Recycled Name Plate Food Tags

Food tags from old desk name plates

Turn Tim Harrison into Food Tags

As I'm digging through bins of stuff I found these food tags I made last year, you know BB (before blogging).

Simple project.....

Bliss's Half Azzed Tutorial:

I got some old name plates at a garage sale
Slide out the name thing (that is a pirated photo, I do not know Tim Harrison and I do not own that photo).  You have to use the other side of the name plate because the front side is engraved so it has indentations where the name is.
Ask someone handy to cut them all in half - the name plates and the metal stand.
Paint chalkboard paint on the smooth side
Spray paint Hammered Copper on the metal part
Done

And the reason I'm spending less time right now at the computer and more time staring out my windows........

The View at the ranch

(I should be on the other side actually washing those windows!)

P.S.  This is my busy season, but I want you all to know I haven't sacrificed reading blogs.  I climb into bed with my Ipad and still read all million that come to my email.  However I'm not commenting as much right now.  It's just important to me that you know I'm still there with 'ya and the stuff you all make and write amazes me. 

P.S.S.  That big old dresser in the first photo is sitting in my entry way after it's redo from HELLLL over the weekend.  When He-Man and She-Ra have time they will move it to it's new home and She-Ra will blog about it.


These Tags are partying at:
Wildly Original Party @IGottACreate 
 My entry into No Minimalist Here Open House Party  sponsored by Appliances Online

Little Forgotten Desk

It's a small one.  And a cheap one.  This desk set me back a whole buck at a garage sale last May.  I had intentions on turning it into a craft spot for two adorable kids.  As small as it was it wouldn't fit in my daughters car, so I called my son a few blocks away and he came and loaded it up for me.

Then I forgot about it.

One day in August he said "hey mom, you wanna paint that desk for me?".

What desk?

The little desk went to his house, in his vehicle, and he claimed it, working outside with his lap top on it all summer.  It was nothing fancy and that's why he liked using it outside.

So in August it showed back up at my house, the desk I forgot I owned.  The buck desk.  Waiting for a paint job so it could go back to my sons house for him to use.

The before photo is half painted, because I always forget to take one till I start.  (No... really I remember, I am just too lazy to go fetch the camera).  It was all raw wood or something that resembled raw wood.  It was a buck, who cared!

Dark Walnut on the top and front drawer, ASCP in white followed by some distressing and dark wax, yard sticks for drawer pulls, a pants hanger for bills, and within a day it was back in his vehicle heading home.  His home.

I didn't really have room for it anyway.

A buck well spent.  The chair was .50¢ as is, but that didn't go to his house.  I remember I own it because it's in my garage taking up precious space.

I was mostly impressed that I painted it outside instead of in my entry way.

Moral of the story...... offer to take my stuff home in your vehicle.  I'll never remember and then it will become yours.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 If you get a chance stop over at Meridian Road where I have a guest post while Suzanne is off weighing sugar beets.  She has some great projects and was my inspiration for Dr. FeelGooder's first aid kit.

Old Photo Valance Guest Post @ Meridian Road

Linking the Little Desk to:
Make the Scene Monday @ AlderberryHill
Junking with Joe @TheCottageMarket

Operation: Fall Chores

Around Bliss Ranch there are plenty of fall chores to take care of before Winter arrives.  Because our Winter is cold.  And full of snow.  Grrrr..... so depressed now.

The Chore Doctor

Anyway, it's not like anyone jumps up on the weekend and says "HEY let's go rake those beautiful Autumn leaves mom".  And...there is this Random Act's of Craftiness challenge going on over at His and Hers.  And.... my craft is random that's for sure!

So I have combined the challenge of getting the leaves raked
with the link party challenge at His and Hers.

The challenge:  This is the first month and a mystery item is revealed for participants to make something out of.  The item.....  game parts.   Has to be original.  As far as I know mine is original and I'm using "parts" all right.  Go check out the challenge, a gal can even earn a ribbon for a big fat FAIL.  Wonder if a big fat guy counts?

I started with this naked man.  Because really who doesn't like a naked man in that portly shape with all those ailments?  We'll call him Milton.  Milton Bradley.

You will notice Milton is not anatomically correct and neither is my redo.  Milton's skeleton 'bread basket' isn't anywhere near his stomach.

