6.17.11 ... reclaimed texas state puzzle piece magnet

i was sorting through my fred finds today and couldn't resist turning this puzzle piece into a magnet for our fridge.

isn't it a hoot? and, look - austin! woo hoo.

charlie brown says "that's pretty good." even johnny deep is happy. everyone needs one of these, don't you agree?

ps. the grapefruits here are usually amazing i will say. sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

4.25.11 ... fun with recycled packaging personality

one day last week or so i played around with making my own packaging out of return envelopes provided in bills. now that i pay online - or i am not interested in whatever someone is trying to sell me - i have a lot to recycle. and i use them in so many ways. oh! speaking of that, guess what? i used my homemade stickers - the ones i made from unused envelope flaps - that i shared here recently. for the first time. this flower pot went into an empty tissue box so i cut a card to cover the opening on top and put the address on. there was some type down in the corner so i said 'aha! i can use one of those envelope stickers.' it was perfect. looks great too. i wish i'd gotten a photo. it was a very dark day and i had a hard time getting photos so i was crabby photographer gal.

returning to this project ... i had the red squiggles from a valentine surprise so i mixed in my papers and tossed in some of my miniature hearts. they are hard to see but the next photo reveals a couple of them if you look closely.

the second package really floored me because i reached for a piece of card stock and this one caught my eye. i grabbed it because i loved the color and almost fell off of my chair when i saw the paint name --- swiss coffee! how nuts is that? i love serendipity. i only have four or five of those paint cards and i never looked at the names because we were rushing that day. and, of course, that was before i made these magnets.

these sold very quickly. that's always a pleasant occurrence. it is hard for my handmade shop ( joonbeam.etsy.com ) to get noticed.

i had this idea at the last minute. how cute is this little card? and, again, i can't believe that i found the coffee type. i used one of those silly safety envelopes for this one, too. 

sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

2.21.11 ... little packaging fun . snoopy . gregory peck . home .

today we went on a trash/recycling collection walk about. we collected a total of 617 pieces of litter and recyclable trash in 50 minutes. this is part of my project snowflake. for every item sold in my etsy shops i pick up 13 pieces of litter. i had no idea i was doing so well! i am behind but we made great progress today. i need to clean up 490 more pieces to catch up with my sales. i started this challenge on march 17th, 2010. so far, evan, scout & i have picked up 1330 pieces of litter. it's a good feeling and the neighborhood looks that much neater. meanwhile ...i have four packages to get ready for the mail and these magnet and pin packaging cards are my creations to share for today.

as usual, i had fun with these. the snoopy pin is from a very old paperback book so the paper is very fragile. i folded & sewed it and added the piece of tagboard for extra stability. the 'home' set is on a bit of christmas card. i forgot to get a photo of the back but it has a pretty pale blue card stock with a heart tree stamp that turned out to be exactly the right size and shape.

i hope the recipient will enjoy the presentations. sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

2.15.11 ... 1930 era greeting card magnets

i have a collection of very old - 1920s - 30s - greeting cards that my lovely and wonderful sister sent me. i have only used a few of them over the past year or so that i've had them because i find they don't lend themselves to reincarnation easily. at least i am finding them challenging. but today i made these magnets by piecing a few things together in creative ways. i think they came out pretty sweet.

i will list them in my joonbeam etsy shop. and... last but not least... the valentine cookies i promised to show you. they are so delicious.

and pretty, too, don't you think?

sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

2.12.11 ... teeny little guy space rocket man

how is your saturday, everyone? we've had such a lovely day. i found an old board game recently while thrifting and planned to use it for paper ephemera packets that i am developing for my joonE etsy shop. then we would make a wall shelf out of the board for scout's room because the game is like new. but, as happens quite often here in the wilkinson household, someone falls in love with a find and - change of plans. this game is called rat race. ever heard of it? i had not. it is from a canadian company and i can't find but one or two references to it via google. seems kind of rare. anyway, scout fell in love with it. so she read the directions and she and ev played a test game while i worked in my art room - where i came up with this little guy for ev. he's a magnet surprise gift because ev loves space and because he's been taking such good care of me and doing my house work all week. i will be very happy when my back is all better. but i bet not half as happy as him.

