No....No I Can't.....

That was my answer to Russell's "You just can't leave anything alone, can you babe?" query.  I'd bought another bottle of Jones Cream Soda at the grocery store and I actually did walk over to the trash with the bottle.  Then I hesitated before tossing it in the bin and looked at it.  I just couldn't make myself throw it out. So I rinsed it and let it dry, dug out my bags of sequins and E6000 glue.

I forgot that I had a small baggie of sparklie circles that had no holes in the center like regular sequins and knew they'd be exactly what I needed for this project.  First I put a row of the larger flowers around the top and bottom of the label, then started adding the rows of circles.  Russell came out to the kitchen at one point and watched me working and said, 'looks tedious.'  It really wasn't.  It went fairly quickly.  I got the best results by putting a thin line of glue on the bottle, then I touched the tip of a toothpick to the glue and touched the circle and it worked perfectly to pick it up and set it into place, and didn't leave any residue on the sparkle.  Using that method, setting the circles into place went very quickly.  There is no way I could have done this using my fingers to pick up the circles.

But was I done yet?  Of course not!  I had to add rhinestones on the label too.

All the way around the bottle.

Bottled in Seattle, product of Canada.  

And some sparkles for the cap as well. 

String Egg on Balloon

Been meaning to try this for awhile, despite seeing so many attempts with bad results, esp. on Pinstrosity.  So I decided to give it a whirl one day.  I first used a smaller thread size because when I was a kid, I had one of these string eggs and it was made with fine string.  I decided to use Mod Podge for one and starch for the other.

First I was entertaining myself with the static electricity.

OK down to business.  I spread Mod Podge on the balloon and started winding the string.  This was exceedingly messy and a pain in the ass.

Then I used the string and sprayed the starch as I went along.  This, too, was extremely messy and by the time I was ready for them to dry, there was glue and starch everywhere.  

They took all day and night to dry and when I let the air out of the balloon, both 'eggs' were total fails.  The Mod Podge one on the left had clear, dried glue in all the spaces between the threads.  The starched one on the right was extremely fragile and just didn't hold up at all.

So then I tried it again, this time using Elmers glue mixed with a little water and placing the yarn bits in it before wrapping around the balloon.  This was also extremely messy.

Took all day to dry again, but it's much sturdier than the first ones I tried.  

Not a total fail, but I also wouldn't do this again.  It's just way too messy.

More Cross Stitch

As you can see from my past posts, I've been doing more cross stitching.  Part of the reason is that I started following the Stitching Daze blog a year or so ago.  She has so many projects underway with more kits coming in every day, that it inspired me to take my stitching out and work on it again.  Plus it's a good project to do in the livingroom when Russell is home.

I started this one at the very end of January and it took about 2.5 weeks to finish, but only because I didn't work on it every day.  I had it on Facebook less than a half hour when one of my friends asked if she could buy it!! 

I know I featured this one before, but I finally got it framed.  Painted a plain wood frame in light blue and added some of the blingy keys I made right before the Superbowl that were inspired by the Seahawks colours.  I also had an old charm (with the old logo that contains a less angry-looking bird) so I put that on the frame too.  Another thing....not one person noticed that in the original photo, I put the wrong Roman numerals for Superbowl 48.  I had it as 47.  Rather than rip the entire row out, I shimmied in the 'I' to make it XLVIII.

This was a free pattern that was shown in just regular red, but I decided to use my varigated red floss instead.

My friend Bev pinned this adorable owl design on Pinterest, so I made it in about 2 hours.

I made them both into cards.

So many projects!  So little time!

Steampunk Keys

More altered keys.  People really seem to love these.  I wasn't expecting the response to them, although it's greatly appreciated!!

That one on the far left is my fave and I just can't part with it.  It makes me think of college at St. Joe's but I'm not sure why. 

I found that padlock in one of my old jewelry boxes and the keys work so I added stuff to it.

E. Sandwich

Popped over to mom's and couldn't believe how much more snow she had at her house.  She has a regular plow guy.  He's running out of places to pile it.

Easily a foot of new snow.

Poor old cedars are so weighed down with heavy clumps.

Robins seem to be year round now because I've seen them all winter, yet no sign of spring.

This is in the CVS Parking lot in Forestdale.

Also in CVS parking lot.

Staaaaahp!!!!

Got hammered with another blizzard on the night of the 15th.  They were still unable to really get a read on the track of the storm, other than the fact that the Cape and coast would take the brunt of it.  We got stuck in the 6"-12" range.  

This picture cracks me up.  Confirmed Bumbles sighting in Buzzards Bay. Or, Bumbles Bay.  OK that's not really BBay.  

It started snowing early in the afternoon, so we got the generator all ready and ran the extension cord into the house.  They were saying it'd be a very wet and icy storm with lots of hurricane force gusts, so a larger chance of power outages.  We lucked out though, because Bourne didn't end up getting as much as Sandwich did.  They got 15", we got about 6".  I didn't even have to shovel my way out of the house!  When I took Pepper out at 3:00 AM, it was already over, and we woke up at 7 to a gorgeous morning.

We were already plowed, but I still had to clean off the car and shovel around it.

 It really is pretty when it's fresh.

Later in the day, the light got otherworldly.

Especially with the snowy trees against the sky.

This was later in the afternoon.  I was hoping for a nice, red sunset but not that night.

So. Sick. Of snow.