Succulent Garden

26 Thursday Jan 2017

Posted by Julia Monroe in DIY, gardening, home decor, nature, On my Worktable, tutorial

Tags

DIY, gardening, home decor, indoor gardening, succulents

I made my first succulent garden! My mom gave me some of the succulents so long ago that they were starting to root into the paper towel on the plate. I got most of the others from Homewood Nursery. 1-succulent-arrangement-materials

The platter is actually a big, heavy plant saucer, 14″ in diameter. Since it was so shallow, I decided to build a little stone wall in order to build up the soil. The stones used for the wall were all gathered from my back yard. Since the edge of the saucer was curved, I had to hot-glue the stones to keep them from sliding in to the center of the plate. It only took a small amount of glue to hold them together. I planned on using a cement filler between the stones but ended up not using it. 2-succulent-arrangement-stone-wall

Since the saucer has no drainage, I covered the bottom with more stones. 3-succulent-arrangement-stone-drainage

A layer of bonsai soil was spread over the stones. Not shown is a very thin scattering of charcoal to help with drainage.
4-succulent-arrangement-layer-of-bonsai-soil
A thicker layer of cactus/succulent soil was placed on top, with a little more bonsai soil mixed in. I also arranged and glued more rocks to make another wall on top of the soil, then built up more soil inside to give the arrangement height. 5-succulent-arrangement-layer-of-cactus-succulent-soil

Not all the succulents got used. 6-succulent-arrangement-planting-finished
I’m so happy with how this turned out since it the first time I planted succulents. 7-succulent-arrangement
8-succulent-arrangement

9-succulent-arrangement

10-succulent-arrangement

11-succulent-arrangement

12-succulent-arrangement

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16-succulent-arrangement I got a container of “vase filler” from Target and sorted through to pull out all the black stones and light stones. The black stones were used on and near the elevated area in the center of the arrangement. The light stones were used everywhere else. 17-succulent-arrangement

This dish is beautiful but I weighed it and it’s very heavy… 22 lbs! Wow! It’s definitely not a casual arrangement I will be moving often. But today, I’m really enjoying it on my dining room table. 18-succulent-arrangement

Sweet & Sparkling Specialty Sugars for tea and coffee and sprinkling

31 Saturday Dec 2016

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, allsparkledup, baking, cooking, crafts, DIY, food, recipe, sparkling, tea time, tutorial, Uncategorized

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Tags

allsparkledup, crafts, DIY, food

So happy she loved the gift I made for her! Specialty Sugars for her tea and coffee and sprinkling on toast, cereal or anything else that needs a little sweet sparkle.

Delicious and beautiful flavored sugars in jars.

I bought the decorative knobs and glass jars at Hobby Lobby. It was easy drilling a hole in the corks, using a hack saw to shorten the knob bolt and gluing them together with a few beads.

~ Lavender Sugar ~
I ground up culinary lavender with a mortar and pestle, then put the lavender and sugar in a food processor. The lavender sugar was then layered with crystal sugar in the jar.

2-specialty-sugars-spice-sugar-and-lavender-sugar

~ Lemon Orange Sugar ~
Lemon and Orange zest were placed in a food processor with sugar and ground medium fine. I’ve been making this mixture for years for use in cheesecake because it makes a very fine textured cheesecake. To fill the jar, I spooned in a layer of Lemon Orange Sugar then used tongs to place white sugar cubes against the side of the jar. Then I spooned in more sugar and repeated the layers. Next time I’ll add more orange zest for a darker orange colored sugar.

~ Vanilla Bean Sugar ~
I scraped the seeds from two vanilla beans and ground the seeds with sugar in a food processor. I used one half of each vanilla bean, split lengthwise, to place in the jar. I spooned in about 1″ of Vanilla Sugar in the bottom of the jar. Then I used tongs and a wood skewer to position each vanilla bean against the side of the jar before adding the rest of the Vanilla Sugar.

