Day 20: Today was a rough day.....sorry....Paper Beads and Gift Card Pottery Tools

Today was rough.  My physical therapist called me "lumpy" today, and proceeded to work out all of the most painful knots.  I did get one major thing accomplished today:  I SWITCHED BANKS!  I have been a TCF girl since college, but they have a funny way of taking our extra payments and putting them towards paying FUTURE interest rather than paying toward the principal.  In this era of automatic pay and online banking, it is rather rough to change banks at all.  Now that hubby will be changing jobs, we gave the new employer a new bank account to do their auto deposits......and we will phase out TCF little by little over the next month and then sever all ties.  To commemorate this occasion, I made paper beads and little paper cut-outs from my old business account checks.  It is less than glamorous, but I will find private justice in making a new bank deposit while wearing a lovely set of stretchy bracelets made from ex-TCF checks.  I suspect that when I ever actually pay off my mortgage, I will make paper beads out of it instead of shredding it!  I can just have a set of anti-debt jewelery....very fashionable in this day and age!

  My real re-use of material today came from old gift cards to Caribou and Starbucks.  YES, even though I can make a really tasty cup of coffee with milk and chai flavor at home, it is still my vice to overpay and have them do it on occasion.  As a former teacher, my favorite teacher gift were these coffee cards.  They are small, consumable, and they make my day whenever I use them.  Then when the balance is zero, and they ask me if I would like them to toss it for me, I shout "NO" and then insist on having it back.  I then pocket them or stick them somewhere without marking whether or not they have money left on them.  This is not smart.  I then have a pile of these cards, and when I actually want to use one to make a tool or something, I hesitate since I am never really sure whether I am cutting up a cup of yummy coffee.  So today I got coffee at Caribou to celebrate the start of my anti-TCF movement and to console me from the mercy game I lost at PT AND to further console me for living in the frozen-sub-zero-freeze-moisture-in-your-nose-while-it-is-STILL-breathing state of Minnesota.  I then decided while there to check all the gift cards in my purse and find out which ones were empty.  I then decided to write TOOL on them, so I could tell them apart.  I did the same swinging by Starbucks on the way home (not to get coffee, but to confirm that the TWO cards I had on me were both empty).  I was pumped to find that I still had one card with money on it which I used to get my coffee today, and I had THREE cards that were soon to be cut into pottery ribs that I will try out the second I decide to hop on the wheel again.  The "stem" tool is to make little stems for ice cream cups that I like.  It has two sides: one for a more rounded detail and the other for the same general idea, but with more angular details.  I used a heavy duty hole punch to make a texture rib to drag along slabs or to detail thrown pots.  The last rib is one that I haven't tried before and I hope will work.  I cut various sections to achieve two different detailed rim designs on thrown pots.  I will take pics when I use them.  I should find some other uses for these cards....I know I have more of them.  Little did my former students know how much I love the gift cards....first and foremost, the thought is the best, then the actually product COFFEE, then the warm pick-me up that lasts all day long, then the pottery tool that I can use in my creative process....maybe even to make a coffee cup with special details that I give to them when they graduate to take to college.  I miss my students a lot even though it is right for me to be here doing this right now.  I don't stay still well, and teaching was very intense temptation to do things for kids even if the body couldn't keep up.  So I exchange my conducting baton and my teaching hat for a 365 project and a blog.....I still love my coffee though, so thanks, bandies!

Day 19: Dye Job, Pillow Case Pick-Me-Up

Not a whole lot of actual finished jobs today, but some half started ideas.  Since coffee dye was a little bit gross, and not really blotchy enough to not just look more dingy than they already were, I tried a packed of blue dye that I had around for some other project?????  I honestly don't remember buying it at all, and there it was in the back of my drawer with the fabric paints.  I have three other colors too!  My friend Kristin calmly read the directions on the back while I put on apron, gloves and respirator.....and 10 napkins and jars and tupperware filled with scrunched up yucky dingy napkins later, I have some actually lovely napkins.  What ever will I stamp or embroider to the corners?  I might even go back and dye over the coffee dye job from the other day and see if I can't get a little closer to something I would willingly wipe my mouth on.....

I also took the pillow case (with coffee dye on it, to cover up the yucky sleep stains.....bleh) and painted on it with black india ink and gave color accents with very watered down fabrick paint.  I don't know if I am wild enough with these results to paint the same idea on more of the fabric or if I will just use this pillow case as my test case for different painting or dye jobs....every hobby has to have its guinea pig.  Maybe, if it is lucky, it will eventually grown into a purse or fabric journal cover or something....for now, I am just going to throw it in the wash and see what happens to the colors then!

Day 18: File Folder Notepad Covers, my old standby....

