Countdown......5 4 3 2.....

Happy New Year's Eve! The count down is going pretty slow. It's only 4 in the afternoon. We still have 8 hours to go...... Knowing me, I will probably be asleep way before the ball drops in NYC.

I started early this morning. I made the draped table and the hats. I gathered the booze and the food from around the house. I have it set up in the box that I am going to paper for the occasion. I don't know if you can see it, but the table cloth has confetti, wine bottles and glasses on it. By the time I had that done, the cat and dog had joined the party. As usual, the cat is scratching the tablecloth and eyeing the food. I am not so sure about the dog. He is wearing a top hat and waiting for someone to fill his crystal bowl with Johnny Walker from the bottle in front of him. I think maybe he should have a designated driver if he has to go anywhere. No.....Don't fill his bowl. He doesn't need encouragement!

Anyway, by tomorrow I should have the box finished. I got sidetracked earlier. My husband's birthday is tomorrow. We decided to go see Jim Carrey's new movie "Yes Man" and go to Red Lobster for lunch. Now do you see why it's not finished yet? Hey! I'm doing pretty good considering that I just got the idea this morning.

Now I am going to go work on the box part. You will see it tomorrow and I will see you tomorrow. It's a whole new year!

Running Away From Home

If I am running away from home, I have to pack my bags. Right? Well, first I have to make them. OK. Just in case you feel like running away too, here's how you do it. No. I can't instruct you on the running away part, but I can show you how to make the bags.

There are ways to make open bags too, but I am just going to show you the closed ones today. We are going to run away in style. No nap sacks for us. Good old fashioned hard sided suitcases. Nothing will get broken.

Start with some half inch thick balsa wood, thin leather(I used suede) or fabric, gold cord(you can get this at fabric stores in the trim dept.), small jewelry findings( I cut up old jewelry with wire cutters for this) and dimensional fabric paint.

1. Cut three blocks from the balsa. One is 2 1/4" x1 1/2". The second is 2" x 1 1/4". The third is 1" x 3/4". Round the corners with an emery board as you see in the first photo.

Next put a smooth, thin layer of glue on one side of the suitcase and lay it out on the leather, leaving about a quarter of an inch all around. Do this on both sides of each piece. Clip the corners as shown in the second photo. Put glue on the inside edges and glue them down. They should look like the top suitcase when you are finished.

Now cut a 1/2" strip of leather long enough to fit around the suitcase. Starting at the center back, glue it around the edge. Trim if necessary.

If you use fabric, the instructions are the same for the sides. When you get to the strip you have to cover a piece of card stock, 1/2"wide and long enough to go around the suitcase, with the fabric. Smooth the outside of the strip and trim so that you can wrap it around to the back neatly. Then apply the strip to the suitcase.

Next starting in the same spot on the back, glue two strips of thin metallic cord around the suitcase about 1/8" from the top. This will represent the opening. Put a couple of small jewelry findings on the front of the two larger cases and one on the smaller one.

Now cut a little strip of leather for each handle. I usually just eyeball this. They are about 5/8" long and 1/8" wide. Then cut the ends to a point. Put a small amount in the center back of each handle and squeeze it together with your fingers or a pair of needle nosed pliers. Put a little glue on the ends of each handle and apply to suitcase. Put a "rivet" in the end of each handle with a dot of gold dimensional textile paint.

You are now ready to pack and run away! Or by now you will have given up on the fantasy and decided to go back to work. I know I have. I'm going back to sorting books. See you tomorrow.

More Hatmaking....

OK. When we stopped yesterday, we had the crown formed and I told you how to cut out the brim. Incidentally, you can cut the brim piece any shape or size you want. The one that I put in the instructions was just a random size. You can draw a circle or an oval and just make sure that you use a size for the center hole that will fit around the crown and overlap just a smidgen.

I messed up and didn't take a photo of the brim being added while still on the form. I think that you can get the hang of that by just doing it though. I did cut off the bottom two layers on one side of the brim overlap so that it wouldn't be too thick in that area.(see bottom right) After the hat was dry I took it off of the form and here you see that I have trimmed about half of the excess crown from the inside. The edge of the brim is a bit rough. Adding braid or even some of the threads from the fabric itself to the edge with glue will take care of that.

