Ornamental Awesomeness.

A couple of months ago I made this for my mother.  It's my own take on Breast Cancer Awareness. 

I keep my eye out for anything that might cause "rackspiration".  Yeah, I just made that word up and it's Awesome!

Anywho, I was looking for some gifts for friends and sister-in-laws this year (I was going to make coasters, but that was a fail.) when I stumbled upon some ornaments.  Enter "rackspiration":

Pink, glittery, rack. Perfect! I put the " Keep Track of Your Rack 2011". I had a ribbon puncher and pink paper, so I added the ribbon on to the top.  

This is the one I kept for myself.  As you can see, it is not the best one.  The writing is a tad crooked.  Personally, I think that this is an awesome reminder to my friends and family.  Every year they get the tree out, I hope they remember to check themselves out.

I LOVE YOU MOM!

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!!

Or in our families case Merry Chaosmas!!

From: The Rutledges

Jelly face boy trying to remove his shirt on his own,

underwear on head,

and toddlers first concert.

From our house to yours have a great holiday!

Army of Owls

I know, you thought I disappeared didn't you.  Well, the last couple of months have been up and down.

No excuse, right. 

My mother's cancer has become a bigger battle that we thought it would be.  Leave it to her to make something complicated.  Some of you might cringe at me saying that, but that's how we deal.  My family are a bunch of jokesters.  It's not that we aren't sypathetic, it's just that somebody needs to make the patient laugh.  When telling her story, my mother would say "Hey, at least they found I had a brain."  She's hanging in there right now.  We won't know if her brain tumors have shrunk until mid January.

In the shadow of all this, I've completed very few projects. However, I have been pinning many projects that I want to attempt on Pinterest! One of which was a gift for my son't teachers.  Only after the fact did I realize it wasn't very holiday like. But, he's teachers still liked them.



It says "Thank you for making me wiser."

 Brown paper bag, glue and scrapbook paper.  We traced my son's hands to use as the feet.  My owls didn't look near as mean as some of the one's I saw on Pinterest.  In fact, mine have a look of bewilderment in their eyes.  It reflects Liam's personality much better. 

Behind the blue door... it's not what you think.

The road of not so fun construction is really long and abnormally bumpy.  There are few bright spots when you are fixing things people don't see.  But, then you get one thing.... just one little bright spot in all the doom in gloom of rotten sub floor and beams... A new painted door!  Yes, it's a small thing.  One quart of paint to be exact.  But, it makes me happy.

Now you can see where I was going with the wreath color selections.  Hubby is a visual person, so I had to start warming him up to the color pallet.  Hmmm.. looks like the welcome mat that we got for a wedding gift is showing it's age.  Maybe 5 years old is the senior status for straw.  Time for a new one.

I tried not to get the over grown tree/bush, or the dead bushes in the picture.  You can see they had different ideas.  I'm blaming the loss of 3 bushes on the drought we had.  It is most definitely not a reflection of my distaste for taking care of vegetation.

I'm in love with the door color.  I tried to explain it to my mother.  My description made no sense to her...see if you get it.  "The color is aqua, but not 80's bridesmaids aqua.  More blue than green... more like nautical or Hampton's even."  It make total sense to me.  The actual color is peacock plume or something birdie like that.

I'm still alive, I promise!!

I know it's been a while.... a long while and I apologize.  Complete chaos has been swirling through my household.  For once, it doesn't have anything to do with my 2 year old, well not really anyway.

My house has been under construction.  It's not even the fun kind of construction.  It's just stupid old, "you were going to fall through the floor, but now you're not", kind of construction.  "The winter wind used to blow through the1/2" gap around your front and back door, but now it doesn't", "sitting on your toilet was like riding a bucking bronco, but now it doesn't move" kind of construction.

Did I mention that my house was built in the early 50's?  Some people by old houses because they love to fix them up.  I married into this house and should have made the hubby sell it.  Here I am, nearly 9 years later and I still hate this house.  It has a ton of potential, but I don't have the money to put into it.  Oh, and the other thing....no storage.  This place has 2 closets, well 3 if you include where the water heater is.

I'm ready for a little less maintenance! Like a place that just needs some paint you know!

Here's a little peek at what's been happening.

This is the laundry room.  New subfloor, new beams, and new door.  There was a hole straight through the subfloor by the door.  I'm going to miss the old sheet vinyl.  I always thought it looked like tile.

New subloor in the bathroom.  The house is pier and beam, because of the horrible drought the foundation is sinking causing all kinds of problem.