I had physical therapy today, which does seem to be going better, but after running a couple of errands and grocery shopping too (not to mention bringing in the fruits of the errands and putting them all away)....well, I didn't have much energy/drive/motivation/ability to do much else.  I did use patterned file folders this time around which is actually very nice.  I cut down on the amount of paper used at all, and still the product looks finished and cute.  I did only 5x7 sizes today, and I used every last scrap for the projects....including the tape backs for flowers, the scrap file folder pieces for Cricut cutouts, etc....Not glamorous or new, but some days are like that.  Creativity has discipline days just like any other daily activity.  It takes discipline not to use "sick days" when you are just sick of working.....it takes discipline to go through emails when you know they are only full of things that people need you to do....it takes discipline to practice your scales when all you want to do is play your fun music....it takes discipline to create when all you want to do is spend all day in bed sleeping.  It was especially cold today in Minnesota as well, and the cold always get into my every being......art always reflects life, right?  So blah days can yield somewhat blah art too....I have been sitting on some really decent ideas for a few days now, so when they get done rattling around in my noggin, then I will throw them out here for sharing.  Until then, notebook covers!  You know you love 'em!

Day 17: Sock Monkey Embellishments and Napkins

Jerri Sock Monkey got a lovely new tummy pocket to carry around whatever needs to be carried (it will probably hold my cell phone at night as it hangs out on the night stand lamp) and paper bead earrings and necklace.  Now she is just chillin' out from a hard day at home with the two kids on a non-school day Monday =)




The better part of my day was spent entertaining the kids, but I did manage a cup of coffee this morning, and decided to try taking my dingy white stained napkins and staining them darker and more intentionally in a boiling pot of coffee.  I then took a lyno block and carved "N" in it for Neddermeyer, stamped the monogram on each one, and set the paint by using a steamy hot iron.  Ta-da!  Artfully stained napkins guaranteed to hide the stains of a family of four!

Day 16: Sock Monkey Mania

I didn't get much of my own craft time today, but we did have sock monkey mania for the children!  Check it out!  Sylvia did much of her own machine and hand stitching, and Felix made lots of his own color choices, and stuffed his own monkey.  I will save further comments about my own sock monkey until it has been fully accessorized!

Day 15: Blog Blahs

I am afraid that I have the blog blahs today.  I did craft much of the day, but I didn't feel inspired with anything new or innovative.  I helped my kids work on their own sock monkeys this morning, I took a nap in the early afternoon, and then, I went to babysit friends' kids so they could attend a company party.  After all kids were asleep and the Steelers were safely done with their game, I did some more paper beads and finished off some pendants made with scrap paper.  The pendants were mentioned several days ago when I was using diamond glaze to stick paper flowers onto a glass bowl.  The pendants are glass tiles with decorative paper on them.  The paper is covered with the glaze to seal it from skin oils and moisture.  They are nice, and easy to make.  The only down side for me is the cost of each glass tile at The Bead Monkey.  I have found that I prefer the square or rectangular shapes even though I can get the glass pebble kind in a number of sizes for about $3 for an entire bag of clear round ones.  The square ones range in price, but average about $1 each.  With paper beads, I just kept working to get faster, more size and shape variety, and I got a few different looks using scrap paper instead of magazine leftovers.  I will be more interesting tomorrow, I hope!

Day 14: Total Waste or Using Waste in Haste? You decide!

Today was a full day.  I spent some time with a friend, helping out, and just resting there so I didn't have to be alone at home today.  I think it is funny how we, as people, find it pretty easy to extend a helping hand to those we love and even to those we don't know in charity, but it seems nearly impossible to ask for help when it is needed...even if it is little help, like company, or spirit, or crock pot meal, or a ride, or an errand, or whatever.  When Robert and I lived in Pittsburgh, before moving back here to Minnesota, we lived near his aunt and uncle.  They were wonderful people who I still miss very often.  When they needed to move a headboard from the upstairs bedroom to the basement (it was heavy, and had to be taken out the window, lowered by a rope, and brought in through the bottom entrance), they called us, and we helped.  When we moved into our first house, they came (along with Robert's parents from halfway around the world) to help us move, and paint most of the rooms in our new home.  None of us thought anything of it, and it was more fun to do it all together than to strip wallpaper or install flooring alone.  At any rate, we commonly agree that it takes a village to raise children, but we don't extend the same relationships toward remaining healthy and happy and joy-filled adults too.  I think we should, and I am personally going to work on asking for help more and spending what energy I have investing in my friends and family.

Now that that is off of my brain, onto crafting for the day.  I started this little project about 9:00, as I was finishing up going through some crafting magazines and catalogs that I had saved.  I like to take these sorts of things, cut out pictures of great ideas or projects, and then I glue them into "idea" books that I look through later when I get stumped with creativity.  I then recycle the magazines and don't give the rejected ideas another thought.  Today, I took a pre-Christmas advertisement from Archiver's and cut the booklet into strips (the whole thing was cut easily into as stack using my running cutter thing....a Fiskars product, I think) and I then had a quick pile of all the same size strips.  They made quick and colorful paper beads.  I will make more here and there, and then string a collection of them together.  I made some straight strips which just made logs that weren't very interesting, but the triangular strips were cool.  I am sure there are other variations which could add interest as well.  I sealed them with diamond glaze around little toothpicks.  Easy, but now my fingers are caked with diamond glaze as well.  Now tonight, before I go to bed, I am going to flip through my idea books and see if I can't get some fresh inspiration for tomorrow's project.

So, paper beads.....total waste or hastily used waste?  Cute and quick.....but still fitting in a little time for just me in this joy-filled day.