Oganizinig 101

I have been organizing like crazy these last 2 weeks. The studio, the website, the blog...and a little in the house.

I put myself on a schedule a couple of weeks ago and it is working great! I feel more satisfaction at the end of my day now rather than that feeling of never completely accomplishing anything. If I'm going to do everything I say I'm going to do I HAVE to be organized.

When I volunteered at the zoo's wildlife rehab center, we were extremely organized. The entire organization runs on volunteers with only 2 paid employees. The same people are rarely there two days in a row and the place runs like a top.  Lists were the key. There was one for daily, weekly and monthly jobs. I loved it and always intended on getting my home and studio on such a schedule.

This is NOT my nature...or it hasn't been until now. It may be that "age thing" again creeping up on me. Whatever the reason, though, it's working. I'm on a daily/weekly schedule so far...the monthly, I'm working on. I like this feeling of knowing what to do and when to do it. It's not like it used to be when someone else dictated my time or even when I had the gallery open and had to be there when I really had other things I'd like to do. This time it feels right and easy so it must be "meant to be".

So, the blog has some new features now, if you want to take a look. I found that you can add stationary pages (I'm always the last to know these things) so I listed my new services and workshops that will be available in September when we open. Yes, we can safely say we will be ready by then. Finally!

They are listed under the banner at the top. Let me know what you think or if you have suggestions for workshops etc.

Thursday's Thrifty Finds

Besides being wonderful glass globes do you know what these were in their first life?

 This one may give it away...the large ones are street light globes and the smaller ones are from security lights like you would have in your backyard. This one is the outer covering for the small one above. I thought it would look beautiful with a candle inside since it has a hole in the top. Imagine an outside dinner party at dusk. The ribbed glass will probably have a dramatic affect on the flickering light.

This one is hard to see through as well so it may serve well just as a cloche to protect young plants from a late frost...any decorative ideas?

We have the 3rd one on our kitchen table. This wasn't the best time of day for photographing but you can see how beautiful and purposeful they can be in their next life. My chickens are finally protected from accidental beheading by roudy kittens.

Like them? We will have two more large ones and two more small ones in the shop this summer. We are keeping our eyes open for more but so many were destroyed by the utility company when they were taken out of use that they are hard to come by.

Identity Crisis

The title of my post today is in jest but it could be an actual theory if I were to stop and think about it long enough...but I won't do that. Who has time for contemplating these days?

This image of chaos has been evolving for months now and only since my husband suggested to me last night that I "may be having an identity crisis" that I realized it looks like I truly am all over the place these days. My studio looks like an explosion occurred leaving things from one end to the other.

I know the importance of branding and doing that one thing and doing it really well. The experts continue to teach these first steps to success. For over 20 years I've essentially done the "one thing"....floorcloths... and my brand, Free Rein Art and Design, is established. When I look back at my accomplishments they far exceed any first thoughts I ever had about painting rugs. I just wanted to sell enough to afford to stay at home with Erin until she started school. I never knew that before she would be a year old my floorcloths would have been featured in Country Living Magazine or that the year she actually started school we would build a new studio with the profits from my sales.

Now, our daughter is on her own, we have a son in high school and I am about to turn 50. Time flies when you're having fun! I guess it's really going to jet now that I'm having major fun. I almost feel like I should be apologetic that I'm not painting so much anymore. This time I've had to wait for Rick to get his shop built so I can begin working on my store has been a blessing.

I have found that I have unlimited resources from the trailer for being creative and I am thrilled that so much that may have been thrown away will be recycled and re-loved. I am first a designer by nature and degree, and secondly an artist. Below is a couple of boxes I have on my work table this week. They are almost finished and will be available in the shop this fall...possibly in my etsy shop as well if I find more string boxes. On Wednesdays, I will be featuring what I am working on during the week. I'm trying to make myself some sort of schedule so I will post more regularly.

Wooden Cigar Box (from my junk swap partner) decoupaged with selections from vintage 1960's travel brochures.

