A HOARDER'S ESTATE SALE - OH, MY GOODNESS!

You know that show, Hoarders? Have you ever watched it?

I have and it makes me so, so sad when I do.
Being a psych/soc major in college and keeping up with my reading, I know the pain a hoarder suffers and watching them have to go through the trauma of un-hoarding (un-hoarding? new word) just breaks my heart.

It's different when I go to a hoarder's estate sale.
Oh, hush. Someone has to buy that stuff.

I went to a hoarder's estate sale this past weekend. I dragged my poor 82 year old mother with me - I say "poor mother" but when I told her I could just go by myself she said absolutely not, she might miss something!
It had rained about 3" Thursday night so when we drove up on Friday it was a mushy, muddy mess. I'm surprised neither of us fell down. I told mom that if she fell down she'd be too muddy to get back in my car so she better hurt herself badly enough to require an ambulance.

We trudged through the mud and hit both the house and the barn.
Oh, my.
I forgot my camera to take pictures to show you the amazing amount of stuff, but, if you've seen the show Hoarders, just picture this house and barn having the same look except the trash has been shoveled out and the possessions are left.
It bothered me somewhat, it did, when I would look at ALL of the stuff/junk and think of whomever it was living that way. But, I knew they had to get rid of the "treasures" and that the money earned from the estate sale would go to whomever lived there or their children.

Okay, now for the treasures.
Treasure #1.) I met another estate sale shopper when she was standing there waiting to check out and I was checking out one of her items; I was just looking at it and we started kidding about "hey, back off!" and before I knew it we were laughing and having just the best time. We exchanged our business card information and planned on getting together. She lives pretty close and she's adorable and so much fun and she gets me - you other mixed media artists know what I mean. She gets me, lives close, is an antique/junk dealer, wants to work on her mixed media art skills, loves estate sales and, well, she's just great!

Her name is Anne Lorys and you will want to visit her blog and her etsy shop - both are worth the time! I love her blog - she writes like she talks, just like me:)

So, the next treasureS are the deals I got.
When mom and I went on Friday it was regular price, however, they were so wanting to get rid of her stuff that I was still able to deal - I loved that.
On Saturday it was what I would call, "It's a Steal" day because, not only was everything half price, but if it wasn't priced I was given such a good price (and most of it wasn't priced - too much stuff!).
Wanna see what I got?? (This is so much fun - sharing my finds with you!!)

I have to tell you the funniest story - y'all know that Craig, my oldest, is a police officer. I'm always buying him things to fill his books shelves on each side of his fireplace - I buy him books with titles like, oh, She Cried Murder, so this vintage framed embroidery piece was a given (mom thought the guy was a crossing guard and this girl standing near us overheard our conversation and saw the picture and said, "Who wants to grow up to be a crossing guard??" It was hysterical!!) Gosh, that was a great sale! And, the vintage plates will be used to make cake/cookie stands, the vintage hammered tin dish is for the Tank's remote control, and I'll use the book on pieces of art. Whoop!! (and did you see the wee little bisque doll and the wee white pitchers for my collection?)

Bases from vintage lamps. There were gazillions. I'm going to use these as bases for cake/dessert plates. They'll be for me or gifted and I'm soooo excited!

The copper pieces?? All of them for $8.50 - Whoop - they're going to be wonderful pounded and stamped for jewelry making! And the big doillies are just wonderful and I know exactly how I'm going to use the vintage dish!

This bowl is full of rusty wonders and wooden flourishes, black sequined trims, all vintage. I have so many ideas for this stuff, but you might find some of it in my Etsy shop - I got a LOT of stuff in this bowl!

Fun vintage metal pieces, hinges, and a great little vintage white ceramic blowl on a metal stand with wonderful metal trim which I want to make into a bird's nest. Oh, and a little jar that I thought was pretty cute!

A vintage clock for my clock collection and I want to use this lamp piece as a skirt in some kind of project. At least, that's my thought today!

A grouping of more fabulous finds. I tell ya, I was in heaven!!

Anne and I both dug through this file cabinet that had two drawers packed full of these fabulous vintage greeting cards. We had so much fun finding ones that were better than the last ones! The "Happy Anniversary Folks" card has a pop-up when you open it! Amazing. Whoop!!

This precious vintage picture is going to hang in the hall bathroom after I paint the frame either a dark cherry red or black. Probably black - you tell me! I got it for $1.50. .....I KNOW!!

