TALLER BY THE DAY

It is rather frustrating when I am confronted by tall cabinets and a television screen that is mounted so high on the wall that I find it problematic to switch it off.

Enter the humble stool.

I had earlier on decoupaged a step stool that was painted with chalk paint.

I then acquired 2 more stools which were flat packed and I LOVE putting stuff together, screws and all. Very good, except that most of these flat packed stuff are not female friendly. Putting the screws and bolts together require immense strength. (Note to self: purchase an electric screwdriver) One of the screws did not go down well in my first attempt but I improved after that.

I decorated the stool below with leftover wall paper and stencilled the sides.

For the next stool, I painted zebra stripes and decoupaged.

Friends have asked me whether I would stand on these hand painted stools. Why not? Being an Asian, I do not wear shoes indoors and socks or fluffy slippers will not harm the surface.

COFFEE OR TEA?

Coffee tastes better when served on a handmade tray - a tray that is painted with vibrant colours and decorated with  fussy-cut pictures of yesteryear's delicate crockery. Below is the tray before the makeover.

I love coffee and I must have my fix every morning. Tea will do me too, but nothing beats the aromatic coffee bean. So I got myself a nifty coffee machine that promises luxury and a little bit

closer to George Clooney?...ahhhhh..........

Now that the summer weather is improving alfresco dining beckons. Coffee, tea and cucumber sandwiches will certainly taste better in the great outdoors...errr......in the garden. So I bought a butler's tray  and painted it with the primary colours of the roses in my garden. The sides too are stencilled in contrasting colours.

Now the setting is complete for a teddy bears picnic.

LET THERE BE LIGHT

Lampshades are lovely things and they become more beautiful when you create new designs on them. Having inherited a number of lampshades, I decided to try my hand at a few new techniques related to decoupage.

This is the first one I made.

And this was what it looked like before.

I then made used of leftover wallpaper to decorate another lampshade.

Here's another made from a Cath Kidston design

Which matches perfectly with the seat cover of a chair that I upcycled.

And now with the light on

Once I got the hang of it, I decided to go for more challenging designs. This technique is more complicated as I must make sure that the pictures are in order.

And  with the light on....

Now that I've run out of lampshades, I will move on to decorating trays. Watch out for the next post!

Quilted Wall hanging

I bought this panel from Oughterard, County Galway, some time last year and it has kept me busy through the cold winter months. It is very rewarding to quilt by a warm open fire. Now that summer has arrived, the quilt is done.

I tried my hand at trapunto quilting and there are several techniques found on youtube. I chose the one that I like and then there's no stopping.

The term "trapunto" means "to embroider" in Italian, and "to prick with a needle" in Latin. When speaking of this quilting technique, both meanings apply. Trapunto is a technique which may be done by hand or machine that creates a noticeably raised design. In trapunto, also known as "stuffed work" by American and English quilters, extra padding is slipped behind the quilt top to create the puffed effect. 

I prefer to do it by hand. In addition, I did shadow quilting (stippling) as well in the areas surrounding a trapunto motif to further accentuate the effect.

I have a few more panel pieces and I can't wait to work on them!

A Box Divided Against itself Can Stand

Boxes are very versatile things to play with. More so, a box divided against itself! Found this little box and Michael said, 'Will you leave it alone?' No siree!  That's why the business to go into these days is selling embellishments and I'll be a loyal customer.

A perfect display box for four varieties of tea. Tea certainly tastes better when it comes in a pretty box.

With my head still boxed in by boxes, I found these two box-frames. Gave them a good coat of paint and filled them with potpourri.  Colour coded even. Talk about an extreme case of OCD.

All cracked up

I did some crackle effect on small pieces of chipboard years ago. So recently I decided to try out the crackle medium again. This time round, I bought Rust-oleum Crackle medium from Stakelums, Thurles and had a wonderful time experimenting with the different crackle sizes.

Sue Thomas gave me the wine box and another friend gave me the lavender serviette and I bought the lavender stencil. It is very amusing that whenever my friends have some lovely stuff that they have no use of, they would think of me and pass them on to me to turn them into something beautiful.

You can never go wrong with nature, so I complemented purple with green.

I decided to use the box for my spare cutlery.

This is the original box

Then I progressed into something bigger. This time it is a bedside locker.

Embellished the drawer with trimmings and a lovely new Roman numeral knob.

This is the original bedside locker

Now I have another bedside locker, so I'm going to do something different. Watch out for the   next post!

Upcycling Exhibition

The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider's web.

                                                                                                                            Pablo Picasso

And Picasso was absolutely right. We hold the emotions and then release them again into beautiful works of art. Such is the variety of upcycled objects on display at the Upcycling Exhibition held at the Killaloe-Ballina Family Resource Centre today.

Upcycling is "the process of converting old products into new products of better quality or for better environmental value." '

It is amazing to see furniture and household objects being transformed into works of creativity. 

Not unlike Cinderella going to the ball in a coach made from a pumpkin and drawn by mice turned horses.

I invited my friends who came mainly from Limerick. They formed quite an international crowd: Scot, Hungarian,Brit,Polish and of course the Irish too.

Throughout the weeks, I went round hunting for interesting stuff whenever we visited other cities and towns. These are pre-loved objects that I prefer to refer to as posh junk.

                                                                  A stool from IKEA

                                                             Chair and table from Kilkenny

                                                   Bird house stand from Ennis

                                         Wooden clogs from Garrykennedy (Hachi my dog chewed them)

And turned them into Gorgeous stuff!  After all, one person's trash is another's treasure, right?

                                                            With Nathalie