1929 Model A Photos

We had pouring rain Saturday night and got some water in our garage.  Scott pulled the Model A out so he could clean things up and let the garage air out.  Since the car was in the driveway, I took the opportunity to take a few new photos:

This is just the antique plate for now.  We still have to get the real plates for it but it's the next thing on the list.  A few things need tweaking and there's still a few things we need to get for it but we plan to take if for it's Maiden Voyage out of the subdivision on the 4th of July.  My mom's house is only about 8 minutes down the road so we're going to drive it there for the first time.  I feel like we should have a band and escorts with little waving American Flags!!!  LOL!!!   Maybe a parade! It's been a long time coming!!!

In other news, I added a few new hanging pillows to the shop yesterday.  Mom made these:

I have several more that I'll add this afternoon.

Last but not least, I only got a little stitching time in yesterday but here's an update on my Purple Rose Door Hanger:

Have a nice day everyone!

Our 1929 Ford Model A Tudor Sedan

I'm putting together an online class for Maureen at Maureens Vintage Acquisitions.  I spent most of yesterday afternoon working on it and didn't have much time for stitching.

So, for today, I thought you would enjoy seeing some new photos of our 1929 Ford Model A Tudor Sedan.  We had to take new pics for our insurance company so here they are:

This car started out as a rusty, crusty, ugly mass of moldy oldie metal:

This thing had bullet holes in it from someone using it as target practice.  But now, it's a gorgeous streetrod!  We still need the side windows but the windshield and visor is on!

Scott did the majority of the work himself with just a little bit of help from me.  He works at Friendly Ford in Roselle, Illinois and Friendly Ford now does Classic Car restorations!  If you live in the Chicago area, be sure to stop in at Friendly Ford.  It's a beautiful Ford dealership!  If you need a car restored, Friendly Ford is the place to go!

New Projects and This & That

I've been going through some heavy duty withdrawals the past few days.  2 1/2 weeks ago, my Dr. let me drop my Zoloft from 75 milligrams to 50 milligrams.  Overall, I feel much better but on Friday, my mood dropped drastically.  I could feel the chemicals moving and changing in my body and my brain.  Quite un-nerving!!  But I kept talking myself through it and it seems to be balancing out now.

I have decided to formally announce that I am no longer designing Counted Cross Stitch.  I want to pursue other avenues.  I'm a Crazy Quilter.  And yes, you may highlight the word "crazy"!  LOL!!!  Honestly, crazy quilting and mixed media textile art is what I love so that's what I'm doing from here on in.

I will continue to add my hand-made items to my Etsy shop.  I really enjoy that a lot!!!  I just did a CQ project for a new magazine to be released in the Fall:

Click here to visit their website!

I've been sending some things out to Somerset Studio publications and I plan to teach Crazy Quilting out of my home.  I haven't worked out all of the details yet but I'm getting it together little by little.  I've been sick for a long time and I really need to get my life together and back on track.  I just can't go back to doing some of the things I did before.  I'm 1/2 way between Chicago & Milwaukee so if anyone lives in my area and would like to learn crazy quilting and perhaps some of the other gazillion things I know how to do, please drop me an email and let me know.

In other news, I wanted to share this photo with you:

Darlene K. worked this lovely crazy quilt block using my peacock tutorial.  Isn't it pretty?  I just love peacocks and was thrilled to receive Darlene's photo.  If you would like to work with my Peacock Tutorial, you can find it here.  Thank you so much Darlene for granting me permission to post the photo of your beautiful peacock block!!!

So what else do I have to talk about today?  Well, I add a few new things to the shop.  These lovely earrings were made by Kathi:

Gorgeous!!!!  And I added these Crazy Quilt pieces that I did:

I just had to do a crazy quilt block with Marie Antoinette!  You know I just love the pink and the fluffyness of Marie!!!!   Anyway, these and more can be found here.

In other news, Scott has the vinyl top on the Model A now:



Isn't this car beautiful!  He's worked so hard on it.  I think he's getting the bumpers ready to put on the car now. Not sure exactly but the more that goes on, the better it looks!!!  He puts it in the front yard for awhile on the weekends and then I ride with him when he drives it back into the garage!  I love looking at it!  He puts it up front here so I can see it while I'm stitching.

I guess that's it for today. Oh, with 1 exception!  I thought you'd like to see what I have to contend with when I'm on my laptop:

Lucy just loves to lay on the keyboard!  Makes typing a bit of a challenge!!!  And here's one more photo of my little Miss Queeny:

Those green eyes just melt my heart!!!! 

Ok, I'm off to put some salad together for dinner!  More tomorrow.

Taking Apart An Old Hat Tutorial

Bubba & I hit 2 Flea Markets yesterday!  I didn't find anything all that exciting but I did pick up this ugly old hat for $6.00:

I buy these these old hats for the vintage flowers.  Many times, they're velvet and silk and usually in very good shape.  I buy them when I find them for around $4 - $6 and then I take them apart.  This may seem like a rather dumb tutorial but I thought someone out there may like know how to do this.