~ Pumpkin Spice Sugar ~
This recipe is something one of my sons and I made up, based on the spice ratio I use in my Pumpkin Pies. We keep this sugar blend on hand to make Pumpkin Spice Lattes, which everyone knows don’t have any pumpkin in them anyway. haha. Still, the flavor is very close to my pumpkin pies, sans pumpkin. To fill this jar, I used a small spoon and a tiny funnel I made from two straws. I can’t explain how I did the design but if you look up “sand art in a bottle” on youtube, you’ll get the idea. The white layer is Vanilla Bean Sugar. The dark brown “spots” in the white layer are pieces of cinnamon stick. I wanted to position the cinnamon stick pieces to look like hearts but the white sugar kept filling in the spaces so it didn’t work out.

“Necessity is the mother of invention,” it is said. So true. I couldn’t access my precut wood pieces or run a saw so I ended up using the only wood on hand, a 30 year old piece of Sassafrass root from my parents property. It’s been in my tea collection for decades and still has a beautiful scent. I used a small craft saw to cut thin slices of the wood to make the tags. I wrote on them with permanent marker. Now I wonder if I had wood-burned the words in… could the slice of sassafrass be steeped in boiling water to flavor tea? What fun that would be! I’ll have to try it out.

For each of the flavored sugars, I used one cup of granulated sugar plus the flavoring agent. That was plenty to fill the jar, with a little left over.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas! We sure had a jolly time.

The Snow and Crystal Tree and Tendril Snowflakes

20 Wednesday Jan 2016

Posted by Julia Monroe in allsparkledup, Christmas, crafts, DIY, home decor, projects, sparkling

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Christmas, Christmas decorating, DIY, home decor, nature crafts, snowflakes, tree, tutorial

I put away all the Christmas decorations except for one – the Snow and Crystal Tree. The corner will be too empty if I put it away and I love the wintery look of it. The snowflakes remind me of scribbles. Scribble Snowflakes!

Snow and Crystal Tree, with vintage chandelier crystals and snowflakes made from dried vine tendrils.

The tree is a dried branch cut from a tree in the woods behind our house. I stuck it firmly into Styrofoam in an urn and laid moss around the base.
The crystals are from the old chandelier that used to hang in my parents’ dining room when I was a child. I loved that chandelier so I’m thrilled to have some of the crystals from it.
The snowflakes are made of natural tendrils and curls that I collected from the vines in the backyard in the fall. My granddaughter helped me look for the curly tendrils and we really enjoyed our time together outdoors.

Dried vine snowflakes, little 1″ glass ball ornaments and vintage chandelier crystals.

To make the snowflakes, I broke off the dry twigs and slid the curly tendrils off. Here is a photo I posted on instagram of the twig bits with the tendrils removed.

The tendrils were gently twisted and pulled off the broken twigs.

Each snowflake needed six similar pieces so I grouped the tendrils by size.

Once I had six similar tendrils, I trimmed the ends so they were the same length.

For each snowflake, I made a contoured mat out of foil for gluing. A small bead was glued temporarily on the back of the foil so it would create a small mound on the right side.

The foil is gently pressed down around the bead to create a little mound.

On the right side of the foil, on top of the tiny mound, I glued a small bead for the center of the snowflake. All the tendrils will then be glued to this bead using hot glue.

The tendrils were arranged around the center bead in a pleasing manner.

The two straightest tendrils were glued on first, opposite each other, to create the line of symmetry.

The other tendrils were glued on the sides and the hot glue was allowed to harden.

To remove the delicate snowflake, the foil was folded and pinched together under the snowflake. Then the snowflake was gently popped off the foil. One of the snowflakes stuck too much so I used tweezers to pull the foil off and reglue the tendrils that had loosened.

The snowflakes were hung with thin hooks I made from jewelry wire.

The vintage crystals look lovely on the tree.

Vintage hand-cut crystals adorn the tree.

