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In Felicia the Artist

Configuration Book Workshop.

Have you seen the Tim Holtz Mini configuration books? 
They come in craft coloured heavy chipboard ready for you do whatever you want to them…….
Here is my finished project, I painted the whole thing white and didn’t use all of the little boxes inside (which leaves me with two little boxes to make something else with).
I used scraps of paper from different collections and then used up lots of the trinkets that were in my stash…. you know the ones you’re keeping for something special? yeah, those ones!

I deliberately kept the front embellishments flat so that it could slot in with books on the shelf, but if you want it to be on display you could put much more dimension onto the front cover.

                                                 
                                                  The spine looks  pretty amongst the books.

If you want to come and do this workshop, I will be in Bunmahon Co. Waterford on Saturday 28th June. There are three places left, so let me know if you’re interested – its a good project for all levels, if you’re thinking of taking up paper crafts then its a great first project!
For everyone who is already booked in I will post a list of things to bring very soon.
F xx

In Felicia the Artist

June Bank Holiday Weekend.

The June bank holiday means only one thing in Killarney….. the BIKEFEST!!!!!
Town is filled with bikers from all over the world, every hotel, B&B and campsite has rows of amazing bikes in front of it, and it really is the best event of the year (and we have a lot of events going on here!)
I spent the afternoon out at the Gleneagle listening to the bands, dreaming of being a Harley owner, picking out my choice of bike and since there is a tattoo festival incorporated, resisiting the urge to get more ink!

                                             Eoin, Zac, Ebony and Gilly enjoying the  sunshine.

                                Since the day was fine we had our first outdoors dinner of the year

                                                                               Boo.

Typically, when it came to dinner time, the heat of the day had disappeared so the chiminea was lit (much to Toby’s delight!) Tomorrow the plan is to take the dogs to the beach, it might be a sun screen day or a woolly hat day, you never can tell.
Hope you are enjoying the bank holiday too!

In Felicia the Artist

Kids Class Reveal!

Well, this is what they did with the paper machè birds!!

 Only one painted their birds the same – and she is a twin (her twin isn’t in the group)…. and its their birthday today, which I thought was lovely!

 Can you see the board painted like a football pitch in the photo below? they all  had such great ideas – and all their own, I don’t make a sample for them to copy because sometimes they do just that – copy, and its so much nicer when they come up with their own designs.

                                   I think I should have made more – i’d like to do some myself!!

In Felicia the Artist

Kids Art Classes~

Eighteen little birds are waiting to be made bright and colourful this Saturday when my young friends come over to play!

There is quite a lot of preparation for this class, paper machè takes time to dry and one layer is no good, so my kitchen table has looked like this for a few days. Come back on Monday to see how they turned out!

Have a lovely Bank holiday weekend and if you’re in Kerry drive safe – its Rally weekend after all……..
F x

In Felicia the Artist

Is there anybody out there still??

Hmm, hmm (that’s me clearing my throat) erm, well, after my big, “oh,  i’m going to do loads of blogging” claim I fell off the blog wagon and have only got back on today……

So here, without further ado, are some photos of an altered configuration box that I made today.

I should have cropped them and brightened the colours, but if I did that it would be another week before it went up!
I could promise you I won’t leave it as long but that might be a big hairy lie,
Enjoy your day !!

In Felicia the Artist

How Pinterest inspired my kitchen…….

Right, so do you remember when I had those ideas about getting my house in order? well one of them was to re -organise the kitchen to make the best of the space. This could have involved tidying out the cupboards we have, but I much prefer trawling through Pinterest to see how other people have done it.

You see, we have a cupboard up high over the dishwasher – but for some reason it doesn’t fit all the way across the space. The counter above the dishwasher is used for the microwave, toaster and blender.

Then this popped up and a light bulb moment happened!….

                                                                        (source)

The cupboard (which held glasses) was taken down. As you can see the walls were yellow before the cupboard went up, and yes, those are polkadots on the left wall.

 The glasses eventually went into the wooden top cupboard on the left. They were emptied of food items which went into the new larder – so far, no saved space, but more organised.