In most cases, the glue on these hats is rather brittle and the flowers will come off easily but I have had a few that were a big old bear to get off!!!

First, I started on this one by removing the leaves:

The leaves & flowers are usually glued to each other.  Find a starting point and carefully start pulling the leaves or flowers away from the mesh base.

Silk flower petals may tear a little.  Do your best to carefully pull them off and keep in mind that if they tear, it adds to the charm and raggyness of the flowers.  I for one, love the raggy look of vintage things!  They can always be slightly trimmed with a pair of scissors.

There may be areas where you just have to cut the mesh base to get the flowers off.

Once I had the flowers off of the sides of the hat, I cut the mesh base on the top off.

This just makes it a wee bit easier to get the rest of the flowers off.

Continue to carefully pull the flowers off the top.

I pulled them all off the top of the hat and then I pulled them off of each other.  And now I have a nice bagful of silk & velvet vintage flowers & leaves!

It takes about 1/2 an hour to tear one of these old hats apart but it's well worth it.  The flowers can be used on crazy quilting, art quilts, cards, art dolls...just about anything!  They can be sewn on or glued on with a glue gun.  The can also be glittered!!!

If you find one for a few dollars, give it a try!  It's fun to re-purpose these old flowers on new projects!

If you would like to see some the projects I use these Vintage Millinery Flowers on, please visit my Shabby Chic Boutique at Etsy!

When I finished tearing that old hat apart, I did some baking!  My Kitchaid was calling to me!  LOL!!!  I made some Banana muffins with chocolate chips:

I just used a regular Banana Muffin recipe and replaced the nuts with chips.  Scott always laughs at me because I put chocolate chips in everything!!!

Then I made a batch of Sugar cookies with cinnamon and chocolate chips:

This is my basic Drop Sugar cookie recipe.  You can find it in my sidebar.  I added 3/4 of a teaspoon of cinnamon to it.

By the time I was done baking, it was late afternoon and Bubba had gotten the headlights on our Model A:

Is this incredible or what?  He's been working on this car for 7 years now and it's really starting to come together.  He has the running boards on it now too!

Finally for today, I'll leave you with an update on my Autumn purse block:

This is ready for beading now.  I'll start on that later today!

Before I head out and start my day, I wanted to say thanks to everyone for all the sweet comments that you've left for me on my depression & anxiety discussions.  If any one would like to share a link to the articles on their blog, please feel free to do so.  I truly feel that if I can help even one person who's going through a horrible depression experience, then my energy in writing these articles is so worth it.  My next article will be available this week.

This And That

First, I'd like to welcome my new followers!  I truly hope you enjoy my posts.  I offer tutorials, recipes, guest bloggers and tons of needlework & craft eye candy! I'd love to hear how you found my blog.

I've been busy the past few days, stitching on some little Halloween Crazy Quilt Cat Dolls!  Here are the first 2:





I have a few more in progress but these are available in the shop now.  I think I'll do an Autumn purse when I complete the next litter of Halloween kitties!

Also in the shop are some new Scarecrow Tussy Mussy's by mom:



There are 6 different Scarecrow Tussy Mussy's available, each one is different and so cute!  Mom is now working on some Halloween Tussy Mussy's!

Does anyone else feel like it's August already?  I don't know what it is but I feel like I should be putting out a few sunflowers and mums!  Maybe it's the extreme heat we've had the past few weeks.  Feels like I should be baking apple pies & carrot cake!

I've had Autumn on my mind a lot lately and came up with these sweet little Spider Web Needlekeepers:



I just love doing spider webs on Crazyquilts but wanted to make a few needle-keepers.  I'm planning on making a few more of these, not necessarily with spiderwebs but perhaps some flowers.  When I do, I'll write up a tutorial for you.  I'm going to make 1 little change to how I put them together next time.

In other news, Bubba has the gas tank in the Model A:



And he has the fenders on it:



Every day is getting a little closer!!!  Scott's been working on it for 7 years now!   If you would like to see more photos of our 1929 Ford Model A Tudor Sedan, click here to visit my Flickr site.

Last week I mentioned that I plan to write some articles on coping with disorders such as ADD/ADHD, BiPolar, depression, anxiety and Seasonal Affective Disorder Syndrome using creativity to ease the symptoms.  From personal experience, I think it's safe to say that I've become quite the expert on the subject.  I like to keep my blog cheerful and uplifting so I won't be complaining about these things.  I've been able to see much of my disorders with a sense of humor!  I just want to help others who who suffer with these things.  I want other women to know that they're not alone and that artistic creativity is tool that we can use to work with the disorders rather than fighting them constantly.  I'll be starting this series of discussions in the next day or so.

I joined the Sister In Bloggerette Sorority at Some Days Are Diamonds blog:

Please hop over to Karen's blog and read about it!  Join too!  I think it'll be fun!

Well, I could swear there was something else I wanted to talk about today but it now eludes me.  I think my brain is fried for the day!  I'll leave you with my sister's newest pair of earrings:



These gorgeous green quartz earrings remind of Jadite Fire King!  They are so pretty in person!!!  And, they are available here.