Janet of All Trades

I have started to organize my laundry room storage area since it has not looked too pretty lately. I have wanted to tackle this for a few months but the holidays arrived and I had no time but to make it messier. Finally it was time to start and I started with a baby step since I think breaking a big project down into little ones helps with the sense of accomplishment. I decided by ribbon had just gotten completely out of control. Bits of ribbon saved from gifts and leftover from other projects. I don't like to throw any pretty ribbon away,so I tend to end up with a ton and it all gets tangled together. I started with a some cardboard (recycled from my work place) and plastic bins (that I have had for ages, also rescued from the dumpster at my workplace..yes we use to have great garbage). I then cut the cardboard to about 2" wide by 8" long and started to wind each piece of ribbon around the cardboard. Making sure to keep similar colors together and keeping only those pie...

I my attempt to learn how to use other settings on my Camera other than Auto, I have been taking photos of what I see during the week and tweaking some settings. This week I changed the ISO (Light sensitivity) and it is a hold over from the film camera days and film speed. Now I completely understand film speed from my days with my Old Canon AE-1 Days. So I started by just walking around my work warehouse and snapping some shots. Leather 1 - ISO at 800 I like this nice detail in the grain of leather and the light is coming from above. Washes out the white leather but I love the contrast of the green and brown. Leather 2 - ISO 400 There was over head lighting that was shining down on this lovely blue leather, giving it a very shiny appearance, when in fact it it is really not shiny. Light Bulbs -ISO 800 In a very dark corner of the warehouse, these bulbs are stored and I thought they looked interesting. Not much light, but some it is reflected of the metal ends. Leather Bins - ISO ...

This is the beginning of my Pantone Experiment and to rediscover the colors picked by Pantone to be the color of the year. I will begin my study of the year 2000 pick, Cerulean Blue. Now the very first thing that came to mind when I read then name, was a line from The Devil Wears Prada and Amanda Priestly's comment about gowns made by Oscar de la Renta in the color and how the it was picked up by other designers and then trickled down into department stores where it was exposed to the masses.I thought it was a funny in the movie,but I am thinking the logic might not be off the mark. Since this is what I found in current publications and how the color is still widely used. (1) The color is used in advertising and main page displays. Not shown is the facing page which also used this color for the length of the page. This is the main Index for Interior Design August 2010 (2) Interiors and accents. This room uses not only the color but a variation of it in many places thru out. Prov...

I few weeks ago I found some blank or nearly blank pendants at Joann's. I thought there must be something I can make with them since they were only $.97. Then I was working on my other book page projects, I came across a book that had nice large letters in a old typeface. So I took the blank pendants and cut a circle to fit and then covered with Mod Podge. Then I added a little bit of sparkle paper, topped it with my letter and then covered it again with Mod Podge. I added a bail and a chain and it was ready to wear in about 2 hours! I was super easy and fun. I made a few more but this one was without the letter, but with a star and an Antique glass bead (recycled from some old Christmas decorations). I think this one is just as unique and on a larger scale could be a ornament. This is a really easy project and the possibilities of projects with Book pages seems endless to me. Just for the record I have only defiled half of one book so far, so I don't feel all that bad about c...

Ove the past few weekends I have started a whole slew of projects and have many more on my list. This weekends list includes some projects and some organizing that needs to be done. So here is my list for the second weekend in 2011.  (1) I found this super easy pattern for Draped Cardigan in Sew News April/May 2010. Takes three yards of fabric although, but is easy to sew and looks great on anyone. (2) A little ribbon organizing. All this ribbon was wound and stored so perfectly some years ago and has gradually gotten tangled and messy over the last two years. Time to take control and store it better. (3) Another organization project is my fabric mess. Now I don't have a photo of it since I am slightly embarrassed of the piles and piles sitting on two chairs, So I will show you what I want it to look like and what I will use.  I want it to look like this.. And I will use these from http://www.thefabricorganizer.com/ (4) Lastly and sadly is take down my Christmas trees and de...

Recently Pantone announced that the color of 2011 was Honeysuckle. I thought Honeysuckle was yellow since Honey is part of the name, but hence it is a rosy pink. So I thought it might be interesting to see what colors Pantone chose over the last decade and below are the colors form 2000-2011 At first I thought I saw a trend since there is so much red,orange and blue and the colors almost repeat over the twelve year period. But with a closer look they are all unique. So over the next 12 weeks I will explore each  color of the decade (even though there are 12 and not 10) to see how each one has influenced the items we buy or create for our homes. So come back next week when I start with 2000 and color was Cerulean # 15-4020 a nice calming blue to start the 2000's!

One of my New Years Resolutions was to learn how to use my fabulous camera that I got for my Birthday in June. I have been using for over six months with the setting on Auto and seriously need to learn all that my Canon Rebel XS can do. I just happened to read in Macworld Magazine this weekend that Auto is great for good point and shoot photos but taking it off Auto and experiencing what I can do is the first step. So I decided to take a few photos with their suggestions and the following is what happened. New Year's Eve Glass of Champagne I This was taken with no flash and on Program AE mode in which the camera selects the aperture and shutter speed but you can change other settings such as ISO (image sensor sensitivity to light). Here is another shot as well in this mode. New Year's Eve Glass of Champage II This one I totally love since you can see the color of the glass reflected in the bubbles. Once again on program and did not touch any other settings. Now that I am readi...