This is what is now in that space. ( There is a glass door and a window to the left which makes taking photos a bit tricky…… and remember i’m a bit rubbish at it, so not the best photos!)
The new larder fills the whole space and holds all of the food items in one place. We did think about removing the red door and making matching double doors for the lower half. It might happen yet, but i’m in no rush – if you knew how long I waited for a dishwasher you’d understand why I didn’t want to cover it up!
Tim being the clever sort he is, looked at the picture on Pinterest and then made similar racks for the inside of the doors (isn’t he great?!)

 
The toaster,blender and microwave are now housed inside the cupboard – which I like, we leave the doors open if they are being used. The inside of the larder was made from display units that a friend was throwing away from her shop. We had to alter the width of them, but they were the perfect height and came with as many glass shelves as we wanted. We had to get the shelves cut down to size at the local glass cutters, but since the carcasses were free, it was a good deal!

Some of the glasses were too tall for the other cupboards and had to stay here, that annoyed me way more than it should have done-but thats what you get for taking organising too seriously!

The shelves still need a bit of organising,the door racks are great for jars and spices,  but between this and the red cupboard below everything is now kept together.

And then, as a final touch of yumminess, I found these door knobs and they followed me home!

I have a larder!!!!! I keep opening it just to look πŸ™‚ The pots and pans have moved into the corner cupboard where bread and cereals used to be and there is also an empty cupboard. This was a cheap enough project, the doors were the most expensive part, but it has turned really well and I love it!!!

In Felicia the Artist

Polly Dolly Bunting!!

Good Monday morning to you! 
Next weekend is Kate’s CHA party in Athlone – and as I already mentioned I am bringing the Polly Dollies out to play. I wanted them to be sort of shabby chic but I found the “Stationers Desk” paper collection from Prima so it got a bit darker in colour when that was added. Actually, you can see very little of the papers, they are torn and distressed or almost covered up… but they’re there!!
I discovered that it is nearly impossible to photograph bunting while its hanging… unless you have a wide angle lense. I had to stand so far back to get it all in that you would have no idea what each piece looked like.
So here is each pendant close up!
(I am out of flat back pearls which is why my flower centres are all naked….. I will have them for the class though :))

All of the details are on Kate’s website www.createwithkate.com  but let me just tell you quickly~
The whole party is on Saturday 15th and Sunday 16th, but my class is on the Sunday at 11am. The cost is €40, Kate will have her shop there so retail therapy is in order and the Hodson Bay hotel makes a decent cup of coffee, whats not to love???

Have a good week xxxx.

p.s.
Back in January I said I was going to tackle the storage in the kitchen, well the “Larder Project” is complete and I will take photos today after i’ve been shopping, cos its pretty sad looking at the moment!! (and yes, i’m actually sticking to the menu planning once a week shop notion!!!)

In Felicia the Artist

The weather and something to look forward to….

There is a lovely line in Pride & Prejudice where Mrs Bennett tells one of the Miss Bennett’s that if she can not think of anything nice to say she should kindly confine her comments to the weather.

Well….. the weather is the topic of most unkind comments today. We are having the worst weather here, there was a closest thing to a hurricane that I have seen since “that storm” in England in 1985 today. There are trees down on every road, we amazingly still have power but most don’t, thankfully I haven’t heard any reports of injury but there is a lot of structural damage. My poor Mum watched her greenhouse fly away bit by bit and there was nothing she could do, and the local nursing home was evacuated because of damage to the roof.

Anyway, I am thanking my lucky stars that we are all safe and I hope you are too.

Now, did you hear that Kate is having a CHA party on the 15th & 16th March? well she is! In the Hodson Bay hotel in Athlone and I get to teach a class (woohoo!!!)

Have you seen the releases? oh wow! I have fallen in love with a Prima collection ( I know, Prima?!) it is
“Stationers Desk ” and it looks like this:

and so I am going to use that to make one of my favourite things…….Bunting!”!!!!!!
but not just any bunting, oh no, this is going to have something extra special, it going to have some of my Polly Dollies on it ( at least I hope you think that is special?)
I am working away here on the final thing, there will be Dollies, lace, that gorgeous paper, buttons, seam binding, charms, ribbon – just a big shabby chic mess of yumminess!!
I have a little sneak peek for you but bear in mind its a work in progress, I haven’t got my mits on that paper yet!!

