"11" New Years resolutions & "33" Inspirational HighLights from 2010 !

It's been a wonderful year posting on my blog , so I've put together some highlights of 2010 which I hope you'll enjoy and be re-inspired!

1. Grunge coat, 2. Homemade play dough, 3. Winning Stick, 4. Birthday Crown, 5. Crazy Love,
6. Butterfly mask, 7. All day crop, 8. Tea Cup Pincushion, 9. Alice Charm swap,
10. Spring time tutorial, 11. The Living Desert, 12. Flea market finds, 13. Faerie garden,
14. Getty on Mothers Day, 15. Silly Dilly!, 16. Tussie Mussie
17. New Job, 18. Impish grin, 19. Faerie chairs, 20. Mermaid crown
21. Fair Crown, 22. Comic Con, 23. Quilted Bee, 24. Tote tutorial
25. Wish you were here charm swap, 26. Blue note, 27. Holiday birds
28. Haunted, 29. Worms, 30. Pumpkin tutorial, 31. Sizzix House
32. Melody Ross book, 33. Sea Side Soiree

My 2011 resolutions:
1. To post more tutorials to keep you inspired.
2. Not to be afraid to go "alone" to art classes or events-
because we know I'll leave full of new friends and creative inspiration. :)
3. Scrapbook more. :)
4. Learn to make cream brulee
5. Organize my studio/craft space on a daily basis.
6. Service my sewing machine
7. Create EVERYDAY.
8. Keep in touch with friends that Inspire me.
9. Keep in touch with Family who Support me.
10. Write down my thoughts, dreams and inspirations.
11. To love myself first, so I can share my Love with others.

Happy new Year and see you next year !
~ Michelle Cummings :)

Love Every Moment!

After months of saving my (hard earned stay at home Mom) money,
I gave a iPad to myself this Christmas!
I'm having loads of fun with it,
working on some new artistic designs-
the first being, my new banner (above)
and then this,
...."Love every moment".
I'm really looking forward to the new year, 2011.
I feel many creative moments will blossom and color my soul. :)
See you soon!
~Michelle Cummings

Day 25 - Countdown to Christmas is Done!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
At last! Today is day 25 and the last matchbox creation was made by
Amy Duff!
Thank You Amy!
Merry Christmas everyone!
Thanks to Linda of A Swap For all Seasons for organizing this amazing feat!

Here is a example of the matchbox I sent out.
I used vintage inspired Christmas stamps to make bottle cap magnets.

I wanted the bottle caps to resemble a snow globe, so I used lots of glitter and glaze.

I love the bubbles!

Egg Carton Ornaments

This last June, my Mother in law, Susan passed away and I wanted to make something that I knew she would have enjoyed. So I used some vintage glitter she had given me to make these "Egg Carton Ornaments" with Dyllan.

You will need the following:

1. Empty egg carton, I used 18 ct times 2. Don't use the Styrofoam kind or the paints won't stick.
2. Gesso- as a primer (totally optional)
3. Paint color of choice
4. Mod Podge
5. Glitter
6. scissors
7. paint brush
8. table protection
9. containers for paint and mod podge
10. spray glitter - optional
11. spray sealer
12. a bamboo skewer
13. Tin Foil
14. assorted colors tulle
15. sparkly wire trim

Start by trimming away all the egg cartons extra's so you are left with nice bell shapes.


Then mix the gesso with some water so it's not so thick and begin painting the inside and outside of each bell, setting aside to dry as you work.


I had a baby wipe on a plate nearby for Dyllan to help wipe up drips. :)


He had loads of fun painting, can't you tell? :)

To make the bell, I cut 1" strips of tin foil, from the width of the roll. Then I cut 5" pieces of the wire trim.


Working on the non shiny side of the foil, place the end of the trim and fold the foil over.

Bend the wire trim a bit and fold some more foil over that to keep the trim stabilized and unable to easily pull out. Continue wrapping the foil around the end piece with a ball shape starting to form. Be sure to keep the shiny side on the outside.

Keep going till all the foil is used. Use your fingers to mold the foil into a ball shape.


Here are two of the 30 + bell balls I made.

