Fluffy Wreath

Fluffy Wreath
Originally uploaded by Novelty Kitten.

Dear Kelly,

I may not have been crafty for Christmas, but my mom sure was. She made me this awesome wreath of fluffy white tissue paper and sparkly purple things. I may have to take some close up pictures. I don't think this one does it justice.

Love,
Shayne

Notecards from Kelly

Notecards from Kelly
Originally uploaded by Novelty Kitten.

Dear Readers,

Kelly sent me these great quilted notecards. I untied the awesome packaging before I took the picture because I needed to use one right away, but they were tied up with pretty ribbon with handmade envelopes, pink labels and even a fancy matching glue stick!

Love,
Shayne

ATC madness

Dear Shayne,

As you know, I've been in this ATC swap for some time now... I didn't want to post photos here until the recipients got their cards and now that they're trickling in, I can post!

This first card was for someone who wanted an Eiffel Tower/Paris theme. I used photos that I took of the Eiffel Tower, which I thought was pretty cool (not that you can really tell the difference between photos that I took myself and any random postcard, but I know that I took 'em and that's what counts, right? Right.)

The next one was for someone requesting Black and White TV/Movie comedians. It took me awhile to decide on who to go with, but then I found this hilarious photo of Lucille Ball and I thought it went well with her spiel on Vitameatavegamin.

It was hilarious to recall that episode while looking for the text online. I love that, as she gets drunker and drunker on the stuff, instead of saying, "Do you poop out at parties? Are you unpopular?" she says, "Do you pop out at parties? Are you unpoopular?" I tried to work the word "unpoopular" into the card, but it just didn't work. (Poop. Hee hee.)

I "hand colored" the black and white photo (in Photoshop -- that's by "hand," right? My hand used the trackball!) and I think it came out pretty well, especially after a big household debate about what color her hat should be.

Oh, I just realized that this is going to be the All Photoshop post...

This last one was for someone who wanted birds. I'm not really much of a bird fan, so this one was difficult for me, but I went poking around and found some bird photos (whee), fiddled in Photoshop for awhile (quite awhile -- I am so damned slow in Photoshop, it's not even funny) and... voila! I think it came out pretty well. You know, for birds.

These are the only ATCs I've made so far using Photoshop and I liked how they turned out, although I'm still a big fan of scissors and glue and fabric and thread. Of course.

In Christmas crafting news, I'm going nuts (big surprise, right?). This weekend is the Final Push, so... wish me luck!

love,
-kelly

Well, this clinches it

Dear Shayne,

Perhaps you have had the following thought: "I wonder if Kelly is actually insane." (I know I have...)

Well, here's our answer:


What's that? This isn't a testament to my sanity? Oh yes, my friend. Yes, it is. Know what that's a picture of? You might think, "Well, it's Christmas time... that looks Christmas-y... Maybe Christmas cards?"

Well, you'd be close. It's the envelopes for our Christmas cards. I've made envelopes for all of our Christmas cards. And this? Oh, this is only about a quarter of our cards. Yay!



So yes, I'm insane. On top of all of the other holiday stuff I've got going on -- decorating, making and buying gifts, baking, traveling, etc. I made all of our Christmas card envelopes.

The friggin' envelopes, Shayne.

love,
kelly


PS - Oh, I made the cards too, of course. I just don't want to spoil the surprise by posting here. I'll post those after Christmas... assuming I'm still above ground. Wish me luck!

Knitting with something odd

Dear Shayne,

This week, I have been knitting with something odd:



What are you looking at? Well...

(But I've only been knitting with two of those things.)

What have I been making? Napkin rings!


(I had to look all over my house for a piece of white cloth for that photo... all of our cloth napkins have tomatoes on them, which wasn't useful and, ah... I guess I'm just not really one for plain white [big surprise]. I finally found a tea towel that's been waiting for embroidery. So the napkin modeling credit goes to Mr. Tea Towel.)

I made four of them altogether, but they were difficult to photograph in a group:


Kaesea wants to know: "Why aren't you knitting with my shadow?"

(As you can see from this photo... I kind of am!)