Want to see it?

Kate will have all the details of all the classes up soon on her blog
Hope to see you there!!
F xx

In Felicia the Artist

Altered project:

Here is my altered project that was featured on Kates blog this week…


Guest Blogger πŸ™‚ ..7 Gypsies Vintage Receipt Holder.

03FEB
Can’t believe February is here already, but we are kicking it off with a great start, a super project by our guest blogger, the gorgeous Felicia from Scrapzville.
Felicia will be teaching a workshop at our CHA Release party on the 15/16 March so for those who aren’t familiar with her work you will get a sneak peak at her creative mind :-)
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Hi, its Felicia here from Scrapzville, doing a little guest blogging today.
Once upon a time, the lovely Kate said β€œWhat would you do with this?” and handed me the 7 Gypsies Vintage receipt holder…..
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I love anything from 7 Gypsies, so I was delighted with this challenge!
She also gave me some mini file folders,
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so off I went to make something lovely and creative ( You should have seen the mess in my craft room when I was finished!)
I decided to make a birthday calendar – there are only ten compartments on the holder and since there are twelve months I had to double up a couple of times, but i’m really pleased with how it turned out!
I used odds and ends from my scrap box, covered the back of the receipt holder first and then started work on the file folders.
(Prepare yourselves for photo overload..!)
I used one little folder for each month and then listed all of my friends and family’s birthdays in it. So, now I have no excuse for forgetting anyone!
As you can see March & April and August & September had to share a compartment –
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I used the Sizzix Mini clock key & Pocket watch die to make this watch. I cut it from Kraft paper, added someblack dabber, UTEE , some Tim Holtz Ideaology and a chain. This was a really good project for using up that stash!
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I’m loving this new  β€Flora” die from Sizzix Bigz collection  -, it makes beautiful flowers. I cut two the same size, scrunched them up and added a centre. I put UTEE on the leaves and then cracked them to add some texture. This is the middle size which is about 3β€³ across.
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and this is the smaller one, which measures 1 1/2β€³ across:
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If you fancy creating something similar, Here are the links to shop for the products I used
Thank you Kate for letting me play!!
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Love it !!!
Thanks a mill Felicia for sharing your creativity with us
Kate x
In Felicia the Artist

It Arrived!

Well, you know I was mad to place my first Scentsy order – I chose my burner and then spent ages going back over the samples to choose my smellies. The catalogue said the fragrances came in packs if three, so I was thinking (like most other things you buy) that was three packs of the same scent. Hmmm, choosing one I liked that much was prooving tricky, so I rang Aideen and she told me I could pick any three and so the dilemma contined!
Did I mention how odd about smells I am?
I absolutely  hate artificial smells – fabric conditioner is totally banned in my house, the smell of Juicy Fruit chewing gum is enough to send me over the edge,so I was slightly doubtful that I would like any of these.
However, I found three I really liked and placed my order on Sunday.
 Then I wondered how long would they take to get to her, and then she would have to post it to me, and how much would that cost? All the time dying to test these things…
On Thursday I came home to find a lovely big Scentsy box on the table!! the cost that you pay includes direct shipping and I was really surprised how quickly it got here. πŸ™‚
My burner is much prettier than it was in the catalogue, and it has lights (I thought I had ordered one without lights) but this has turned out to be a good thing because it means I remember to turn it off!
Here it is sitting on my little table in front of the book shelf – I chose to burn the “Simply Basil” first – I wish this was a scratch n sniff blog because it is sooooo delicious!!

                                                             
                                                                 Told you it was pretty!

I have had this burning everyday since I got it and I don’t notice the wax going down yet (when I say burning, I mean heating – there is no flame so its safe to leave on all day) I think it will be more cost efficient then scented candles.
I’m still waiting on the Scentsy fairies to tidy and organize my house….. perhaps they come in a separate delivery??!!
 xxx