Operation:  Turn naked man into fleshless skeleton

I got my craft thing going on - really quite funny if you were watching me.  I turned a naked man in need of hospitalization for his ailments, into a Fall chore chart.  Have you ever considered that?  I didn't think so.

Remove his wrenched ankle?  You get to pick up the tools inside and outside of the garage.
Take out his Adam's apple and your job is to pick the rest of the apples on the tree and toss the ones on the ground to the chickens.
Water on the knee........ clean up the pool area.
Spare ribs....... choose what goes on the grill as a reward when done.
Broken heart...... pick up all the broken toys/junk and haul it away.
Charlie Horse....... get the ducks and chickens winterized.
Writers cramp...... RAKE.
Etc.

Moms Cheshire Pumpkin Grin

The rule is everyone plays.  Draw a card (the originals from the game).  Remove the body part that the game card directs and check the corresponding sheet of paper for your chore.  Doesn't even matter if you make his nose light up, in fact it's encouraged because then you get two chores.

Played every weekend till it snows or the chores are done. 

Operation Fall Clean Up

Everyone Wins!

Operation Party-Link here:

Random Acts of Craftiness @HisandHers
Wildly Original Bewitching Fall @IGottaCreate 
All Star Block Party @FullCircleCreations

Glass Globe Pumpkins

Fall.  I  love  it.  Not just a little,  a lot.  

I don't usually start to decorate till October, and when I do it normally has a spooky twist.

The Little Chest Redo

I picked up a little chest at a garage sale filled to the brim with toys. 

The lady said she didn't feel like picking through all that tiny little tykes playhouse furniture so just sold the chest with the toys inside. 

She apparently didn't know people buy those 80's toys on Ebay for several times the original cost.

But I did. 

Scarecrow

 A few years ago, six apparently, in 2006 BB (Before Blogging), I decided to make a scarecrow.  I took a few photos of the process, but not a full tutorial like maybe would be nice for ya'll or you all as we say in the North.  I think at the time I planned on making two and wanted pictures to refresh my memory of the process.  

Meet Punkin Noggin.....

Punkin Noggin started out a semi round form of old rusty chicken wire. 
Yes even six years ago the rule was don't buy stuff to make stuff.

Can you see that chicken wire?  It's right in the center there next to the trashcan.  We have a brown trash can now, maybe it would blend in better.

You make a round form with the chicken wire and then balance it with wood shims nailed to your work place so you can work on all sides.  His melon gets pretty heavy.

The long paper thing at the bottom left will become his stem.

You start to mud him.  It helps if you know a drywall contractor who happens to keep drywall mud on hand, because when you want to make something you want to make it NOW. 

But you don't get to use the regular premixed stuff.  No you must use the dry kind you mix with water, it's called something technical like 20 minute mud.  At least at our house.

Mix up your goo in a old sheetrock screw bucket if you have one, and use that goo like paper mache.  Dip strips of fabric (I used old sheets cut up) and put it on the chicken wire.  Let dry, do again, and again until all the chicken wire is covered. 

Then you just keep smearing mud on fabric and shaping it as you go and eventually you get a gray blob resembling some sort of alien gourd with a stem that resembles a super size umbilical cord.  The stem is a metal clothes hanger with newspaper twisted and taped on.  You mud that too.  If I recall there was also some duct tape involved here somewhere.

Now you might want a beautiful, perfectly shaped pumpkin...... I did not.  I wanted to put a bit of the scare in the word scarecrow.  Halloween has never really been cute to me.... I'm the girl who wanted to be a witch year after year, and I was very afraid of witches, had nightmares about them.  Guess that's what's called facing your fears at a young age.

His body consists of grape vines from the woods and an old trench coat from a garage sale that I ripped up.  It was recycled from a costume.  No, no one was a flasher at Bliss Ranch.  Instead arms were flung open with the statement "wanna buy a watch" fully clothed underneath.

All the vines are twisted around a wood "T" and staple gun staples were strategically shot in, to hold it in place.  The whole thing was sprayed with varnish to protect it, and the head has about 10 coats brushed on so it wouldn't get mushy left out in the elements. 

Must of done something right because it has weathered 6 Octobers.

