Where Bloggers Create II

Welcome to the second annual Where Blogger's Create! I hope you enjoy your visit. Be sure to visit all of the other wonderful Bloggers who have posted today, including our host, the amazing Karen Valentine from My Desert Cottage. Thank you Karen for hosting this event again. I really enjoyed it last year and have really been looking forward to today!



I remember years ago, reading through Jo Packham's Where Women Create, thinking to myself, "How wonderful it would be to have a whole room to myself to create in". And now, here I am with a WHOLE room to myself. I feel so blessed. Actually, I feel like a teenager at times because it seems to be where I am all of the time. In MY room.



So welcome to my space. I love it here, especially now that I have this futon. The girls can come in and watch some T.V. or do their own crafting, and I can lay on it if I am sick and still be in my space. As you can see above, it is also where all my animals seem to come. Having a black carpet and a white dog can be a problem at times. Lucky I love him!



I love that my desk is in front of the windows. I can view the sky during all of the seasons and keep an eye on my girls if they are outside playing. It's fantastic! Best of all, I can see when the mailman has come, yippee!



Look, it's about to storm. I love summer storms.


I sit in this chair WAY too much. But it is comfy and my cats like it as well, as one can see from all of the scratch marks on top. I love it when they sit at my shoulders though.



And of course, a gal who loves Paris HAS to have an Eiffel Tower lamp and other assorted Parisian finds.



This metal lamp is great because it can be used to store magnetic tins. I use every single ounce of space that I can in my studio. Below, an inexpensive basket holds my watercolor pencils, crayons and markers.





Inexpensive organizers that hang over a door are also fabulous. I have one that holds all of my glues, tools, staples, etc. and another one that holds all of my note cards and tissue.


I can never have enough drawers. I used 12x12 papers cut in half to "hide" the contents and make it appear more organized, hahaha! I also love my label maker to help me to remember where I have placed things.



Some of my favorite collections.





The above shelf is fantastic. My husband just got a huge board that I painted, hung it on some cheep brackets and then I thread some tubing through it to hold some of my many ribbons. There is another one on the other side of the room that we used a pipe on. The added shelf is great to display many of my favorite items as well.






This dress form was my mother's and I was thrilled when she passed it my way. The last thing she used if for was to do a fitting for my wedding dress. Now, it displays tags and notes from friends as well as a tribute to Brandon Flowers (the lead singer of my favorite band, The Killers). He wore feathers on the shoulders of his jacket at the last concert I went to (also the one I met them at) so these feathers I had seemed to fall into place.




I asked my husband to put these wooden slats on the wall so that I could use the space for my rubber stamps. The wood was just laying around in our garage, and having my stamps displayed not only makes it easier to see what stamps I have, (Lord knows, I need some more) but also frees up a lot of shelf space.



Some of my British Robins from my BBFF Carolyn. Love you Caz!





I love German doll heads. Can you tell? This wall is covered with cubbies from a local school that was being torn down. Unfortunately, I just deleted the largest picture by accident and, correct me if I am wrong but I don't know how to add a picture to my blog in the MIDDLE of pictures already posted. UGH! You can see it on my post from last year which is linked to below.



Each cubby has ten spots and I have six cubbies stacked on top of one another. That is A LOT of space and I LOVE it! I try to make each spot look unique but functional as well.



This is a photo of my Great Grandmother Adams. Isn't she gorgeous! I've had a collection of her silver for many years. Some of it is engraved with her name, some are places that she traveled to. I don't use them, they are so precious to me and are over 100 years old. But I never knew a way to display them until I saw where someone had placed tags onto a tree branch in a magazine. My light bulb went on!



I found a branch in our backyard, suspended it, very carefully, from my high ceiling, and used vintage seam binding to attach not only my Grandmother's silver, but my collection of silver travel spoons. I love how it turned out!






I love my collection of vintage pennants from Paris, as well as my Cavallini & Co. calenders. Each one displays the birthdate of either myself, husband, or our girls.



Don't let that curtain fool you. It is not a window. It is a disguise to hide my master bathroom, (insert evil cackle here).





I can't seem to stop collecting vintage ledgers. I use them for my art work, sell some pages at my etsy shop and also love to read some of them.



Look for me on an episode of "Horders" in a few years. My family is going to call the show and report me because my Somerset magazines will NEVER be thrown away. I couldn't even imagine parting with one. I still have my first Somerset issue from before my kids were even born.







Some of my vintage souvenirs from Paris.





Above are my ATCs as well as all of the Itty Bitty books ever made. I've been in them all, except one. Luckily, I won the PIF copy.



I know, I know. The strange little shrunken head is creepy. It scared me as a child and belonged to my Grandma Betty. Now, it is special to me.





Above is a paper lanturn that I have had for years. I LOVE toile and decided to add this pretty toile tissue to it. I love how it came out!




Vintage Game Pieces


My Travel Round Robin Books


Cool papers and Hello Kitty items from our trip to Japan.









Again, gotta love my futon. It adjusts in so many different ways. I can slide it all over the room with one hand, and my girls and puppy love to lay on it and keep me company.

Below are some more of my favorite spots and collections in my studio.










What is inside all of those drawers? Well, let me show you.




Above you can see how I cut one piece of 12x12 paper to "disguise" my full drawers. I can also change the paper very easily for a new look.





I even use the space on the side of my cubbies to store items. The more I can see, the more I can remember that I have it and use it, lol. I want to paint the ends one of these days.













Binders hold my single unmounted stamps and containers hold my packages of unmounted stamps.






Above are the old printer's trays that I have. They sit on the counter in my master bathroom and hold my tiny collections.






The oposite wall holds many of the things I have received from swaps and friends of the Marie Antoinette Mail Art Group that I belong to and am an administrator for.




I WAS PUBLISHED! Screams of joy! My goal is to have even more work published after my youngest starts Kindergarten in the fall.




I love to display the art my girls have made all over my studio as well. They are very talented and my oldest has even had some chosen for her school's website.

And last, but not least, the ridiculous collection of 12x12 papers I have collected over the years. Luckily, I figured out a great way to store it all and can easily go through it. It is hidden in my master bathroom closet, behind another curtain.



So there you have it. My studio that I love so much. And I can't wait to visit many more of you and see more ideas for my constantly changing studio. I hope I have given some of you an idea or two and that you have enjoyed your visit. Hope you will come back soon and if you would like to see my post from last years "Where Blogger's Create" you can go here, RhondaMum 2009.

Time to go and cuddle with my puppy and visit some other bloggers. Have fun and come back soon! Thank you to Karen for hosting this amazing swap, and to Jo Packham as well for helping us all with our sanctuaries of creation!