Always start and finish the braid at the point that you will be putting your decorations. Those will cover the joining. For the bow, put a small spot of quick grab where you want the bow to start. Lay the end of your silk ribbon on it. Loop the ribbon back on itself and glue to the same spot. Keep looping it to opposite sides and glue each time in the center. Only you can decide when your bow is full enough. I usually do 6 to 8 loops. Keep maneuvering the ribbon clockwise with about the width of the ribbon between the loops on each side. Cut it off. Then cut some tails as long as you want them and put glue on the end and tuck them under the bow. You can decorate with roses and feathers. There is a tutorial for the roses here. http://caseymini.blogspot.com/2008/08/roses-for-mlady.html

Here is the yellow and green one that you saw yesterday. This one has everything but the kitchen sink on it for decoration. It has roses and Ostrich feathers. The Ostrich feathers can be curled by running them over the blade of your scissors like curling ribbon.

Experiment. I am sure that you will find that decorating the hats to your own taste is more than half the fun.

One of these days I will show you how to do silk and velvet bonnets. I will let you mess with these for a while first though.

The only other thing that I have to report today is.....My miniature bookcase is clean.....And full! I dragged all of my miniature, decorating and furniture making books out and put them together in the bookcase in our bedroom. If I find any more I am in trouble! They just fit. If I do find more(and I probably will) the two mini scenes will have to go live somewhere else. As it is, all of my costume and miniature doll dressing books are going elsewhere. Wish me luck!

I am in the process of reorganizing all of the bookcases in the house. I found a couple of books on bead work this morning that I didn't even know that I had! It's definitely time to straighten things out when I buy a new book and it disappears before I even get to read it!

I am off to do more book moving.

See you tomorrow.

Here's Your Hat.....

I am back to the dreaded room cleaning. I was looking for the straw braid to make hats. I am still looking for the straw braid to make hats. I will probably still be looking next month at this rate. It is nowhere to be found.

So.....I decided to quit looking and show you how to make a hat out of needlework fabric instead. This is what we are aiming for. It's a picture hat with either a rounded crown or a flat crown. They are fairly easy to make once you get the hang of it. I will show you how to make the basic hat today and tomorrow I will show you some trim tricks.

BTW, the hatstand is really easy to make. The one shown is made from a wheel bead, a fancy spindle and a 5/8" wooden bead from the craft store. It was assembled and then all of it was stained.

Now about the hats.

This gadget is the hat form. The round end is what they call a round knob or sometimes a doll's head at the craft stores. It is flat on one side and sometimes has a hole on the flat side. I simply glued that to a 5/8" diameter dowel. The round end is for the rounded crown and the flat end is for the flat crown. I am sure that you figured that out for yourself. At least I hope that you did....

You can work on two hats at once this way. The rubber band is to hold the fabric in place until it dries. This particular fabric is some #24 congress cloth. You don't need more than what you see in the photo to make a couple of hats. This can be painted after it is finished to make whatever color of hat you would like.

Here you can see that I have stretched squares of the fabric over the ends of the tool. I first sprayed the fabric with extra hold, scentless hairspray to make it damp and pliable. With this, it will dry nice and stiff. I smoothed out as many wrinkles as I could manage. After I put the rubber bands in place I worked even more of the wrinkles out of it. After it is in place, it must dry thoroughly. Walk away and go play with the cat, or knit, or take a walk. Just don't be anxious to play with it.

Actually, I use the time to cut out the brim. I cut one of card stock. Then I glue that to a piece of the fabric. I trim it close to the card stock. Then I turn it over and do the same thing to the other side. If your fabric is stiff enough, you can leave the card stock out. If it is really stiff you can use just one thickness of the fabric. It just depends on the fabric that you are using.

In the photo above, I used the card stock in all three. I wanted a heavy brim. If you are doing a summer hat I would suggest that you use a heavy fabric and spray it a lot.

After you get the brim covered with the fabric, put glue on the inside of the brim and along the back seam. Take the rubber band off of the crown but leave the crown on the form. Then overlap the back of the brim and place it over the crown. Pin in place and wait again......Go have lunch. Play Guitar Hero or Rock Band.

When it is dry take the hat off of the stand. Trim all of the ragged edges that are hanging down from the crown. Trim it right up to the inside edge of the brim. You now have a hat that is ready to trim.

