Buy an American Flag made in China?!

Good for Gov. Ted Strickland. He and others like him are debating an Ohio bill that would outlaw the sale of foreign-made U. S. and Ohio flags. A father of soldier killed in Iraq had this to say to the Senate: "Unless you have stood before a flag-draped casket bearing the remains of your warrior son who gave his life in combat, you may never know of the pride and ideals that this flag instills in those of us who have." Pretty powerful words. Several others states, including Minnesota, Colorado, Wisconsin, and Tennessee have already passed similar legislation.

People opposed to the bill say that passing such a bill goes against free trade agreements. This guy they interviewed on TV said that passing this type of bill sends a negative message to China and could end up closing our free trade with China "which we worked so hard to open." And why is that, sir? Why did we work so hard to open free trade with China? So that thousands, millions even, of Americans could lose their jobs? What we have with China isn't free trade. It's unequal, unfair trade. What does China depend on us for, seriously? We depend on them for a lot (practically everything sold at Wal-mart), but I can't really think of a single that other countries really need us for. Here we have a problem. Buy American, people. (And don't even stop there. Buy handmade American!)

I have so many Americana items in my house.... here's a set of star shaped boxed I got at a garage sale that houses some of my sewing supplies


A Clock I received as a gift


A couple pitchers I just had to have, and an antique duck that was my grandma's

This is a picture frame I picked up for a few dollars at an antique shop. Yes, it has some damage, but I love it nonetheless. Framed in it are pictures of my Great-Grandma's family.


A rocking chair with a handmade Old Glory pillow made by yours truly. It was really easy. I took a thrifted flag and sewed it onto a pillow. The fabric covering over the pillow was also added by me... I chose blue and white fabrics to match the flag :)

Linking to: Someday Crafts Patriotic Linky Party 2012

Toilet paper can be cute too

Don't ignore the most important room of the house! Check out this flea market find. It almost blends in with the wall color because the two shades match so well. Funny thing is, I painted neither the walls or this bird house-TP holder. Both came as is. It also fits perfectly in the little spot between the toilet and the sink and is even the same height as the toilet. It's like it was made specifically for this spot. I can't believe my good fortune!

And who doesn't like birdhouses? I have birdhouse lamps, jewelry holders, Christmas ornaments... what else can we make out of old birdhouses? I have two birdhouses in the garage that my grandpa built before he passed away. He fully intended them to be used as bird houses, but I bet we could come up with some other cool use for them. They have flat roofs- it's made for a certain kind of bird but for the life of me I can't remember which kind. They have removable floors for cleaning purposes, so I could make one into a bank! Just put the money in the hole intended for the bird's entrance, and you have an instant bank! What else can you come up with?

This was also a flea market find, however it was from one of those tents where they're selling all new stuff. This keeper-of-the-TP is put to good use in the upstairs bathroom.

But what if we have company?

What if fifty people were to just drop by the house, and we felt the need to throw an impromptu tea party? Just in case that scenario should ever present itself, I need to be prepared!

Each of these vintage, floral beauties was hand picked from flea markets, garage sales, etc for next to no cost at all. I have a few more tea cups, but they don't all fit in the cabinet anymore (plus I have my great-grandma's matching china set but I don't really care for the pattern-- it's currently in a box in the basement). I have an idea. Instead of downsizing on the vintage china, how about I just buy another Hoosier cabinet?

More transformations

The lady who made this is the bomb. She is my hero, seriously. You should totally check out her blog. This is the inspiration for me to do something with this, if I could just bring myself to cut it up:

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Here we have a small piece of wood, painted a lovely shade of green, to which I screwed in three vintage hooks. While I was still with my ex, his apartment building was being torn down to make way for a new university parking lot (that totally pissed me off but that's neither here nor there). Since it was being torn down, we took the hooks that had been hanging in the closet all those years. It was the least I could do save a small piece of history.

