Getting ready for craft fair--and spring flower cuffs!

Reminder--tomorrow is the Riverdale Park Arts Festival! Please stop by and see me if you're in the area...it's from 11am to 6pm. I make no guarantees as to the hobo-ness this year though :)

I'm currently packing up for the fair and just finished a new batch of my flower felt cuffs for spring!

Happy spring everyone!

Decoupage frenzy! Baskets, plaques, and boxes

I spent most of the day yesterday working on additional decoupage projects. Here are the ones I finished!

Close ups of some of the pieces...

Small ship tins--I have about 100 of these cute little circle tins lying around so I thought I might as well decoupage a few.

Castle wall art--love the fairy tale look!
 

Ship wall art--I never get tired of this image.

The backs of the nesting ship boxes are painted with a palm tree on a beach.

I'm so excited to be using up a big chunk of my stash of wooden and other boxes, frames, trays, drawers, etc. More coming soon!

What else should I paint on these? Flowers, octopi, leaves, Sean Connery?

Hobo craft fair this weekend! Plus projects in the works...

A quick side note: today is the 226th birthday of John James Audubon...please check out the Audubon Society and what you can do to help birds in your area!

Over the past few weeks, I've been working on a bunch of new items for the upcoming 4th annual Riverdale Park Arts Fest--yup, that's right, this is the craft fair Brie and I refer to as "Hobo Craft Fair" (due to the rain, cold, and our other assorted hoboness from the last time we did it).

It's going to be this Sunday, May 1 from 11am to 6pm and there's food and live music too--and hopefully no rain! Last year I was sick and couldn't make it so I'm excited about attending this Sunday.

The main projects I have in the works right now are my felt flower and leaf cuffs, and more decoupage wall art.

Three of the cuffs here were ones I finished while in New Mexico...the other three are still in progress.

And I have a bunch of the decoupage wall pieces ready to be painted. I draw in the pictures with my favorite Faber-Castell Pitt brush pen...and then they will be colored in, and sealed with another coat of decoupage finish.

On this last piece, I am still deciding what to do with the middle square. My original intention was to draw an anchor in that box, if I can manage to make it look normal. If this was going to be a personalized piece, I'd paint a big colorful letter for the person's first name in that box.

Shopping and inspiration from New Mexico

A few weeks ago I was visiting Albuquerque and had a great time relaxing, visiting birdfriends at the zoo, eating, and of course a bit of shopping! 

We spent an afternoon strolling Canyon Road in Santa Fe and checking out all the cool galleries...my favorites?

• Brigitte Bruggemann's gorgeous flowery abstract paintings at Mill Fine Art
• Jim McLain's turned wood vessels
• Robert Highsmith's photorealist watercolors at Marigold Arts

I also bought these fabulous vintage parrot (I think they are rosellas?) candlesticks at Canyon Road Flowers.

We also stopped in Night & Day, one of my favorite bedding and bath shops--and I could not resist buying this framed bird illustration:
 

 
There were also some luxury custom sheets by Bonjour of Switzerland that I fell in love with, but those will have to wait as they generally run $1000 for a set! 
 

We had a delicious lunch at Bumble Bee (I loooove their quesadillas!) and then took a look through Santa Fe Greenhouses.

Inside they have lots of cool garden stuff and even some kitchen goodies...coasters, dishes, etc.

 

Gardening gloves in every color! 

I don't know why, but seed packets make me happy.

And Vinsy, this photo is for you! Heron legs!!!

Some of my other favorite places in Albuquerque:

Hey Jhonny: a small and exceptionally beautiful shop with fantastic, unique home decor and accessories

Jackalope: a giant warehouse of eclectic furniture, accessories, home and garden decor, pottery, etc.

Flying Star: stop in one of their many locations for delicious baked goods, lunches, or breakfast all day....mmmm.

Hanayagi--The Japanese Garden Shop: awesome Japanese art and other unique finds make this tiny shop well worth the visit!
Bookworks: independent bookstore with a great selection of craft books, funny magnets, and other cool gifts!

New decoupage frames: whales, ships, fishies, castles, and a mutiny

Kate's birthday was this weekend and I wanted to make her something original and cool, so I decoupaged a picture frame with pages from an abridged illustrated version of The Mutiny On Board HMS Bounty. Then I painted a cute little ship in the corner with acrylic paints. Turned out just as I imagined it!

I loved the ship frame so much that I made some other versions.

Here's one on a wall hanging piece instead of a frame--love how it looks with the rope!

And here's one with a whole bunch of stuff painted on it. Yes, I know the text is sideways. It was an accident but I like it!

ArtSpring move and other fun stuff

Today, ArtSpring in Silver Spring is opening in its new space! Very exciting :) I went by last Saturday to bring my new spring items and check out the new store space--it's upstairs above Austin Grill where Ceviche used to be on Ellsworth Drive.

Since the space used to be a resaurant/bar, it's super trendy looking and cool...perfect for displaying funky crafts and homemade items. They were still in the process of getting it ready but I thought it looked awesome! Tons of fantastic stuff to buy--animal notecards, birdie mugs and dishes, cool purses, jewelry, etc. And they have more than 100 of my new items there, including my decoupage minibooks and letter trays, octopus purses, framed map paintings, ribbon placemats and table runners, and more, so go check it out!

The new ArtSpring shop opened at 10am today and I'm going to swing by on  my way to hang with Vinsy this afternoon to check it out...and ok, maybe buy a few things.

The plan for the afternoon is possibly to attempt baking something...possibly more vegan cupcakes? Last time we tried this, we had a near-disaster with an unfortunate baking soda/baking powder mixup but we caught it just in time...and had some delicious cupcakes!

Coming soon...inspiration, birdies, and crafts from my visit to New Mexico last week.

Some spring inspiration

Sounds like a lot of folks are having a tough week, so I thought I'd post some happy/inspiring spring pictures. I took a walk around my neighborhood this afternoon and it was so darn pretty out!

is that broccoli growing out of the planter?

blue jay in the tree!

In progress: new flower cuffs for spring

After making the felt leaf cuff bracelets, I decided I wanted to do more of them, but with a springlike theme.  Here are a few of my felt flower cuffs in progress...

I probably will have to get some more ribbon (as if I didn't have 1000 spools already) because the kinds I currently have didn't really suit the cuffs. I do have some yellow grosgrain ribbon with daisies that I'm going to use for the one on the right.

If these come out cute, I want to do some purple and pink ones next!