Cuteness...

I think we all have come to realize that I have a soft (as in mush) spot for chairs. Chippy, shabby, beat up chairs in particular. Obviously. So in my Kijiji travels (I really need to stop...) I came across this:

It's an old canned nursing rocker. Fortunately the caning is in fabulous shape (Thank goodness for that, I am no caner let me tell you!) and all it needs it some loving, some painting, and some wax rubbing, shabby chic style ofcourse. It will then require an adorably delicious shabby frou frou pillow to keep it company. Which I have the technology for. Just look at those legs? Aren't those the most adorable chair legs ever? And that little crown on the top of the back splat? Total sweetness. I may invest is some wood appliques for this piece, I think the back splat needs a little something, but not too much because it's just so sweet all on it's own! Mr. Pretties even likes it, even though we need to drive over an hour away to pick it up... I'll definitely be sharing the end result (seriously, don't be surprised if it's the same as the starting result, I have a tendency to like it a little too much the way it is...)

I was thinking I'd love to do something like 'Makeover Monday' each Monday, and show the end results of furniture we've done, but that would mean we would need to do a piece a week, and by extension buying a piece a week... not sure I could hook Mr. Pretties on that one. Not saying I wont try though ;)

Fab Antique/Vintage Online Group/Forum

If anyone wants to join a fab group on antiques/vintage/shabby chic/cottage chic/arc. salvage and retro just let me know, I'll send you an invite! It's a ton of fun, there's some super knowledgeable folks on it, and everyone is really friendly. It already has 1300+ members, so you gotta know it's hopping!

Just a thought.

I shall return later with tales of child trauma and blood. Oh, and how this further proves I'm not the SHIRA (K, Pippa?) that I thought I was. Ugh.

And I've updated the blogroll again, there are now some really fab Shabby Chic blogs on there, enjoy :) I know, I know, no one needs more blogs to read, but don't you love it?!

A New Vice In Life...

... I require buttons. Lots and lots of buttons. Vintage and antique buttons ofcourse. Do you have any idea how insane this makes Mr. Pretties? And no, I didn't start obtaining them simply for that purpose, I can do that well enough all by myself without the props ;)

I just happened to be junking. Again. And as I was making my way to the pillow case section, to get myself some vintage linens no doubt, I saw a huge bag full of buttons. Now, a normal person is saying 'Yuh huh... so?' and they would have kept on walking. Not me, I snatched up that bag like it was a bag of gold and there was a line of gold diggers standing behind me. The older lady standing there checking out the vintage patterns looked at me like I was nuts. Which, ofcourse, I am. Clearly. I then walked over to Mr. Pretties with a big stupid grin on my face and proudly showed him my loot. I believe he said something along the lines of 'Riiigghhhtttt.... and you're buying that? I'm not even going to ask why. Nope I'm just not going to...' and walked away. Quickly.

I sorted them lastnight and there were 1236 buttons. Some were glass, some ceramic, possibly some bakelite and celluloid. Some were so old they were no longer round, which is so sweet, it's like someone kept sewing those little sweethearts onto blouse after blouse until they were too small for the button holes after years of fingers buttoning them. That makes me feel all warm inside... I spent two hours just sorting them, examining them and totally loving on them. I totally get how people collect them.

I've now won three ebay auctions for some Victorians and some fabulous cameos, I cannot wait to get them. I'll post pictures soon, I don't need Mr. Pretties wary glance as he sees me busting out 'those stupid buttons' to take pictures of them. Especially since I don't take his picture or anything...

Have I shared my need to open an antique shop eventually? I've now decided that I would love to get some antique candy jars from the old sweet shoppes and have the buttons sorted some how (haven't decided yet...) and have them in the big old jars with little metal scoops, customers can then scoop (or pick, lets be realistic, there'll definitely be some picking going on) the buttons into old fashioned paper bags and weigh them on the antique scale (as we'll be selling them by weight ofcourse) like you see in the bulk stores. Wouldn't that be fun? Now I just need some old jars. And a scale. And, well, a shop would be helpful too...

*Sigh*

So that's were we've been at lately. Christmas was lovely, magical, loud, and I'm glad it's over. It's so nice to not have to be rushing around, cursing at Mr. Pretties about things we still have yet to pick up, cleaning the house, cleaning the house, reprimanding the LPs for sabotaging my continuous cleaning efforts, and, my lack of interneting as been unfortunate. Have I mentioned Mr. Pretties is on vacay and is absorbing a lot of my time again? He is, and he has. It's really rather selfish of him, I know, I've told him. He doesn't care. Luckily this coming week is his last one.

Friday Flea Market...

... Is today!

Follow this red spotted piece of fab and check out some must have vintage funs. Who ever thought of putting the flea market online is a genius. Clearly.

I'll be listing some of my vintage/antique finds next Friday, I just found out about this yesterday and have a huge mom sale to prepare for tomorrow, so it's just not going to happen today. Crap.

And if you make any purchase from these great umm... I guess we'll call them 'stalls' for the sake of keeping it flea markety, post me a comment and let me know what you got (I'm nosey like that) and if you can post a link to it, we all want to know what you got!

Cupcakes, Roving, and Sales - Oh My!