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Here's my husband's not-so-attractive TV stand. We were getting rid of furniture when our two households merged, but I saw some potential in this one. I knew we would need more TV stands, since together we had six TVs. I knew just the corner where this one would work. Here it is mid-way to being done.

And here it is after it's paint job and new skirt (attached with velcro)

What the heck is this thing?

• What in tarnation is it? Awhile back, I bought it at a flea market for next to nothing. For the longest time, I proudly displayed four pillowcases (one hung in each hole), however I have decided to put the pillowcases back in the closet. Sometimes I sling a purse over the top, and I'm sure it would be good in a bathroom to hold a handtowel, but what else could it be?

I suppose you could glue round pieces of cork into the circles and have a very interesting cork board.

You could somehow place lace around the circles (perhaps with hot glue), and use it as a place to store earrings, but I don't really wear earrings.

If the circles moved, you could position them so you could put flower pots in it, but they won't budge. Who else has some cool ideas? Speak up, people! Let me know what you think.

My Chair Fetish

According to good buddy Merriam-Webster, a fetish is:

1a- an object (as a small stone carving of an animal) believed to have magical power to protect or aid its owner; broadly : a material object regarded with superstitious or extravagant trust or reverence
b- an object of irrational reverence or obsessive devotion

Yes, that's me. "Obsessive devotion." Why, oh why, do I love chairs so much? Big chairs, little chairs, wooden chairs, plastic chairs, metal chairs, upholstered chairs, chairs that match, and chairs that lack a partner. I love them all the same. Perhaps Dr. Seuss should have spun a little tale about chairs rather than his infamous "One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish." Don't you think, "One chair, two chairs, Red Chairs, Blue Chairs" just has a better ring to it?

Yes, I do have too much time on my hands.

My husband is very good about my garage saling habit, however he now expressly prohibits me from bringing home anything that remotely resembles a chair. Well, he isn't exactly that harsh, but you know what I mean. A few weekends ago I came really close to bringing home a chair. My friend and I were garage saling at a huge community yard sale, and the sales were wrapping up for the weekend. This one homeowner had already gone inside and called it a day. And there it was. It was wooden with a broken cane seat. It matched almost perfectly the chair that my grandma gave me to few years ago, right down to the broken cane seat. And best of all, it was free. At least, I figured it was free. It was just sitting out by the curb like trash. But I didn't take it, and now it's probably taking up space somewhere in some landfill. I'm pissed off just thinking about it. Hopefully someone nabbed it, even if that someone wasn't me. Here's mine holding some vintage tablecloths since people can't sit on its broken cane seat:





I don't own a pair of these chairs, however the idea behind them are so cool I wanted to add them to the list. Click on the chairs, and you can visit their website. They recycle video game consoles and somehow make chairs out of them!



This one was sold to me back in college by a friend. At the time, it was covered in ugly black vinyl, so I covered it with green velvety fabric that I bought back when I worked at Joanns (loved that employee discount!) The pillows and blanket were second-hand finds.


This chair is temporarily holding this Sheriff's hat that I got for Jason. Suffice it to say, as a child, Jason used to collect little police badges, and I thought this would make a nice addition to his collection! (Fifty cents at a garage sale, and this hat was mine!)


I bought these little charmers at three separate garage sales/flea markets. I can't believe I was lucky enough to find three of the same type of chair! Inconspicuously printed on the chair is "Made in Mexico" ... my guess is they were hand-painted.


This rocker was a college hand-me-down from a roommate. She didn't want it anymore and gave it to me when we graduated. I recovered it and paired it with this pillow I made.


These plastic chairs were originally green and red when I was given them by a college roommate's mother. I painted them white, distressed them, gave them leaf motif stamps, and then placed a seat cusion on them (where is the other seat cushion?!)


This chair is being put to good use to hold kindling for this summer's bonfires.


I got this little beauty at an antique store for ten bucks. It's tiny and cute. I wouldn't spend ten dollars for a chair anymore, but this was one of my first finds.


