Mary Poppins Spring Mantel!

It's easy!  Let's see..You think.  You wink.  You do a double blink.  You close your eyes...and jump!

The finished product!

Okay, so Thursday there is a spring mantle linky party at The stories of a2z, and I thought, well, we don't have a mantle, but we certainly do have a long shelf that looks like a mantle (which, FYI, we got for free dumpster diving).  And let's be honest; our mantle was covered in wedding leftovers (read: fall colors).  Time to spruce things up!  So I looked at the old mantle, then I looked at some burlap bags I had lying around (they were free, so I took them), and then I looked at my hodge-podge mess of a craft room and decided it was time to get crafty.

Old Mantle

Burlap Bags

Messy Craft Room

 So then I thought; how will I make this springy?  In Indiana, the first sign of spring is when the daffodils bloom.  I love daffodils.  And then this lyric popped into my head:  "The daffodils are smiling at the doves!"  If you don't know what movie that is from by now, well, allow me to enlighten you:

MARY POPPINS!

Okay, so it may or may not be my favorite movie of all time.  And what better way to celebrate spring than with one of the greatest movies ever?  It's "Right as a morning in May!"  The youthful innocence, the bright colors, the gaiety...what?  You want me to tell you about the mantle, already?  Okay.

I started by making some silhouettes.  Not with a Silhouette fancypants machine.  With an exacto knife.  That's what us poor people use.  Spartan.  Then I added some chipboard letters and lyrics, and voila!  Some mantle decor that quite frankly would also make fantastic nursery decor.  Sigh.

"Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious"
"With tuppence for paper and strings, you can have your own set of wings."
"When you're with a 'sweep, you're in glad company."

Then, I added some doodads to the mantle: a little bird (Hobby Lobby), some medicine (my own creation), a sugar bowl (Goodwill), and spoons (family heirlooms).  (Get it?  A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down!)

You can't really see it in this picture, but you should know
that the medicine is Rum Punch flavored-MP's fave!

"In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun.
Find that fun and SNAP!  The job's a game."
I tried to absorb this concept into studying for class,
but no matter how much I make studying a game,
it is still not fun.

Okay, so then I made this little shadow box for the birds, because let's face it; feeding the birds is what this whole movie is about!  (Generosity, seeing past the end of your nose, etc.)

"Feed the birds, that's what she cries; while overhead, her birds fill the skies."

Okay and then there is this scene where Bert hands MP a bouquet of flowers, but when she goes to smell them, the flowers turn into butterflies and fly away!!!  So, I put some butterflies in some vases!

Too literal?  No fear, I am going to personalize this thing, don't you worry!  The movie takes place in 1910.  How funny, I have some old family photographs from 1912-1918 (and one first communion form the 1930's).  Granted, the movie takes place in England, and the photos take place in France, but I figure it's close enough.  I took my 100-year old photos, scanned them (yeah, no way am I going to ruin those treasures!), and, wait for it....made them into a banner!  I was a little sick of sewing, so I used a hot glue gun, some ribbon, some trim, and some pieces cut from ye olde burlap bags.  Not too shabby! (Actually, it's kind of shabby chic, so maybe it is too shabby?)

My grandma at her 1st Communion!

Great grandma (I think) and her two brothers. And some other peeps.

 And one last bit:  you can't see them in the picture at the top (because they aren't there), but I added some more doodads.  For me, spring also signals the greatest holiday in Christendom: Easter.   Luckily for me, I found some old First Communion and Remembrance cards with spring themes (from France, from 1912-1918).  Again, these were 100 years old (but in fantastic condition!), so I scanned them, glued them to cardstock and folded the cardstock so that they would stand up.  Ta da!  Aren't they lovely?

Flowers from Bethlehem.

Yes, I realize the one on the left is in German.
Historical tidbit: My family is from Alsace-Lorraine, France,
a border region that bounced back and forth from French to German control and back, so everyone in that area simply spoke both languages.  Cool, huh?

So here is my final product: not as clean as the picture you saw at the beginning of the post, but for me, it carries so much sentimental value.  With these artifacts, I feel like I am right there in turn-of-the-century Europe, singing along with Julie Andrews!

In the words of Mr. Banks: "How pleasant is the life I lead!"

Linking to:

Vacation Photography Tips

I recently got this new camera, a digital SLR.  I thought I would share some tips and tricks I have learned along the way, especially as I was experimenting with it on my trip last week:

-Always remember where the sun/light source is.  This is a cardinal rule of photography that I seem to forget a lot.  It can create some weird shadows, although occasionally having the sun in my frame makes for a cool shot, like this one:

-Invest in some filters.  I always have a UV filter on, if for no other reason than to protect the lens.  A $20 filter is way cheaper and easier to replace than trying to repair or purchase a lens.  Also, I added a polarizing filter on top of it, which helped reduce the glare off water and glass, and also helped give the sky a richer tone.

-If at first you don't succeed, keep shooting until you do.  I really really really wanted a cool shot of this marina sign at the end of a road in Key West, but the sun was right behind it, shading the whole picture. I was taking pictures from every angle, trying to get something out of the shot.  Finally, I got so frustrated that I walked over, stood underneath the thing, and shot.  And it came out great.  I did a little color enhancement in the photo editor, and voila, my perseverance paid off!

-Don't be afraid to edit, and don't delete pictures until you've had a chance to play with them.  I kind of already mentioned this above, but photo editing software can do you wonders.  I wish I could show you the before and after of this shot, but I think my friend might kill me.  Let's just say that half her face was washed out and the other half was completely hidden by shade, she had 5 chins, and a little bit of sunburn.  I took 10 minutes to retouch, add some color enhancement, and blur the edges, and came out with a halfway decent portrait.  It's nothing professional, but trust me, it was a delete-able picture beforehand, and now I can at least put it on Facebook (or this blog)!

Stay tuned for an AWESOME project from Mrs. K!!!!!

Distressed Canvas Pictures

Okay, so after my wedding in October I really really really wanted to get a wrapped canvas print of our wedding photos---maybe some kind of collage or something.  Unfortunately, these things start at around $50, which is a price I am not interested in.

Soooo after a conversation it Mrs K, she directed me to the following link, which showed me how to make my own canvas prints for much, much less:

DeliaCreates Distressed Canvas Pictures

And here are some of the results:

-an anniversary collage for my parents.  When my mom got this, she said, "I think you'll have to fix it...it looks like it got damaged and something stuck to it."  I informed her that it was supposed to look like that.

And a full-canvas attempt for my husband.  This one came out better, with more even distressing.

And the wedding collage.  Surprisingly, this did not come out as distressed as I had hoped.  I used probably too much gel medium, and I forgot to wet a couple of the pictures before I applied them to the canvas.  oops!

But overall, I was really pleased.  It looks great on our living room shelf!  (Candlesticks courtesy of Goodwill, and the Votive holders were leftover decorations from the wedding.  The shelf was a dumpster find...occasionally I love living in a college town!)

Overall, this was a really fun project that did not require much time at all!  Be warned though; it is a messy project!  I had little bits of paper everywhere!