They installed the old toilet.... see all the wetness on the plywood.  That's how much water had been leaking causing some of the problems.  Sigh... why would you install it again? Boys!  Anyhoo, I made them get a new toilet and that problem was solved.

Stay tuned and you will get to see a picture of another toilet really soon.  Betcha can't wait.

Can you feel my heart beep?

TERRIBLE "TWO"SDAYS


Yeah I know it's not Tuesday.  My regular 7-5 job is kicking my a**.  I've been down and out for a week or so.  


So, today's "TWO"sday is not your typical 'pull your hair out, what did you do' story.  Prepare for your heart to be warmed by the thoughts of my little monster.


This month Liam is learning about service people in school (firemen, policemen, doctors).  Yesterday, they learned about doctors and used doctor kits.  When asked what he did in school he responded, "I put them in my ears, and I whistened to Major's heart beep. I whistened to Sopia's (Sophia)heart beep and my heart beep."


It cracked me up.  All the rest of the night he was talking about his heart beep.

Terrible "TWOsday"

My 2 year old miniature monster has at least one blog worthy moment a week.  So, I think he should have it out there for everyone to enjoy.  I'm not a selfish person and feel like everyone should hear what it's like to live with a 2 year old.

This week in lil' monster land (I mean that in the sweetest way possible) he figured out how to open the child gate.  We have one gate to keep him in the living room.  Before I realized that he was gone, I heard silence.  That's the sign of something gone a rye. 

I found him in the bathroom looking like this.

He must be worried about pre-mature wrinkles.  As you can see it's hard to be mad at that little face.  ESPECIALLY, because he knows how to say he's sorry.  He pats you on the arm and looks lovingly into your eyes and says,"I sorry". 

Not more than and hour later I found him covered in self tanner!  It's ok, he did not end up looking like Snookie.  He was just preparing to be and Umpa Lumpa for Halloween.

Flashback Thursday??

How's this name for the old projects section? Yeah I think it's kinda stolen from a local radio station, I guess that's why it sounds so good.



Let's take a look at an oldie but a goodie...  My first media room conversion.  I'll keep this simple and just put some before and after pictures up.  It was a loooonnng process.

Design concept

Before looking towards where the screen will go

Before looking the opposite direction where the bar will go

As you can see, this was a bowling alley of a space.  The owner wanted to have as many seating options as possible.

After

We ended up putting a velvet fabric valance and panels on the screen.  There's 3 rows of love seats and granite bars on either side.  I think that's a total 16.



After bar area

2 more bar seats at the kitchen area.  Above the kitchen area there was an LED night scene painted like a night sky. I loved the leather tufted door!

After another view

Probably the biggest project and overhaul that I've ever done.  I wish I had better after pictures.  I still love the faux finish in this room.  If the main goal wasn't to get as many people as possible in the theater, I would have eliminated one row of seating.  What do you think?

Freakin' Fall Wreath!

I call this Freakin' Fall Wreath because I'm a little disturbed that I have headed down the seasonal decoration path.  But, if all you people in Blog land would stop being so darn inspiring, maybe I'd be happy with my plain front door.  However everything you guys make is cool and I too would like to be cool.  It's a slight problem I have....it's been going on since I was a kid lol!

I was inspired by this post that I saw on Tater Tots and Jello of 25 Fall Wreaths.  The one from Home Stories A to Z really caught my attention, and she had a tutorial to make the flowers. So I made my own version of it.

I started with the green Styrofoam form, charcoal yarn, and several colors of felt.  I wrapped the yarn around the form.  By the way, no one tells you that it takes a while to accomplish the yarn wrapping....also wears your arms out. I made the felt flowers using the Home Stories A to Z tutorial, you can find it here.  It's totally easy.

 Here's the yarn covered form and the flowers.  I also found some pre-cut foam leaves in my colors so I threw those in the mix.

I hot glued some orange rhinestones and teeny tiny pearls inside a couple of the flowers. I did this with out burning my fingers which is amazing.

I found some old ribbon from last years stock and used that to hang it.  Please try to ignore the fact that my door is pink.  It was one of those color cards you pick up and thing "yes, I'll paint my house, trim, and door exactly what the pre-picked color says."  It will be replaced and painted soon! Anyway the wreath looked pretty decent, but I didn't think it was quite there.

So, I found a wooden initial and mod podged some cute paper on it.  Then sanded it a little and used my favorite distress ink on the edges.  I also painted some turquoise on the copper ribbon, just to add a punch at the top.