Inside lid still has original cigar logo

Banjo Strings box sealed with poly with marbles for feet

 Lid and bottom fitted with old sheet music

So, if you have wondered if I still paint, the answer is yes. I have begun accepting commissions again and have work scheduled on my calendar for June. This means a busier summer since now we have to begin working on the store rather than working from it as previously planned. Due to the time constraints I will not be traveling to Wyoming to exhibit this year as I had hoped either but nonetheless I am very excited about what is happening here on the home front.

I hope to in the future continue to design and paint floorcloths, but too I want to be a designer on a daily basis and do more than that "one thing". I think turning 50 does something to us that says it's okay to do it our way and the heck with what the experts say. If I want to design a belt today and an rug tomorrow who's to say that's incongruent and won't work? Not me. I feel like diversity is essential today.

What do you think? Diversity or that one thing? There is no right or wrong, I suppose...just whatever works for you.

Do you remember?

 

I've gone back in time to 2nd grade this morning and have been lost in this 1967 gift catalog. I remember scouring these kinds of catalogs at my grandparents' home on Sunday afternoon visits when I had to stay inside and keep my dress clean....did you do that too?...Sunday afternoon visits to relatives or friends and have to keep your Sunday best on all afternoon?...We only did this for a short time while I was a very little girl. It was torture for me at the time...but fond memories today.

 This one, as you guessed, came out of another box from the trailer. It's a Gold Bond Gift Catalog.

The camping and picnic pages were some of my favorites. Gosh, I'd love to have some of the things on this page! I hope to find them...in the trailer.

 Check out this collage style page...

 These gals could be a modern day girls here in the 21st century.

I honestly hated these styles back in the day but now...well I've changed.

You have to take the good with the bad...

 And, who didn't love the toy pages?

I'm planning to list this on ebay this evening. Not much demand here in Randolph County that I know of, but there are collectors out in the world that may like to have it. Check in about 9 pm eastern by clicking on the ebay button at the top of this page.

In the same box were some Eastern Airline travel brochures. Some from places in NC that I will keep to put in the shop, but these are more special and I will first offer them online through ebay.

 1957 Love the illustrations!

Inside

 Further inside

 Opened up completely

This one doesn't have a date but I assume its about the same time in the 50's.

Destinations Inside

Back side

Do you keep things like this stored away for years in boxes? What are you going to do with them? I wonder what the Hughes family was saving them for...wishes and dreams? I wonder if they bought something from the catalog or went on a nice vacation? I imagine the more I dig around through their belongings I may find some answers.

My Newest Addiction

I have always loved the beautiful scrap booking papers and all the embellishments to go with them...but I don't scrapbook. For years I have wondered what I could do with them and now I've found my solution. These little boxes are so addictive. I made these last Thursday morning in just a couple of hours. If I'd have had more supplies I'd have kept going.

The possibilities are endless with the combination of paint, papers and all sorts of embellishments. The top is faux painted while the bottom is paper covered. This size makes a nice gift box for jewelry and as a keepsake. 

The same combo of paint and paper with velvet ribbon trim.

This one is for dreams and wishes...or anything else you want to keep inside.

 Back view

Top View

 Stay tuned...More to come

A Clock Case No Longer

Today's post is NOT about guitar catalogs! I've almost sold them all thankfully and am moving on to more fun things. Today's post is about the clock case project I've been slowly working on. As you can see in the photo above it's finally finished.

For me, the best projects evolve. I can't usually just walk out to the studio and make something in an afternoon. It has to grow into something. With this clock case, I let it sit out for a month while I worked on other things and when I was out and about either in the trailer or shopping for my usual art supplies or junk...I  kept the box with so much potential in mind. Eventually I started collecting things I liked and then began to put them together until they evolved into a jewelry box.

I am not sure what happened to the photo of my before shot of the clock case...but, just to give you an idea, it was mildewy brown and black with an oxidized alligator skin finish....and smelled musty.