Now that I'm a blogger, I suppose if I was making another one, I'd probably have to use chalk style paint and wax it.

Brawn taking my friend for a walk down to the end of the driveway where he was put on a metal pole.  Punkin Noggin, not Brawn.  This is a good view of the stem and top and you can see how big he is.

Punkin Noggin.  He's outstanding in his field.

Punkin Noggin is gonna get you at these parties:

DIY Pumpkin Projects with Donna @FunkyJunk

Make the Scene Monday @Alderberry Hill 
Sunday Showcase @UnderTheTableandDreaming 
Cowgirl Up Party @CedarHillRanch 
The Style Sisters 
Fall Party @SarahDawnDesigns 

My big headed punkin is haunting at
The Primp your Pumpkin Party with Debbie Doos,
Fox Hollow Cottage Doos,  and Mom 4 Real Doos
BOO!

Mosaics & Tombstones

This was July.  I've been sitting on this post since then when a BFF took me on a birthday adventure, and it's a bit of a *departure* from my usual posts.   I wanted to wait closer to Halloween just for a spooky effect, but I don't really want to creep anyone out.  Mostly I was just in birthday age denial, yet happy to be around to celebrate another.  Nothing makes you appreciate getting older more than visiting a place where that opportunity no longer exists.

So what kind of friend takes their best garage sale'n pal to a cemetery for her birthday?  One that knows you have an appreciation for mosaics silly!  Dii (I did not make up her name for this post) didn't mean to take me to a cemetery it just so happened it was on the same grounds as this amazing quaint chapel.

 This is the Lakewood Memorial Chapel.  

Minneapolis, on the shore of Lake Calhoun.

From the web site:   
Mosaic interior ....created by designer Charles Lamb and many consider it the most perfect example of Byzantine mosaic art in the United States. In 1909, Lamb traveled to Rome to enlist the services of six mosaic artists who had just recently completed a project in the Vatican. The artists created more than 10 million mosaic pieces, called tessellae, from marble, colored stone, and glass fused with gold and silver. The artists then traveled to Minneapolis to assemble the work inside the chapel. Upon completion in 1910, the Lakewood Memorial chapel was the only building in the country with an authentic mosaic interior.

 Did you catch that?... 10 million tiny pieces.  1909, completed a year later.  Someone better than me do the math... if they worked 365 days how many tiles a day is that?

Pictures of course do not do it justice.

 

Dii is a mosaic artist in her own right, she's the one who turned me on to smashing china.  Dii actually plots out things in a pattern, me I just smash something and glue it on randomly.  I don't have the patience, you know that lazy crafter thing, and I can't even imagine doing the whole interior to a building in tiles the size of a fingernail.  

I wanted to see the cemetery, this is art too.  It was the most well kept cemetery I have ever been to, especially for its age.  No I don't hang out in cemetery's but I'm no stranger to loss.  I really prefer to visit them in this fashion than have reason to go.

 Reading the names on the skyscrapers tombstones it was easy to see why it was so well kept; these are the movers and shakers of the area buried here.  The namesakes and founders of towns and businesses across the state. 

And then there were the ones that caught my eye...... 

I kid you not, Griswold and Chase were next to each other. 
You know... Chevy Chase and the Griswolds from the Vacation movies?

 

This was my favorite stone.  The lettering just looked all vintagy and cool.  

 Some make you wonder the significance of the design.  Why did Rosie get a log?

No matter how old I get the last name of butts will always be funny. 
Probably because I'm thankful it's not mine.
Seymour was not next to it.  I looked.

 And everything in it's place.....

 The deceased mortician from our town was named Grimsmo.  Appropriate huh?  The current mortuary owners are friends of ours and employ one of my sons from time to time for things like vehicle washing or extra hands for what ever is "needed".  Occasionally it makes for interesting dinner table talk.  And yes often we find humor in it, but don't doubt for one minute the admiration we have for that family.

Old cemetery's are historical places.  I found this one very interesting.  Just ponder for a moment how fast time goes by.  Death is certain and that fact wasn't any different 100 years ago!  Someone still felt the loss that each one of these stones marks yet only 100 short years have passed and no one is left that even knew the people buried beneath the oldest ones. 

I said ponder, not dwell.