Author name: Karla Nathan

Why am I wasting my time? I don’t know why I am not creating much, piddling seems to be all that I am doing.  Nothing really constructive, just goofing around.

I glittered up the chalk ware dorky and gave her a pearl crown and matching chocolate pearl eyes, then made a collar and dog tag for her with ribbon and part of an old earring.

The glue is still wet, she isn’t really foaming at the mouth.

While shopping in Beth’s Bargain Basement, I found some cute doll and baby clothes.

And – ultimate bargain!! – they were  a gift for Sugarwings. I thought I was buying them for $1 each, which is a pretty good deal in itself, but she just gave them to us.  Beth is generous with stuff like that. 

Plus she took an IOU for the stuff I did buy, I’d forgotten my check book-oops.

Not that it was a waste of time to play with the new dresses, but really, how high on my priority list should playing with doll clothes be?

Especially when Sugarwings isn’t even here.  If she was, she’d be wearing this blue cutey, it looks like it would fit her.

But lately, all she wants to do is sculpt with play dough or paint. I can’t convince her to put on a pretty dress and play tea party with me and Twinkle.  She is obsessed with paint. I think I am beginning to understand how my husband feels when I lock myself into the studio to paint  and won’t come out.

This morning, I puttered around at a few garage sales, even though nothing in the newspaper looked all that interesting, and when I got there and saw them in person, they were even worse than described.

I spent a few dollars and got a couple little things with potential, though.  I picture this pink poodle all foofy with glitters and goobers.   She will be a poodle diva soon.

And the birds can be glittered, maybe one can nest in the crocheted basket?

But the bows, oh my, those are really, really nice as is!  They were 50cents for all three.

One garage sale had stacks of sheet music.  They were going for 50 cents each, but I always ask what the volume buying price is before I shop.

I was able to buy 25 for 25 cents each.

The deep colors are great on this one, but don’t you think that the woman is a bit scandalous to be wearing PANTS??  Of course, the cover does say she is the Heavenly Sinner" 

More rich colors on this one, but the lady seems sad. She must be waiting home alone while her man is chasing after that harlot wearing pants.

This cover is my favorite. As much as I loved the saturated colors of the first two, these soft and dreamy shades are more my style.

This assortment of stoppered bottles came free in the pink poodle mug.

Two are hand blown glass and I am not sure what their real purpose is.  One was filled with peppermint oil that I poured into the trash, and now my whole studio is scented with mint.

These can be re-made into fairy dust containers, don’t you think?

These little picks might be my best find of the day.

And of course, the best are the 3 pink ballerinas.  I am really attracted to pink ballerinas.  Well, that didn’t sound the way I meant it. Not that there is anything wrong with that.. I just meant the vintage plastic variety. Lets not start any gossip about what goes on here at Karla’s Cottage, OK?

There were a few mermaids in the bunch too.  I wanted to be a mermaid when I was little.  I knew I could never be a ballerina, because I am more than slightly clumsy and have no dancing skills. But for some reason, I thought I might have a shot at being a mermaid someday.

Now, these girls  aren’t picks, I wonder, are they cake decorations?

Keping with my day of puttering around and not really accomplishing much, I decided to clean these bottles from the flea market. Carol and I have plans for a group project with a few bottles and pumpkin heads.

Sounds odd, but when our magazine article comes out in the next issue of Romantic Country, it will  make sense.

First I soaked them in hot water.

Then, I dropped in denture cleaning tablets.

Still dirty. So I dropped in a few more.  The bottles were pretty cheap, but I spent $4 on the denture cleaner. 

They aren’t looking much better yet, so I will let them soak over night. I’ve heard this will work, but who knows.

Between the denture tablets and the peppermint oil, my studio smells like a dentist office.

TO BE CONTINUED

(OK, now you have to picture the voice of a soap opera announcer- or can you picture a voice? I must mean, imagine the voice-)

Will the bottles ever become clean?

Will Karla ever get the minty fresh scent of peppermint oil out of her studio? Or will Karla hear dentist drills in her dreams tonight from the over powering smell?

Will the chalk ware Dorky’s apparent rabies cause it to attack Karla’s toes as she works at her desk?

Will the scandalous woman in pants steal the husband of the daydreaming lady?

Will Karla quit goofing off with piddly projects and get any work done? Or will she sprout a tail and swim off with some pink ballet dancer?

Scrabble letters seem to be popular to work with, but I have never really used them. Recently, I was given a bagful, and thought I should see what I could use them for.

So, I just drew on a few with ink pens and will use the game pieces as accents in the swap bags I am making up, matching up the letters to each person’s name.

It was a quickie and fun thing to do and now I am looking for all sorts of places to use these tiles!

I added one to this aqua and purple tag that I made for a friend whose name begins with "P".

While I had the tags out, I finished off a few that I had started at Beth’s on Tuesday.

I was experimenting with her cuddlebug,  and embossed a few tags and some vintage wallpaper.

And, I figured it was time to start being inspired by the "Pre Bella, Get Inspired, Get Acquainted Swap" and use some of the stuff I received!

Heather had this ballerina on a card she sent to me, so I cut it out and glued it to the tag I made at Beth’s.  Dark ink around the figure really makes it look shadowed and 3-d, doesn’t it?

The flowers on this one and previous tag are from Holly. The velvet ribbon is from Andrea.

I was trying to do a trick that Beth uses a lot, with gluing bits of wallpaper into a  kind of crazy quilt look.  The two tags with the green ruffle are listed on Etsy, the other two will be soon…. if I can get organized and get it done, that is. 

Down in Beth’s Bargain Basement, I found this glass doored cabinet and decided to switch it out for the robin’s egg blue child’s hutch that I had been using as a glitter cabinet. This white one is more convenient. 

And now, I can give the hutch to Sugarwings, since I bought it for her to use in the first place. She says "MINE" every time she sees it, so I think she wants it.

Have you ever tried Martha Stewart’s glitter glue? It is 25% off at Michaels this week, so I bought a jar.  I got the kind with the brush attached to the lid, like  a little kid’s paste pot. It reminded me of the first day of school and the joy of dipping into a fresh jar of paste.  Seems like a fitting thought for the first week of September.

I am extremely happy with the stuff. The brush was fantastic for getting in and out of the crevices of the birds and roses I was glittering up.

And finally, I got the swap goodies packed up!

Here is a picture of all the gifts together, ready for the box. 

I added a few more things:

a bag of buttons

some cuddlebug tags

an old earring

chocolate

and the scrabble initials

  Everyone was so generous with the postage, I wanted to add some weight to the boxes!!

If you’d like to see all the photos of the swap goods, I have started a flickr site: http://www.flickr.com/groups/876636@N23/pool/

Well, back to taping up packages.