You can either go for it and decorate it or you can come back tomorrow and I will show you how to do the bows and other stuff.

See you then.

Hang in There......

Don't give up on me yet. I am just getting reorganized from Christmas. There is progress to report. I am getting back to normal,well for me anyway, today. I went into town this morning at 4;30AM, ate breakfast at my favorite cafe and then went to Wal Mart to check out the day after, the day after Christmas sales. I am not insane. I skip the day after. I figure the stuff that I am meant to have will still be there. If it's not, I wasn't meant to have it. It's logic or maybe just an excuse for not fighting the crowds.

Here are the treasures. You already saw one of them.....or one like it. Wal Mart puts Christmas gift box sets on 50% off the day after and they still have a lot left now. In a few days, if things go as usual, they will mark down to 75% off!

The green one here is just like the one that I made into a perfumery last week. Yes, I bought another one. The first one went home with my daughter Christmas day. It wanted to hang out at her house. Now I have two more for the price of one. It was 5.00 for both and with all of that smelly stuff besides. How could I leave them there?

These two were originally 10.00 each. So it was 2 for 1. You do the math.

They are covered in faux alligator skin. I thought that they would make good masculine vignettes.

They are about 2 1/2" deep and maybe 8X 10 inches.

I think that I did pretty good at 15.00 for the four and all of the good smelly insides to boot! I will have to check in a few days again and see if they have gone down to 75%. If they have the first ones will be 1.25 and the second ones will be 2.50. There were a few other candidates too. I wanted to get these first because I have specific ideas in mind for them.

Now, if you just stick around for another day or two I will be back in mini action. This was the first step.

See you tomorrow.

Thanks Santa!

Santa only brought me one mini present. It was one that I asked for. This is it!

I spotted this Chinese chest in the Design Toscano catalog a couple of months ago. Then I hinted heavily. It worked. I wanted this for either a 1/2" scale "house" or a 1" scale vignette. I still haven't decided which it will be.

It has a shelf that divides it in half inside. It will depend on whether I can pry that loose or not without ruining the case.

For a while it will just sit around waiting for me to do something.

Anyway, that was my biggie as far as minis go for Christmas presents. I think that Santa was pretty nice.

Today I am just vegetating. I went from 5:30AM until about 8:30 PM yesterday at full tilt. I don't plan on doing anything today. Tomorrow is another story. See you then.

Merry Christmas to All!

That's about all there is to say today! I hope that your holiday was as happy as mine. Back to reality tomorrow. For today here's a "Where's Waldo" for you. It's really a "Where's Mookie".

See you tomorrow.

Twas the Night Before....

You know the drill. I wonder how many out in blogger land will be using that phrase tonight. I am late today. That's my excuse. Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, there was a mess. OK. I know that's not how it's supposed to go. This is my version.


I have been cooking and wrapping presents since the crack of dawn. Literally. There is now a big old chocolate cake ready to eat and lots of other partially fixed foodstuffs. So.....I am doing something that a friend asked for. Debi, who lives in Canada and is up to her ears in cold. She is at about -32 degrees or so!!! That just plain scares this desert rat. She asked for closer photos of the Christmas Island. Here you go Debi.


Tonight I wish my house looked like this. You don't want to see mine. Believe me!



I guess you might want a few specifics about what is in the cupboard. All of the tinned food was purchased. I don't know if they still sell these. I haven't seen them around for a while. The box that the eggs are in is made of perforated paper for cross stitching. The eggs are tiny beans. The canning jar with peaches are some that a friend made. They are poly clay and resin. The potholders are some that I made from tatting thread with a # 14 needle. The jars with flour and other things are really those things. I sealed them tightly and have never had a problem with them.


That darned cat is at it again. There isn't going to be much turkey left if he has anything to say.


The dish towel is some fabric that a friend gave me. I just fringed the edge and folded it over the towel bar.The coffee pot is real pewter from England. The rolls on the bottom shelf are poly clay. I think that there is a little of my influence on the lady that owns this kitchen. Otherwise why would she have a Christmas present in with the coffee pot?



