Hugs and Hershey's

Oh the excitement!  There I was, about to sit down to my lunch today, when the doorbell rang.  Who could that be?  The postlady... with this:

A Small White Box... from U.S.A.

It had the sender's name on the other side, a certain nice blog friend... What could be inside?

 

Yummy! Sweeties! And American Sweeties at that.  We don't have these here (or not in my little provincial County Town anyway). 

Also This - she even remembered my response to a post with a recipe for Cornbread, where I said I'd often wondered what it was like and would like to try some.  My very own Cornmeal; and a beautifully written recipe so I can try it for myself. 

How Exciting!! So beautifully packaged too, with ribbons and pretty labels.  How lucky am I? 

I had to have a Tasting Session:

Oooh... quite sharp and rather Hot flavoured! Wasn't expecting that - I thought they were Sweeties... but actually they're quite nice, once you get over the shock. 

Six different wrappers... I wonder if there are six different kinds? 

This one was white chocolate and very creamy - nom, nom, nom... sticky...

And these are very sweet, slightly rough in texture and you have to suck them lots!  Nice...

So, resisting the temptation to scoff the lot all at once, I put the packets back together, so I could show them to DS when he comes in from school.  No doubt, he'll be willing to sample some himself.  I wonder what he will think of these?

And I must say a huge Thank You to Deb! 

Thank you Deb, you really do Rock!

Aftermath...

Dear Readers,  when we last heard from our heroine, she had suffered a bit of a disaster:

What used to be the shelves in my Studio...

Having removed the remaining shelf fittings and picked up the stuff that was thrown onto the floor, we had been left with this:

A load of stuff all over the desk and a precarious work table and "supporting" metal strips...

... piles of stuff all over the floor...

... boxes piled up in the hallway and shelf-boards leaning on the bookcase.

That was Sunday. 

* * *

Thursday

Yesterday afternoon I started work to clear and re-arrange the studio, so we could replace the lost shelving and put all the stuff away properly.  I carried on today and  DH helped me to take down the work table, that was clipped to the metal rails on the wall.  We took the bent and useless metal bits down too.

This is what it now looks like:

Sigh...

Sigh again.... I'm trying to "Keep Calm", but I must admit that "Eat Cake" is the best advice I've had all week...

I have taken the stuff off the three remaining wall shelves, so I could re-arrange them, to hold the more important stuff.  However, they are not supported by a bracket at the wall end.  So, the far end of each shelf is not properly supported - we need to put another support up in the corner.  I can only put very light things on the corner end of the shelves and not-very-heavy stuff everywhere else.  

Sigh...

Some progress has been made - but not very obvious.  I have measured and thought, consulted with DH and decided to buy an 80cm wide bookcase from Ikea, which I will put in the gap at the end of my desk, where my worktable was.  See the white drawer unit in the photo? The bookcase will go behind that, against the wall.  It is 28cm deep and the drawers (and worktable top) are 60cm deep.  

Still with me?  Hmm... So.... I can buy another white drawer unit too, plus a tall 20cm wide cd/dvd unit, to match the bookcase, which will make the whole bookcase-wall-thing 100cm - same width as the worktable.  I can use the drawer units to support the table top, making a pedestal desk (yay!). 

If it is placed right in front of the bookcase, the whole thing will be 88cm deep, meaning it will stand out 8cm (about 3.5")  from the edge of the big desk; but as it's by the window, we think that will work ok.  I won't be able to alter the height of my table any more - but then, I never did do that anyway... and the part of the bookcase behind the drawers will be difficult to access (the dvd shelves will be totally buried), but I'll still have 125 x 100 cm of shelves to use for storage, plus a work table again (and another set of drawers - yay!).

Hmm.... So that's all very nice... But we still have the problem of the Studio Needing to be Tidied Up First.

These are two of my current Bookbinding projects...

and this is my desk, where I'm supposed to be making the books...  Sigh...

...and the rest of the room, that I'm trying to tidy up...

bigger sigh...

So, overall, I am feeling rather overwhelmed by all the mess, clutter and confusion.  I have filled half a rubbish bag and most of a recycling bag, yet hardly seem to have made any difference.  There is just stuff Everywhere.  I was trying to "put away" the things on my desk, only there is no "Away" just now.  I want to clear the messy side of the room, so I have a large and clear patch of floor - where we can build a new bookcase, then put the boxes of stuff while I re-organise the room...