Final product much better.  It will look even better on my new door!  Happy Crapping everyone!

Linking up to:
The Shabby Creek Cottage
The DIY Showoff Fall Festival

PREVIOUS LIFE....

Let's call this a working title for this new series.  I was thinking that maybe readers might want to know where the heck I came from.  Not where I was born or anything, I wouldn't want you guys to fall asleep, but where I came from design wise...

Previous life... because it feels like forever ago.
Trip down memory lane...

Whatever I decide to call it, it will be a look at some projects I've done.  Mainly a peek into who I am as designer and artist. I'm kind of interested to see how much my taste has changed and if it's gotten better or worse. Eek!!! Shine the light baby... let see some awesomeness or some ugliness lol!

I think a good place to start is with my son's room. So, I wanted something more generic than the usual sports theme room.  I'm anti blue or pink FYI.  I painted the leaves and bird in the alcove where his crib was going.

Graphic Mural

Anybody else see that weird ghost like thing in every picture.... Not a ghost. It took me forever to figure out that there was still something on the camera lense... probably pancake. I was OBSESSED with pancakes while I was pregnant.

 Anyway, I reused a curtain that used to be a pair for the window treatment.  Take notice of the dresser in the left corner. Dang I wish I had a better picture of it! I had painted it and used wallpaper that looked like maps on the drawer fronts.

Old Dresser

Lucky for me, my parents helped me sand and re-paint this dresser.  I think I was nearly going to pop when I made the final decision on how I wanted it to look. Used the wall color on the drawer fronts.  Then, I did the one thing I said I would never do.  I used appliques that came with the bedding.  I know horrific right! The only way I justified using them was because

a) I didn't put them on the wall b) They are not clustered together over the bed c) I didn't use them all


This is the third paint job that this dresser has had.  Just goes to show you that one staple piece can go a long way!

New Dresser

KEEP TRACK OF YOUR RACK

Just a quick note today.  It's been a weird couple of days.  My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer on March 31st, yes the day before April Fools day.  She actually called people to tell them her diagnosis on April Fools day. 

Anyway, she's had 4 rounds of chemo and had her last treatment a couple of weeks ago. (She let me give her a mohawk when she lost her hair) This round has been especially un-kind to her and she's been feeling pretty yucky.  News from the doc yesterday was that she would go on to have 6 weeks of radiation. Boooo!!  That wasn't supposed to happen.  But, it's a better safe than sorry kind of thing. 

 I've been tossing this idea around since she was first diagnosed and I finally got it done.

It's what I like to call a "Rack Plaque".

I wanted something other than the usual ta-ta's or boobies.  Not only is it a good reminder to get your yearly mammogram, but it's going to double as a wig/scarf holder for my mom.

I took it over today to cheer my mom up and she loved it. The only way that we make it through tough situations is with laughter.  Wait until you see the cards that I'm making. Stay tuned....

KEEP TRACK OF YOUR RACK

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C.R.A.P.

Have I ever told you.... probably not. 

I throw around the word CRAP and probably unintentionally offend someone.  I thought I better explain it. 

 Remember my friend Louschell?  Well she's pretty brainy when it comes to jingles and acronyms.... just don't ask her to read a big word like extrapolate outloud. She's very athletic, and as you can see here she's going places. 

I contacted Louschell to come up with something witty for all of the random stuff I had been making lately.  She came up with the name of my shop,  Peepskeeps a couple of years ago. (More on that later) So, you can see why I would force ask her to lend her creativity to me once again. 

I'm not going to tell you what the orginal concept was....lets just say I had to make it more everybody friendly, and less offensive.  But, she got the ball rolling and that is where CRAP came from (insert inappropriate joke here).

CRAP stands for Creative Repurposed Awesome Pieces! It's everything I live for.  Making something old, newer.  Turning something useless into useful.  Or create a piece of art out nothing.  I love CRAP!!

My friends have also turned this into a fun game.  They call me with an idea or something they've seen and ask "Hey, do you think you can CRAP that?" or "You can CRAP out a chair like that in your sleep."

It's catchy isn't it?  You're all going to be CRAPping now. (endless inappropriate jokes too)

HAPPY CRAPOWEEN EVERYBODY! Stay tuned ....

RECORD BREAKING ART PEOPLE!!!

First off, this is record breaking because I'm posting 3 days in a row.  It's completely unheard of!! Honestly it's because I'm just sooooo damn proud of myself. Hold on...patting myself on the back...OK I'm done. 

