to paint or not to paint; is it even a question?

I have a beautiful Queen Anne writing desk, not too dissimilar from this:

Mine is a darker, and the pulls are different, but you get the idea (it's currently covered with "stuff" or I'd have posted an actual photo.)

The thing is, as much as I love the look of this painted Toby Fairly desk (swoon),

the idea of painting something that once belonged to a family member (my dad's Great Aunt, who never married) coupled with the fact that it's an antique kinda freaks me out.

I have zero problems painting my metal filling cabinet, in fact I'm getting ready to paint it for the 3rd time, but I don't think I can touch my desk.

If only I could find a sweet card catalog style CD storage cabinet at a thrift store,

then I'd paint that and stop all this nonsense. Hmmmm, that's a really good idea. That would be excellent storage for ribbons and trims and other misc supplies. Must remember to Mom on the case- she seems to be able to find anything.

colorscope

Paper Source has this fun little publication called a "Colorscope" It's supposed to tell you something about your personality based on the color(s) you are attracted to. Of course, it's mostly a bunch of bunk, but it's fun to play with and it's pretty to look at.

Right now, I'm these colors*:

I have a project that I'm working on that includes all these colors, but it's still in the formulation stages, but soon the plan will be ready & more work (since I already started some of it) can continue!

*My apologizes to PS for adjusting the colors slightly to match my project; they were close, but not quite there.

gadgets and gizmos galore

Over Easter weekend, Joe and I visited his parents & his mom asked me to do through some old sewing stuff that had belonged to her aunt. I expected to find buttons, old spools of thread and assorted other basics, all of which I found and some of which came home with me, but the coolest thing was this box:

First off, I'm a sucker for a cool looking box, but what really got me was what was inside:

It's a whole kit of Kenmore specialty sewing machine feet and color coded cards on how to use them! I ♥ color coding!
Not only that, but after I brought it home, I confirmed that they fit my modern Kenmore machine!

The old school zipper foot kicks the gluteus maximus of the one that came with my machine & it's fully adjustable without having to remove it!

I love how each attachment fits neatly into its own place in the box:
I can hardly wait to try out the ruffle attachment, but unfortunately, that may have to, because I'm already in the middle of, oh, half a dozen other projects and I really should finish one of them before adding another.

And on a completely unrelated topic, here's a pic of me at work on the day of the Royal Wedding:

Who says it's not normal to wear a lace dress to work? We had an afternoon tea that day, so of course I had to be dressed for Westminster. The cup holds Prince of Wales tea, naturally.

one of these thingsis not like the other

Notice how different the labels are on my bottles?

I actually used the same inkjet clear labels for both, but the "scrub" bottle went through a special treatment first. Turns out that the layer that is added to the labels to make the inkjet ink stick to them (but not make them water resistant) is *removable*!

Using some of my homemade cleaner & a scrubby sponge, I was able to get rid of that stuff & then ran the labels through my laser printer, thus making water resistant, clear labels!

Ok, so they aren't perfect, but they look pretty damn cool. I know that they will eventually need to be replaced, but by then I might even own a Silhouette and would be able to make something really cool.

By the way, if you are wondering and don't already know, the font is Pharmacy, which is easily down-loadable & although you can't see them, I typed the recipes on the back in good ol' Century Gothic- easy to read and a nice clean contrast to Pharmacy.

I'll get the cleaning recipes up soon...

spin the bottle

As promised, here's the post about the new spray bottles!

But first, let me refresh your memory regarding the old ones. They looked really pretty on line, they were the right price, they shipped quickly, they were crap.

New bottles, little bit more expensive, packed amazingly well and totally AWESOME!

Here's one of the new bottles & one of the old ones: (I told you it was yellow!)

I realized that I not only liked the way the black sprayers looked better, I liked how they feel in my hand better as well. Luckily, they are the same size as the sliver ones! I just switched the straws inside and swapped them out:Notice how crushed the blue bottle is? That's what happened *every time* I sprayed with them!:
I went ahead and picked up some of the Dollar Tree bottles as well and although they are a little more shiny than the big ones, along with an old stainless salt shaker, they all look super cool together.

I have another part of this little project that I'm really close to being able to post about, but not quite, so I'll leave you in suspense...
(I know it's almost killing you)