It got to the point where I couldn't do any more.  I just don't seem to be able to work out where to start or what to do.  

The stuff that fell down from the wall didn't bury me - yet I somehow feel that, really, it did...

Disaster!

We spent the weekend away at a family party - more soon, when I've gone through the photos.

So we drove home this afternoon and didn't plan on doing much for the rest of the day, except relaxing.  The Boys had a model-painting project on the go, followed by a networked computer gaming session. 

I settled down happily in my studio, with some nice new covering paper, cutting pages and boards for a new book.  I had  finished the pages and interleaves for a photo album and reached up to put the art bag containing the rest of the tissue and interleaving papers back onto its shelf. 

Disaster struck! 

The shelves in my studio came away from the wall.  Everything cascaded down on top of me (and Sherlock), tipping me into a heap in the middle of it all!  DH and DS had to come running to help us - DS rescued the poor, frightened cat and DH rescued his poor, frightened wife!

It was all a huge jumble of fallen boxes and packs of paper, books, trays of bits & pieces, board games from the top shelf, shelving boards etc etc. 

Added to the mess was the anxiety that the wall brackets would break, landing those metal shelves on top of us.  We had to very gingerly clear up whatever we could, moving it all out of the room and stacking shelf boards in the hallway.  Then DH helped me to take down the brackets from the bent and twisted metal supports.  Once we had done this, he carefully removed all three metal shelves and took those away too.  

My poor Studio, that I was so proud of!  It's a terrible mess... Piles of stuff all over the desk top and under the desk, all over the floor...

There were some boxes already on the floor along this side, waiting to be tidied up and for their contents to be put on the shelves (!).  Now they are just part of a large and general jumble. 

In the centre there, topped by a sheet of blue mulberry paper, are the pages and sheet of covering paper for my new photo album project.  The lovely paper has two big holes, where corners of shelf boards speared it!  Yet, in spite of the chaos, the damage to this project was minimal and it looks as if I'll be able to make it after all  - some time! 

Everything else has had to be moved into the upstairs hallway, or our bedroom.  I have managed to relocate my paper stocks to the bottom of my wardrobe, although the cover-bags are just a little bit too deep and the doors don't shut properly.  It's going to have to do for now, until we can sort out what to do next.

I have had to clear the desk by the window; it's my "clever" desk, with adjustable legs - legs that clip to the metal shelving strips that are (were) screwed to the wall.  It will need to be taken apart now, so the metal strips can be taken down completely.

My laptop computer was on the desk when everything fell. I am so lucky it wasn't damaged at all.  In fact, so far, apart from the wrecked shelving and a few dented boxes (one full of sock-pet making stuff, that I fell on and squashed!), hardly anything was damaged or broken.  The paper I was about to use for the photo album cover has two holes - but I think the sheet can still be used for something, as the holes are at the edges.  A little ceramic pot I used to hold "bits" was smashed and I threw it out, the handle of a paint-brush mug was broken and a lot of little shreds of paper and bits of cotton, bookbinding thread and stuff were scattered over the floor - should have tidied them up before anyway! 

No-one was injured, though the cat was very frightened and had to be lifted out from under the pile of stuff (unsquashed though, so he was lucky). He recovered well, after a lot of kind attention from J.  I was badly shaken up and needed a stiff cuppa and a chocolate, along with a sit-down, before my knees would stop wobbling and my hands shaking.  Other than that, it's just a matter of injured pride and disappointment. 

I will need to have another think about the storage situation in my studio. Meanwhile, that pile of stuff that I've been "going to" tidy up, will have to be tidied, so I can make a much neater pile of storage boxes, containing all my equipment, scrapping supplies etc, that used to be on the shelves. 

This is obviously my own fault. The shelves must have been overloaded and me dropping a bag of paper on top of the pile was just one thing too much - that tiny bit of force needed to pull it all away from the wall. We had put the supports up carefully and used good, long screws. I think there was just far too much weight overall, pulling constantly at those metal strips. At least I wasn't sitting down when it fell, or I would have been injured by the falling shelf-boards.