This entire box of vintage earrings.............guess how much...............$8.50. Dying. I was dying!

A Bible from the late 1880's and four really beautiful trinket boxes that I plan on making even cuter than they already are! You'll find them in my Etsy shop

.

Won't this book cover make a great canvas??

Vintage jewelry, yum, vintage clock that says "NAP" on the face for my collection, old bottles, and a vintage coin purse.

Vintage heart shaped molds, vintage JELLO molds (see, you can see JELLO on the bottom of that one!), paint brushes for like nothing, brass stencils and a vintage bitty coin purse.

There were boxes and boxes and boxes of all different colors and hues of colors advertised. I missed them all by minutes. These two men bought all of the boxes..............but, they missed this one! Whoop!! The bottles are filled with powdered paint pigment. I know exactly what I'm going to do with all of these bottles. Well, some may be in my Etsy shop. Maybe. heeheehee

Those are my treasures:)

And, there's going to be a Part II to the  barn sale - the entire "loft" area which is as big as the downstairs (four rooms), is packed with so much that you can't even walk up there! The sale will be in about a month and you can bet that Anne and I will be there - together, I'll bet!!

Thanks for sharing my treasures!! I love you all, readers!

Jan

WHERE BLOGGERS CREATE - IT'S A PARTY

IT'S A PARTY AND I'M SO GLAD YOU COULD COME!

This is a chance for me, a blogger, to show you where I create.....show you in my own creative way because, seriously, Where Women Create magazine is never going to ask to do a spot on me!

You'll see what I mean in a minute...

When you're finished enjoying my studio, go to Karen's blog and in the right side column you'll be able to pick your next spot to drop in on - everyone has their party dresses on and is waiting for your arrival!

And, be sure and leave a comment that you had been there - makes us all feel special *popular* to know that lots of people came to our party!

Oh, I'm so excited!!! Here everyone comes!

This is why I am being creative in showing you my studio - it looks like a crack house, it's such a mess.

I could have cleaned it all up for you, but then it wouldn't be MY studio. Get it?

This door is the door that goes from my studio into our garage where the "rest" of my studio is stacked!

I have a fabulous pink disco ball hanging from the ceiling in my studio.

THIS is what my studio looks like on any given day.

Thus, the nickname, The Crack House.

Glue on my fingers. . .a common sight!

A row of my wooden stamps...

I have hundreds and hundreds of stamps - lots of wooden and lots of unmounted.

My row of Barbie dresses!

I smile every time I look at them!

I LOVE Barbie!!

A bird caught in a snowstorm...the closest I could get to a snow storm in Texas!

I have this thing for old *and ratty* dolls and doll heads.

I think they're so cool - most people think they're strange and scary!

Cracks me up.

Gesso, molding paste...fun and vitally important items when working with paints!

And, of course, Gorilla glue!

I love to buy big sheets of fabulous papers and I roll them up and store them in this really big glass cylinder.

It looks cool and serves a really important roll in my studio.

*Get it??? "roll" in my studio? That was a joke. LOL*

Paint brushes and bling. Who could want anything more? Heehee

I utilize every space in my studio. . .this vintage lamp shade and bird cage are hanging from my ceiling.

A vintage typewriter, vintage silhouette tray and a couple of vintage dance cards.

Every mixed media artist has lots of vintage papers!

A stack of finished tags just waiting to be uploaded into my Lollishop and Etsy shop.

Oh, would you look at the time???

You best hurry on to your next party!

I'm so, so glad that you took the time to visit my studio and come to my party!

I hope you had a good time - tell me what you thought in your comment!

And, to my faithful, bestest readers in the world, a special THANK YOU for coming!

XOXO, Jan

the PAPER COWGIRL ART RETREAT was a BLAST!!!

I am so excited to share with you the Paper Cowgirl Art Retreat! This is a long post because there are a lot of pictures, so grab something to drink, put your feet up and relax as you scroll through the Paper Cowgirl Art Retreat......

As the time approached for me to leave for the Paper Cowgirl Retreat last Wednesday, it seemed like my studio, aka crack house, became more and more dangerous to walk through. I took a couple of pictures just for you to see my work table. . .
Can you believe this? I'm so ashamed.
I arrived in Waxahachie last Wednesday after driving for five hours - I had so much "art stuff" in my car that I looked like I was going to California and didn't know the way.
The retreat was held at the Hampton Inn *my favorite hotel* and my room was so, so nice as evidenced in the photo below of my bed.

