coasters.

anytime i get the wild thought that i want to spruce up my living room, i usually start with coasters. the living room is literally where we do the majority of our living... naps on the couch, movies at night, dinner at the coffee table, k dumping out her toy basket and playing, me writing on my laptop... the list goes on & on! for some reason, with this last move to our new townhouse, the redecorating bug bit me really badly, and i literally wanted to start over. so, basically, within the confines of our budget, i did! and of course, i started with my little obsession with coasters.
i usually do little quilted ones, but for these, i tried out a reverse applique idea that i think turned out really cute! especially paired with the dotted fabric. i absolutely LOVE that amy butler dotted fabric. i'm doing the room in a mix of mostly tan and orange, but with a little dark brown and just a touch of green for fun (of course, the ones with green are not pictured yet because they are still sitting on my sewing machine, not quite finished). now they have a place of honor on our coffee table in the little baskets that house our remote controls and the random pens and cluttery-stuff that collects in the living room.
the more logical thing would be throw pillows, but i have a strange intimidation of them. if i just sat down and did it, i'd probably find that they were the easiest thing in the world, and why didn't i do it sooner? aren't they kind-of like giant coasters with stuffing? but now the loveliness of the throw pillow offerings on etsy are wooing me, despite the fact that it would be much cheaper to make them myself, and i have an obscene amount of fabric just waiting to be used! maybe i will get brave this week & just go for it!

paper lanterns.

i'm not even sure it's safe to tell you how many times i've almost ordered some paper lanterns online. i'm glad i didn't, because a few weeks back i found these at michael's for $1 apiece! (i think the big one was $2.50. but still).
with no shipping. they're doing a great little one-dollar-spot like target, which is genius of them. i used some ribbon to hang them at different heights and thumbtacked it into the ceiling, et voila! exactly the look i wanted on the super cheap, which is even better.
also, when you rock in the rocking chair, it creates a slight breeze that fans the lanterns back and forth ever so gently. love it! i'm trying to decide if i want to get a lamp kit to put in the big white one to make it an actual lantern instead of just decorative, also available on the cheap from pier one! (a fun little side note, recovering the cushions of that glider rocker has been on my to-do list since before K was born. i had the fabric out and ready to work on it the day my water broke, and then, well, life and a new baby happened!)

i have always loved these paper lanterns, and have to physically resist putting some in every room of our house. they are a great, cheap, and easy way to decorate, especially for parties! i bought some extra little pink ones for K's upcoming first birthday (wowza, already?), some yellow and white ones for a friend's baby shower that i am helping decorate, and some of the little green ones to hang around the edge of my booth for a little extra pizazz at craft shows!

welcome!

thanks for joining me from ellebee studio! i'm so excited to finally have this new blog up and running. as i said before, i'll always love ellebee studio, but i'm looking at this name change as a chance to hopefully revamp, re-do, recreate, and revive. a new start, in a way!

i have lots of exciting plans for leaf & letter. i've started twittering (tweeting? twittereeting?) and will have an all-new etsy shop up and running soon. for now, the old shop, ellebee studio, will all be clearanced to some get-it-for-a-steal prices.

for now, i'm hard at work redecorating our townhome, and trying to finish lots of home-y projects. thanks for your patience with me as i transition to the new!

teeny tiny little jars- part 2

is it bad that my favorite part of having a 7 month old 8 month old (geez, they grow fast!) is all the teeny tiny little jars all over the house? truly, i have a kitchen drawer full of them as a result of saving every single one she's ever eaten out of. seriously. i've done a fairly good job of washing them out, de-labeling them, and setting them aside for craft-preparedness as we get done emptying them of their pureed contents. i gathered some up the other day and set them on the porch to dry, delighting in the sweet possibility of little empty jars.

i found a pretty little tray in my craft room, set them up in it, and started filling them will all the little craft-room flotsam and jetsam that tends to get tucked in a drawer or a ziplock baggie somewhere and lost or forgotten. even after tucking every little something i could find into them, i still have a few empty ones- prime real estate for more crafty organizational fun! my favorite is that i finally have a place for the little parts and pieces of a couple different sizes of fabric-covered button sets.

i love it when some of my favorite crafting elements collide- simple, repurposed, organizational, and cute! some of the things that finally have a home are: pushpins, blank magnets, hairclips, brads, buttons, beads, mini keyrings, and small, rolled-up tape measures!

oh, what a staple gun can do.