I first put a wash of green blue paint over it and continued with several coats until I liked the intensity. This sealed up the "stink" and was the beginning of the new finish. I love how paint works with old oxidation. The texture is wonderful visually and after a very, very light sanding it's considerably smooth.

For me the solid color was just too much of a good thing so I then gave it a light wash of linen white and let it seep into the grooves to highlight the design in the wood...SO much better.

Since I don't speak French I have no idea what the label is but to me it looks feminine and maybe like a powder box top. I got it from The Graphics Fairy after I had already painted the box. It was an almost perfect match, so that really sealed the deal.  I love how the graphics on the glass door frames it too.

I'm sorry this is horribly out of focus, but I wanted to show you the pull...it is part of an earring and I epoxied it to the door front.

This brooch came from the same estate and just seemed to fit the bill for some added oomph to top.

Inside behind the label is a piece of textured wallpaper I got from my Junk Swap partner a couple of months ago. It was the perfect solution to hide the holes where the clock fittings once were and also to brighten up the background so that you can see inside when it's closed. I am considering putting a tiny light inside for nighttime display. To the sides I've put in 4 coated hooks for necklaces or bracelets.

I removed the shelf supports from the top and moved them to the bottom of the case and added the shelf for the ring posts. They are simply dowels inserted into holes and glued up. I finished the top with nickle studs painted with gold leaf. On the front of the shelf is brown velvet ribbon which is the same trim as on the boxes below.

These were as much fun to make as the jewelry case. They are paper mache covered in paper and sealed with poly. The lids are painted and embellished with jewelry-like stickers for scrap booking or card making. the insides are also lined with paper and velvet for holding small pieces of jewelry or earrings.

 I am working on two smaller coordinating boxes to finish out the space inside the case. Since they have been such a fun project on their own I will be making more to sell individually. 

All in all this fancy froo froo jewelry case not going to hold a ton of jewelry but more likely to hold what someone wears on a day to day basis during the week. The basics. So, it's really intended as a place to put "regulars" away at night and find them quickly the next morning....or it could just be used to display treasures or family heirlooms.

So, did anyone guess correctly a few weeks ago when I showed the supplies? Did you know what it was going to be?

It will be for sale at our first open house sale this summer along with lots of other recycled items I'm trying to save from the landfill. I hope to see you then!

Collecting Vintage Catalogs and Ephemera

I never meant to get into the catalog business. We never know what will come our way do we?

In this trailer I keep referring to are many many boxes and in these boxes are things that haven't seen the light of day in 15 years. Before that many of these things were already packed away in plastic bread bags or old cereal boxes and even wrapped in 60 year old newspapers.

Among these items were catalogs. Quite a lot of music catalogs from the 50's and 60's as these people whom the estate came from were once the owners of a music store. I believe they closed in the early 60's and saved everything they weren't able to sell. They threw nothing away...or should I say...they wasted nothing. I have found myself reusing more of my recyclables as a result.

The first thing I noticed about these great vintage guitar catalogs was the illustration art. I'm a big fan of this style art and learned to draw by copying book and magazine illustrations. Some of these catalogs are genuinely beautiful....but, this is not why they are collected.

People that collect catalogs, I've found, actually are collectors of the items found inside them or have a professional interest. If the actual item is hot, then the catalogs too sell very well.

Buying catalogs is a good way to start your collection or even add to it, whatever your interest may be. If you can't buy the item or don't have anymore room for the actual collectible...look for the catalogs. Some people collect old department store catalogs, Christmas catalogs, car catalogs and almost anything you can imagine. I used to keep my old J. Peterman catalogs for the illustrations and stories. I wish I still had them now.

Good places to find old catalogs are ebay of course, estate sales, and old book sellers, such as AbeBooks.com. 

What do you collect? Are there catalogs? It's something to think about.

Here are a few of the catalogs and brochures we have listed this week on ebay.

...and there's more to come.