I've been too busy crafting to write posts about my crafts... ironic, eh?

love,
kelly

Does this count?

Dear Shayne,

I'm not sure if this counts as crafty, since I didn't actually make this craft myself, but I just have to share.

I don't know why, but I have always wanted a trophy. Unfortunately, this desire has never meshed very well with my complete lack of competitiveness (Is that even a word?) (Do you see how deep my lack of competitive drive goes? I don't even know the terms.) and my fondness for sitting on the couch. Unfortunately, they don't give Best Couch Potato trophies (I would win that for sure!) (If I cared about winning, of course.)

For some unknown reason, I decided to start playing hockey a few years ago (Non-competitive couch potato + hockey? How does that work again? I'm still not sure.) Of course, I'm not very good. In fact, I'm pretty bad. But I have managed to score a couple of goals and, earlier this year, I scored a "game-winning" goal. My darling sweet Bill kept the puck from the game and had this made for me.

It's a trophy! With the puck from my game! Even though I did not craft it myself (nor did Bill), I think it's a pretty sweet-ass craft -- they actually put a screw through the base, through the puck, and through this guy's feet. (Doesn't he look mean?) (I mean, for a 6 inch tall gold plastic guy with his feet screwed to a block of wood, of course.)

So I guess I'm highlighting the craft of some trophy-makin' man somewhere -- good job, sir!

Of course, I did "craft" the goal myself. Maybe that counts... ?

In other Crafty News, I've been making ATCs like mad, so you'll see some of those soon. Aaaand... I've finished the second Knuck! Of course, now there's the embroidery... what's that? Something shiny? Right.

Hope you're feeling better -- I miss you here in blogland!

love,
kelly

PS - Today's post was brought to you by parentheses (cause I used a lot of 'em.) (See?)

One down...

Dear Shayne,

I've finished one glove. Yay! Even though this one was fun to make, I am having difficulty getting motivated to start the next one. Hrm... think I'll find something else to distract me and procrastinate on finishing this pair? Me? Never! Oh, wait... me? Yeah... probably.

Seriously, I gotta get these done before football season is over -- the Browns won today! Maybe it was my finished glove! Oooh... it's a maaagic glove... with maaagic powers! Fun!

Meanwhile, I took this photo at night again. Hard to get good night shots. I tried using Photoshop to clean things up, but I ended up making my skin look like a lobster. Lobster claw? Not so sexy. Sooo... I went with de-saturating again. We're going to call this "artistic" and say that this is a "theme." Got it? Okey-dokey.

Off to cast on the next glove! Or, um... go to bed. We'll see.

love,
kelly

WIP: Knucks

Dear Shayne,
In my continuing saga of How to Procrastinate on the Crafts I'm Supposed to Be Doing (AKA The Story of my Life), I present to you my latest not-on-my-list project: Knucks from Knitty.

This, of course, is just the finger portion of the glove (the first finger is still on the needles in this photo). I couldn't resist this yarn when I saw it last year -- it's brown and orange, which are the Cleveland Browns colors (football, if you're not into sports). I had two balls of this stuff and I wasn't sure what I was going to make with it. Then I saw the Knucks pattern and realized that GO BROWNS is 8 letters, so I'm going to embroider that on my knuckles when I'm done. YEAH!

Of course, now you understand why I just had to knit these right now. I mean, football season is half over already! I need me my Browns gloves. Wonder if it will help them win... hrmmm... that's probably too much to expect from a pair of gloves, isn't it? Oh, well. I can hope!

As for this weird-ass photo, I apparently took these pictures in the dark and no amount of horsing around with Photoshop seemed to help. So I de-saturated my hand so you could actually see the yarn color. In the end, it looks a little zombie-like, so we'll go with: It's Halloween themed! Yeah!

love,
kelly

Wrapping up the ATC swap

Dear Shayne,
Fair warning: I am now about to bombard you with photos. Ready?

I have finished that ATC swap I was in on craftster so here are the final cards I sent out, plus the holder I sent.