before: square bulletin board covered in cheap fabric for $5 on the clearance rack at hobby lobby

after: cute little clip board for hanging/displaying earrings, or any other small lightweight thing that could be attached to paper and clipped on!

how to: I cut neutral cream-colored fabric to size (with a little extra to wrap around the edges) & stapled it in place on the back edges. I used two pieces to make sure the old brown cloth didn’t show through, & realized right afterward that I probably should have ironed it first. The trick here is to stretch it nice & tight before stapling, & to use lots of staples to secure it. then I stretched lengths of green ribbon across, eyeballing a generally equal distance between them & stapled them to the backs too. i used an iron photo easel to make it stand up on the table. done & done!

before: shabby chic style tabletop floral birdhouse fence thingy (maybe supposed to be used as a background for indoor plants?) for $4 at goodwill

after: tabletop hanging necklace display for craft shows!

how to: I started by removing the little birdhouses & attached grass by unscrewing the poles & gently pulling them out. Then I used a little green paint to dab over the little painted flowers to make it more leafy & less floral, & painted the pink ribbon detail into two green leaf details. i also dabbed on some green paint over the gray checkerboard edges. i added a few little nails into the top of the display (corresponding with each fence point) to hang the necklace hangtags. add the necklaces & presto! show-ready! I really love how these two cheapies transformed, & was really excited about how much they added to the look of my craft show booth! i’m getting there, slowly but surely.

craft show woes.

{this post could alternately be titled 'when the going gets tough, the tough use a bedsheet for a tablecloth'. which is what i did!}

it seems like every time i prep for a craft show i have some crazy story to tell, beyond just my usual procrastination and resulting late-night preparations the night before. my husband's favorite one to tell is how the night before my very first craft show i starting pricing my products at about midnight. of course, by pricing i do not mean writing a price on a sticker and sticking it on the item {oh no, for that would be way too simple}. i started tea-dying and hand lettering each tag to be different with a price and a small item description. when at about 1 am the tags were dyed but not dry enough to start lettering them, i sat dabbing them with paper towels and then trying to dry them with a hair dryer. at about 2 am, i gave into the 'you are a completely crazy woman' look my sweet helpful husband was giving me, and finally went to bed.

oh, perfectionism.

luckily, the two days leading up to this most recent craft show were not as dramatic or eventful. this time it was just a complete and total breakdown of my sewing machine, and some unpleasantness that looked and felt suspiciously like pink eye in my right eye. i tried to prevent the late-night before getting up at the crack of dawn for the show by staying up as late as i needed to on thursday night instead of friday {the show being on saturday}, but as it was, i still didn't finish several coasters and my new shop-name banner i had planned to, due mostly to the broken sewing machine.

it all ended up working out fine- i had enough product to fill my booth, and was really happy with how it looked. i feel like each show i've done has moved me a little bit closer to how i've wanted it to look all along. even though the sales were quite a bit disappointing for this particular show, i did get some good feedback on my display and product, which is good. and, i remembered to take pictures!

designer's downtown market, july 2009

my happy little price tags! {not too elaborate this time}

since i had one borrowed folding chair and nowhere for my husband to sit {he came to help me set up and then stuck around long enough to bring lunch! best husband ever!} he also ran out to target to get us a second chair. they were so affordable he got two, knowing how much i love a matching set! and in green, to boot! what a good man...

i also have to give him a big huge, official, blog thank you for all the help he's given me recently. i have a big exciting change in the works for this blog that i'll be unveiling very soon, and he's been instrumental in helping me work though all the details. he is so much more creative than he lets on! thanks so much, babe!

all in all, i must say my favorite part of the day was when we got home, took all the craft stuff out of the car, then immediately loaded it back up with stuff and headed to the beach for a few days! we're here enjoying sand and surf {and naughty fried seafood} but spotty internet, so it may turn out to be a little vacation from all things technological as well. have a great week!

cookies + cupcakes

happy fourth of july!

leave it to a former senior art director at martha stewart {and current book/stationary designer} to come up with one of the most genius cupcake ideas of all time {not to mention a truly beautiful blog}. each cupcake with a cookie on a stick sticking out of it? yes, please! why is it the most simple ideas that are always so gorgeous and lovely {and delicious, in this case!}? trademark example of the wonderful-ness of martha, thanks to the amazing designers behind her branding. awesome!

{just because she worked for martha stewart, i can almost forgive her for her photos being so perfect, and for the general "i should be making things more" feeling i get from reading. ps- i do realize and apologize for so many scrolly little parenthesis for just one paragraph}.