At the base of the urn is a gilded tea cup filled with little glass ball ornaments.

The beautiful earthy and neutral color ornaments were from Terrain. The tea cup is from Anthropologie.

Snow and Crystal Tree, with vintage chandelier crystals, glass balls in neutral shades and snowflakes made from dried vine tendrils.

The little fox ornament I got several years ago finally found a home… at the base of the Snow and Crystal tree.

A furry, little red fox ornament sits at the base of the Snow and Crystal Tree.

I don’t know what to put in the corner when this tree comes down.. probably a lamp. But then again, perhaps I’ll make a Snowy Valentine tree…

Pencil Rolls and Coloring Pages

04 Monday Jan 2016

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, art, Christmas, color, crafts, DIY, fabric, On my Worktable, photography, projects, Spoonflower, tutorial

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colored pencils, coloring, coloring books, DIY, fabric, pencil roll, photography, sewing, Spoonflower, tutorial

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year’s. We did!

I made the girls Pencil Rolls and custom coloring pages for Christmas. They loved the sets.

Colored Pencil Roll

Pencil roll with special coloring pages

I used Julie 1971 fabric from Spoonflower.

Julie 1971, a fabric featuring houses made of felt, is available on Spoonflower.

The inspiration for Julie 1971 is a piece of artwork I made when I was 12 years old, in 1971. I made the little felt houses from bits of felt and glued them to the back of a piece of laundry detergent box cardboard.

The pencil roll was very easy to make. The lining, pocket and flap are linen, the decorative cover wrap is cotton canvas.

Felt Houses

Even after all these years, the cardboard is still in great shape.

The back of the Felt Houses artwork is cardboard cut from a box of All laundry detergent.

My father cut the picture frame from a single piece of wood. The Felt Houses art hangs in our guest room.

The original artwork is still vibrant and prints beautifully on canvas and linen fabrics from Spoonflower. Here you can see the original art next to canvas, which I have aged a little by machine washing it in warm water.

The pencil roll open, with flap folded over to protect pencil tips and keep the pencils from spilling out during transport.

Outer cover – made of a piece of decorative Julie 1971 fabric 17″ x 8.5″, sewed to a piece of linen 17″ x 4.5″ for the flap, to make a rectangle 17″ x 12.5″.

The outside of the pencil roll, with the flap open.

The outside of the finished pencil roll, with the flap open.

Lining – made of linen cut to 17″ x 12.5″.
Pencil pocket – two pieces of linen 17″ x 4″.

The cover piece with flap was sewn to the lining piece, right sides together, with a small opening for turning at the bottom. This cover piece was turned right side out and pressed flat.

The pencil pocket was made by stitching the two 17″ x 4″ pieces of linen together with a small opening for turning at the bottom. This piece was turned right side out and pressed flat.

The pocket piece was sewn to the bottom of the cover piece. Here you can see how simple the pocket is attached to the cover piece.

The pocket piece was stitched inside the cover piece at the sides and along the bottom.

To figure out where to stitch for the pencil pockets, I simply stuck pieces of masking tape vertically, all across the pocket piece, with a little margin between each piece of tape, and stitched between the pieces of masking tape. Several of the pockets weren’t exactly the same size but that was fine. That method of marking for the pockets was super easy and didn’t need any measuring or marking the fabric at all.

To keep the roll shut, I used what I had on hand – stretchy beading elastic tied in a loop.

For each girl, I made a custom set of pictures to color. I used Photoshop to alter photographs and printed the coloring pages on cardstock.

Some of the coloring pages I gave to the girls.

Boxes for pencils are nice, but there is another layer of artsy satisfaction when you unfurl a roll of creamy pencils tucked in soft linen.

Coloring with pencils

Here are two free coloring pages for you keep and print out.

Free coloring page – Do what is Beautiful and Never Give Up

Girl with Flowers in her Hair – a free coloring page for you.

Enjoy!

