One woman's quest to salvage the world's castoffs, lock, stock and bauble
Old wooden cutting boards are the Rodney Dangerfields of the thrift store. They get no respect. They're generally sitting on the back of a bottom shelf somewhere with a pile of mismatched Corelle and frayed wicker plate holders on top of them. And if you go to the trouble of digging one out, it's probably …
I do NOT collect glass jars or bottles. Really. I don't. If you asked me what I collect, I could easily name 20 things off the top of my head, and glass would not be on the list. I am not one of those crazy people at the flea market buying up every piece of …
Hola amigos. I would like to apologize to all of my loyal readers for my absence from the interwebs recently. (Hopefully you both found something else to read during my hiatus.)The reason I was MIA here: I took a trip South of the Border last week. (And by "South of the Border," I mean "Mexico." …
Continue reading "Mexico: A tourist’s tales of tequila, temples and tableaus"
Hollywood's got nothing on my mom. The 25 8-millimeter films above are all Joyce Friese productions, shot on an old Kodak Brownie movie camera between 1963 and 1973. Isn't she cute? Mom didn't own the movie camera yet (in fact, she wasn't even a mom yet) when the above photo was taken (I believe in …
Dear Readers, If you ended up here after typing "Wisconsin Magpie" into a search engine in hopes of finding information about an elusive ornithological species -- and now you're wondering why you're up to your binoculars in stories about a woman buying other people's detritus and building toy robots in her basement -- I apologize. …
A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away.... ... by which I mean, in August of 2014, in Milwaukee .... ... my son and his girlfriend moved into their first apartment together and decided to decorate it in a movie theater theme. I made the Now Showing sign for them that I blogged about earlier. …
With Hollywood abuzz about the Oscars next week, I thought this would be the perfect time to show off the Now Showing sign I made (with a little help from my husband). The sign was actually a gift for our cinephile son who was moving into his first apartment and wanted to decorate it in …
Continue reading "Now showing: The making of a movie theater sign"
I've always wanted a vintage typesetter's tray. The trouble is, the ones I've seen for sale have been on the large side, and the walls in my house don't have any large-sized spots left to fill. So until I can persuade my husband to buy a bigger house or to build another wall in our …
My sewing skills can best be described as "rudimentary." If you want proof, just ask my long-suffering childhood 4-H sewing leader/mother. She tried her best to pass her seamstressy superpowers on to me with very limited success. Nevertheless, I decided to blow the dust off of my hand-me-down sewing machine recently to make new cases …
Continue reading "Making easy stenciled envelope pillows from canvas drop cloth"
I love typography. Not all typography, mind you. I am a firm believer that the world would be a better place without Brush Script or Cooper Black or a lot of those weird gimmicky fonts. (I'm looking at you, Hobo and Papyrus.) But, for the most part, I can (and do) stare at type all …