Why Ey to Zee?

I finally found the right title for my craft blog. I’ve been changing this twice. First is “Colour” but I find it boring. Then “Arts and Crafts by Marianne”, but since not all crafts featured here are handcrafted by me then “by Marianne” is so inappropriate. “Arts and Crafts” are widely used and I want something that is unique. I think of several blog titles such as Art Angel (which I cannot use because it’s a television program in one of the local networks), Craft Angel, Craft Fairy, I Heart Craft, Easy Craft Ideas, etc. But all seems so dull for me and over used.

Then one time I migrated my blog, Messages, at Wordpress just to taste what Wordpress is, and Used “Ey to Zee” as title. Which eventually I deleted after a week, you know I still love blogspot!

Then when I confirmed the deletion of my blog, it just pop up in mind why not used it for my craft blog!!! And so here I am with my new title “Ey to Zee”; as in A-Z Craft Ideas and “EyZee” as in Easy Craft Ideas.. Get it! LOL….

I personally design the header. Got the digital scrapbook Spring kit at freedigitalscrapbooking.com

Greetings

Whew!!! I have tons of ideas to be posted here. But I was caught up by Christmas rush. Maybe next Christmas I’ll be able to show crafts for Christmas season. Sigh…. that’s 365 days to go…

Anyway I’m here just to leave a message…

First Dye Project

This project is an inspiration from Marissa Lynch Blog’s New Dress A Day. I religiously followed her blog since the day I discovered her blog through Yahoo. It’s amazing how she can turn an extra large dress into a great dress. And she never failed to impress me.

And now I have file of dresses in my cabinet that I collected for my dress redo projects. Certainly I won’t do it for 365 consecutive days like what she did. Because in the first place I do not know how to use a sewing machine. So sewing it by hand is quiet tedious and will took me a bit longer before finishing my project.

So, for my first project I decided to dye my old dress.

Bought this blouse three years ago.

 

But the colors turns yellowish. I thought that dying it would help my dress revive its beauty.

I look for Rit dye in the local market but I guess it’s only available in US. So I decided to use Venus Fast Dye instead. It’s only Php 3.00.

And tadaaaang!!! My dress turns into purple. Yay! Very Timely for the advent season…..Love it! Love it!

Flower???

Uh-oh!!! it’s not a real flower it’s a carved melon.

How I wish I could also carve such a lovely flower. It was my sister’s boyfriend who did it! 

 

Though I’m drooling when I saw it. (hey I love melon!), I think I would leave it standing on my table rather than eating it. Those cute carved flowers are irresistible. I can’t take my eyes away from it. Shhh!!! I’m studying how it was done. Hmmm…. simply because i want to try carving fruits….LOL….

 

Christmas Card

While cleaning the cabinet in our library, I found this Christmas card I made during my first year in college, way back 1999. It’s made up of indigenous materials, such as shells, sinamay, dried flower and dried corn leaf. I added ribbons to enhance its beauty. I found it cute, that I opt of keeping instead of giving it. LOL…

Though colors fade already, I still adore it.

Roses are Red

I’ve been eyeing this set of ladies accessories in the magazine about bead jewelries/accessories I bought a year ago. I just love its sophisticated design. I was looking in the craft store in our area and in the city for the bead rose but to my dismayed it’s not available.

from the magazine

So when I discovered polymer clay, first thing that crossed in my mind was to make a bead rose. With the help of video tutorial from youtube, I was able to make my own roses. Actually it’s easy but I have problem with conditioning the clay. I think it’s getting harder because it’s already expose. I’m using the Makin’s Air Dry Clay…. Anyway this is a sort of practice. Later when I will get this seriously, I mean into clay business, then I will use the polymer clay used by the professional clay artist.

my output

First Project: Simple Name Tag

I haven’t started a clay project; I haven’t even touched clay with my bare hand. I’m afraid I won’t be able to maximize it and will just harden because the first set of clay I bought are air dry from Makin’s Clay.

I wanted to wait for my tools to at least be completed first before I start a project. But I couldn’t wait... seeing my stock of clays made my hand itchy. So I grabbed one packed of clay and cut its lid. Just imagine a child who wanted badly a new doll or a chocolate with the eyes gleaming and widely open… That’s how I reacted… with hard beat pounding in my chest… perhaps too excited to do my first project. LOL…

I hate its sour smell. Yet it did not thwart me from doing my first project… my imagination get wild…. But to my disappointment I found out that the clay was hard to condition. I was rolling, twisting, flatten the clay… Not satisfied with my output I did the same procedure for several times. And I honestly started to hate the clay. My hands are sweating and the more I had a hard time conditioning the clay.

I almost gave up yet I continued doing with my first project because I don’t want to waste my effort, time and of course the money. So I decided to make a very simple project instead… a very simple name tag… Simple yet I adore it…

First clay project