i.love.my.job.

I'm thankful for it everyday.  

Taking our natural lavender laundry and cleaning products,

 and my repurposed assemblage jewelry,

to markets and shows is something that still seems like a dream.

(a dream where I work very hard... but a dream nonetheless.) 

If you have followed me up to this point, 

THANK YOU!

I know that I have come and gone, and come and gone again,

so I appreciate each and every one of you that still stop by 

when you see me come up in your sidebar. 

...and if you have followed for awhile, then you know that I have loved reclaiming 

forgotten treasures for forever. 

 I get caught up in the process of turning a phrase into a wearable reminder.

Repurposing the forgotten little pieces of someone's long ago story

into jewelry for someones new story...

 something as simple as a beloved dog's tag,

a reclaimed memory of someone's best friend...

into a necklace for a special dog lover.

Each small piece of our history inspires me 

to create a sparkly something special for you to wear.

I draw inspiration from the rusty, crusty, sparkly, shiny, 

 the natural, earth formed gems, and our past.

...and then there's this -

our incredibly fresh scented, hard working

natural lavender goodness.

like I said in the beginning...

i.love.my.job.

Thanks for stopping by!

Please make sure to check my social media pages

The Old White House on FB

and 

Instagram

and even

Twitter

for the latest updates on what I'm up to,

and where you can find us!

love,

t.xoxo

easy peasy charms to make...

So, there I am in Hobby Lobby minding my own business, getting a few supplies in the jewelry findings section for the flowers and such and what do I see?  Fabulous silver bezels that require no soldering!  Oh I still love me some soldering, and will show you in just a bit more of what I have been up to, but these are the perfect charm to share without the cost or fear of the molten lava hot soldering iron!

They require few supplies, the most important being your imagination and free spirit!

After said bezel has been located you will then need to purchase some diamond glaze. There are other products out there that are similar, it is a dimensional glaze that will dry like a resin without the mixing part.

The product I used is called Scrabble and Glass Glaze by Sun and Moon craft kits, I found it on etsy and I know you can find diamond glaze on there too. I have used both and they both work great.  Mod Podge also makes a dimensional glue now that I think works the same way, but I could not find my bottle of that and so haven't tried it yet.

note to self... clean out the workroom!

O.k. this is very important, find a sweet picture... and then it must be LASER copied!  You will not be able to copy these on your inkjet printer, for some reason when the ink and glaze are mixed, the ink will turn different colors and run.

You can also take a picture right out of a vintage book like I did here.  These two are Mary had a little lamb and little Jack Horner from a vintage nursery rhyme book.

  I used the pattern on the bezel package to measure how big the picture could be and then just traced that on top of the picture in the book.  seriously easy peasy.

I love how stinkin sweet these are, those little books always catch my heart with a bit of nostalgia.

This one is a snippet of an original photo, you can use those too if you dare to!  I was on a roll and tried not to think of how bummed I might be when I can't go back and use the photo again. But sometimes a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do! 

We don't have a print shop in this one horse town I live in. 

For this one I measured the bezel pattern on to a piece of scrapbook paper and then cut the little girl out of the picture and glued her on.   I then cut out the word precious from an old book and added some detail with markers. 

So this one was a bit of collage fun too!

So you cut out the picture, and then embellish if you like, I added glitter to the one that says precious by putting a very thin bead of glue around the background paper and then sprinking on the glass glitter (also found on etsy).

Then you squeeze enough glaze onto the collage/picture, enough to fill the bezel to the top and leave it alone!

This is always hard for me to do, cuz I'm a bit impatient. shhhhhh.

O.k. before you run out the door to buy you some bezels... here are two important tips... DO NOT shake the glaze bottle!  It will cause bubbles in your glaze and you do not want bubbles on your charm but if you do get bubbles then just take a pin or toothpick and pop them.  Spoken from experience, I promise.

Because I am a thrifty kind of girl, I bought the bezels when they were 50% off, which HL does quite often so they cost maybe 1.00 a piece for the big one and I think 1.50 for the set of two. 

So there you have it, cheap and easy!

Something I never wanted to reveal about myself!  LOL

This was your tip from Theresa for Tuesday...

Thanks for stopping by!

Theresa xoxo

this just in... I'm linking up to Hope Studios for Tutorial Tuesday. and Tip Me Tuesday over at Tip Junkie and the Glitter Party over at Running with Glitter!  I'm headed over now to see what I can learn today!

spring and silver, a great combination...

A while back I made this metal cone/ tussie mussie out of an old screen, I liked it a bunch but there was just something about it that I thought needed a bit of tweeking. So I pulled the ribbon off of it that I had used to cover the raw edges and the construction bits and as soon as I did I knew that was the problem... less is more!

