Pendents and cabinets

I'v been a busy little bee in all sorts of arenas lately so here are some more finished projects! I'm always so happy when I can talk about finished pieces because I have so many (ahem) unfinished ones floating around. I have to work very hard at not feeling guilty about that (a wasted stupid emotion) and instead let each piece progress and grow at its own pace. Or something. I just wish some pieces (and you know who you are!) wouldn't take years to incubate. [see how I did that? its not my fault I have a bejillion projects underway]

Here's the latest in my cigar box cabinets. Note the beautiful woods used on the boxes. Gosh, they sure are pretty. No cigar box labels for these lovelies! The logos are simply burned or imprinted into the wood and stained. Notice the dove tailing on the edges? So nice.

This time I used very small and demure knobs to help me grasp each box and pull it out from its shelf. You hardly even notice them, huh?


And here's a picture of all of the cabinets I've made so far nestled all up together all snug and friendly in my studio. They look happy I think.

Should I make some more? I do have a few more boxes. Well, we'll see.











But as I mentioned in the last post, this past week has been all about domino pendents. Yesterday I finished 8 more. Fiona, my daughter, ran off with one of them, so here are the remaining 7.

This batch turned out better than the first two as far as the surface sealer was concerned. I don't know what I did differently but the sealer dried crystal clear and was perfect. I used a mixture of different images: another Frida Kahlo portrait, 3 Tarot cards from the Major Arcana, 2 screen shots from Pocket Frogs (my current fav iPhone game) and even a close up from one of my quilts.

And now I truly do have the whole process ironed out and the whole thing is a breeze to complete.

Cigar Box Cabinets--Done!

Big sigh--don't you think every weekend should be 3 days? I sure do! Two days for chores and necessaries and one day for glorious crafting and nothing but crafting.

Here's what I got done: 2 cigar box cabinets (OK, I started the first one a couple of weeks ago, but still). And I packed them full of craft supplies instantly. Clearly I need to make more--so I have 2 more planned/in the works.

Thanks to ebay, I bought 2 lots of vintage cigar box labels and used those to decorate the sides of the cabinets (I just thought they looked a little plain). I used Mod Podge (remember decoupaged purses from the 70's??) and, man, that stuff is awesome!

Somehow, I missed out on the whole decoupage craze back then (not sure how, I tried everything else!). I tried both the matte and gloss and definitely liked the gloss the best. It made a nice finish on the surface of the wood I was using and, duh, adhered the labels down and then sealed them beautifully. I just had to be careful for air bubbles forming in the center of the larger ones. But I managed.

The nice thing about the labels is that they are embossed so there's a great textural element too, when you look closely.

I'm also exploring another Mod Podge product: Dimensional Mod Podge. The jury is still out--I'll post when the projects are complete. I have some high hopes. If it works like I hope it does, more fridge magnets and a bunch of new pendents are in my immediate future. Or, shall I say, my etsy store's future. :)