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Archives for August 2011

Tutu Celing Light

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Wouldn’t this be fun in a little girl’s room? Or, AHEM, a not so little girl’s room. Did I ever tell you about my ballerina snowglobe? It was so cool! Okay, not as cool as my Liberace snow globe, but, you know, who doesn’t a love a ballerina? Especially since that Black Swan movie came out and they started looking all hungry and interesting, instead of skinny and stupid and perfect. I mean, even Angelina Ballerina (a cartoon mouse), is looking a little deranged after keeping company with Natalie Portman. I like unhinged people who wear lots of pink. They make me feel comfortable.

Wow that was random.

Back on track: I made this light before I had a blog (read: no tutorial) but it’s easy to make using a white wire basket from the dollar store and a bunch of tulle. Same exact process as the plastic bag lamp, only girlier.

Warning: This thing is simple and cheap and loads of fabulous but it attracts dust like a mo-fo. Be prepared to vacuum!

Spangled Flannel Lanterns

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 I can’t stop thinking about these flannel lanterns from Free People‘s series of store displays. I’m not going to make them because 1. I don’t have space 2. I’m moving 3. I already have to pack 23 homemade light fixtures and for someone who lives in a 5 room apartment, that’s pretty effing impressive.

So you have to make one and tell me how it turns out. K?

Bounce over to Building 25 (Free People’s blog) and watch the video. And pop around while you’re there: mucho nifty stuff.

  

It’s the Little Things

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Look, if I have to box up and label everything in my possession, it may as well be cute, no? And, the movers are going to be so impressed when they see these precious labels! (Five bucks says that’s the first time anyone has ever put movers and precious in the same sentence).

Making something as fussy as moving labels might seem frivolous, but it’s the little things that make the process fun. Plus, now I have an endless supply blank stickers to use on fun things like gifts and stationary. These are so nifty, I can’t stand it! And as long as I was printing them for myself, I uploaded the PDF so you can have some too. Click here to print.

Note: I designed these Ikat labels to be compatible with multiple brands and label sizes. I’m using Avery 5163, but you can use any size as long as there is a center seam (ie two labels across).

Note: Some desktop printers will add a white border around the edge—consult your manufacturer’s manual.

Welcome Home Inigo!

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Months ago I googled up “Inigo Montoya painting”
and found this thumbprint image…
little did I know he was the real deal

If by chance you should ever write about your love of black velvet paintings and Mandy Patinkin, and, you just so happened to post your wish to commission a portrait of Inigo Montoya on your blog, well, don’t be surprised if out of the blue you get an email that says, Hi. Your wish has come true!

Fast forward to last Friday, to me, standing in the crowded downtown Chicago post office tearing apart a giant cardboard box with my teeth —no literally, with my teeth—only to behold the latest member of my household: Inigo Montoya has come home!

The guy next to me stopped filling out his postage forms and exclaimed, Praise Jesus!

While the woman behind the counter smirked, Crazy white lady.

I said, HOLY CRAP JUST LOOK AT THIS THING!

Y’all. This is good. I mean, real good. Obviously I am a fan of the subject but the quality of the painting wasn’t something I was expecting. It is superb. These photographs don’t do him justice. I wish you could see him in person. He looks real. His eyes follow you around the room. It’s kind of amazing.

The artist is Bruce White, North Carolina native, tattoo artist and painter extraordinaire. If you are in the market for a one-of-a-kind work of art that is guaranteed to start a conversation, you need to check him out! Bruce’s portfolio is filled with just about every movie icon and cult hero you could ever hope for. Star Wars fan ahoy!

I plan to get him properly framed after I move, but until then I have him temporarily hanging on the faux velvet wallpaper above my bed. And just to make it even more weird, I put a frame of twinkle lights around it. Awesome much?

Between the lights and the dark velvet and the eyes that follow you around the room, Inigo has become pinnacle of some sort of diabolic shine. Friday night I went to bed I felt like I should have brought an offering of goat’s blood. Now he’s had a few days to settle and I find more and more to love about this painting every time I look at him  it him it…him or it? I can’t decide. But perhaps thats the hallmark of a true art – the piece takes on a presence and personality far larger than the confines of a canvas. He It feels like a real person.

Welcome home Inigo!

Thanks again to Bruce White for making my wish come true! You can check out Bruce’s work or follow him on facebook and twitter.

Veruca’s Wallpaper

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Original images via Payton Turner. Click here to see more!

Eeeeeeeeeeeeep! I KNOW RIGHT?  Is this not the most amazing thing you have EVER SEEN?!
So. Flippin. Cool.  It’s from a 2009 multi-media exhibition by Brian Kaspr and Payton Turner. I’m so sad I never got to see it in person, although, it’s probably just as well since the whimsy factor in the room would have spun my head clear off my shoulders.

Reminds me of the scene from Willy Wonka where they all go licking the fruity wallpaper and Wonka says, Try some more. The strawberries taste like strawberries, and the snozzberries taste like snozzberries! 
And Veruca says, Snozzberries? Who ever heard of a snozzberry? 
So Wonka looks down at her and goes, We are the music makers…and we are the dreamers of dreams.
Well go ahead Willy Wonka, just go ahead and blow my mind with your fruit-filled nuggets of Buddhist wisdom why don’t you. See if I cry. You’ll see.
And can we just talk about Veruca Salt? Has there ever been a cooler pre-pubescent villain. No. No there hasn’t.