The theme request for this first one was "Vintage hats, purses & shoes." Everyone else made her super-old Victorian style cards. I am a dumb-ass and interpreted "Vintage" to mean 40s/50s. So this card stands out like a sore thumb in the rest of her collection. Oh, well. The cool thing about this card is that it's also a little book, although I didn't scan a photo inside of it. I don't know why. Perhaps it's that "I'm a dumb-ass" problem. I got the idea from an article in Cloth Paper Scissors magazine. The "spine" of the book is along the bottom of the purse. The book is about... I don't know... 8 pages. It was cute (if I do say so myself).

This next one was for a theme of "Myth & Magic." I don't know why, but I immediately thought of The Magician tarot card . I have a spare tarot deck that I got as a promo item (???) at a convention I went to once. (Yeah... weird.)

So I used that card as the base, and then cut up a little book I have on Tarot for the smaller tarot image. The explanation of the card was cut from the little tarot guidebook that came from the deck. I burned the edges and may have exhibited a little too much "self-confidence" in burning (those are the words I nearly burned entirely off). Oh, well -- it's got that "handmade" look, right? Heh.

Here's one that I was totally stumped on but I ended up really liking. Her theme was "Zetti." (If you don't know what that is, click that link and check out Teesha Moore's site. Go ahead. I'll wait.)

I found this theme to be overwhelming, since there is so much possibility with it. But the chick I was making it for owns goats, so I used that as a starting point. I have a butterfly stamp that I used to make the wing and I sort of free-handed the crown. It was a little plain at that point, so I put the "joy" tag on the bottom. He seems joyful, doesn't he? I know I would be if I could fly... that would be so coool. Wouldn't that be cool? I would totally love that! I have these flying dreams and they're so vivid... oh, wait. Where was I? Oh, yeah. ATCs.


The final card for the swap had the theme of "Old Blues Musicians." This is also the person I had to make a holder for, so I was pretty burned out on this theme by the time I got to her card. I ended up doing something totally goofy, but here it is.

I took images from a Bessie Smith song called, well, you can figure this part out, but it's called "You've got to give me some." The images are a "peckerwood" (woodpecker), cream, steak, sugar lumps, and lollypops. They refer to well, er, um... read the lyrics for yourself here. Ahem! And people are shocked by lyrics today -- I guess the imagery of yesteryear is a bit less graphic, but still... pretty raunchy! So that's how I came up with that card. It's a mystery to anyone who isn't familiar with the song, but the person I made it for is, so it works.

As I mentioned, I also made the ATC holder for that same chick. I feel like I might have screwed her with what I made, but, well, here's what I did. The actual original requirement for the swap was a "book" to hold the ATCs in. Early on, I asked her if a non-book holder would be okay with her and she said that whatever I wanted to make was fine. Whoops for her!

As the swap went on, I kept seeing all of these incredible cards and thought about how nice it would be to display them (as opposed to tucking them away in a book). So I made her a little display case/shrine type thing.Here's a bit of a side view.

On this side, we see Bessie Smith, one of the musicians she specifically mentioned as a favorite. Inside the display area is a map of Mississippi. There are widely various arguments about where the Blues originated. This is one opinion. I don't really care if other people disagree. I needed to get the holder done, so Mississippi it was.

On the other side of the holder is Robert Johnson, another musician that she mentioned (he's from Mississippi!) (It's hard to write that word without thinking of the sing-song-y way of spelling it.)

You can also see my random music-y notes embellishments inside... I was kind of desperate with this theme, as the Blues is really not my bag.

The entire time I was making this, I thought, "Oh, good. I can take photos of the ATC I made being displayed inside of the box." And then I promptly sealed that ATC in an envelope before taking photos of this thing. Smooth. So here is a picture with the lovely "Sample ATC" standing in. Sexy nice.

I really love making these boxes. They're strangely satisfying to make and they come out really sturdy. I learned to make them by using these kits from Paper-Source (of course). I highly recommend the kit if you've never made a box before -- the instructions are great and they pre-cut all of the boards. I cut my own boards now, which is cheaper and more adaptable, but also a pain in the butt. I've made a couple of other boxes this past year, but that's another entry for another day.

