Repurposed!

This week I have been continually searching for things and in the process finding things long forgotten...  One was this old needle book. I always loved the bakelite rose button...perfect for the clasp.

 It was too large to carry in my sewing bag so it was shelved and yesterday I repurposed it into a journal cover....perfect!












Below is both front and back....

PERFECT! PERFECT! PERFECT!

SOMEBODY SHOULD PATENT THIS!!!  I blogged for a year about how I love having my threads on rings like JMB but I wanted ALL at hand where ever I was stitching in the house.  Recent I blogged about how I converted a revolving shoe rack into a thread merry-go-round. (http://olderrose.blogspot.com/2014/09/could-i-be-more-hoop-happy.html BUT it was a little shorter than I liked... so back to the barn this morning.  With an old broom handle and a couple cotter pins, it is now a perfect height.  I also added some plastic to the bottom of the basket to store tools in use... and a ring at the top to move it about...  It is so wonderful that I'm doing a "happy hoop dance!"

If money were no object!!

Our old worn sectional couch had to go and I looked at thrift store and on Craigslist for something to replace it...  But everything now is so huge and overstuffed and totally inappropriate for our old house....  So I finally settled on a used sofa with a Victorian look for the end of the room... Now there was nothing for the dogs to sit on to look out the window and this would never do. 

Of course something like this old chaise would be perfect except for the price..

 

Then I ran across a "Victorian sitting bench"....arms on both ends and no back..... perfect except for the price.

So when I ran across this I knew I could make a Victorian sitting bench that would be perfect for the dogs and  off I went to the barn to find 2 old wooden folding chairs that had been destined to be returned to the thrift store from whence they came years ago....

Stay tuned..... to see these chairs transformed for Morris and Molly to watch the birds again.....

 

 

Finally a bag system which will work for me!

How could we manage to CQ without ziplock bags but I had never found a way to keep them sorted AND handy and I've tried umpteen ways...I did it in tubes,boxes, baskets and drawers. The latest was to label a bag (ex. gallon) and put all like-size bags in that bag... But it just wasn't handy and I just didn't do it.  So having reached the final frustration level I went online...  I ran across  methods of storing them upright.   I liked that because the height instantly indicated the size.  I knew the tubes wouldn't work for me because I had too many bags but the other idea used a divided carton which I adapted.

 I just used a beverage carton.  I roll them up individually and easily slip them in and take them out.

I have it sitting on a tall (but small) plant stand  by the door to my storage room. The leftover used bags are still in the pantry when I need them.

If in my thrift store forays I found something like this to which I could add dividers  and hang on the end of the bookcase it would even be better.  I'll have to keep an eye out..

In my search I ran across this clever "instant drying setup"
She kept a quart jar of aquarium gravel under her kitchen sink and when she needed to dry something she stuck in a bunch of BBQ skewers.  Clever and cheap!!

Update:  I still love my stacking boxes for each project and just found another one cheap on e-bay..  With a tray each for my beads, kreinik threads, and ribbons and by thread ring hanging from my lamp I have everything at hand. Since I am mostly beading right now I can put that tray on top.
Equally it is all put important easily put away... Unfortunately since I work on the dining table I do occasionally have to clear it for company.  I will start putting doodads into the new stack of boxes for the hanky quilt which will probably be after the holidays...

Thrift store shopping tip and secret to "safe" place..

One of the things I'm always on the lookout as I cruise thrift shops are cheap little bracelets... either just pot metal or the kind on elastic. I usually snap them up at around $1-2 and use them as seam embellishment. This pink one was pretty worn but so cute and I cut it up and used in on each of my tools and scissors fobs on my chatelaine...

I like the fact that they are different but coordinated.

These are two I picked up yesterday and they are just laced on elastic. Both will be used on my suffrage quilt... The top one was $1 but the bottom one was $4... but it has twenty sections and is so art deco looking.

These little bracelets are often in clumps in a basket or on a rack..  Look for them..