Latte Magnets for the Water Counter

24 Friday Jul 2015

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, crafts, DIY, On my Worktable, projects, tutorial

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crafts, DIY, health, magnets, refrigerator art, tutorial, water

“Did you drink anything today?”
“Yes… I think I did… I had a cup of coffee… maybe two…”
“Any water?”
One of my sons is keen on proper water consumption and I really appreciate his healthy diligence.

I keep a Water Counter on the refrigerator. You can check out the tutorial here.

To help curb my coffee intake, I made two Latte Magnets. From now on, it’s two cups of coffee a day max. Coffee is no substitute for water. In fact, caffeine actually dehydrates you and flushes fluid. So for each cup of coffee you drink, drink one or more cups of water to stay hydrated.

The magnets were first coated with gold acrylic paint.

The magnets are painted with gold acrylic paint.

Here you can see the finished magnets, as well as my test painting right on the tray.

For the test, I made a puddle of gold acrylic paint on the paint tray. Immediately after that, while the paint was wet, I used the tip of a toothpick to lightly dab on blobs of white gesso. The gesso was carefully dabbed on top of the wet gold paint, not mixed in. Then I used a toothpick to draw through the gesso and gold paint to make the design. The test worked great so I did the same thing on the magnets and let them dry overnight.

To make the design, I dabbed on two small blobs of white right next to each other for the heart and long thin “smilies” under, for the leaves. It only took one sweep of the toothpick down through the center to make the design.

White gesso is dabbed on a puddle of gold acrylic paint. A toothpick dragged down through the center of the wet paint creates the cute Latte design.

Little Latte Magnets.

Now when the water counter on the refrigerator just has two cups of coffee in it… that means drink more water!

Plastic wine glass Water Counter on my refrigerator with water, juice/wine and Latte Magnets. Today it’s one glass of juice, one cup of coffee and two glasses of water… need more water.

Angel Curtain Treatment

12 Friday Dec 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, Christmas, DIY, holiday, home decor, lighting, sunlight, tutorial, Uncategorized

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Tags

angel, Angel Window Treatment, Christmas, Christmas window, curtain treatment, curtains, DIY, home decor, tutorial, window treatment

All I wanted was a little more light in the dining room so I gathered up the curtain in one hand and pulled it up and discovered … an Angel Curtain Treatment!

Angel Curtain Treatment

[Please excuse my unwashed window. We’ve pared back on a lot of things since my surgery. ;) ]

Normally, the sheer curtain just hangs over a tension rod stuck in the window frame. I don’t hang the curtain full length as normal, using the rod through the curtain sleeve, but rather just drape the floor-length panel over the tension rod so the pretty embroidered bottom edge hangs about halfway up the window as seen in this fall photo.
I also like the double thickness of the sheer when I hang the curtain like that.

To make the angel curtain treatment, all you need are two S hooks with lengths of ribbon tied on and whatever decoration you want to use for the top of the “angel head.” That’s it! One end of the ribbon is shorter than the other when tied, as you can see here.

I made two S hooks from an old hanger, making sure they would fit over the tension curtain rod. I like using the inner stiffening layer from men’s ties as ribbon. (You can see what else I used the tie pieces for here.) In this tutorial, I will call the wool tie interlining pieces “ribbons” for clarity.

The curtain is very light and airy and you can see how long it is here. I’m not sure this treatment would work as easily with a heavier curtain. Also, the top of the curtain will actually be the bottom of the angel’s dress. So the back of the curtain’s hemmed sleeve must look good.

To begin making the angel, the S hooks with ribbons were hung near the center of the rod.

The two shorter ends of the ribbons were tied loosely across the middle, wrapped several times to make the ends hang at the sides of the “angel head.” I didn’t have to tie any knots because the rough tie fabric held position easily when wrapped around several times. But if your ribbon is slick, like satin, you will have to pin it together to make it stay.

Here I’m lightly gathering the curtain in one hand, a little above the embroidered edge. I adjusted the curtain length over the rod and made sure the embroidered edge was arranged with pretty folds as I gathered it together.