From this view you can barely see that the drawers actually open. I should have taken the photo from higher up. They are actually made like shallow boxes. I simply added 1/16" double bead molding all around the front to fancy them up a bit. If you could see down into that drawer, you would see that it's the towel drawer. Her towels are much cleaner than mine. As you can see, I am there helping out. My coffee cup is on the counter. The contraption on the lower right is a coffee mill from England.


That's about it for the tour tonight. I have to go mash potatoes now.


See you tomorrow. Merry Christmas Eve!

My Favorite Things.....

This is not going to be anything like the song. No raindrops on roses. No whiskers on kittens. Someone on the Greenleaf forum asked how people determine what will happen with a new house or other building. How do you figure out what is going to be happening in the scene, what colors to use, in what time period will it be set?

Most of the time I have the building, room box or container in hand and the idea comes. Once in a while, for example the castle, the idea comes first and then I have to build the structure around the idea.

Whatever comes first, there is always some paper and pencil involved. Usually this is a quad rule "Planning Pad". They are available just about anywhere you go. I get most of mine at Wal-Mart. I would have to say that I would rather have one of these and a package of Bic pencils than anything else that someone give me to attempt to entertain me. I don't know how many of these I have filled over the years. They are my weapons of choice for just about everything, especially for minis.

I seem to have a weakness for new paper and new pencils. I think that the most memorable Christmas present when I was a kid was my very first ball point pen. I was fascinated with the fact that you never had to sharpen it and could keep writing and drawing indefinitely......No one told me that they leak, you can't erase mistakes and sooner or later they run out of ink. I think that I probably lost it somewhere before that happened.

Then there was my great uncle Hank. He worked at a print shop and always had all kinds of neat pads made of leftover paper to share. He would give me stacks of these little pads every time I saw him. Yup. He was my favorite uncle. I also loved the start of each school year. Nope. I didn't particularly want to go back to school. I just wanted the new notebook with fresh paper and the new yellow pencils and always a sharpener to go with them.....That always somehow got lost too. If I was desperate enough, I remember chewing on the pencil wood to get to the led. That was not a great way to sharpen them though. Are you starting to see a pattern here? New pencils and paper, give me some of each, and I am a happy camper. OK. I am over the daydream of paper and pencils now. Back to the subject.

The answer to the question that was asked at the beginning is notes, lots of notes, drawings, lists, and measurements. When I want to start a new mini project I pull out a planning pad and go to it.

I start with a page that is the outside of the structure. This usually has a rough sketch of what I plan to do with the building. For example, when I did the Buttercup bookshop, this is where I decided how the two kits would be cut and reassembled into one.

Next I do some pages for each of the floors of the house or shop. This is where I decide what the rooms are going to be and how they will coordinate. I do a floor plan of each story.

From there I do each room. On these pages go a scale drawing of the room with windows and doors. Then I decide what furniture will fit, colors and accessories are listed. I also make a note of what I will need to finish that particular room.

Many times these note and lists change daily. They aren't written in stone. That's the reason for a pencil with an eraser.

Here you see one of the pages from the basket shop. The plan for the worktable is at the top. I used the actual measurements on the page for the construction. At the bottom, I started with a plan for a stool. That one never got built. It may come in handy for another project. It stays where it is just in case.

This last photo is of a list of all of the projects that I still have to do. This particular list was a mistake....At the bottom of this page is the number 21. I did not turn the page to let you see that it goes on.....and on......Maybe I will sometime, but not today. It is two days before Christmas and I don't want to depress you.

See you tomorrow. Merry Christmas Eve Eve.

Not a Miniaturist Today.....

Did you ever have one of those days? This morning I did yardwork. After that we went to lunch and looked at new TVs to replace one that is on it's last legs. When I finally got to the place where I realized that I had done nothing mini today I ran around in circles looking for something to do in mini. I think that the main problem was that I was not really in the mood to mini. Yup. Sometimes I get like that.

I was sitting at the computer, so I decided to do something on the cross stitch program. This is it.

Feel free to use it if you want to. I thought maybe a door mat or a small rug. Simple. Two colors. Plain old cross stitch. Can you guess that I am bored? Bah Humbug!