We should all be so proud. My cupcakes arrived as I said, and I made them into clips ;) Only two though. We'll see how they go on Etsy because I spruce up the other two. I think they're cute... but I'm not buying them so my opinion is neither here nor there. While I was in create mode at 3am this morning (Mr. Pretties is working nights and I cannot make myself go to bed at night, it's becoming a problem) I thought I'd try to felt an alligator clip. Why you ask? Who knows. It was one of those random thoughts like 'Hey... if I felted this here alligator clip I bet it'd look all cute and felty like! We could pretend it's 'earthy''. So I break out the hot water and dish soap and I try to cover this thing in moss green roving. Do you know what it looked like when it was 'done' (Read: When I was tired of trying to make it look cute and earthy)? This: No. That is not a hair ball regurgitated by Wilma (aka 'The Boss'). She's too good for things like that, didn't you know? No, it's actually a funky/earthy hair clip, can't you tell?! Yeah, just looking at the picture is making me feel a little nauseous. Both because it's a really bad picture (Have you come to the conclusion my camera sucks yet?!) and because it's super ugly. It does however smell like lavender dish soap... possibly the only thing going for it at this point. Note to self: No more 'creative' thinking past, say, 1am. The results are not pretty. I sort of feel bad for it, and kind of responsible for it's grotesque appearance so I can't seem to throw it away...



I have this old window/mirror frame (Not really sure... if anyone knows drop me a line)

and again, if anyone knows how to fix this sideways picture issue, other than expecting me to remember not take pictures this way, let me know. So, I have this old mirror/window frame. It had no glass or mirror. It's only about 2'x2.5' and was $5.00 at a flea market a few months ago. I had no use for it and nowhere to hang it, but I just couldn't leave it behind. It's been moved around my house numerous times since then, never finding a spot that felt 'right', several places that felt 'mildly acceptable until further notice' but just not 'right'. 'Right' is important.




I was discussing this piece on the Etsy chat lastnight and there's a shop owner there who sells really cute vintage/antique stuff like this at http://www.mountainvintage.etsy.com/ :

Honestly, how cute is that?! I could marry it! Anywho... she had this great idea to use it has a bulletin board! Did you hear that?! What a great idea, why didn't I think of it?! It'll be so easy too and very unspendy. I just need some cardboard, foam/batting, staples, some black satin ribbon, and some black and cream toile. It will be stunning and then it will go in my kitchen and serve a purpose. I haven't done it yet, I need to obtain myself some black and cream toile first, but I just know it will look 'right' and I'll be able to sigh a sigh of relief. I really hate it when I have cute things that don't seem to work anywhere. I tried to explain this bulletin board concept to Mr. Pretties. You can pretty much imagine how that went. Something to this effect. I love it because you can really feel the love.

Me: 'A girl on Etsy gave me this fantastic idea about what to do with that old frame on the mantel'

Mr. Pretties: 'Throw it out?'

Me: 'Uh... No. Don't be rude. She said I should make it into a bulletin board! I could cover it with black and cream toile!'

Mr. Pretties: 'What's toile?'

Me: 'It's fabric don't worry about it. but-'

Mr. Pretties: '- I don't have time to go to the fabric store today! I have to sleep you know, I have to work tonight!'

Me: 'Did I say we were going to the fabric store today?! At what point did I say that?! And you have to work? Do you know how much work Etsy is?! Do you!? Pshh... never mind, when you wonder why I stop telling you things this is why!'

Mr. Pretties: 'You're going to stop telling me? Why didn't I think of this before! I'm a genius!'

Uh huh. Whatever, that's what I was thinking. As I said, it's all about the love. Some how Mr. Pretties has a brain wire malfunction that we're working on that makes him think when I say something it means we need to be doing it immediately this second or the world will come to an end. It's a little bit annoyingish. But we're working on it. But, my bulletin board will be fabbity fab, I can tell because I can see it in my head ;)

I added more new clips to Etsy lastnight and this morning and out of that came 15 sales! FIFTEEN. I'm so glad it's for clippies I already had made and just have to make the packaging and cards (Have I told you I really wish my clip cards were here already?!) tonight and send them out in the morning which is awesome! I'm so glad customers liked my new clips as much as I did. I have to say I'm a little bit sad about the pink and brown scrapbook series going. I sort of had a personal attachment to them. I'm sure their new owner will love them as much as I did. She bought all of my pink and brown clips in fact, atleast I know she appreciates the whole pink and brown thing as much as I do :) That's sort of important. I personally like these new shiny ones:

I still have to make clippies tonight, I was wrong. I bought a whole whack of new stuff to incorporate into some OOAK clippies. I tried to get some really fun pictures but my camera is having major attitude and didn't want to. That's okay, it'll look cuter when I'm done. As a preview I have tiny pink glass tiles with initials (think monogrammed clippies), silver tiles with initials that look really fancy, bees, flowers, blue rhinestones, and some new ribbon. I have a vision for the pink tiles (Both for a furniture project as well as a clippie!) and I'm anxious to get on it. That wont be happening until Mr. Pretties is off to work and The Little Pretties are off to bed. So, let's say sometime tomorrow. Or never. I'll work something out. I'll try to stop crafting before 1am though. No one should have to suffer like that again...