Obviously wall-mounted shelving is not the solution to every storage issue! Overloading shelves is dangerous and foolish (duh!!) and I won't make that mistake again.  I was in J's room after this, checking what is on his wall shelves - nothing nearly as heavy as the things I had dumped on mine!

So, I have stopped shaking and am having an early night (8pm, sitting in bed!).  Tomorrow is Monday - jobs day - so I will have to leave things as they are.  Tuesday will have to be the start of the Big Tidy Up!

As if I had nothing else to do, eh?

Peacocks, Posies, Cards and Cats!

Update!

Just to complete the story of the Peacock Wedding Album, I posted it yesterday, in a special presentation/storage box:

I had a large, plain white box with acetate lid, which I covered with deep blue mulberry paper. 

The inside dimensions of the box were a tiny bit larger than the book - quite handy really, as I was able to add some extra support and protection for the book, by covering cork strips with mulberry tissue, fixing them round the inside of the box and covering them at the same time as the rest of the box, so it was all "fitted" and matching inside. 

I wrapped the book in blue tissue, added a bit of decoration and put the lid on (acetate does not photograph well, so I haven't bothered with that picture!).

Then I wrapped the whole thing in my shop colours - white tissue, wine-red ribbon - packed it in a pizza box, took it to the post office and sent it off to its new home.  I'm waiting to hear that it arrived safely and what the customer thinks of it!

* * *

Things I Also Made:

Inspired by a recent post from the fabulous Alexa, I made this "home made scrapbook paper":

A hand stamped and coloured page border.

This was so simple to do. I cut a sheet of plain white paper to 10" square, then attached it to a sheet of smooth white cardstock, using re-positionable adhesive (note, the "repositionable" adhesive rollers don't always come off cleanly - there are now little sticky bits on my cardstock!! I would recommend the spray adhesive available for craft projects, even though it's more expensive).

I then used an assortment of stamps, with a waterproof black ink pad (like Stazon etc), to stamp a selection of designs around the edge of the paper, letting it overlap onto the scrap paper in the middle. Once it was finished, I peeled away the scrap paper, to leave the stamped border. I didn't worry too much if the stamps overlapped each other, as I wanted the design to fill the edge nicely.

I coloured the stamped outlines with watercolour pencils, then used a small brush and a little water, to blend the colours together. As I coloured, I decided which of any overlapping images would be the "top" picture, then coloured the overlap in those colours, letting the "underneath" image remain just an outline.

Closeup view of a corner.

It really worked very well and I'm so pleased with the result.  Thanks to Alexa for her great tips.  If you haven't been to view her post, I suggest you do - she took this one stage further and hand-doodled on her page as well.  It looked stunning!

* * *

It's my MIL's 70th birthday tomorrow and we're off to her party.  I made her a birthday card:

It's A4 (Letter) sized, the papers are from the "Bella Belleza" collection by Bella Blvd - one of my favourites (I may cry when I finally run out of this paper!). 

I cut the paper to size and left a tab, that I creased and folded round the back of the A4 card that I used as a base.  Once I had finished assembling everything, I stuck the decorated paper to the card and fastened the tab round the back - the card is nice and stable and it looks as if the whole thing is made from this pink scrapbook paper (which wasn't big enough for a whole A4 card, since that would need a piece of card 42cm wide and 30cm high).

  

I used a craft knife to cut round parts of the flowers and butterflies on the patterned paper, then lifted the petals/ wings up and curled them slightly.  I used Stickles to decorate them and give them some sparkle.

  

I attached fabric flowers at the top and bottom corners, using a selection of brads, then added a bit more interest with Stickles.

My DH is happy with this and I think it's rather pretty.  MIL will like it, as she loves butterflies!

* * *

Speaking of Card Making and Crafting, a new UK magazine came out yesterday, from Practical Publishing.  It's called "Simply Homemade" and is aimed at people (women really I suppose!), who like making stuff.

DH has just come home and given me Issue 1, which I'm about to read voraciously from cover to cover!  It looks great and came with a free set of clear stamps, called "Molly Blooms, designed by Clare" - they are so cute! Also there is a great booklet of papers for crafting, on the theme of family and home. The designs are in browns, golden and blues, on a "cross stitch" theme. These also look fab!