At the bottom of the holder is a drawer for the ATCs that are not on display above. Here's a photo of it with the ever-lovely "Sample ATC" inside. Yeah... cause you might understand what a "drawer" is or how it works... (this post is going downhill now, isn't it? >sigh<).

The final photo is the top of the whole thing. I found this great quote from Ralph Ellison (click it for a larger version, if you want to actually read the quote).

Of course, I didn't actually learn my "Just Leave It Alone" lesson (did you really think that I did?) with the earlier card and added the swirly stamps at the very last possible moment. For the most part, I like how they turned out, but I totally biffed one of them on the top of the box. It looked horrible. So I slapped that little heart sticker over it. Not sure that it really works, but... 3am? Needs to ship the next day? Right. Done.

Whew! I'm relieved that this swap is done, but... of course... I've already signed up for Round 2. Soooo... I'm off to make some fresh ATCs!

love,
kelly

Halloweenie

Dear Shayne,
Whew! No posts lately, and you'll soon see why -- I've been Halloween costuming up the wazoo. Last week, Bill and I went to a Halloween party with a "Post-apocalyptic World" theme. I was a bit stumped, so put the idea out to a few co-workers for some brain-storming. Almost immediately, someone said, "Twinkies!" Sure -- 'cause they're going to last forever, right? Love it! That led me to think of cockroaches. Soooo... I was a Twinkie and Bill was a cockroach!

I am particularly proud of the antennae on this costume -- I think they came out really well. I was initially going to put them on a headband, but Bill shaves his head and I thought that would look goofy. So he suggested a hood -- we had this brown sweatshirt, so I attached them to that. They really came out even better than I expected... in fact, I had some roach-y dreams that night after working on this. Blech.

The extra legs aren't that great (Bill is a champ for sticking out his arms in this photo in a way that shows them off) but both of these costumes were whipped up the night before the party. Sooo... stuffed pantyhose it was.

For the Twinkie costume, I went with quick and dirty (to tell the truth, this is generally my preferred Halloween costume methodology -- I like costumes that are my basic "uniform" [long skirt + long shirt] dressed up to look like something else. I also rarely do makeup and pretty much never do wigs).

All yellow with white spots where they inject the Twinkies with filling. I had a suggestion to wear a cowboy hat for the "Twinkie the Kid" look, but... is that guy still around? At any rate, I'm not sure that the Kid will survive the apocalypse... he always seemed a little wimpy to me. But those non-baked baked goods? Oh, yeah.

The best part about this costume is that I had everything on hand -- the yellow sweatshirt is a print sweatshirt turned inside out, and the yellow skirt and chucks were straight out of my closet. I had the fleece to cut up and sew into "filling." Mmm... Twinkies.

The only thing we had to buy were brown pants for Bill (which he can hold onto until he's 70 and wear them again!) and the pantyhose for the roach legs. Sweet!

Whew! That must be it, right?

Au contraire, my friend!

That was just last week's party. That doesn't include the crazy Halloween party craziness (I know I said crazy twice -- it's really crazy!) that takes place where I work.

A bit of backstory (cause hey, I never shut up) first: a few years back, the theme was "Haunted Hollywood." At the last minute (notice a personal theme there?) I decided to wear my hockey gear and go as Wayne Gretzky -- you know, when he played for the LA Kings? LA? Hollywood? Yeah, it was a stretch, but I had everything on hand and just had to use duct tape to write "Gretzky" and "99" on my back. So I wore my skates all day. And it was super fun! I looooved skating around the office.

The next year, I decided I wanted to be "wheeled" again. So I went as my car. You can read about it on my very first ever post on craftster here (Awww... memories...). The next year (last year), I decided to go as "Hell on Wheels." I don't seem to have a photo of that one, but I wore a black dress with flames all around the skirt and made an iron-on transfer of Rodin's The Gates of Hell for my shirt. And skates. Of course.