Then there was my "art stuff's" bed. . .

Thursday my friends, Rita and Susan, and myself, went shopping in McKinney.

Oh, my. There's this store there called Smitten. I left a large amount of Frank's money there. We had such a good time at Smitten's and the other shops we hit. Then it was back to 'hatchie for the "Meet and Greet" held at the Dove's Nest in historic downtown Waxahachie. Amazing.

Meeting all of the girls, seeing old friends, meeting women I've known like forever through emails and blogs and shopping at the Dove's Nest while enjoying appetizers was so much fun!

My class was scheduled to take place the next morning, Friday morning. I was so excited I could hardly stand it! I LOVE to teach and I had put so much into the prep for this class that I felt like I already knew all of the ladies so I was anxious to spend some time with them!

For those of you not in the know, I was teaching a class called, Home is Where Your Art Begins, and it involved painting and collage on a 16" X 20" canvas. So, okay, I'm on my way down to set up the room.

Oh, I simply must show you what I filled my "students" goodie sacks with - all kinds of wonderful little things that I hoped they would love. Look at that Aleene's Tacky Glue in the wee bitty bottles. Cracked me up - I had to buy them!

I was VERY fortunate to have a lovely assistant. LOL My BFF, Mendy Mitrani, one of the other teachers for the retreat, helped me in class and she was really SO helpful! Here she is with Terri, showing the class the example I brought from home that I had painted the prior Sunday. It's a collage of Marie Antoinette and worked well to show some of the different techniques we would be using on our own canvases.The class started with a blank canvas; literally! They had a wee bit of homework which was to paint their blank canvas with a layer of Gesso to prepare the canvas to take the paint well.

The next step, and first step in class, was to lay out what you THOUGHT your collage would look like. I have found that God always has his own idea about what it should look like and not to get upset when something doesn't work that I wanted to use! So, we all cut, shaped, and laid out our collage.

The next two steps involved painting a light color of their prominent color all over the canvas.

From there they could add other colors that complimented their first 'wash'. Then they added some papers.By changing from painting to laying papers, back to painting to laying more papers, they were able to create layers. It was at this point that I taught them how to use napkins in their painted collages. Boy howdy, was that ever a hit!

Here's my finished canvas. You can see that I used a napkin for the flowers along the bottom, cut papers, torn papers, stamping, coffee stained cheesecloth, glittered rose, a "special event" tag next to a multi-flash (remember those???), a metal circle, the Paper Whimsy girls, of course, and layers of paint.

Everyone worked very hard in my class and at the same time, we caught ourselves roaring with laughter at something someone said. It was a riot!

I had just the BEST CLASS! I loved every one of my students and hope we will remain friends and see each other at least at next year's P.C. Retreat!

Andrea, who is from San Antonio - right down Hwy. 10 from me:), was totally focused on applying her first layer of paint.

I wonder what it was that caused Cara to stop drying her paint to check out Lisa? LOL

Here's Mendy, my lovely assistant, helping Nancy dry her first layer. In front of them, Terri and her daughter, Andrea, are hard at work!

Here's Elizabeth, aka Stripper Girl, AND good sport! It's a long story, but even without hearing the whole story, you can imagine how hard we laughed. It was so much fun. In this picture she is showing us her finished canvas - it's simply lovely!

This is Nancy, a darling woman whom I've had the pleasure of knowing from last year's P.C. Retreat. Here she shows us her beautiful canvas. It's not quite finished (the fence needs to be attached), but didn't she do a wonderful job?

Lisa is rightfully proud of her canvas. She used a picture from a vintage magazine and napkins to make a soft and beautiful piece of work.

Wow. I wish I could tell you who did this piece, but I took the picture without the artist.

Duh. But, even though we don't know the exact artist, we can all enjoy the collage she created. I think I know who it belongs to, but not being sure, can't say. But, for the sake of the post, we'll refer this canvas as Rhonda's Canvas. (Gosh, I hope I'm right! LOL)

The canvas below is Cara's. I know that because of the yellow in the first layer:) Didn't it turn out great??? She incorporated several of the House of 3 color copies that I brought and are so beautiful.

I'd almost bet the ranch that this next lovely piece was done by Kim. If you read this post and you know better, please email me and I'll fix any mistakes I've made! But, whoever did it, it's wonderful, isn't it? I like the way the pieces of collage seem to grow out of the one attached to it. (Did that make any sense???)

Me, working hard on my corsage in Mendy's class.