This little darling came from a garage sale for a buck or so. My children will make good use of it some day, but in the meantime I set stuffed animals on it.


These shabby chic chairs came from a thrift store years ago and cost ten bucks for the pair. When covered with the cushions I made to go with them, they are really comfy.


Here's a another garage sale find


This bentwood chair has a mate downstairs in the kitchen. Both came from garage sales.


Some don't care for these chairs, but at 1.50 for the pair at a garage sale back in college, I couldn't pass them up. I recovered them and painted them white and now they look like totally different chairs. My dentist's office has these same exact chairs.



You might think that's all I have *cackles with laughter*, but honey, this is just a mere drop in the bucket!

I Hate Gardening

That's right. Someone who's as frugal and eco-friendly as me, well you would think that I enjoy gardening. Growing your own foods so you don't have to rely on pre-packaged veges at the grocery store, that sounds like a "reducing" from the 3Rs if you ask me. Well the only thing I am growing is clover in the yard so I can feed it to my rabbit. And even that is a weed.

Notice the thistle weed on the right side of the picture and the baby redbud tree sapling on the left. That darn tree is always dropping its babies everywhere. I've never seen such an invasive tree before. It such a pain to go dig them up all the time. Oh well; at least it is pretty in the spring. I guess that makes it all worth it.

My husband is in charge of mowing, and I am supposed to be in charge of weeding the flower beds. It's a running joke around here that I am systematically eliminating the flower beds by turning them back into grass. The side of the house has a flower bed that used to be full of perrenials (which I do love the look of) but lately it's just been home to thistle weeds. I plowed it under, planted grass seed, and it is no longer my problem. Next job to tackles is the ginormous flower beds in the back yard that go around two sides of the sunroom. I always thought it would be nice to plant veges there, however it never happened. The only thing that grows there these days are weeds. That's right folks, I am a horrible gardener. I don't like the heat nor do I like the sun, and so being outside to pull weeds is utter torture.

This is about as close to gardening as I care to be-- sitting in the living room looking at pretty pictures from my favorite decorating magazines.

I do a little container gardening. I had an aloe plant, which I mistakenly thought might like to live in the sunroom. Oops. It's almost dead now. I also have a plant on the kitchen windowsill that's in pretty sad shape. I guess I lack the gene that causes the condition known as "green thumb." My aunt got all those genes.



I do like the look of terra cotta pots. I saw once in a magazine where they took the itty bitty ones and wired them together to form a wreath, which they hung on their gate. It was the most adorable thing I ever saw, not to mention a good way to repurpose something! I grab the little clay pots at garage sales whenever I see them, however so far I have not collected too many, so I can't make my wreath just yet.

In the meantime, here are two ladies who have made a version of the terra cotta wreath. I especially like the first one because it's a little bit fuller with more pots on it.


When you visit her site, you'll see that this woman is really into gardening. She has such fun, funky, and recycle-minded ideas!


This site isn't oriented toward gardening, but instead on Trash to Treasure. This is one of my favorite past times-- taking what someone else thinks is junk and revamping it into something beautiful and/or useful!

Cherries

I love cherry fabrics! This first one is a vintage dish towel... isn't it sweet?



This next one was a skirt that I got at a thrift store. I've cut it up to make a handbag out of it.... what else?



This vintage fabric belonged to my great-grandma. She sewed a lot, and after she passed away, I inherited all of her fabric.

Vintage tin canisters & and Eyeless Chicken

More second-hand finds, coming right up! These vintage canisters I've picked up at garage sales. None of them match, and that's exactly how I like it! Right now they're empty, but soon enough they'll be storing little things like batteries or change.














I love these little canisters. I want to fill them up with little bobbins, because I need to get some more and they will need a place to live.


These metal boxes came from various garage sales. The blue one I just got a few weeks ago. I think my friend thought I was crazy when I got it (for one dollar I might add) but after she saw how it fit in, she changed her mind. I did a little research, and the Johnson & Johnson product had something to do with dairy farming. Not what I would have expected, that's for sure.