Next I decided to try making something with fimo. Aha! Gingerbread men. I used my smallest 5 petal flower(1/4") to cut them out. Then I smooshed the two bottom petals together for the legs and squeezed in the neck and made the arms a bit thinner by shaping with a toothpick. I was too lazy to make white frosting so I used some creamcolored liquid fimo tat I already had made. I dabbed it on with a toothpick. They turned out pretty awful. I sliced some round cookies and filled them. Also pretty awful. I was so bored that I tried to convince myself that slices of oranges could look like cookies. Then another miscellaneous cane was sliced and it didn't look any more like cookies than the man in the moon. Remember the word smooshed that I used earlier? I used the technique again. Everything got smooshed together! No more cookies!

I finally settled on going back to work on Christmas presents. I am doing some beadwork. I can't show you that. Someone might be looking that shouldn't see it. So here's something pretty to look at in place of that. The top piece is a Listerine breath mint container that I made a couple of years ago. I am not sure if they even make the mint sheets anymore. You know. The kind that melt on your tongue. I am now trying to figure out another use for it. The pencil is one that I did about the same time. These are both made with #14 beads. That means if you line the beads up in a row(not strung) hole up, you will have 14 in an inch long line. That means that each inch of beadwork has approximately 200 beads in each square inch. Technically these pieces count as miniatures. They are the same size as the beads that I use to make mini purses. Anyway, that is as close as I got to any miniatures today. I am soooooo ashamed.

See you tomorrow.

A Silk Purse From....

Nope. Not a sow's ear. Well it's not really a silk purse either. I was wandering around looking for something to write about. It is too close to Christmas to be thinking about starting a new project. It is too close to Christmas to be working on old ones. I should be working on presents. So I will combine thinking of something new to work on with writing. That's where the silk purse analogy come along and bites me.


As I was wandering and looking I spotted the following: a picture frame, an eighties style box for holding drink coasters and some gift bags. I made the picture frame into a mini display once before and wasn't happy with it. No silk purse that time. I need to try again. This is no ordinary picture frame. I found it at T J Maxx a few years ago. It is the perfect size for a 1/12" vignette. The window is 5"x7". All I had to do was build a box behind. I did. I never liked it so I tore it apart. I do that sometimes and I am proud of it. My philosophy is if it doesn't work don't try to force it. I still like the frame so I will try again.


The eighties style box has a sliding door like a roll top desk. I paid a quarter for it at a garage sale. It will make a neat little half inch scale room. Why not do a retro eighties room in it? I know it's not the thing to do right now, but in about 10 years that will be the in thing to do once again. Did you know that everything goes in 30 year cycles? I learned that in a history of fashion class in college. Think about it. If you are old enough to remember what you were wearing 30 years ago, you may not realize it, but your kids are wearing an updated version of it now. It's the same with home decorating. It has something to do with the coming of age of a new generation.


The last candidates for new vignettes are these. A friend found them in a shop in California and sent them to me. Yes. They are gift bags! They are somewhere between 3/4" and 1" scale and could be made to work. There are two shops and two houses. Each has windows with cello in them so that you can see inside. The back wall is fully illustrated and looks like the interior.


I have been holding on to these for when the mood strikes. One of these days it will. Until then, I take them out and unfold them. I look in the windows and dream about what could be put inside.......Some day soon......This is the garden shop. It almost seems a shame to mess with them. See the checker board floor and all of the flowers inside? It is almost like it is already done. Hmmmm.......I think I just finished four room boxes in one day! I am going now to unfold the other three and set them on a shelf somewhere. Then I am going to look at them while I work on Christmas presents.

I hope that you are further along on Christmas prep than I am.

See you tomorrow.

I Can't See the Forest....

That's because I am making the trees now. Then I may be able to see the forest, or at least a small part of it.

I am back to the poly clay today. I'm making small table trees for Christmas. Here's how I did it. I gathered up dark green, gold and red poly. You could use other colors, but I wanted to make it simple. You will also need a small pair of scissors with sharp points, toothpicks and your hands. That's about it.

I started with the green and made small cones by rolling the clay into a ball and then, putting more pressure on one side, I formed the cones. If the bottom is not flat, you can cut it off with a clay blade. Starting at the bottom of the cone, I snipped in little V shapes with the pointy scissors. Go in at an upward angle and cut. The photo shows approximately the angle used.