There are articles on cooking, knitting, handcrafts, homeware, papercrafts, making things from fabric and felt, soap making, stencilling... There is also going to be a regular feature page, called "Found On...", which will showcase online sellers.  This month's features four shops on Folksy.com (a UK-based online marketing site, similar to Etsy).  They all offer lovely items crafted from fabrics or yarn and I will be hopping over there some time very soon, to see what these shops have to offer.  Next month, they will feature shops from Etsy.  Guess which Blogger You Know Well is having her Etsy Shop featured? Can't guess? You will have to wait til March to find out!  (Here's a clue, I'm very excited about this!).

* * *

And Finally....

DS learned on Wednesday, that not all cats like cuddles:

He always hugs Sherlock when he's going out, but my niece's cat wasn't too happy about this form of "Goodbye".  She swung a paw in panic and her claw caught his right eyelid and the outer corner of his eye (luckily it was no further across!).  He has developed a lovely "shiner"!

Sold to the Lady in the Wedding Dress! Peacock Wedding Guest Album

I have been working hard on a great project, for an Etsy customer.  A lady called Sylvia contacted me, to ask if I could make a special Wedding Guest Album for her.  Her theme was Peacocks  (in a traditional style, rather than too blingy), with a colour scheme of dark blue, browns and touches of gold/copper colours. 

I sent her a picture of some Peacock paper that I had:

This was a reproduction of a Chinese wallpaper from a National Trust property in the UK. 

Sylvia loved this paper and we came up with a design for her book, using her ideas and mine combined.  She wants her guests to write their messages on some blue luggage-tag style tags that she is making.  She thought it would be lovely to have an album where she could store these after the wedding. 

I sent her a little "Samples Book", to show what she could select from for the pages, covering materials, interleaves, stitching and thread, eyelets on the covers etc.  There were samples of paper and card for pages, covering materials and silk pieces in various "peacock" colours. 

 

After some discussion, we settled on a design with large, stiff card pages, to which she will attach brown kraft paper envelopes, to hold the tags. She wanted an oriental stab-stitch binding, so I included this on the sample book, to show what it would be like, along with a sample of silk bookcloth, that she could have as an edging for the covers. 

She liked the golden linen binding thread and navy silk edging so much, that she decided to have these for the "real" book.  We agreed that the back cover would be brown kraft paper (as she liked the back cover of my sample book - which I only did because I didn't have enough spare cover paper!)  She chose interleaves of a strong, but fine Japanese mulberry tissue and we agreed that there should be an interleaf between the last page and the back cover, as the kraft paper was not guaranteed acid-free/archival quality.  This should provide some protection for anything on the back page, though I think it would take a very long time for any damage to occur.

Work In Progress:

Back Cover - brown kraft paper and blue silk bookcloth

Pages of 300gsm Ocean Blue card; spacers of card and book board, page wraps of peacock paper.

All are cut, creased and punched, ready for assembly and binding.

The front cover, with hinge and decorative navy tussah silk panel. 

The Japanese Stab Stitch binding in progress. 

The finished stab-stitch binding in golden yellow linen.  You can see the section wraps, of peacock paper, to match the front cover.  Each section consists of two card pages, two mulberry tissue interleaves, wrapped round card spacers for strength and a book-board spacer, to allow for the extra bulk of the tags being added to the album. 

Detail of the binding and tussah silk edging. 

The back cover, with silk edging and linen stab-stitch binding.

 

Views of the inside of the album, showing the covers, the blue card pages and interleaves. 

The finished Peacock Wedding Album!

It measures 12" x 12", with a useable page area inside of 11.75" x 10".  There are 12 pages of 300gsm Canford card, with Japanese Bib-Tengu mulberry tissue interleaves.  The front cover is a peacock design paper, reproduced from a Chinese wallpaper at Erdigg, a UK National Trust property.  The section wraps are of the same peacock design paper.  The binding is a Japanese-style stab-stitch binding, with a hinged, two-part cover, over navy tussah-silk hand-lined bookcloth decorative edges.  

I contacted the customer today, to tell her the book is completed and will be on its way to her very soon. She's really excited about this - and to tell the truth, so am I!