's getting there. I need to spend more time creating and less "spiffing" if you know what I mean!
I came across a fantastic old hymnal book that's literally falling apart the other day...hmmm, right up my alley. So rather than leave my shelves plain I've had fun with this paper....
I'm nowhere near done but it is a fun project....
Of course paper's not all I love, I also lined some shelves with old crochet trim, love that look too...
Why not look around your space and see what kind of "spiffing" you can do?

Happy and safe July 4th to you all!!!

My very favorite new book evah!!!!!!

I'll admit it here among friends that I am a self-confessed book "nerd". My best friend Melanie has a copy of this book and last time I visited I started really looking at it.....it's just the most amazing book, filled with amazing things.
The inside covers (of my copy, of course I had to have my own!) are pretty worn but the rest of the book is in amazing shape considering it's age...published in 1883.
The fonts in this book are so varied and beautiful and amazing. The book is actually a "Guide to Correct Writing"- showing how to express written thought plainly, rapidly, elegantly, and correctly.
It's an amazing book to study because it shows all the important etiquette of the time.....
beautiful pages of blackboard flourishing....
chapters on etiquette between neighbors....



And my personal favorite "The Etiquette of Carriage-Riding". 

Guess I'd better brush up because that is one subject I know nothing about :).

Vintage childhood revisited.....

Waking up as a child and realizing it's summertime is a special feeling....because you can while away your days jumping rope,
and when you get tired of jumping you can head to the shade of the big tree in the backyard and play cards with your best friend...maybe Old Maid?
When that games over, it's time to really relax with  a good book, how about this one?
The colors are amazing and the stories just take you somewhere else......


Time for a nap.....hope your summer is relaxing so far.

Flat tires and injured pigeons.......

What? That was my Monday folks.....woke up to dh telling me, "We have an injured pigeon in the backyard so don't be alarmed." 

O.K.

I leave the bird alone and take dd to get a workbook, that's right, a workbook that she was craving. Gaaaaah, it's the first week of summer vacation, what kind of a kid wants a workbook?

So she'll be entering 3rd grade in the Fall, I got her a 4th grade workbook and she's plowing through it........Gaaaaaaah again, should I make her stop in case she gets too far ahead?

Whatever, she enjoys it so I'll just go with the flow, because that's so NOT who I am.

So we're on the freeway and my car makes some weird noise and a light goes on, hmmmmm, what's that about?

We get to the store, come out, and I look at my rear passenger tire, it's flat, as in Flat Stanley flat. I look over and see a Les Swab, bingo..go over there, get tire changed, is it a Monday by chance?

I'm trying to find some time for my etsy shop (it's new you know :)) and the book pictured above will be listed soon, came back from Portland with many goodies, can't keep 'em all....

Hope you're all having a fun, warm, summery week so far!

Whose that girl?

I found this little beauty at my favorite "new" thrift store. She is in such beautiful condition but I did have to give her a bath, her dress and slip were filthy. She looks like a Nancy Ann doll but I've never seen one this large...any clues from some doll experts out there?

Today was the last day of school for dd (yea!!!!). I love having her around for the summer....but wow, the last month has been so busy with her many activities.

In the meantime I was finally able this week to get my Etsy shop up and running so hopefully you can pop over and check it out....let me know what you think. (See the link at the top of my page.)

I love having my own shop!

Next week I'll list a lot more goodies so stay tuned...in the meantime have a great weekend.

I'm going up to see my best friend and I can't wait....lookout Portland!!!!