I clipped little cuts in the edges of all of the leaves. As you can see, it is easier to do if you stick the tree on the end of a toothpick so that you will have something to hold onto. After that, I brushed the branches lightly with metalic powder. This step is optional. Then I made tiny balls of red and put them at the upwards Vs.

The second tree has a leaf cane sliced and placed at random to cover the tree. Then I cut the gold in tiny balls and filled in the corners. I rolled it around a bit to make sure that all of the gold balls stayed in place. If you want to find out how to make the canes go to Polymer Clay Central. Their website has all kinds of tutorials for canes and other useful information on the use of poly clay.

The third one really needs no explanation. I just formed the cone, rolled out thin strips of gold and red and twined them around the tree. You could add balls between or use a different pattern of strips to do this kind.
I couldn't find a star cutter so I improvised and used a heart cutter for the tree topper. I will probably have to go back and re do that part when I find the star.

This just goes to show you how simple it is to make decorations for your house. These are all under an inch tall. You can make them whatever size you want.

I am done for the day. I need to tend to my knitting now. See you tomorrow.

A Cop Out.....

Actually, it's a Santa Claus out. I didn't get to mini at all today. So you get to see tiny Santa on the porch and then you have to go. Don't worry. You will have fun where I am sending you.

I know it's not nice to kick you out so soon, but I have to. I still have work to do.

Here are some websites for you to go look at for the rest of the day. The first one is Linda Young's glass greenhouses. These are done just like stained glass lamps etc. are built. Amazing. http://ladyjane.com/index.html

Next we have 3 sites that are beautifully done architecture in miniature. In fact, one of them was a full sized architect and changed to mini. No. I don't mean that he was full sized and changed to mini. His work was.

http://www.markturpin.com/ Architect

http://www.goliathminiatures.com/index.html As far as I know these people have always been mini.....makers.

http://community.webshots.com/user/bungalowbythebay Karin Corbin has a Webshots site showing her unusual miniature houses. I love the Acorn Cottage.

http://www.moureyminiatures.com/ Last, but never least, is this French site. Pierre Mourey does some of the most incredible antique French furniture that I have ever seen. Again, I can't read French, but I can appreciate the work.

OK. It's back to work for me. I hope that you enjoy the tour.

See you tomorrow.

Santa Claus is Coming!

Come along with me and make a mini Santa from poly clay for your house or Christmas room box. This is one of those things that I do on the spur of the moment to entertain myself. I was in the mood to play and this is how I played.

These are the tools that I used. The rolling pin at the top of the photo is one that I have shown before. The pink bands on the ends allow the rolling pin to make an even slab of clay. It is a fondant roller made by Wilton. I use it when I am too lazy to drag out the pasta machine.

I am sure that you know about the ball pointed stylus. That is like my right hand in all kinds of crafts. The outside of that is covered with canes of poly clay to fancy it up. The clay blade is self explanatory. The wicked looking tool in the center is a Wilton cake decorating tool. I got it at Wal Mart for about 3.oo. It is meant to make "stitches in fondant frosting. The other two wheels stored in the handle are for a kind of zigzag edge and one is a plain cutter. I use all three for various poly clay projects. No. They do not belong near food!

I used red, 1/2white and 1/2transparent, and black poly for the snowman. The green cane is a leaf cane that I made some time ago. It will be used for holly on Santa's hat. If I didn't already have that made I would have used plain Christmas green.

As you can see, I rolled one cone about 1/2" across the bottom and 3/4" to the flat top part. I rolled another that is about 1/4" across and 1/2" high. This is the hat. I then did two pieces about 1/2" long, rolled out to about 1/8" inch. There is a small scrap of black that I cut the end from and made the eyes. Santa has a piece of one of the head pins pushed down into him so that everything will stay together.

The transparent white was a scrap rolled out thin and then I ran the tool of torture over it in parallel rows and cut it in strips for the cuffs of the garment and hat. I made one small white ball for the end of the hat, a wider strip for his hair and a triangle for his beard. His nose is a small ball with a bit of red added.

He now has the trim around the bottom of the hat, his hair and his beard. I kind of turned up the front edges of the hair and poked a hole in the beard so that he would look like he had a mouth.

The two black balls will be flattened slightly and stuck half way under his coat. Then the piece of fur trim will be put around the bottom.

I forgot to mention a small strip of black for his belt and a tiny gold square with two holes in it for the buckle.