This wallpaper reminds me of everything…of my grandmother’s dining room…of Victorian grandeur…of Trapper Keepers and pencil boxes…of happy days spending lunch breaks in the schoolyard swapping stickers with my friend Heather (yes, we were Sticker Nerds, thank you)…and now I’m wondering what I did with all those stickers? They were too precious to put on my binders like the other kids…what did I do with them? Where is that shoe box? How am I going to make this ridiculously awesome wallpaper at home WITHOUT THAT SHOE BOX?

And this, my friends, is why I hoard things.

Sequins and Misker Puffs

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A few folks asked about the sequin pillow featured in this photo from a few weeks ago, and I’m so glad you did! It’s one of my favorite things 🙂

The pillow is made from an old sequin tube skirt that my cousins picked up in a thrift store in New Orleans and gave to me for my 16th birthday. Judging by the style, cut, age of the sequins (they are like a super fine metal?), lack of tag or lining, I believe it was initially made as a Mardi Gras costume in the 1930’s or early 40’s. The matching top — a sleeveless, blousy sort of tank top with pearl trim — was sadly lost to a former roommate after an epic battle of Hungry-Hungry Hippos. At one point, in a monumental outburst of teenage flair, I wore the outfit together on top of my conservative school clothes, topped with a tiara and finished off silver orthopedic shoes from the local nursing home’s lobby-side charity shop. Holy crap did I know how to dress.

Few years ago I gave up on ever fitting my butt into a size 6 ever again, so I grabbed a slice of pie and my sewing kit, stitched up the sides, stuffed it with goose down, and in 20 minutes I had myself a majorly snazzy pillow. And I didn’t even get any pie on it!

Years have gone by and it has held up nicely. These days it sits in my living room, rarely seen without Lola in close proximity. Man, does that cat love her some sequins. Out of all the cats I could have brought home from the Treehouse shelter that day, it is no coincidence that I came home with the one that loves to rub her face on anything spangled, sparkled and sequined. If you come over to my house wearing a bedazzled sweater, 1. You are awesome and 2. Expect Lola pounce on your lap and start rubbing her misker puffs all over your chest. 

*Old School Breakdown for the Non Crazy Cat Ladies; Misker Puffs: The areas on either side of a cat’s nose scattered with whiskers and fur, most prominent when yawning or being cute in general. Which is always. 

Lola likes to sleep next to it in the yellow arm chair, and after a while the down feathers and old metal sequins really start to heat up….it’s only a matter of time until she wakes up from a nap and starts rubbing her face all over it, sometimes going so far as to bury her whole head inside and punch her paws back and forth like she is making biscuits.




Moving is going to be awesome.

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Slowly packing up the house is drudging up all sorts of crap. Physical and emotional dust bunnies abound, not to mention a skeleton or two. This is typical with moving, especially for someone with  hoarding tendencies like mine.

This morning I was clearing out a junk drawer and found myself debating whether to throw out an unused roll of super-sticky fly tape. Simple enough, right?  Toss it, right? Then I remembered the time there was a roll of fly tape above the trash can in the alley when I dropped in my garbage bag and accidentally flipped up my elbow-length hair, successfully taking down the gluey-tape and several dead flies in one fell swoop.

And it wouldn’t come out.

And then I had to go to work.

And then my co-worker Jeannie had to rub my entire head with ice cubes because she called her mother for advice, who said, ice gets gum out of hair so it should work on fly paper, but you know what? It sure didn’t. So then Jeannie just started cutting out chunks of my hair with a razor blade envelope opener, and then that weirdo bearded guy in shipping came by and said you look like you just came out of a can, so then  I had to go to the beauty salon and get ALL MY HAIR CUT OFF up to my ears, only to take some solace and said to the hairdresser, I’ll gladly donate my hair to Locks of Love, but she snapped her gum said, No Hun, those cancer kids don’t want flies in their hair either.

So now I’m standing over my junk drawer, feeling horrible just thinking about all the sick, bald headed children I denied a new wig because I got sloppy with the fly tape.

Good news: I recently learned that smothering your hair with peanut butter will remove fly tape and any other sticky substance, including hot glue. Who knew, right?
Bad news: Now that I know the peanut butter trick, how can I possibly throw out the fly tape?

This is how my mind works: Keeping the unused roll of fly tape + One Jar of Peanut butter = Doing my part to help kids with cancer. Throwing out the fly paper would be the equivalent of snubbing an ill child and would derail my path to Sainthood. The whole But-Peaches-You’re-Not-Even-Catholic-Thing will be overlooked if only I keep the fly tape. So clearly, I’m keeping the tape. 

Moving is going to be awesome.

Ruffled Jellyfish Explosion (aka: Plastic Bag Light)

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Damn skippy you guys are good.

I asked folks to guess what I was making last week and nearly everyone said hanging light or lamp or pendant chandelier. And here I was, thinking I could trick you. Shame on me. Y’all are too good!

Clearly, either I am getting predictable or y’all know me too well. This probably means I should to cool it on the light fixtures for a while. *Sigh*

A hearty congrats to Jackie for coming up with the winning guess. Hope you have room for a ruffled, exploding jellyfish light on your ceiling. She needs a good home!

Safety Update: Don’t anyone go and set anything on fire! Make sure your basket and light bulb have a good 6″ or more in gap space, otherwise you might risk overheating or the bags melting onto your bulb, and that’s no good. Give yourself lots of air room, use a low watt bulb, or an LED bulb that does not generate heat. Safety first 🙂