This piece of CRAP has been bothering me for years.  My husband and I bought an awesome statue from Z gallery for $40 about 5 years ago.  That's back when we had money pre-layoffs and pre-child.

We had it for about a year before the glass broke in the back due to an unfortunate doggie attack. It had water in it, kind of like a snow globe without the snow.

Because I'm a hoarder, I never threw it away.  It has been hanging out gathering dust (as you can see from the picture).  My mother is cringing right now.

I took out some aggression and busted the glass thinking I'd just paint it and leave the coral in the center.  But, once I started messing with it, it looked really stupid.  With a little bit of work , I ended up being able to remove the entire coral piece and had a stand with a gaping divot in the top.  It needed something on to fill it.

Originally I thought about just putting a candle in the top.  Until, I was in the shower today and had a thought...wonder if I can find a hurricane to fit in the top!!

Drum roll people because seriously you would have thought I had found the cure to cancer I felt so smart.

Well..... yeah I know you're amazed.  My obsession for high gloss white really paid off (hint: you'll see more of it later).  I found the perfect hurricane.  There was only one of these in the store and I was just crossing my fingers it was the right scale. Added bonus: $2.99 on sale! What?

But, wait there's more. 

The candle was on sale and I had the large glass beads hanging out at the house.  See, I told you I was smart.

Quickie C.R.A.P.

Part of the reason that I haven't been posting so often is because I start one project and then get ideas for a million more.  So, I have a little bit of everything laying around...you know painted deer racks, 60's doggie cookie jar, vintage Kleenex box cover, cabinet doors. You get the point right. 

I thought I'd give a little look at some of the only quickie C.R.A.P that I've completed.

This is a 6x6 gallery wrapped canvas. The front is a piece of scrap paper.  I used a chip board "O" and stamped a print overlay.  On the side, that you can't see well, I used a stencil and modeling paste to give a raised texture.  The modeling paste I used already had a mustard color to it. 

Another 6x6 canvas...actually I got a 4 pack on sale for $14.99.  Not a bad deal.  I used an entire piece of paper to wrap this one, then stamped in 2 different colors. I used blue ink to distress or play up the creases. I cut up a felt coaster that I got out of the $1 bin at Michael's last year.  It's the yellow piece in the bottom left corner.  On top of that, I layered a pendant out the clearance jewelry bin.  Are we sensing a theme here??  I hate full price!  Personally, I feel much more accomplished if I can make $1 bin stuff look good.

Last but not least, a collection of small C.R.A.P.  All three of these are small boxes. The back right was simply painted and then I put a fun sock monkey print on the lid.  The back left is layers upon layers of paper.  We'll call her "Owlina" and she can be" Owliver's" cute lady friend.  The box is my favorite shade of green.  I put one layer of a leaf paper on the lid and cut an owl pattern out of different patterned paper.  The last application consists of small cut out flowers.  I aged the edges of all the cutouts to give them more dimension.  The front item is an eye glass holder.  Another amazing $1 bin find.  It has a flexible veneer top.  All I did to this was spruce it up with paint and some stamping.

The lesson here?? Keep the C.R.A.P. small and maybe I'll finish it in a timely manner.

Orange Mary

Yeah, couldn't think of a good name for this piece of C.R.A.P (Creative Repurposed Awesome Piece). So we'll just call her Orange Mary or Mary Sunrise?? Why do I feel the need to name my C.R.A.P?

 I have this amazing friend, Louschell, and she keeps harassing me about blogging more.  In order to get her to shut up, I am working on it.  You see, she's an avid runner, which you can read about here, and I have let her down in my attempts to be a runner. (I don't run unless something is chasing me)  So, I will have to build her faith in me by being a better blogger.

This piece of C.R.A.P literally evolved out of nothing.  I needed some filler in my shop Peepkeeps.  The box had been hanging around for at least a year and it was covered in some lame scrap paper. I had pulled the paper off and applied some texture and paint a month or so ago, but was still uninspired. UNTIL... a necklace I was wearing broke.

You can't see the texture on the box very well, but it's a stucco finish.  I painted it orange and then used a purple ink to bring out some of the deeper ridges and add shadow.  The gray strands of mica is the necklace that broke, and leaning up against the box is a broken key chain that's been hanging in the junk drawer for a couple of years.

I was originally going to use the strands whole, and wrap them around.  That didn't give the effect I wanted.  I glued the individual mica pieces in random directions, and they ended up looking like rocks or boulders.  So, Mary looks like she's hanging out at the top of a cliff.  Then, I finished it off with some dots of white paint.  I think she needed to be more graphic.  What do you think?