When my gesso bells were dry I gave them a coat of silver paint. These dried fairly quick so I could move on to the glitter part. :)

I coated each of the bells on the outside with Mod Podge. Then I attached a shaker cap to the glitter and generously applied glitter to each bell. I handeled them up as shown to get better glitter coverage and also held them over non glittered pieces so the extra glitter would not go to waste.

I set these in the garage to dry and once done I sprayed them with a sealer. When the sealer had set, I flipped them over and spritzed the inside with some craft glitter spray (from walmart).


Use the bamboo skewer to poke holes in the dry pieces and then thread your bell up through the hole, loop it around your finger and thread it back down through the bell hole. Twist the tail of the wire to the bell trim hiding it inside the bell.

Tie some tulle (I used red, pink, and some greens) on the bell and attach to cookie plates, gifts or decorate your home!

Merry Christmas! I hope you enjoyed my craft!

Day 24 - Countdown to Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
Today is the day of Christmas Eve!
This matchbox surprise was created by Wendy Ford.

BE FILLED WITH JOY

This is the first real tree
we've had since Dyllan was born
where we've been able to decorate it with the "breakable" ornaments.
Handling those ornaments
made me a bit timid
but happy in the end
because they helped make the tree,
BE.
The tree is plump and
FILLED -
overflowing with all of our wonderful
Family memories.
Some are vintage Czechoslovakian ornaments,
and I share this heritage
WITH my Mother.
I love how the angel
on top seems to glow with JOY.

Day 23 - Countdown to Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
My Dear friend Sherry Edwards
created this little gem of a ornament for today!
I have known Sherry for many years through many of my Charm Swaps. :)

Day 22 - Countdown to Christmas!

Mary Perhulu gave me this adorable little snowman

and folded music sheets angel wings!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap

Day 21 - Countdown to Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
A Sparkly little Star by Jenny Sears!

Day 20 - Countdown to Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
This probably one of my favorites
because of all the hand stitched detail
and that it's just priceless!
This little Christmas Mouse was created
by Vanessa Seeholzer.
Be sure to visit her blog to see her other 'stitched' creations! :)

Day 19 - Countdown to Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
Tiny little tree sewn ornament by Bonnie Linhart.

Day 18 - Countdown to Christmas!

Countdown to Christmas Matchbox Swap-
Once again I received another beautiful matchbox
from Angela Coniglio! So pretty!

My Artsy Urban book by Melody Ross

Recently I had the honor of meeting the beautiful and inspiring Melody Ross!
She attended the Sea Side Soiree weekend retreat where I taught a crown making class - (post still to come!).
She was nice enough to give everyone one of her kits and even printed off little "best of 2010" affirmations plus a few goals for 2011 for us to journal with!
This particular book was "Artsy Urban".
Melody even brought her Chip art tools for us to personalize our books!
~~~~~~~~~~
So here is what came in this kit. These are high quality printed chip board pages.

And fun stickers plus her printouts.

Here are the supplies I used to personalize my book.

I started by using a makeup sponge and my dark brown ink pad to distress all the books edges.

I tore some music sheet paper, distressed those edges and rubbed it over the top of a fat glue stick before adhering to a page.

It adds a nice touch, don't you think?

To make my name and date on the cover of the album pop a bit, I lightly rubbed my metal stamped letters and numbers with the brown ink. Then I doodled some squiggles all around with a pen, and finished of with some more squiggles with a glue pen. I let this get tacky before rubbing on some copper glitter. (see album above for glitter results)

Next, I used my most favorite and most used tool in my stash- my Dymo label maker with 3 interchangeable text disks. I went to town adding captions and words of inspiration here and there!

A little bit of advice when using this tool, if you have a lot of short words to make, print them out in one long strip with spaces in between. Then when you cut and release the strip, remove the backing as shown before cutting up individual words. It's really mush easier this way!

I love the bright cheerful colors of the tulle I used!

I'm a stickler for chunky books. :)

I had some other embellishment hanging around,
so I added the crown to my book. Seems fitting, don't you think! ;)

I just love Melody's words of inspiration!

I don't know if I'll have room to write all my "new" best friends I made in 2010! :P

"There is nothing so beautiful as someone who is not afraid to fly"

I added paper scraps, distressed tickets, red and black polka dot wrapping paper....

My own affirmations....

the end. For now... :)

Thanks for coming by!