And I'm amazed a follower did not write and tell me the secret to finding all the things we put in the elusive "safe" places and then one can't remember where those safe places are... I started cleaning my little (very messy) painting/storage room and found lots of  lost treasures including my silver needle case that I'd been searching EVERYWHERE for...  So when all else fails....clean house.  I'm thinking seriously of doing it again...but not too soon!!

Market cart in new trimmings

Remember a while back when I showed you my market cart that I'm using to haul supplies to my CQ classes? (on the left)  Well look at it on the right all decked out in its new liner...  Whatta ya think, Susie W.?

There was a cart on the internet that I admired that had a leather tool belt attached for pockets... I didn't want to appropriate my only leather tool belt, but I did have two canvas carpenter aprons....both equally grungy.  I soaked one in detergent and Oxyclean overnight and it came out well enough... I thought about buying a new one but this is a NO$$$ (from the barn) project.

This one has ten pockets of various sizes and I'm going to add a little lace trim to the pockets to finish it off...

It's nice to cross something off my list that wasn't even supposed to be on my list.

Want to take a walk to the barn?

DH was looking for his favorite paring knife this morning and accused me of throwing it away..  If it wouldn't have been so difficult to get up again, I'd fallen to the floor laughing.... I NEVER throw anything away.  Now that I've decided to do the front door I am going to need some impressive lumber to do a frame around it and of course if I'm doing the door I will need to do a frame around the entry porch... So I decided to poke around the garden and barn this morning to see what is salvageable. What I do know is:

• I will need several days for this project
• DH must be out of town
• It must be warm enough to take the door off its hinges.
• I have VERY limited funds most of which need to go for paint.

In the big sewing room in the barn (formally the tea room) there are about 40-50 feet of shelf around two walls. They  are wonderful 2x10s.  I would need a strong body to help me get them down as they are about 10ft  above the floor and I have promised DH and my doctor to stay off ladders. I was much younger when I put the shelves up and used a pulley and a 12' ladder.

I was thinking of some birds I carved for a bench and thought they might be suitable for over the entry to the porch...I knew the bench had since collapsed and found the birds were in pretty bad shape..  But I do have this faux thing over a window in the barn shop which I will repaint and use.   How many people do you know who have lace curtains on their barn window...?

And speaking of doors... Remember when I had an emotional meltdown over a door...  Well the replacement door (not nearly as nice) and is still sitting there on sawhorses.  Wouldn't it be nice if I could find the perfect use for this door this summer...?

Something else from the barn upcycled!!

While teaching the crazy quilting workshops I find it necessary to haul about 7-8 totes.  I have supplies for the day's activities, plus the laptop with a slide presentation, related books and lots and lots of samples of my needlework, and essentials things for my own use such as camera, notebooks, etc.   Getting it all to the car and then into the shop was a battle...

 Also I needed something elevated to set the laptop on so everyone could see it...something the height of a bar stool... a folding bar stool for easy transport?  Maybe a folding bar stool on wheels??? So in searching through the barn I came upon  vintage folding carts and if I put a cake rack across the top of one, it was just about the right height...  I could use it for the laptop AND to haul all my totes as well...and get to the car and into the shop in one trip.
I used to use mine to haul trees and shrubs around the garden to transplant. I have two ...this one with larger wheels which is my favorite.

Last winter when I visited Susie in California she took me to the humongous flea market at the Rose Bowl...There were people everywhere pulling these vintage carts.  I was amazed because I never see them in thrift stores any more.When I did a search on Google I found they are now actually referred to as "flea market carts"  I also saw lots of them for sale with fancy little liners which would be easy to do.

But the one I liked the best not only had a liner, it had the pockets and a tool belt... The liner would be nice because the metal wires are quite widely spaced and things can and do fall through the sides and bottom.    I think I definitely need to do this..
Is this cool or what?.

Lost wagon found plus lovely surprise!!!

In 1984 I acquired this old wagon on the left and planted that small beauty bush next to it.. I fully intended it to be the focal point  and the beauty bush was to be a backdrop...  Well on the right you can see by 1998 the beauty bush was consuming the wagon (see arrow).  As years went by I had all but forgotten the wagon was even there...

