NEW STASH, UPCYCLING A FLOWER BOX, AND CONJOINED TWIN VEGGIES
New stash
I decided to take advantage of the opening sale from Temu. I got a whole lot of stuff with huge amounts of discount. I stocked up on new beads and various other bits and pieces for the studio.
A few closer shots for a bit more detail. Firstly, beads, spacer beads, bead caps, and some metal steampunk embellishments.
More beads, a circle cutting tool, some fine-tipped glue bottles and some black necklace cord.
More beads and bead caps.
Finally, some ephemera cards and a couple of brayers.
I also ordered some bits and pieces from Ebay, Etsy and Ali Express, all of which have now arrived as well.
Gold and silver round elastic, and several non-metalic round elastics in different colours, for use in album closures etc. A long length of 1/4 inch wide white elastic which I bought to alter my new skirt and also replace “gone” elastic in a couple of other skirts. See details here. Sari silk ribbon in multi-coloured and cream, and some dies.
Making use of the box my birthday flowers came in
I received a lovely bunch of flowers by post for my birthday.
They arrived beautifully packed in a long cardboard box with white floral designs on it, which I thought was far too nice to throw away. Unfortunately I forgot to photograph it before I opened it. The opened and flattened box spent a few days on the floor in my studio until I finally couldn’t stand it any longer, so I got my large self-healing cutting mat out, and my Stanley knife, and cut out all the floral images.
This is the remains of the box once I’d salvaged what I wanted.
All the pieces cut out and the cardboard layers separated.
I sprayed each piece with water to soften it a little, and then I was able to peel away the top layer without damaging it. Normally if I split corrugated cardboard like this, I am pleased if there is some residue left on the corrugations as it adds interesting texture, but in this case I obviously wanted to keep the top layer as intact as possible.
I saved the corrugated and plain bottom layers – some of these came apart, leaving the corrugated layers unstabilised. Everything is re-usable in one way or another.
There were also some small floral logos which I thought were very attractive, so I cut those out as well.
Looking at these more closely, they look almost as if they are printed on fabric. I really like the rough edge of the paper where it was cut.
Once I’d finished peeling the layers apart, I left them to dry. When I returned, they were all quite curled up, so I placed them under a heavy pile of books overnight to flatten them. Here they are after a night under the books, all ready for further embellishment and use.
I am intending to add doodling and maybe some colour to some of these resulting paper panels. I really like the white designs on the brown cardboard background. Any areas with printing or writing on them can be covered up. I think these designs are so pretty – I couldn’t possibly just ditch this box!
Finally, a bit of fun from the kitchen department. Completely off topic, but I couldn’t resist!
Conjoined twins?
I had a couple of strange fruits and veggies last week, the first being a sort of conjoined twin kiwi fruit. Before I cut it, I noticed it had quite a deep groove a bit like a plum. When I cut it in half I could see that it was trying to be two separate fruits! Really peculiar.
Then, when my Tesco delivery came last week, and I was brushing the button mushrooms, I noticed that there were several clusters of mushrooms:
and also another conjoined twin.
It has a bump on one side, and when you turn it over, it has two stalks!
Weird, or what?
I always photograph my wonky veg because I think they are fun, and much more interesting than bland same old same old ones!