Once the curtain was gathered together in my hand, I raised it up.

Again, I adjusted the folds to adjust the bottom of the curtain.

Once the curtain was held up, I looped the long left ribbon under and around the bundle of gathered curtain.

The two long long lengths of ribbon tie were tied together under the gathered bundle.

I fine tuned the embroidered curtain edge, pulling it down a bit to make it longer.

Here you can see the curtain sleeve from the top of the curtain now hanging at the bottom of the angel’s dress.

To finish the angel, I simply tucked a small halo of gold star holiday wire and a Christmas package decoration on top of the ribbon tie.

The finished Angel Curtain Treatment

An angel spreads her wings of sheer batiste. She disappears at night when I let the curtain down and the window sill lights shimmer through like stars.

To make this window treatment took less than 5 minutes. Seriously, it took longer to rummage through my old ribbon box to find the package decoration! To take it down, simply untie the ribbon from behind the curtain and remove the S hooks. Super simple.

And Thank You, Brenda, for your husband’s ties. This project finished up the linings I had from the first batch of ties. Your bag of ties will be plenty for new projects!

Sugar Bonnets

02 Tuesday Sep 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in cake decorating, candy, crafts, food, recipe, tea time, tutorial, Uncategorized

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Tags

cake decorations, DIY, food, pressed sugar, recipe, sugar, Sugar Bonnet, Sugar Bonnets, sugar cubes, sugar decorations, Sugar Hats, sweets, tea time, tutorial

Sugar Bonnets, made with just sugar and water and a tiny bit of food color for the decoration. Each one is about 1 teaspoon of sugar.

I’ve been making these Sugar Bonnets for many years and used to sell them to a local tea room. Now I just make them to keep on hand for guests. They can be used for cake decorations but I just use them as sugar cubes to sweeten tea. Recently I made a batch for a Dessert Tea.

The Dessert Tea was so much fun! The tablescape was actually my entry for a Dessert Tablescape Contest by Rosanna Inc, which I will post about soon. Every year Rosanna has a terrific tablescape contest and the entries are beautiful. I seriously adore Rosanna’s style and look forward to seeing the entries every year. This is the first time I’ve entered and I’ll definitely be doing this again.

Oh my goodness, I had so much fun setting the table and baking all the treats! I’m looking forward to sharing photos with you soon.

I didn’t have a smaller table for my entry so there was a lot of table space to fill. I spread things out a bit and placed all the desserts on the front of the table but the back of the table had tea items, including a dish of Sugar Bonnets for the tea.

The back of the Dessert Table had items for tea, including a dish of Sugar Bonnets.

This is the recipe I wrote a long time ago for making Sugar Bonnets.

This is my recipe for Sugar Bonnets, written over 15 years ago.

This is my recipe for Sugar Bonnets, written well over a decade ago. I can’t even remember!

Each bonnet is about 1 teaspoon of sugar. The ingredients are just sugar and water. Perhaps with a little food coloring if you want other colors. They dissolve quickly in a cup of hot tea.

I do confess it takes dexterity and patience to make these but the effort is well worth it. And they keep for several years in an airtight container between layers of wax paper, perfect for on the tea tray.

I created the hat form from a cake decorating lily nail set, matte board and packing tape. There is a piece of packing-tape-wrapped matte board wrapped around the nail to form a small smooth edge, which becomes the hat brim. I’ve replaced the matte board and tape only once and it has held up amazingly well, even with a quick wash and air dry. Some day I’ll cut a piece of PVC pipe to replace the matte board piece.

The tools I use to make the Sugar Bonnets include a Lily Nail that I’ve adapted with tape and matte board.

The bottom of the lily nail, showing how the matte board has been secured to the nail.

I use a small baby spoon to spoon damp sugar into the lily nail. This is how I hold the nail while spooning in the sugar and making the initial “press” with the top of the lily nail. Holding the nail this way helps the sugar stick together around the “brim” of the hat.