What does this have to do with canisters? Absolutely nothing. My grandma gave me this vintage chicken, but its eyes must have fallen off at some point.

Repurposing- The Fourth "R"

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Repurpose. The last one's the most fun, isn't it? I didn't exactly repurpose old cork like I should have for this project, though I am repurposing old hoops. I know if I was patient I surely would have run across a corkboard someone was selling for next to nothing, however at Smith & Hawkins, they were having a sidewalk sale yesterday and, on clearance, they had these circular cork mats to put your plants on for $1.39 each. They were perfect (or so I thought), so I grabbed three; one for each of the hand-me-down embroidery hoops I had in mind for the project.

After I got home, I traced around the hoop onto the cork just like this tutorial says, http://www.sweetjessie.com/2008/03/put-cork-in-it.html , but ran into some problems because the back is lined with plastic. I thought I would be able to gently peel off the plastic backing however the cork breaks when I try to separate the cork from the plastic. So there it sits, awaiting for me to come up with a solution, and also awaiting for me to decide which fabric I want to use. Too many fabrics, so little time.

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In this photo, look at what the vintage fan is sitting on, and there you will find another artfully repurposed craft that is fun and simple to make. I found some shutters at a garage sale (I found some in three different sizes, and so I made three, though the other two can't be seen in this photo). With these shutters, I screwed them together to form a rectangular box, topped it with a piece of scrap wood, and paint as you see fit. Voila, a nice little place to set your beverage, book, clock, or whatever else doesn't take up too much surface area!

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Here you kind of see more of the shutters that I repurposed. On top is an antique shoe-form, into which I popped an old dowel rod (which had been a paint stirrer in its recent past), and there you have a paper towel holder.

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Next is a birdhouse-trio wall-hanging necklace-holder I made. At the flea market in Shipshewanna, Indiana, I found someone who was selling those adorable little birdhouses for something like fifty cents to a dollar, depending on the size. Surely he was using reclaimed wood, which makes this all the more eco-friendly. I glued and nailed the trio together, placed eye hooks in the side and attached with a ribbon I got at a garage sale years ago. Then I screwed three cup hooks onto the front, and there you have it. I originally made it for keys, but after I amassed all those necklaces at a garage sale for ten cents apiece, I needed a place to put them.

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Next up is one of my personal favs. Here we have a few feedsacks that I've sewn to fit a body pillow. Did you know that back in the olden days, people would use their feed sacks just like regular fabric, and many of their garments would get lined with this feedsack material. Companies actually started making the lettering wash out so that it was all the more easier to repurpose the material. Anyway, I love the way they look, and they're comfy too!

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Along the same lines as the Feed sack body pillows, here we have three pillows. One is made from ladies' handkerchiefs, one from fabric napkins, and the third from a vintage bag of flour.

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Last up for now is a wine crate ottoman, complete with free casters that my friend gave me after she took them off something of hers. The wine crate was given to me a long time ago by an ex's mother. I simply placed some foam on top, covered it with fabric, and stapled the fabric to the underside of the lid. Inside I store linens. In this house, almost everything needs to double as storage because I have so much STUFF!

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Here is a mug tree I got awhile ago at a garage sale. I liked it because it was metal and shabby chic, not like the 70s wooden one we all grew up with. I did have mugs on it until I came into a ton of jewelry at a garage sale, all ten cents per piece, and now I am having to find creative ways to store it all. I told myself I wouldn't buy anything to put the jewelry on and would instead just use found objects around the house. This seems to do the trick, however, I think it works best with bracelets because it doesn't have much height.

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This is a cat house I made in college for Lily, our then-cat. She was a stray who just walked into the house one day, literally, and then never left. A roommate of mine kept her after college. To make this house, I used leftover wood that I had. No new wood was purchased. I painted it to look cute, and there you have it. It no longer houses any animals, but it sits out in front of our house just for show.


Wow, am I tan in this photo.