after i made this little rocket man, i joined them in a new game and we had lots of fun with it. so far. no one is winning yet or even close to it. poor scoutie keeps landing on the divorce square and had to go back to a lower class AND pay a bunch of fees. ev has been 'divorced' a couple of times, too. meanwhile...

i haven't been divorced even once but in order to win you need to accumulate $100,000 so you can retire. we played a good two hours and i only have about $27,000. sheesh. times is tough in the old rat race.

oh ... have you noticed rocket man's moon boots? :)

and last but not least, here he is on the {tortilla} moon planting the American flag even. could not believe when this photo opportunity strolled by me. 

time for tea. oh --- dinner: we had cheese ravioli with butternut squash sauce. oh. my. gravy. so delicious. what did you have?

sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

1.27.11 ... pencil valentine & pastel flower magnets

i was cleaning up my art room a bit and sorting through papers and came across a rescued paper pencil bit that i had clipped out of a discarded children's book and punched a row of mini hearts across. that gave me the idea for this illustration with the single heart punch and the traditional puny sentiment. i used my regular colored pencils for this drawing and my beloved le pens for the sentiment.

then i dug out my pastel pencils and made these simple flower magnets based on a little sketched flower i had done one day and saved. i love how they turned out. i don't have many opportunities to use my pastels because they smudge easily but the mylar on buttons and magnets preserves them. so they're good for these projects. i also made the background paper using the three flower color schemes. all in all, highly satisfying creative spurt. ciao for now.

sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

1.18.11 ... packaging & collars

i am always looking for a good way to package my thumbtacks. when i glued the tacks in place i created the boxy part - an idea that came to me, like so many others, while i was in the shower - and today, when they were set and ready to go, i added the ezra jack keats paper. it's from a discarded book i love and use for projects. the kismet part of this particular project is that this piece was leftover from something i did a while ago and it was floating about my art room scolding me mercilessly for not putting it in its proper stash spot. as ev always says - procrastination pays off once again. can you believe how the colors go with these tacks? i love it. to give the tacks something sturdy to hang onto i layered {glue stick}the piece with two more card stock pieces and then attached it to the boxy thing {watch out for those technical terms}. i added three pieces of large bubble wrap and attached the tacks. this was then wrapped simply in white tissue paper with the thank you for caring bookmark tucked between the two outer layers of tissue. to secure it snuggly in the sun maid raisin box i loosely wrapped a plastic shopping bag around it. i wrapped the box in a brown grocery sack and there you have it. it's fascinating to me that i made this set and its sibling at least two years ago and the first one just sold last month and now this one. so close together. and after all this time. there's somebody out there for everything i guess. they are one of my favorite ideas and results so set sail with mixed emotions on my part. the other set also had a nifty packaging - those were magnets. i will find a photo for tomorrow's post. you can really see how i reinvent the wheel over an over.

See and download the full gallery on posterous

i also refashioned two more shirt collars. the first one is a wonderfully soft shirt that's like new that i lucked into via one generous son. i love the color too. but, as usual, the neck drove me nuts. being as it is long sleeve and a nice weight, i have been looking wistfully at it in my shirt stack these past few weeks. now i can wear it for the few cold days we may have left before the thermometer rises to instant summer. i tried a larger zig zag on this one. i wouldn't like it on most tops but i do like it on this one. thank goodness, right?