The arms get rounded and slightly flattened on one end for his hands. A piece of the white trim gets put on about 1/8" from the end. The other end gets really flattened so that they can be smooshed(technical term) against his back and his hands pulled around to the front.

When he is all put together, this is what he looks like. I put a couple of leaves on his hat and a couple of tiny round pieces for berries.

I used some of the red and white scraps to make a cane by making two snakes and twisting them together. I then cut off the ends and then put a crook in one end. This will go in his outstretched hand when he is finished cooking.

The little guy is cooking now. He will be on the front porch of the basket shop when you next see him. I have to go now. I wouldn't want Santa to get over baked!

See you tomorrow. Ho! Ho! Ho!

An Open and Shut Case....

I finished putting everything in the little green gift case this morning. I was baking cookies with one hand and doing this with the other. I am ambidextrous. I'm not joking about that. I used to drive my art professors in college nuts. One of them told me to loosen up by drawing with my left hand instead of my right for a change. I wound up drawing with both hands at once. The professor actually tried to get some of the others to do it and they couldn't. I can also do mirror writing and write with both hands at once in a mirror image too. However, I lied about the cookies and the minis. I was alternating those two activities.

The cookies are good. I had to sample to see. The gift case is officially done. Here is the inside. It is much easier for the camera to see what's there with the front open. I put in a couple of fancy corsets that I had hanging around and three hats. I won't attempt to teach you the corsets, but I may just have to do a tutorial on the hats. They are made of linen and/or hardanger fabric that I use for cross stitch. They are all three trimmed with silk roses and bows. Notice that I tried not to put anything except the brims of the hats where the frame of the front would cover them.

Here's the outside. I didn't do anything at all to that.

I love it when a plan comes together!!! Incidentally, if you want to do perfume bottles with real French labels go here.
http://users.skynet.be/sudene/food.html

Sudene has some wonderful printies. It is a French site and I don't really understand more than a few words of it. I do know how to get from one page to the other just because I know how to do it in English. My point? Be adventurous. Your computer isn't going to explode if you push the wrong thing. There are a lot of neat printies on this site. Go for it and have fun.

I am going to go find something to take to the Mini Witch meeting this afternoon. It will probably take me an an hour or two just to get to the center of my workroom, let alone back out. Yup. It's back to stringing a cord around my big toe when I go in there. Wish me luck.

See you tomorrow.

On the Bottles.....

I have been making bottles for the perfumery this morning. In between that and the real world of cookies I have been busy.

First of all, here are the tools and supplies. I have needle nosed pliers, chain nosed pliers, and wire cutters. I used E-6000 glue or you could also use Crafter's Goop. That dries faster and is messy. They both smell equally bad so work in a well vented area if you attempt this.

The supplies are a lot of jewelry maker's headpins. These are easier to work with than straight pins. They will cut with the small jeweler's cutters and not put dents in the blades. I have lots of miscellaneous beads and findings. If you are just starting out you can tear old jewelry apart to get what you need, bead wise. Flat findings and the tin trays out of eye and lip makeup work for trays.

Basically, all you need to do is string some beads and findings on the headpins and snip them off just above the beads after they are dry.

Here you can see that I used a couple of jump rings glued to the bottom of the green beads to make them stand up.

The red Chinese bead with the gold top and bottom pieces didn't need a headpin.

It takes longer to choose the beads and findings than it does to put them together. You have to experiment until you find the right combination.

Here is what I ended up with.
Yes, it is a close up so that you can't see the box yet. I need to find something to fill in the corners.

Reading from top to bottom and left, to right I have the following combinations. The green with gold findings are glass beads from an assortment of inexpensive beads from India that Wal Mart carries. The red orange ones in the center are from a tassel that came with something totally unrelated to bead work.

The second shelf beads are all from either crystal, cut glass or Venetian blown glass. The crystal is from a lucky find at a thrift shop. They sell bags of "junk" jewelry at Salvation Army stores. Sometimes they throw in the good stuff just because it is broken.

The third shelf is a mixture. The little gold powder boxes are baubles from the end of some gaudy earrings. I put a jump ring on the bottom of each one to make them stand up straight.