Oh and I took off the ribbon that I had used as a hanger and added this silver chain instead.  I dusted it with a bit of glitter and when the glue dried and the glitter stuck it looked a bit like sparkling white paint. 

 and now it hangs in the kitchen on the china cabinet with a little primrose giving all who see it a sign and hope of spring and I just needed to share it with you!  I just adore it and will definitely be making more, I just needed to work out the kinks :) 

I have also been soldering again, and I had my brother Wil over to play last week, these are almost finished, I just need to add the jumprings.

These are the backs, I made my MIL a bookmark out of one for her birthday and I plan on doing the same with these.  I will show you again when I have them finished ~  consider yourself warned!

I made another one with a bit of crochet trim enclosed inside, they are a bit trickier but I do love the results.

Have I ever told you I have a thing for older men?  I do!  I can't help myself, I see these old pictures of a man in a suit and his lil hat and I just NEED to create something with him!  I have put a piece of a dictionary page behind him from the letter O... original, just because you just know he was one!

And last but not least, just in case you thought my sewing machine was sitting idle, Danielle was going on a whirlwind trip to TX. for a comedy festival ( which is why she was missing from the b-day trip pics) and she asked me to make her a small tote to have with her at the festival.  You know I can't hardly say no to my kids, so there I was as she was packing to leave,  sewing and ruffling her new bag :)  She found the graphics and I ironed them on.  This one was really quick and simple, even the handle is made of drop cloth, we skipped the rosette,  and no snap (only because she already had one foot in the car!)

So there you have it... I wanted to assure you that I haven't been sitting on my duff watching the world go by!  

O.k. o.k.... I've been doing a bit of that too :)

I am linking up to White Wednesday, Wow Us Wednesdays, and Link Love... 

what can I say, I'm a creature of habit!

Thanks for stopping by!

Theresa xoxo

Silver Sunday...

I haven't played with everyone over at Silver Sunday in quite some time... I'm thrilled to join in the party today!  I thought that since I took pictures of my latest crafty adventure, soldering that I would give you a peek... oh my gosh it is so much fun!  I tried it a couple of years ago but after much frustration I put it aside, well no more!  It, apparently like all of the other art forms I try, is addicting and with the right teacher is so rewarding!  Thanks again Jill! 

After making many little bubbles and such I finally sat down at the kitchen table and got down to business!  I made a few more trinkets to solder, thanks to Sally Jean Alexander's book Pretty Little Things and tried the crystal for my necklace.  My initials on the little bubble were done by cutting the letters out of an old book and adhering them on the tiny bubble with Diamond Glaze and then gluing the bubble to a silver piece from chandelier crystals, and the Red Cross pin was actually just set into a bezel from Hobby Lobby with a piece of background paper behind it and then filled with Diamond Glaze.  I do not profess to be a jewelry artist, far from it, but I am proud to wear this, it being one of my first pieces.

Have I told you how much I love the red cross symbol and vintage photos of service men, and well I'm a bit of a fanatic when it comes to our flag so adding the red, white and blue is a natural!  This piece is too big to wear I think, it is made from a small match box.  It is a little shadow box and I am thinking I will make it into a book mark.  As you can see, I need more practice on my soldering, but that will come with time.

Jenny Doh just showed something similar to this on Crescendoh that was made with a piece of vintage doily, I used a piece of embroidery from a vintage hanky and then added a crystal to hang off of the bottom.

 

This is where I put a bit of my silliness to good use!  I mean she looks happy, right? LOL  See the scallop edge I am hooked on?  It is a special tape that is already trimmed like that!  I love time saving stuff like that!

These glass bubbles just about got the best of me though ... they are tricky and I think I need to master the straight stuff first!

I also should share that I need to get me some silver cleaner to shine these up! 

This is going to be a book mark too,  I am going to add a nice ribbon to it...

and give it to Duane's mom for her bday.  (she doesn't read my blog so I can say that on here)

So now you know something else about me... I am the Jackie of all trades and master of none!  I can't help myself, I seriously only try a fraction of the things I want to try.  I am like a kid in a candy store when it comes to art... so many choices and so little time!  Here is the question...do I need an art intervention? And if you tried to have one for me would I be able to convince you to try the lastest project that I am jonesin to make?  ;O

Are you like that?  Do you want to try every new thing you see?  Are you like most crafty people I know and see something, and maybe instead of buying it you take it as a challenge and tell yourself... I can make that, and for a good many things in the dept. stores, make it for a fraction of the price!  I have always looked at that thinking as a gift... but maybe it is a bit of a double edge sword... because I would be kidding myself to think that I really have time to do everything I want to tackle.  I mean, there are after all loads of laundry and a sink full of dishes to tackle first!  So now I am off the immerse myself up to my elbows in the kitchen sink and get a bit of my household duties done!I'm sure you can guess just how thrilled I am to do that, but I will look at it as a blessing. 

 If we have dirty dishes, then it means we have good food in our bellies. :)

Thank you Beth for the Silver Sunday Party!

Have a fabulous Sunday Everyone!    Theresa xoxo