Soooo... this year, skates again. Debate, debate, debate. Waffle, waffle, waffle. Many good ideas were bandied about, but nothing that got me really excited. The Saturday before Halloween, I was grilling Bill for ideas (what a champ that guy is) and he came up with "rolling pin" (dress as a pin, wear the skates, done). I couldn't decide between a bowling pin or a sewing pin and neither of them seemed easy to me. So we kept brainstorming with the word "roll" -- rolling stones, rolling hills [heh. heh.], steam roller, etc. At some point, I said, "High roller!" (dress like a stoner, wear the skates...) Bill's answer to this was: "Holy Roller." YES!

There was much debate between a nun costume or an angel costume (even just having holes in my clothes, but that seemed weak). In the end, I decided that angels=holy more than nuns. Also, I wanted to make some kick-ass angel wings.

So I did.

These babies kicked ass. Seriously. They're 30" tall and totally rock. Everyone asked where I bought them -- just the compliment you want when you make something, right?

I also managed to make them comfortable to wear and easily removable, although I wore them all day. Unfortunately, I don't have a photo of the whole outfit, but I made a long white tunic to go with the wings and halo I made.

I'm such a nerd -- that halo looks like Christmas tree garland, doesn't it? Nope. It's eyelash yarn that I knit into an i-cord and then ran wire through. Right. I knit my own halo. Hahaha.

So that's what I've been busy doing. Oh, yeah -- and I finished that ATC swap, so there are photos coming of that.

The bathroom? Hahaha. Right. Not so much. How's yours?

love,
kelly

Obi-Wan Kenobi

Obi-Wan Kenobi
Originally uploaded by Novelty Kitten.

Dear Kelly,

The cape was a little more hobbit than jedi, but I didn't use a pattern for most of it, so all in all, I'm pleased with how Sam's costume turned out. The force is strong with this one.

Love,
Shayne

Ready for it?

Dear Shayne,

I'll end the suspense (cause I know you were just thinking about it all day, right?) and I'll tell ya what the weird craft was. Oh, and I also want to dispel any rumors that it was some kind of sex thing.

When I posted it with the guessing game I just thought it was funny looking. And since I knew what it was for, well... I guess the other things that might go in the hole didn't really occur to me.

Everyone who suggested that it looked like a hemorrhoid pillow was pretty close -- it serves the same purpose that a hemorrhoid pillow does, only for my... ear! This is so stupid and I probably shouldn't have even posted it, but I was just so proud of myself for having a problem, conceiving a craft to solve it, and executing it so successfully! Yay!

So what's my problem, right? Well, I'm not complaining, 'cause it was self-inflicted, but I got my ear pierced last week and now it hurts. Unfortunately, it was on my left side and that's my preferred side for sleeping. So I made this thing to strap onto my head at night -- the ear goes in the middle! (No other body parts, thankyouverymuch.)

Aaaannndd... it worked! The only trouble I had was when I flipped over to my right side and the strap would move, causing the pillow to move and touch my ear. I think a few bobby pins might cure that problem. I'll fill you in tomorrow.

Whew! This post contains a lot of words and no pretty pictures to take the edge off!


Sooo... I'll share the latest ATC I made that's been received. The recipient requested: "a feminine type theme that includes: woman, mothering, sexuality, mother earth, natur-y."

I was kind of at a loss on this one, but I had this great fabric with all of these 50's style moms on it. I cut one out and used a zig-zag stitch to outline her... it gave her a sort of shrine-like "halo" that I really like!

The person I made this for is a vegetarian... but she seemed to take it very well. Perhaps that's a Tofu Ham! ("Tofam"? Hrm.)

All right. Mystery solved. I'm going to bed right now... and I've got my ear pillow on! Oh, yeah -- it looks completely ridiculous on... like I've got one of Princess Leia's crazy giant hair buns. Seriously funny shit.

love,
kelly

Weirdest. Craft. Ever.

Dear Shayne,

It is after midnight here and I have just put the finishing touches on what is quite possibly the weirdest thing I have ever made.

It looks weird and the craftmanship (craftwomanship?) is horrible, but it is exactly what I wanted. In fact, this one was intended as the prototype, but came out so perfectly that I only have to make one. (Don't you love it when that happens?)

I am SO excited about this -- I hope it works!!