Rhonda and Karen - sweet picture of two friends!

This picture was taken in Mendy's class.

Phyllis and LaVerne working hard, or is it 'hardly working', dragging, pooped....whatever it is, it's in Mendy's Corsage Class!

My finished corsage in Mendy Mitrani's class - isn't it beautiful??? I simply LOVE it and Mendy was such a great teacher!

Me with my happy face on and Mendy.

Just some of the spoils from the huge ATC SWAP hosted by an amazing Barbie look-a-like.

Just a hint of what I received in the Paper Ephemera Swap hosted by the delightful Jamie Miller!

This is the most precious Dale McLain who taught a class with a bird theme, I can't remember the name, but it was so wonderful! And just look at her sitting up there on that credenza like a pin-up girl from the 50's! She's a cutie, alright.

Dana and Leisl are chomping at the bit to get started in Dale's class!

"PUT THE GLUE GUN DOWN, LEISL!

PUT THE GLUE GUN DOWN.

WE CAN TALK ABOUT THIS.

DALE ISN'T GOING TO ASK YOU TO DO ANYTHING YOU'RE NOT CAPABLE OF.

THINK OF ALL YOU LEARNED IN JAN'S CLASS.

WHAT? YOU LOVED JAN'S CLASS? YOU WANT TO TALK TO JAN?

WE CAN ARRANGE THAT, BUT YOU'VE GOT TO GIVE US SOMETHING.

JUST PUT THE GLUE GUN DOWN.

WHAT??

AND, YOU WANT SOME ICING SHOTS? NO PROBLEM. BUT, LEISL, YOU'VE GOT TO GIVE US SOMETHING."

Shannon is working hard on her piece in Dale's class.

Lisa and Dana can still have fun while working on their pieces in Dale's class!

I LOVE this picture of Kim. We all have that look on our face at least one time when we're working on a new creation!

These following three photos are from the SHADOW BOX class taught by Joanna. There were some really precious pieces made in that class!We had MANY swaps to go along with the retreat and one of them was the CROWN SWAP. Here are two Paper Cowgirls with their crowns atop their heads!

Here's Andrea, her mom, Terri, and Cindy, ready for VENDOR'S NIGHT! They're probably looking for those icing shots!

Two sweet Paper Cowgirls during VENDOR'S NIGHT.

LaVerne and Nancy had a shared "booth". I think Nancy came out ahead in this partnership as LaVerne is buying some of her items!

And just where did Nancy disappear to when it was time to tear down???

Poor LaVerne, on the floor.....will she be able to get up without help? Here are some cards I made to sell at Vendor's Night. I used my precious Paper Whimsy girls on them along with some wonderful "flashcards, patterned paper, hat pins and swirls!

There were some left and I'll be listing them in my Etsy shop and my Lollishop........soon..........very soon.

My pink flamingos are lined up and ready for the long walk to 'hatchie!

Look at them - you can see how excited they are!What to cover my table with at Vendor's Night???

I pulled out some vintage tableclothes and dresser runners, ironed them and they looked mahvelous!

Here's my table at VENDOR'S NIGHT. I packed it full so it would look really good!

And it did:) I had such a good time that night.
Glittered and dressed for a Texas garden with their coordinating pink bandanas, these flamingos were a huge hit!

The PAPER COWGIRL RETREAT is nothing if it's not filled with the most wonderful women and this year was no exception. Everyone was wonderful, lots of fun, kind, helpful, I could go on and on.

This is Karen - she was a doll.

And here's Cheryl playing Queen for a Day with her wee bitty crown! Dale had these little crowns in her goodie bags and they were quite the hit!

Susan and Rita and I terrorized McKinney on Thursday - here's a picture of them at lunch. We had such a great time. Susan is a delight and, knowing Rita for many years, I can tell you that she's a dear!!

There was always time for a hug as Shannon and Lisa prove!

I could simply end here by saying, "The End", but I have to tell you one more thing.

I may have said it earlier, I don't know.

The Paper Cowgirl Art Retreat is a dream retreat.

It's filled with the most wonderful women, amazing teachers, great bosses, lots of fun things to do to fill our "down" time, and it's in Texas!

Yee-haw!

That being said, I'll leave you with one last picture - a picture of the poster women for Glue Guns.

And to show you how well they do their job (they didn't want me to say anything), they are the ones that talked Leisl down. She gave up her glue gun and no one was hurt.

Thank you, Mendy.

Thank you, Jan.

XOXO, Jan