If you have any square beads they make great fancy tissue holders. Poke a little piece of cut off corner of a Kleenex or other tissue and stuff the center into the hole or put some glue in the center of the tissue and glue it to the top of the square. It all depends on how big the hole is.

Tomorrow I will have the corners filled in and the box will able to be shown. I am going back to being "Crazy Cookie Lady" now. So many cookies. So little time til Christmas!!!

See you tomorrow.

Perfumery.......

Among my friends, there has been talk of perfumeries and making perfume bottles for the past few days. I went to Wal Mart with every intention of getting things that I need in real life and leaving this morning......Then I saw this. It was on the sucker Christmas presents shelf at the front of the store. You know what I mean. Wal Mart always has lots of "bargains" on shelves as you go into their store. They are hoping that you will see something that you can't resist. I usually breeze right by them. This morning I accidentally turned my head in the wrong direction at the wrong time.

I should never have looked to my left. There was a big sign that announced that these were only $5.00. They were filled with White Jasmine smelling stuff. I like white jasmine and I am out of bubble bath.(I will use any excuse.)

As soon as I saw it I knew that it belonged to me. It was a no work(almost) display for minis. I thought that it would be perfect for something. At first I thought of purses or hats. I already did purses just a little while ago. I wasn't going to get too many hats in it. It is 2 1/4" deep, 7 1/4"high and 10" across.

It jumped into my cart and whined for me to rescue it from the shelf. How could I resist? I took pity on it and brought it home. I found this old Mini Graphics wallpaper and a scrap of real wallpaper for the floor.

I pulled out the bath products and got to work. I simply laid it on the back of the paper and drew around it for the back wall. I cut it out and pushed it in place to see how much I had to trim. It was about an eighth of an inch. I did that. Then I cut a 2 1/4" strip long enough to fit the arch and a piece of the other paper for the floor. On the long piece, I had to poke three holes. The handle is a ribbon that is just pushed through and knotted. The button for the closure is simply a ball button on a black twist tie. I removed those, poked the holes and installed the paper. It was easy to poke the ribbon and the twist tie back in place. The front will cover these. They won't ever be seen.

I fancied up the shelf unit with trims and painted it charcoal. I did try some of the hats in it. That's when I found that there wouldn't be much room. That's when I remembered the talk of a perfumery. I finished up the inside. My next step will be the accessories to go on the shelves.

I don't know how many perfume bottles I have made over the years, but I know it is way more than I would need to fill these shelves. They don't take very long to make. I am thinking that I will put in some gift baskets and maybe some towel sets. It will be kind of a bath shop.

This will give me something to do tomorrow. No. The cookies aren't baked. No. The house is not ready for company. No. the laundry isn't done. I ask you.....What is more important?

See you tomorrow with the answer......

Forget the Chimney......

I have been setting up more Christmas displays today. I did use the basket workshop for one of them. Here it is. Every year I set up some kind of scene on the top of this Chinese chest. I am liking the basket shop a lot. It adapted to this use very well. All I did was use an old cheapo Christmas tree skirt for the snow. And the trees I already had so no expense there. Santa and the snowman, same thing. They were old tree ornaments. I tore up some fiber fill for the snow on the roof and tucked some in around the stones and bushes. Please ignore the fact that Santa has to use the front door. I was planning on this being a work shop in a warm climate. Anyway, there you have it. Instant Christmas.


Another Christmas tradition around here is decorating the Above Par Golf shop front porch. My husband is a Snoopy fan so the Peanuts gang get to come to the party every year.
The snowman golfer sneaked in a couple of years ago. I try to find something pertaining to golf to decorate with when I see it.


Last but not least, I got around to the big stuff the other day. This guy is standing in our front yard. You have to understand that it has only snowed a couple of times in the Christmas season in all of the years that I have lived here.....OK, so it snowed once on Easter, but that hardly counts. That was just weird! I made him out of a twin sized quilt bat and stuffed him with fiberfill. He is built around a piece of PVC pipe. I did it so that his PVC pipe slides down over a garden post that I have hammered into the ground. Right now he is off his post. The wind is blowing hard and it's supposed to rain sometime today.....Nope. No snow in site. When you live in Arizona, you have to make your own out of whatever you have lying around the house.

I will get back to the rugs later today. Right now making real live peanutbutter fudge and cookies is more important. See you tomorrow.