If you can't tell from the photo, it is a sewn item -- basically, a stuffed "doughnut" shape, about 5" wide, with a length of elastic sewn at both ends into the seam. I have made it for a very specific purpose and I will know tomorrow morning if it worked.

Before I tell you what it's for... do you have any guesses?

I'm going to go test it out now!

love,
kelly

PS -- I want to see a photo of those socks! You're not afraid to post a photo of your butt for the whole internet to see -- who cares about a few hairs? ;)

Slipper Socks

Dear Kelly

Today I made myself a pair of black polar fleece slipper socks. They came out rather badly because I am lazy. They are even square-toed due to my extreme laziness today. Why I decided to make slipper socks when I was so lazy is beyond me. I can't take a picture today to show you because they are already on my feet and I'd have to shave my legs to take a proper picture. And like I said, lazy. But hey! I was crafty today.

Love,
Shayne

Fingerless mittens

Dear Shayne,
Here are some fingerless mittens I made for a friend (Hi, Dawn!) about a month ago.

Boring flat shot:



















As modeled by my hand:





















Aaaand... action shot of Dawn wearing them:


Why the dinosaur, you ask? Right. Good question.

Dawn thinks she has "T-Rex" arms, so she decided to shoot her dino-y arms next to a little dino. I think her arms are just fine, but this shot is way more fun than my lame-o "Here's my hand" shot. Thanks, Dawn!

love,
kelly

Umm...I didn't mean it that way

DSCF0024
Originally uploaded by Novelty Kitten.

Dear Kelly,

So I was able to make it to my sewing machine. And I was inspired by my friend Winifred's fairy monster she's working on and thought I'd make a little shmoo shaped person. I don't think it came out shmoo shaped. Do you????

Love,
Shayne

P.S. I'm so glad my mother doesn't read this blog.

New Desk

New Desk
Originally uploaded by Novelty Kitten.

Dear Kelly,

This isn't crafty, and I didn't even put it together, but look at the lovely new desk that Randy put together for us...

Love,
Shayne

Skull beads in use!

Dear Shayne,
I'm sorry to hear that your lack of crafty space is putting the kibosh on your crafty mojo. Perhaps this (super easy) fun craft will inspire you!

Bill really liked those skull beads I got last week, so I whipped up a very simple little bracelet for him. It was just a length of leather strategically knotted, but I'm pretty pleased with how it turned out.

The "closure" is nothing fancy. I just tied a knot at one end and shoved it through the knotted loop at the other end. It's a bit of a struggle for him to put on and take off himself, soooo... thank goodness he's got me! ;)

Sooo... there ya go. In other news, I finished another Christmas gift this past weekend. Yay! Oh, yeah, and I've completed 3 more ATCs. That means I've got 7 down and 2 to go. Oh, yeah... and the book. >shudder<

love,
kelly

Why I'm *still* not crafty

Dear Kelly,

Someone else's crap is still all over my craft room. *and* I can't even take a new picture of it because someone won't show me how to use my new hand-me-down Treo. Well, the getting pictures off of it part. Maybe tomorrow, I'll have something to share.

Love,
Shayne

Random McCrafty

Dear Shayne,

You ready for it? I'm about to bombard you with Tales of Random Craftiness. Here goes...

First of all, since we love talking about our bathrooms so much (how's yours coming, anyway? Yeah... mine too.) here's the latest awesome accessory to join mine.

My friend Jan (Hi, Jan!) gave me this sweet-ass little cabinet today. It's got little tiny drawers! I love me some tiny drawers! It's currently living on the back of the toilet. Not sure where it will end up, but it's looking pretty hot right there, so it might stay. Thanks, Jan -- you rock!

She also gave me some super-cool skull beads. I'm not sure yet what I'm going to use them for, but the ideas are definitely flowing. There's a pretty big hole in the middle of the beads, so I'm thinking of maybe stringing them on some yarn and then knitting them into something. Perhaps. We'll see.

Speaking of yarn, I got some new yarn today (cause really, that's all I needed). The first batch won't get used any time soon, as I have a lot of gift knitting to do in the next couple of months. However, when I finish with that, I am planning on making myself these awesome armwarmers. This yarn is sooooo soft. It's 100% baby alpaca, which I know is no good for your sensitive skin, but I am apparently made of rubber and can therefore take it just fine.

