Bead Giveaway

I thought since I had such a huge response to my yard sale bead finds that I would have a Bead Giveaway. What better way to share my find than to give away a portion of the collection. Leave a comment on this blog entry and you will be entered in a random drawing to win a Ziploc sandwich bag of your choice of vintage beads. The drawing will be held Monday March 1st so enter now.

BEADS!!!

My grandmother had a big yard sale this past July. All of the family was there to help out with it. Of course we got first pick of all the stuff. While helping set up the day before the sale I found a 15"x10"x6" box labeled "Beads and craft stuff Whole box $1" . It was packed full of acrylic boxes and a plastic jewelry box. She said she had used them to make fancy beaded Christmas balls years ago. I claimed that box without ever looking in the acrylic boxes within. Over the following weeks I started sorting out all the different findings. Every box contained a lot of rusty straight pens so it was a little dangerous digging in them. Here are the pictures of the majority of my finds.

Sorry this is blurry my camera just wouldn't focus on the white beads.

All of these large beads are covered in tiny holeless beads.



These are the random things left in the bottom of the jewelry box after I picked out the above picture.


Jewels

Trunk

I designed the pattern to this little trunk using AutoCAD back in college. I printed it out on card stock and traced it onto cardboard for the structure. I acquired some old fabric backed veneer and covered the outside. The paper lining is from one of the many free wallpaper sample books I have. I still haven't made the hardware for it. I just can't ever seem to finish a project. Hopefully posting pictures of it will inspire me to finish it.

Miniature Hats Updated

I worked on two of my hats last night while watching tv in the bedroom. I can't really work in my work area with feathers because of my cats.
The large brimmed hat with the brown ribbon now looks like this..

I'm pleased with the brown. This would be the style and color hat I would wear if I was going to the Kentucky Derby. lol

The smaller woven hat now looks like this..

I'm not really happy with how it turned out so I'll probably add flowers or something to it. Its just too gray...and dull.

The cowboy hat I made was quite by accident. I was making a tan leather bowler hat that ended up being smushed before it was completely dry and stiff. I just worked with the dents and reshaped it more like my brothers cowboy hat.

My first Award!

I just received the Sunshine Award from Kim at http://flowerkim.blogspot.com/
Thank you so much. Its so hard to pick just 6 bloggers to pass this award on to.



The rules are to pass the award on to six blogs that you follow then let them know you gave them an award. So I narrowed it down to these six:

Jessie at http://beyondbaffled.blogspot.com/
Lori at http://ohminiofmine-loshcosh.blogspot.com/
Josje at http://josje-bouwt.blogspot.com/
George at http://tallminiguy.blogspot.com/
Nikki at http://nikkinikkinikki72.blogspot.com/
Casey at http://caseymini.blogspot.com/

Miniature Hats

I love making miniature hats but I can't seem to ever finish them. I've acquired a lot of old leather gloves over the years that work great for hats. Any pointers on how to finish these hats would be greatly appreciated.

Polymer Clay Creations

I decided to share some of my various clay creations. These are polymer clay minis.




Other polymer clay projects




I still haven't finished this little guy but I love his face. I covered a glass Christmas ball for his body. His head got a little burnt when I baked him

Feathers... natural miniatures

I found some perfect miniature feathers in our yard after a local feral cat had killed a bird. I washed them in hot soapy water let them dry then I put them in the freezer for about a week to kill any bugs or mites.

I had a neighbor had two pet birds she let me collect all the molted feathers I wanted. I crawled around on her floor picking tiny feathers out of the carpet for about an hour.


When I was in Girl Scouts we visited a local bird farm we were all given a peacock feather. After years of storage it had begun to look a little rough so I stripped them down for usable parts. I bought a small package of peacock feathers at some point too.

I even find myself saving the feathers that manage to escape from my down comforter. I just can't stop collecting them.

Dollhouses

I completely forgot to post anything yesterday. I can't believe I have 52 followers now. Thanks everyone.
I thought I would post some of the random dollhouses that I have.
This is my first real wooden dollhouse I got it for my 6th birthday. One of the walls downstairs fell after years of play so I just left it out. Its being stored at my parents house until I can get a larger house where I can display all my dollhouses. My cat thought it was the perfect size for her. She chewed off some of the shingles on the front edge.

I've got 5 or 6 untouched DuraCraft kits in storage right now.
I started building the Greenleaf Taft General Store a few years ago but I found it was just too big for what I wanted to use it for so it has been put back in storage with all the Duracraft kits.



A few years ago I won the Greenleaf Haunted House from the Greenleaf Forum and decided to bash it and turn it into a workshop/studio. I plan on using paperclay to cover the styrofoam base to make it look like a stone foundation.

SNOW!!!!

Wow I've got 47 followers. Thanks everyone for your support.

It snowed here this weekend. I know everyone else on here has seen plenty of snow this year but we haven't had a snow like this since the 1993 blizzard. I felt like a little kid again. I built a small snowman and had a snowball fight it was wonderful. It started snowing Friday around noon and didn't stop until 9pm. We got about 4-5 inches at our house. By the end of Saturday almost all the snow was gone.


I was determined to attend the Atlanta Miniature Show in Norcross so I braved the snow and headed out at 10:30am Saturday morning. It was a beautiful drive seeing all the snow in the trees. The roads were pretty clear. I met an online friend while I was at the show. After the show I went to my favorite miniature store.. Miniature Designs. Here's the minis I picked up at the show and store.


On my way home from the show I stopped by Petsmart to get some crickets for my geckos and they were having a 75% off sale on dog coats and jackets. I would never have paid the full price of $25.99 for a dog hoodie but I decided to get one since it was only $6.50. Toby loves his new hoodie.

Pets

I completely forgot about posting anything yesterday. I thought I would introduce all my pets since all miniaturist seem to be animal lovers too.
This is my dog Toby. He was a stray that wondered up 4 years ago. He had apparently been abused.


These are our two inside cats. They were the last two free kittens being given away so I took them both in July of 2008.
Samantha aka Sam

Chloe


These are our two outside kittens. A local feral cat had taken up refuge under our house in October. She had apparently torn a hole in the ductwork and these two kitten climbed up our living room vent at four weeks old. I've gotten extremely attached to them.
Delilah

Luna


These are my two Leopard Geckos from Craigslist.
Hunkie & Dorie


And this is my 5 year old Ball python given to me by a friend.
Azimuth