Thursday, October 20, 2011

Office/Scrap space update

Well I just had to stop in and update the photos of my space while I had a chance to. I have a really busy week and it is Thursday. So far this week, I have been on a couple of job interviews and met with a potential client to make cards for her shop. I am so excited because this is exactly what I need to be doing right now. Trying to establish myself here is different from Minnesota but that is because there I knew so many of the store owners from actually being a customer but here I have none of those connections. But that is ok, it just means that I have to work a little harder.


Well here are the photos of my space, well not right now cause it is a mess...I am cleaning it up but I was crafting a few samples for the shop so I pulled out a little of everything. This is the space behind my chair. By the way, I got the chair from Goodwill for $6.00. It is the exact same color as the wall paint for the room and I have no plans of painting this room so this worked perfectly. And that frame leaning against my cabinet is actually my wall calendar that I am working on for the kitchen. I didn't go with that patterned paper on the top but this is where I am at with this project so far, the frame is painted and distressed, I took a piece of a ruler (that was used in the inside of my cabinet drawers to divide them for my dies) to screw in hooks so that I can hang the calendar part below the scrapbook page. As you can see the frame is a shade off from the cabinet, and that is what I meant when I said my house is a several shades of teal. But not several shades in one room, each room has a shade of it except for the kids rooms. They all got to pick their room colors and they didn't have to match the main room colors/shades. I still have to paint that crate that is on the floor. I am thinking black.



And of course the little one just had to get in the shot so you all could see that she could fit right in her little space. I plan on painting their chairs so that they match the room although they aren't the same chairs. I love the way that these little metal school desks are perfectly distressed to match the space. That was a happy accident. I originally was spraying they black but the Rustoleum paint wasn't working right. It looked like dust and I actually rubbed a lot of it off, so I went back with a wet clothe and it rubbed all off. I don't know why it did that. I shook the paint can, and followed the spray painting directions but the paint didn't work. And at that point I was way too hot (which might have been the issue with the paint) to go to the store and get a different brand so I just wiped off all that I could, sanded it and then painted over the tops with the same paint from the cabinets...and I loved it. It almost looks like chalk paint. I then sanded it some more and wiped them down once again and placed them right where they are now.But other than those things, everything else is just the same as it was in previous photos. I still have several projects that I have planned but those will be getting done little by little.

Saturday, October 15, 2011

This week I've been really productive in getting cards done. I really like that I can now craft while cooking, teaching the girl to write her letters and pretty much any other time that I can get a few minutes in my space. I also really like that I have been cleaning up the space now in 15 mins or less. Mostly because I don't pull out lots of things, but also because things are so easy to put back. I really like that...But here are ome photos of the completed cards. I really needed some sympathy cards so thatis what I have been making. It is a hard card to make mostly because it is for a time that is not a celebration for most so I pulled out product that I had that I didn't like that much if at all. So sorry Chatterbox I loved most of your lines but this one wasn't my style or even anything that I liked at all. But they made some really cute cards. I tried not to use too much black but there really wasn't any way around it.




Here is a list of the products that I used. I don't know what company made the stamp though.

Papers-chatterbox

Cardstock- Bazzill/ AC

Dies-Cricut (gypsy), Spellbinders circle die, Fiskars border punch, sizzix branch die

Seam binding-unknown (sprayed with TH distress ink black soot and perfect pearls)

Twine- Walmart

White embosing powder



Well have a great weekend. I am so far. I have been crafting for a few hours today and plan on crafting some more this evening.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Home Sweet Home

Well since my space is set-up and I have been in there; it is now starting to really feel like our home so I felt like I should maybe let everyone else know the address. LOL. Really I sometimes forget that not all my family checks out this site or even has a facebook account. And so sometimes they are the last to get basic information from me which is so sad cause it used to be so opposite of that.





I used to mail cards and photos all the time and keep everyone in the loop about everything and so I pulled out some more supplies to make cards to send to family. Here are two of the cards that I made, and of course I am going to be making a few more to add to my stash mostly because there are 4 newly built homes on my block and I think it's only nice to give each of them a welcome to the neighborhood once they have moved in.





I really like the corrugated looking card the most. Mostly because I finally got to use my crimper on a card design. I have had that tool in my stash forever and I love using it to make banners and stuff for the kids but I never seemed to figure out how to get the design on a card. But it works well for this card because it feels like a cardboard box. Plus I really like the hand stitching more on this card too.




I just can't get a great photo of the cards no matter what. I have gotta figure out what to do to get photos to look good in here. Especially since my room has really only one source of light (which is a large source) but I need to take the photo without the flash. For some reason the flash is really too bright now. Something tells me something is off in my settings or maybe I have dropped my purse one to many times and bumped my camera.




Well I am going to be checking in a little later this week and finally sharing more photos of my space too. I have to say it isn't 100% what I thought I wanted but until I can spend money on it, this space is really nice. And I don't feel embarrassed now to have someone come over cause there isn't a box in sight! And it only took me 4 months to completely unpack every one of them.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Hello everyone. I am so excited to be able to share the start of a layout that I am working on. For the last couple of days I have been working in my space and really getting an idea of the feel of it. And since doing so, I have switched two things around. My stamp tower no longer is sitting directly on the floor but instead I have it sitting on a crate on the floor behind my desk. I changed that because it allows me to actually see my stamps and it also means that I am not bending over to see the stamps. That was a much needed change. And whenever I change the coffee table looking thing out and get some other type of storage, I will make sure that the stamps can still work in that same spot. And the other change is that I got rid of the 3 drawer plastic organizer from under my desk. I don't miss it at all. I think that was one of the things that bothered me the most about my space for now. None of the the storage solutions (well except the cabinets) are my permanent solutions right now. I am using what I have until I can find the perfect solution for my needs.





But here is a photo of my space now. Oh, I do have a new little section for the girls to have their own little student style desks along the wall. And they love them. And of course every time I have been in the room, they have been in there too. But I knew that would happen. But I actually like having them in there with me and seeing the baby (who is 2yrs old) happy that she has her own crayons, and scrapbooking stuff that she doesn't have to share with her sister is just so cute. I am just wondering how I can make sure to hide my nail files because she keeps chewing one them. And I just know that they must be toxic but she keeps getting into them and everything else she can reach.



But I just realized that I completely forgot to take a photo of the space and share it. But I plan on doing that soon. Well back to said layout...



I know its not even close to being done, and nothing is glued down. And besides that the photos aren't printed. Well they were and that is when I found out that there was no printer ink. My son#1 didn't bother to let me know he had been printing tons of stuff and now I can't print pictures. LOL isn't that the way things go sometimes. When you are ready to do something, it just doesn't really work out. But I have a busy week and since my hubby is out of town most of the week there won't be any runs to get printer ink until the weekend. I have to remember to get ink for the Epson printer too. I realized from this print mishap that I really do love my Epson printer printing my pictures instead.