May Gifts

Remember back in February when my boys sent me this for Valentine's Day?:

This morning my doorbell rang and I received this from my boys:

Since I don't eat any sugar or flour, this is a real treat for me!

These gifts were thought up by my youngest boy, Andy:

I also received this yesterday:

From my boys again.  It's for my birthday a week and a half ago and just arrived!  It was my middle boy, Jim's, idea.

He saw the chair in the Cadet Store and thought I might like it.

Well, YES, I do!  I've only been looking at it and wishing I had one for four years.

I want to show more pictures of it.



You may have noticed the paper hanging off the bottom or the chair seat:

That is this:

which holds this:

because this is an heirloom chair.

You bet it is!

I'm having a good week!

Cindy



Checks and Ginghams: Favorite Things #3

I love checks and ginghams in strong clear colors with white backgrounds.  I really like those checks and ginghams on upholstered furniture.  My family room sofa is slipcovered in red gingham:

This is the same sofa in my last house:

Enjoy these other checks and ginghams:

As you can see, I love the strong, clear colors and especially red and blue. 

I hope you're having a great day!

Cindy



Striped Tote Bag

I love tote bags; I think it's because I like things to be organized.  I have lots of tote bags but not too many that are cute so I decided that I need another one that's fashionable. 

I took a piece of drop cloth fabric that I had left over that had been washed and bleached a few times and I made it into a tote bag using another one as an example.

Now comes the fun part.  I wanted blue stripes on the bag so I pulled out a new bottle of acrylic paint and my painter's tape.  I taped off stripes and began my work.

Until I had this:

Then I followed these tutorials here, here and here and made three flowers to embellish my bag and this is what I have!

You can buy premade bags at most craft stores and do the same if you don't want to make your own.  I just didn't want to spend any money and wanted to use up some of my crafting stuff.

I suggest if you make one of these that you don't reuse the tape for the second side.  I did and since it didn't stick real well, I had some blotches to repair.  I just used some acrylic paint that matched the drop cloth to fix the mistakes and put the flowers on the good side.

If you make one of these, please let me know and link to your blog with pictures.

Happy crafting!

Cindy

I'm linking up to the following:

My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia's Tuesday's Treasures

Embellished Denim Jacket

Hi all!  Glad to be back.  I've been under the weather in the sense of not feeling like doing anything creative since Spring Break and then I got a shot of creativity and have been working on some really neat stuff.

Today I'm going to feature my embellished denim jacket.  I've owned the plain denim jacket for a few years but didn't wear it often because it was so plain.  I really wanted to add some bright, saturated colors by adding flowers using calico and felt.

I believe there are 16 pieces that I made and then hand-sewed to the jacket.

All pieces are made using calico and felt stacked up with iron-on interfacing and then machine or hand sewn.  Each piece is mounted on a piece of felt and some include hand embroidery.

I love the colors!  What do you think?

Cindy

I'm linking to the following:

My Uncommon Slice of Suburbia's Tuesday's Treasures

Between Naps on the Porch Metamorphosis Monday

The Lettered Cottage's How To's Day

Wicker Chairs

I've been working on a fun project with my white wicker chairs.  I blogged about my back porch here back in February.

The wicker chairs are 10 year old Martha Stewart chairs from K-Mart.  I love my wicker chairs but didn't like them white so I decided to paint them. 

I chose Rustoleum's Leafy Green spray paint because I love the color and because I already had the paint.

Here is a chair after spraying it with Leafy Green:

I love the color but it was Too. Much. Green!

So I used some Minwax English Chestnut stain.  I brushed it on, left it for a very short time and wiped it off.  That way the stain stays in the crevices and gives the chair some interest and depth and tones the green down some.

This is the chair with the stain:

And here they are together:

The stained chair is on the left.  I love the way the stain upped the texture and gave the chair a victorian look.

Here are some close-ups.

Before:

And After:

The stain gives a nice depth and victorian look; perfect for a porch.  What do you think?

I'll post some pix when they're both done and back on my porch.

Cindy