Holding the custom lily nail before spooning in the damp sugar.

After spooning the damp sugar in the mold, the top of the lily nail is pressed down on the damp sugar and then the excess sugar is scraped off around the edge.

I’m sorry that I don’t have actual action photos since I didn’t have time to set up a tripod and remote. Holding a heavy camera with one hand to take a photo of your other hand sure isn’t easy! So I’ve reenacted a couple of the important steps. Here I’ve placed a dry sugar bonnet back in the mold. If the sugar were freshly pressed, it would fit tightly in the mold and the lily nail would be a tight fit on top of sugar.

The top of the lily nail is removed. Note: if the sugar sticks too much to either piece of the lily nail, wipe them clean with a damp cloth, dry them and then brush on a little bit of cornstarch with a clean paint brush. The amount is so small that you can’t even see it but it makes a difference.

The lily nail set with a sugar bonnet pressed in between.

The top of the lily nail is removed to show the shaped sugar piece.

The hardest part of making these is tapping out the fragile, freshly pressed sugar bonnet on the wax-paper lined cookie sheet. The sugar usually sticks a little in the mold so I hold the lily nail right above the cookie sheet and tap on the handle of the nail with the spatula and the hat drops right out.

The bonnets can not be moved for at least 15 minutes. Then I’ll carefully slide the barely dried ones in neat rows to dry further as I make more. They must be dried overnight to be strong enough to be handled.

If the sugar breaks as it’s tapped out of the mold, I just push the broken pieces aside.

There will be broken pieces. Even with a very light dusting of corn starch, the sugar still sticks a little in the mold.

Some broken pieces are inevitable. They can be reused if you mix the sugar immediately back in with the damp sugar. If they are even the tiniest dry on the edges, they can not be reused.

When the bonnets are dry, they are surprisingly sturdy. Once all the bonnets are drying, I make the sugar decorations.

Royal icing doesn’t melt in tea so the decorations are made like the bonnets, just sugar and water, perhaps colored with a little food coloring, then pressed into flower and leaf molds.

Sugar Bonnet decorations made of sugar, water and a little food coloring.

To make the decorating process more efficient, I line up all the decorations as they will be used on each sugar bonnet.

The bonnet decorations are attached using a drop or two of “sugar paste” which is simply sugar and water mixed together. I crush a bit of the sugar grains up with the back of the spoon while stirring in the water. The consistency is thick, but not dry.

Sugar and water are mixed to make the gritty “sugar paste” to attach the sugar decorations.

Small imperfections and cracks in the side of the hats aren’t a problem since decorations can be glued over the holes.

A small bit of sticky “sugar paste” covers a crack in the side.

Even a large hole can be covered using a decoration.

It’s so satisfying to see an entire cookie sheet covered with drying Sugar Bonnets.

The Sugar Bonnets are decorated and drying.

The only sweetener better than a sugar cube is a Sugar Bonnet.

The birthday girl drops a little Sugar Bonnet in her cup of tea.

It quickly dissolved.

The Sugar Bonnet quickly and completely dissolves in the cup of hot tea.

If you want less than one teaspoon of sugar in your tea, simply break a Sugar Bonnet into pieces.

Aren’t Sugar Bonnets sweet? Please let me know if you make them!

My granddaughter hold a little Sugar Bonnet before dropping it in her tea.

My granddaughter holds a little Sugar Bonnet before dropping it in her tea.

Marble window sills

18 Wednesday Sep 2013

Posted by Julia Monroe in home decor, lighting, projects

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Tags

construction, DIY, home, marble, marble window sill, marble window sills, windows

I’m so glad I insisted on marble window sills for the new dining room windows! They look amazing. I had my heart set on marble but we had to go cheap. So we bought two door sills for $10 each. And then came the sawing. We didn’t have the necessary equipment or blades to saw marble. But I don’t give up easy. So I walked into the workshop and eyed up the straightest blade I could find.
He didn’t believe it could be done but I picked up that old rusty saw and asked God to bless that blade. And then I sat down and began.