I will be using the dark grey for the body and the light grey for the snowflake/skull. Here's hoping that it's still semi-wintery by the time I finish, although it never really snows here... a more realistic picture for me would be a raindrop turning into a skull. But I like the snowflake. And "a raindrop's chance in hell" just doesn't sound as good. (Although, now that I think about it... a raindrop wouldn't last very long in hell either.) But I digress. Kick ass yarn and kick ass arm warmers. Something to look forward to starting at the end of December. Whee!

The other yarn that I got is for a certain unnamed friend of mine who likes pink and can't tolerate wool. I'll be making a kittyville hat out of this. Not sure when that's happening, but, ah, well... you'll know when it's done. Here's the teaser shot for ya:


You think I'm finished blathering on here, but I'm NOT. Last week, we bought an IKEA Markor bookcase from someone on craigslist. I had been wanting this for awhile, as it's much prettier than the stack of milk crates we've had in the office for the past year holding my crap. (It's from IKEA but it looks like real furniture!) And yet, it's about the same size as the milk crate stack. Easy switcher-oo. Plus, buying it used, some other poor sap already put it together. Whoopie!

At any rate, the bookcase was in good condition, but it didn't have a back. So I took the opportunity to get crafty and I glued some paper from Paper-Source (of course) to some posterboard I had.

I did learn a little crafty lesson on this one: PVA glue is a bit heavy for gluing paper to posterboard. Alas, I should have used the ever-brilliant This to That for gluing advice. For "an absolutely wrinkle free result," I should have used "Yamato sticking paste." (Yes, yamato! Hee hee.) I also could have used 3M 77 spray adhesive, but I have had spray adhesive disasters in the past (don't ask), so I probably would not have done that. I had PVA, so I used it. The whole thing got really wrinkly.

Fortunately for me, it was one of those all-too-rare crafty projects where, even though it's just about the sloppiest thing I could have possibly done, it didn't make a damned bit of difference... because you can't. even. tell. I LOVE that!

I'm not sure if it's because it's inside the bookcase and hard to see in there or what, but... it looked like hell goin' down and it looks great now that it's done. Sah-weet. Here's a close-up shot of the inside. Can't see the wrinkles at all. I wish I had more projects like that. Seriously.

Whew! I told you I had a lot to say! Have you unearthed your craft space yet?

love,
kelly

More ATCs

Dear Shayne,

I've got a couple more ATCs to share, now that the people I made them for have received. Wanna see? And read all about my creative process in excruciating detail? Great! Let's go!

The first one was for a person who has a "foreign countries" themed book. I had a few stamps from New Zealand from a friend who lived there for a year, so I thought it might be fun to do NZ. Even though, um, I've never been there and really know very little about it. Sure! Why not?

In my head, I thought: "Map of NZ and these cool stamps! Done!" Of course, it's never that easy. I couldn't find a map that I liked, so I "made" one. I printed an outline of NZ on the back of this green paper I had (it's green there, right?) and even remembered to print it backwards so it was going the right way on the front! Yay! Turns out, there are a lot of nooks and crannies along the coastline of New Zealand. Cutting it out was a total pain in the ass. I apologize now to the citizens of New Zealand for the shape your country ended up in. I'm not so good with scissors, so some details, sadly, got lost.

So then I horsed around with these stamps that I had for a good long time, but really couldn't find a configuration that I liked. It was bad. In fact, at one point, I decided to just do Paris instead (got plenty of Paris themed rubber stamps, ephemera, and whatnot -- why not take the easy road?) But then I went to Scrapbook Territory (which is, dangerously, right down the street from my nearest Paper-Source. It's like all of the drug dealers needed to be in the same 'hood.) (Oh, and don't let that cute little bear on their site fool you -- that place is hard core with the paper, rubber stamps, and all kinds of crafty goodness. Scrapbook Territory: it's not just for scrapbookers anymore.)