But Thursday when we were cutting out plum trees which had self-seeded throughout that area I came upon the wagon and it immediately has gone to the top of my "to-do" list for rescue...

But as I came closer I made a remarkable discovery..  leaning against the wagon was an old leveling bar and a piece of decorative metal gate.  I must have put them there years ago with every intention of using them in a project but obviously had forgotten them all together.

Here it is leaning against the garage where I will mount it to support a newly planted clematis.  It is a handcrafted piece.  All the ends are either hammered and tapered or carefully folded.  Many sections are wrapped... Of course after this period of abandonment it is wonderfully crusted and rusted.  I have absolutely NO idea when and where I acquired it...but what a delight to find it.

And speaking of metal work be sure and stop by Block Talk and see how the black lace used by Rengin is reminiscent of wrought iron work of Victorian times...

Tour of funky garden makeover....

Remember my poor little funky front garden whose fence was periodically destroyed by snow plows and UPS trucks and it's dismal  collapsing rear stone wall?  My goal was not only to repair the stone wall and build a new fence but also to drag in some more "yard art" from the back of the larger garden...

Well look at it now.

Yesterday we worked on the stone wall....  I say we....but I never lifted a stone...  I sat on a stool pointing to the stones I wanted and directed where each should be placed...  Hardly worked up a sweat.

We must have moved each stone at least 6 times until we ended up with a very sturdy stone structure...










I had built two little gates the Friday before I left town.... I do have antique door knobs to use as finials but haven't polished them yet.














I was also able to incorporate some more iron into the back wall which made the stone sections shorter and more stable.  The top piece of iron is from an old balcony railing and if you guessed all day, you would not think the bottom section is from an old cast iron crib.  I use the head of the crib for a gate on my veggie garden and the foot will be a trellis for a clematis...  The lavender hedge took a severe beating during the whole process but it will recoop in a year or two....

And of course now you can see that there are nine of the whimsical bunny finials.... and we are done.  I am soooooooooooo grateful for a really handy man!!!

At our house it is rhubarb pies galore in the spring but in the fall it is DH's aunt Margaret's plum tart with a sour cream custard filling... Here's a photo going into and out of the oven..... In the picture of the garden makeover you will notice a ladder under one of our five plum trees... It takes a frost for them to turn sweet...  DH picks and I bake.. What a team...(he thinks!)

Sneak Preview of Funky Fence Progress

I had my dandy, handy helper come two extra days so we could finish the hardest part of the fence before I leave for SLC next Monday.  I think we might make it... close anyway.  These are the fancy finials for the posts.

The object was to build this fence with things on hand and I certainly have...Of course the 4x4s were salvaged from all the things we disassembled this summer.   And the black base is my  "super tip" of the day" ..  One of the things I've always watched for in antique and thrift stores are mismatched orphan leaves from dining room tables.  There are often piles of them in old stores and they are real wood and dirt cheap...  Most often pine with a veneer of some sort but I have scored some really fine pieces of wood also..  But if you're going to paint it, who cares...  I have used these orphan table leaves to build all kinds of things... especially shelves.  Today they are the black bases for my finials..

I did buy the wood caps... one of the two purchases I've made.

The little rusty rabbits came from a lath deer fence on the NW corner of garden.  They were interspersed with extra tall pieces of lath to add some whimsy.  I still have some other rusty rabbit yard art left out there..

Through the years I have used metal bedsteads for gates everywhere.  This one was a wrapped with chicken wire and used as a gate in the small lamb pasture for about 10 years.  It is not real brass or even brass plated so I had no regrets about cutting it up to salvage the ceramic pieces.  I have always wanted to use them in something but the right project never appeared until now..  I was a couple short but I used plain ceramic knobs in their place...  I was amazed that this bedstead has been exposed to the elements all these years and the little decals are still so delightful.

I didn't have enough for the new gate posts but as luck is on my side with this project,  I found 5 more antique brass door knobs in the barn that will be perfect for the gate posts....  I will start on the gates Friday...