Here I am later. Wow, great progress, huh?

Still sawing…

How about even later?

It took three full hours of constant sawing to make that single vertical cut! I used my right hand. Then my left hand. Then my left hand held my right hand… Just short of involving my feet, I completed the cut.
Dedicated? Determined. Obsessed? Maybe a little insane?
After 3 entire hours of non-stop cutting I had to rest a day. But my husband said I inspired him so he turned on the tv and made the other 7 cuts. Where there is a will, there is always a way!

Our beautiful, hand-cut, marble window sills.

To install, we used a strong construction adhesive, Loctite Power Grab.

Squeezing out the heavy-duty construction adhesive to place the sills.

and then pressed the sill in place.

Isn’t this beautiful?

The marble sill pressed in place.

A completely unexpected effect – seeing reflection of the sky above in the sills! Wow, I would have chosen marble if I had known that would happen. But this was completely serendipitous. When the sun hits the sill, it casts light on the ceiling too, just one more way we have introduced light to the formerly dark room. I love how the trees can be seen in the marble too.

DIY – decorative Wrought Iron design paper

18 Thursday Jul 2013

Posted by Julia Monroe in art, crafts, handmade books, journals, mixed media, tutorial

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Tags

coffee dyed, crafting, crafts, DIY, handmade paper, make your own, paper arts, paper crafts, tutorial

A couple months ago I made some beautiful coffee-dyed, wrought iron patterned paper completely by accident. I wanted coffee-dyed paper for a project so I boiled coffee grounds (about twice as strong as a usual pot of coffee) in water and let it steep about half an hour. I strained out most of the coffee grounds by pouring the mixture through a coffee filter and then added another couple tablespoons of instant coffee.

Even though it was spring, the sun was high in the sky and it was hot out so our cast aluminum, wrought iron-style table was hot. I figured all the heat would help the paper dry.

The day was bright and dry when I dyed the wrought iron style paper. The large pan of coffee dye was wide enough for the paper to fit comfortably.

The day was bright and and the sun was high when I dyed the paper. The large pan of coffee dye was wide enough for the paper to fit comfortably.

I dipped each sheet of drawing tablet paper into the coffee dye and let it drain a little against the edge of the pan. Within seconds of being laid on the table, the table design showed up on the paper! Here you can see the still-wet sheen of coffee on the paper.

The coffee pooled on the top of the paper and the pattern of the table magically showed up on the surface of the paper.

The coffee pooled on the top of the paper and the pattern of the table magically appeared on the surface of the paper.

I covered as much of the table as I could with the dipped paper and loved the variety of design on each sheet of paper.

The table is covered with wet paper. The edges of some sheets are already drying and curling up.

I wish I had written down how long it took the paper to dry, perhaps half an hour. Once there were no more puddles on top, I flipped all the papers over to dry more. When I turned each sheet over, the design on the bottom looked amazing! It is beautiful on both sides but especially smooth and beautifully shaded on the bottom.

The wrought iron design on the bottom side of each sheet has a beautiful creamy color and delightful shading.

I will be using this paper to make handmade books and journals.

If you dye paper like this using a wrought iron table, please let me know how it turns out. Cast aluminum doesn’t rust so there was no rust residue on my paper. A wrought iron table might have a different effect on the paper.

The table surface was very hot. I haven’t experimented to see if this works on a cold table.

There may be coffee dripping from the paper so don’t do this over a deck surface that you don’t want brown drips on. There was very little coffee dripping from the paper because the day was hot and dry and the paper absorbed it very quickly and it didn’t matter to me if there were brown specks on my deck.