Owliver's new home

Thank you McKinney Trade Days for a great find!  Of course it had to be on the very last row......120 degrees outside at 11am.... and entirely too heavy to carry all the way back.  Good thing I had a big strong strapping 2 year old that needed to earn his keep.  We loaded this treasure in the stroller and Liam helped push it back to the car. (don't worry, I at least let him see the puppies as a reward).

Isn't she a beauty... well nearly.  I forced my BF ,who my son has named "Aunt Woo" ( imagine an elderly Asian lady), to purchase this piece.  She agreed with the stipulation that I had to fix her up and put her to use.

I spent a week with her and had a million ideas.  For $20 this really is a lifetime addition to Aunt Woo's decor.  I'm hoping that through the years it will end up at my house for a little while.


I think that it may have been in someones backyard. It had a great patina, some cobwebs, a little bit of moss and some rust.

Aunt Woo is a high gloss, mirrored furniture, silver and gold finish kind a girl.  There's no way this little lady would have fit in without having a flashy sophistication about her.  So, she simply got a coat of silver spray paint.


This is less of a how-to and more of ...how do I put it... envision the endless possibilities of one amazing piece.

Here she is setting on the floor in the bedroom.  There's room to hold 2 throw pillows.

Also, I was thinking that it would be perfect for small blankets during the winter.

Here she is set up on the buffet.  May I also introduce you to Owliver?  We looked all over DFW for Owliver.  Once I envisioned him in this cage it was over.  

Owliver is sitting on a mirror that we set in the bottom of the cage (don't forget Aunt Woo has mirrored furniture all through out her home).  It's hard to see but there's a clear beaded garland and a beaded ball.  I also pulled 2 red tapered candles from the other side of the buffet. It turned out beautifully.

If I could even fathom a fire this time of year (remember you could make Smores on your dashboard) I'd also set this next to a fireplace with you know, kindling or wood in it. This really is the most sophisticated piece of C.R.A.P. (Creative Repurposed Awesome Pieces) I've made so far.

Until next time..... Best of luck with your own C.R.A.P.!!!!

Linked up at:

The DIY Showoff

GLASS CABINET DOOR INTO WIPE BOARD

I'm attempting to work faster as I have a deadline and need inventory.  In the next couple weeks I will have a space in a local store in downtown McKinney.  This is one of my favorites and pretty easy too.

Picked up a cabinet door with glass and mullions for $5 bucks at the habitat for humanity store.  This is what it looked like before..... well minus the blue painters tape of course.

Took off the hinges and cabinet hardware.  Sanded and spray painted the wood green that was supposed to be high gloss. 

Problem #1 Spray painted outside HOT!!!

Problem #2 70 lb gentle giant jumped directly on top of fresh paint

Problem #3 no more high gloss look

SOLUTION SETTLEMENT: take some sand paper to it and distress it.

Next step, I used some scrapbook paper and put it on the back of the door.  I wanted to have a print that was kind of classic.

I wasn't going to add any hardware, but...... there were already 2 holes drilled for the original handle.  I covered them at first but then found these tiny knobs in my junk drawer.

Here it is up on the wall.  The knobs worked out great for keys and dog leashes.  

HEY YOU!!! DON'T FORGET THE DRY CLEANING!!

Ukulele repurpose

Does it seem like I start every post with "Finally I finished...."  Well there's a reason.  It takes me forever to finish a project.  Working full time and having a 2 year old running around makes my timeline draaaagggg.

Anyway, my husband brought this ukulele  home from his grandad's house a couple years ago hoping I'd do something with it.  It sat gathering dust until finally I got inspired to do something with it.  A couple months ago I took an old white matte and added strips of scrapbook paper to change it. ( The reason I tell you this will make sense soon)

This is how the matte turned out.... with the most handsome young man. 

So here's ye ole' Eukele.

I used the same strips of paper to the Eukele.  Then added some cutout flowers and aged the edges with ink.  I slapped a clear coat on the entire thing and waited for it to dry. 

I had purchased some decorative knobs that I glued on....and in one case drilled throught the wood to actually install. Then, I had to wait for my husband, the musician, to put strings on it. 

For the life of me, I couldn't get a good picture of the final product.  But, I've got some close ups that might be better.  So, the cabinet knobs are for necklaces to hang on.  On the strings, I hung earrings and magnetic pendants.

It was a bitch to hang and get level but in the end I think it turned out pretty cool.