Treasures from the barn...... again

I have a passion for shallow drawers and it doesn't get better than these.. I used these for years to store pressed flowers and they were perfect.  But I don't press flowers any more and they were just sitting in the barn..

They are vintage steel flat files for cards.... probably circa 1940s... I acquired them when the city library converted everything to computers and had a huge equipment sale..   Besides these I bought  another blueprint-size flat file... also steel and vintage...and I use it for beads now.

I moved these into the house yesterday and cleaned them up... The bottom one is 11" wide by 18" long and the upper is about 9"x 18".  The drawers are only about 1 1/2" deep. Being steel they are VERY heavy.

They are going to be my main storage for my favorite buttons so I can easily sort and choose..  I have made some temporary labels which will likely  change.  Now I have buttons in cabinets, bins, jars, and plastic bags in 4 different rooms and in the barn..

The nice thing about the drawers is that they fully extend so everything in them is accessible...

I thought about spray painting them but when I did a little research I discovered these cabinets are very collectible and quite expensive so I will keep them in their original condition.  You all know how I love finding YET another life for something languishing in the barn!!!

(I know my friend Connie K is drooling on her keyboard)

My singing heart and other bits..

Like other CQers I am a packrat extraordinaire but having a barn I can do it on a grand scale... especially with lumber. I have piles of lumber most of which I purchased years ago at farm auctions from behind someone's barn.  It was used lumber then and over the years I have re-purposed it over and over..

Since I recently dismantled the sheep sheds and lambing pens a lot more lumber is available. Earlier this summer my son helped me put a railing on the front porch and we dug through my lumber stash finding lovely old 2x8s to use.  They even had moss already growing on them...  Not only did I get to use my lumber stash, I used two pieces of old rusted iron circles which I'd used as trellises at one time...

But even though I had caps for the lower posts I needed some sort of finial for them...  This morning I remembered a box of old ornate doorknobs in the barn....perfect! My heart just sings when I get to find a new use for something I've hoarded for years and to use three things on one project was a real aria. DH hates it and thinks it's really junky but, hey,  it matches the peeling paint on the house.. (quoting an unsolicited   complement of sorts from a friend).

Yesterday we went to a lovely birthday dinner for an even lovelier friend... (the gnocchi lady)  She was born at Lake Como, Italy.. So as a gift I painted a special button for her of Lake Como.  Here is a picture of the scene and the button beside it..  The birthday "girl" was wearing orange and just glowed...

Finally remember  recently I posted progress on my book about Morris and pointed out the "rainbow" garden was lacking ... Well I added the orange and you can see that really did make the garden into a rainbow.... Orange is never my first choice when I'm picking colors, but it does bring a composition alive.

Two Nifties for You in One Day!

Remember the nifty little retractable scissor holder I have on my chatelaine??? Well I have another like it I just clip to my shirt while I am at the sewing machine.. It is so handy not to have to look for scissors to clip bobbin threads. AND it would look equally nice attached to a needle book so I made some to sell at the Adventure boutique and I will put them on my Etsy when I get home...









Aren't they all just gorgeous on the tray..
Just $3.50 ladies... These are the very best secret sister gift....

And speaking of the boutique...it's a whole another thing trying to think about display when you're flying and REALLY limited on space... Wicker baskets would have been perfect but try to get 2 or three in an already full suitcase...

So I have come up with a nifty alternative.. When I was delivering my mom to her bridge group yesterday I swung by the thrift store and picked up 4 rustic-looking place mats. They can fit flat in the bottom of my suitcase...

Once I get there I can tie up the corners and it makes a super, attractive, basket-like container. Actually some large diaper-type pins would work just as well ... Pretty darn nifty even if I say so myself. And I'm upcycling as well....

Responses to heart necklace queries

I'm delighted to receive so many positive responses and e-mails about my heart necklace and I would also be delighted for anyone and everyone to use the idea... in fact any idea in my blog...

To answer Laurie...it is not heavy as the hearts are small.... most being 3/4" or less...