The 1968 Easter Egg Tree

24 Sunday Mar 2013

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, crafts, Easter, family, home decor, miniature

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Tags

1960's, 1960's crafts, 1968, crafts, decorated eggs, DIY, Easter, Easter Egg Tree, egg tree, eggs

My mom was going to throw out the decorated Easter Eggs she made in 1968. They were dusty, damaged and bug-eaten. Then she considered giving them to someone to salvage any useable trims. Of course I wanted them, cracked shells and all! They cleaned up beautifully.

Egg tree eggs, made in 1968 by my mom. My sisters and I made some of these eggs, but not the prettiest.

At first glance, these seem like really simple eggs compared to the lavish rubber-stamped, lace-trimmed, glittered eggs made today. What makes these eggs so remarkable was the creativity with such limited supplies. My mom had very little to work with. She used poster paint, nail polish and a couple jars of my brother’s model car paints to paint the eggs. There was no shiny spray-on acrylic finish back then so she used clear nail polish to make them shiny. She purchased the gold paper trim from a mail order catalog from Lee Wards, a huge craft store in another state. There was no internet from which to buy craft supplies. There were no big Walmart craft aisles, Michael’s or craft stores. The only place for craft supplies was the local 5 & Dime store and even there, craft supplies were extremely limited.

Some of these eggs are missing pearls, some have bent trim, some have cracked shells. But when they are hung on the tree, they are all beautiful together.

1968 The Blue Egg with a tiny plastic dove inside.

1968 Decorated Egg – the Blue Egg with a tiny plastic dove inside.

1968 Decorate Egg – The Purple Egg.

1968 Decorated Egg – My mom painted this egg with a jar of my brother’s model car paint. The plastic hollow sequin “gems” on each side were precious and I was in awe of them.

1968 Decorated Egg – The Yellow Rose Egg. A tiny sequin butterfly flutters above the plastic rose.

1968 Decorated Egg – Painted with poster paint, covered with clear nail polish.

1968 Decorated Egg – I love the spring green color of this egg. I have a couple plastic flowers like those used on this egg so I will restore it before putting it away at the end of the season.

1968 Decorated Egg – A pink sequin butterfly flutters over a pink fabric rose. My mom didn’t have much gold paper trim so she cut it apart and used pieces sparingly.

1968 Decorated Egg. – The Hot Air Balloon egg.

1968 Decorated egg – The Lavender Spiral egg.

1968 Decorated Egg – The Purple Rickrack and Gold Trim egg.

1968 Decorated Egg – Painted with poster paint, brushed shiny with clear nail polish.

1968 Decorated Egg – Painted with pink nail polish.

1968 Decorate Egg – The Bunny Basket Egg. This was one of the few eggs I made for the tree. Even though the bright colors didn’t fit in with my mom’s elegant color scheme, she graciously added it to the family tree. That’s true Mother’s love.

1968 Decorated Egg – The back of the pink rose egg, with a very design of pink rick rack and gold paper trim.

1968 Decorated Egg – my favorite: The elegant M Egg. I don’t know where my mom got the embroidered M trim. M was for our last name – Musser.

1968 Decorated Egg – The Lily Egg. I love how this egg has one side white, the other green. This egg was so shattered on the top that I had to flip it over and reattach the wire on the bottom so it could hang. The little plastic lilies were just tucked inside so they were easy to turn right side up.

The only non-1968 eggs on the tree are the Peter Rabbit Eggs, purchased from Pottery Barn Kids several years ago. My mom used to read Peter Rabbit to my sisters, brother and I so I was thrilled to find eggs featuring illustrations from Peter Rabbit. Here Mrs Rabbit is fastening the brass buttons on Peter Rabbit’s blue jacket.

Even though these eggs have missing beads and cracked shells, they are still so precious. When I look at them, I am reminded of simpler times, days of ingenuity, days crafting with my sisters, days of being read to by a mother that loved us. This little egg tree serves to remind me that it doesn’t take a studio of amazing craft supplies to make something all sparkled up, it just takes an eye for beauty and a determination to make do with what you have.