While there, I stumbled upon this cool New Zealand paper that had the picture of the NZ dollar on it. It had some other stuff that I thought might work, but I didn't end up using. It was the dollar that brought it all together. Hmmm... I guess that is often the way in life, isn't it? Yeah, I'm deep.

For the second card, my recipient requested "Old timey carnival." I really had nothing on hand for this, but, again, found something great at the Scrapbook Territory. Well, I had the tiger sticker. Then Bill said, "Kelly, this card isn't for you..." ('cause I like tigers), but I think tigers are perfectly appropriate at the carnival. So there.

At any rate, on this paper I got, the clown was part of a clown posse (hmm... I think that's a band, but that's not what I meant -- it was just a group of clowns and I like the word "posse.") I was going to use the whole group, but I found that cutting this one guy out was way creepier. And that's what I was going for: creepy. I also found the sticker pack with the cotton candy on it at ST. I loooove cotton candy (It's sugar! Spun! Spun sugar! Yess!) so I knew I wanted to use that too.

So I had the clown, the ticket (both from the same piece of scary-ass carnival paper), the tiger sticker (from my stash), and the cotton candy sticker. As I was arranging them on this card, I glanced down at the sticker pack that the cotton candy came from and... saw the crying child. PERFECT. Perhaps it was a bit heavy-handed, as the rest of the card already sort of said, "The carnival is supposed to be fun, but it's actually pretty scary," BUT... how could I resist the weeping child? Not even the cotton candy can brighten THAT kid's day!

Oh, yeah. I'm sick.

love,
kelly

Why I'm Not Crafty Right Now

Why I'm Not Crafty
Originally uploaded by Novelty Kitten.

Dear Kelly,

I can't be crafty right now because my husband has all his crap on my side of the basement. His crap and some kitty litter. I guess I should be happy there isn't cat crap there too.

I may have to take over some other part of the house.

Love,
Shayne

Halloween cards!

Dear Shayne,

OTB... what? Oh, yeah. I did a bit more on that this weekend. I set those nails, filled 'em with wood filler, and sanded the wood filler. Whoopdee-doo. I know you want photos, but what could be more boring than photos of filled nail holes?

Instead, I will amaze and astound you (or at least, hold your interest for a few minutes) with some photos of some Halloween cards I worked on yesterday. None of these are actually the ones I'm sending out, so I won't ruin the surprise for you, just in case you happen to, you know, actually get one in your mailbox.

The first one I made was of a cut out ghost. I had some cool fiber-y translucent paper that I cut him out of. He looked really cool when I first cut him out. Then I ran him through the sticker maker and he turned into a sticky, pain-in-the-butt mess.

I ended up getting him down on the paper successfully, but realized I didn't want to deal with that BS for the rest of the cards, so we'll just call him the first Failed Prototype (AKA: Rejected Cards) (Poor little things -- think there's a home for them somewhere, away in the hills or something? You know, where they eat bologna sandwiches and drink Tang and make hand turkeys at Thanksgiving? That would be nice...) Okay! Moving on...

The next one I made was also ghost-y. This translucent paper went through the sticker maker a lot more easily, but it was kind of a pain to cut, so I knew I didn't want to make a whole bunch of these either. However, my favorite part of this card is the lower right-hand ghost dude. He's actually punched out of the front of the card, and his eyes make the word "Boo!" inside. Hee hee.

Here is a picture of that, in what is probably the Most Boring Photo Ever Uploaded to the Internet.

Open the card and: BOO! Hee hee. (I love that -- can't you tell?)

The final Rejected Card was the black cat with the Trick or Treat stamp. He actually looks pretty good here, but in person, you can see that I colored him in with a Sharpie. Perhaps I'll send him to someone with poor eyesight who can't see the splotchy coloring-in. I should have cut him out of black paper but... as you can tell from my other comments, I am lazy about mass producing cards.

Sooo... those are the cards that I did not make a bunch of yesterday. I finally found a design that was both pleasing to see and make and made a bunch of them, but... well, since you might get one in the mail, I don't want to spoil the surprise.

So, here -- enjoy my rejects! ;)

love,
kelly