Oct 31, 2011

Happy Halloween

Jack Skellington window decorations for halloween this year - low tech but easy to pack away. Jack was mainly cut with my Silhouette but since the size was limited I had to glue his hand and legs to make it large enough to fit our window. The rest was hand cut.

  

Not too shabby for teeth on a cavity-inducing night. We used a grapefruit spoon with its serrated edges to scrape in between the teeth, then the handle to smooth the surface. We also happen to have linoleum cutters to help remove the white layer so the candle can be seen better at night. The perfect "O" for the little pumpkin snack was made with an apple corer.

Here's where we got our inspiration:
http://www.collthings.co.uk/2008/10/halloween-pumpkin-designs.html


And lastly our bat cave, thanks to Dana-Made-It.
The witch brooms were signature Martha, Martha, Martha.

Oct 30, 2011

My New Craft Room


Here it is, all shiny and new - to me anyway. It's all messy with a laptop, die cutter, printer, and paper everywhere already, but at least I remembered to shoot it in it's pristine shape. Here are the nitty gritty photos so I can remind myself how much it took to get it here (and save poor hubby and me more work).


Amazingly, the never-unwrapped hutch was still available after a month sitting on Craigslist Free listings because it had no matching bottom. The L-shaped desk was quite pitted, but fixed easily with wood filler, then rough sanding prepared it for primer paint. An ironing board is great to hold furniture at eye level. Great thing about moving is all the extra cardboard lying around to be used as a drop cloth for paint. Oh Martha, your robin egg blue just screams "craft with me".



So what's up with the utensil tray? We were very lucky hubby's work had these offcuts of acrylic sheets at exactly the right height - kismet, I know! Our previous kitchen drawer allowed for a 2-tiered tray to divide the large and small spoons and forks, so we had to find a new solution for this tray. I love how the acrylic seamlessly divides and concisely uses space. The chopsticks and teaspoons are tamely corralled with a U-shaped bent piece. Yup, you guessed what I'll be using to divide all my supplies! More to come one day.

Oct 10, 2011

Tricked your Treat!


Who won the "What's inside the coffin contest?" No body. The answer is fish skeleton! Make no bones about it - I even put the answer in my Etsy listing! Please, no booing! Thank you all for playing! I had a screech :)

One more if you dare? Why couldn't Dracula's wife get to sleep?  Because of his coffin.

Oct 3, 2011

Crouching Spider, Hidden Candy


OK so it wasn't hard to guess what was coming, but I hope you've enjoyed the unveiling of my die cut Halloween coffin boxes. This one has a spider web made of black vinyl hidden on the inside of the coffin's lid. A small length of fishing wire is attached to the spider so kids will get an extra hidden surprise as they reach for the goodies inside. I have always loved shiny black on matte, a subtle and entrancing effect.


Here are some of my prototypes. Can anyone guess what's inside? I'll give you a hint - it's white and emaciated. Please be very specific - only FULLY correct guesses will qualify.

I will email a free SVG or DXF spider file to anyone who guesses correctly by next Monday, Oct 10, 2011.

Oct 2, 2011

Knuckles


Pale knuckles grip the coffin's edge... 

my latest trailer for an upcoming die cut bundle for Etsy.

Oct 1, 2011

Die cut spider


Scary movies know thrills are intensified by allowing your imagination go wild before they reveal the ending. Here's my teaser - stay tuned for more. Happy 1st of October!