See and download the full gallery on posterous

the second shirt is an old life is good shirt i found at a thrift store and have worn it to within an inch of its life. it has many mending patches and the neck was fraying to the point where it was almost separated from the shirt. not any more. :) this shirt is a pretty shade of pale lavender. the blue fish piece was once one of my favorite {thrift find, of course} t shirts of scout's when she was just a spud. it will bring back happy memories for me every time i wear it.

it's scout's night to make dinner and she made ratatouille yesterday so it could set overnight. it smells marvelous. we're about to eat that, along with her garlic bread and watch how to train your dragon before the good wife starts. and ev is going to make chocolate drop cookies later. heavenly. i hope your evening is as lovely as ours. stay warm. and come back again. i am happy to see my posterous visit stats.

sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

1.13.11 ... happy days line

i designed and have been working on these on and off over the past few weeks. these are my first original prints pins and magnets (or thumbtacks). i've always used vintage and recycled papers , fabrics or original art. i wanted to create a line of my little happy drawings that i could print out. so here they are. the republican and democrat best friend pins idea came to me over the holidays when a loved one of mine and i were brainstorming for a perfectly unique gift and this situation of being best friends with someone from the opposite political party popped into my head because it fit. we got a kick out of it.. so here are a few photos which, once again, were taken outside on a very dreary day. i did what i could.

 

See and download the full gallery on posterous

the bacon dude was my first happy days character. at our house, it's all about the bacon. this one is a magnet.

blueberry gal magnet

miss watermelon magnet

polly pear magnet

the happy houses are a pair - one pin and one magnet. i have more sayings and happy days characters in the works. what do you think of them? i'd love some feedback. i will be listing this line in my joonwalk shop.

i had a busy day of creating quite a few things. hope you enjoy this sample.

sweet dreams, everyone. thanks for stopping by. until tomorrow. happiness to you. from me. with heart. ox joon

Posted via email from just joon

Support Local Farms ...

Hello Artists. Today I worked all day long on Valentines. So more suspense there. But I also made this set of upcycled magnets or thumbtacks {9}. They can be either ~ I haven't attached anything to the backs yet. I will list these in my Etsy shop, joonbeam. I have four earth friendly themed Etsy shops. But joonbeam was my first and is now devoted mostly to pins, magnets and {what I have coined} my Diamond Girl Thumbtacks. They're super heavy duty. They're not for sissies. While searching for the word 'it's' for a valentine project, I was drawn to these images from a Bon Apetite in my stash and just couldn't resist. In order to salvage every image I love, three of these ~ barn, wine, windmill ~ are carefully cut out and collaged onto other bits. And I actually found ONE 'it's' which was a relief, let me tell you. If someone had put me in charge of the Empire State Building, trust me, we'd still be under construction. But I digress. It has been pouring rain here once again and dark as night all day so I really had a time getting clear/decent photos. {I include the last photo because I think it's groovy. Hope someone else enjoys it along with me.}

Until tomorrow ~ once again ~ It's a great day for America, everybody. Yes it is.

See the full gallery on posterous

Posted via email from thing-a-day 2010

LoVe is what brings us ToGetHeR

Hello 2010. I'm a little late to the party and have some catching up to do. I have plenty of photos and will start with these. Our holidays were lovely. Hope yours were, too. I went on a magnet making spree and enjoyed myself tremendously. Here is one set I made for Jon Cody and Val ~ our family newlyweds. How adorable is this? I've been saving the image and accompanying text forever. They are from a very old Maurice Sendak illustrated children's book. I added the red accents and used a collage technique on both magnets.

I love the serendipity of this ... the photo background is our Christmas card from ... Val and Jon Cody! How perfect is it? It's a sign. I hope they will enjoy this teeny tiny gift with the great big heart for many years to come in good health and happiness.

I used my new iPhone ~ a.k.a pony ~ to shoot a fun photo of the ephemeral element of Christmas. I wish the tree could last all year long. I guess that's what makes it all the more special. I'll be back soon with more of my handmade Christmas magnets soon. Peace to you all in this new year. Full of promise and surprise. Here's to a delightful adventure into twenty ten.

Packaging Counts II

Three recent packages I enjoyed designing.
The package above includes one of my handmade
corner bookmarks. This one a recycled envelope corner.

I love my new heart tree stamp.

Reverse of the button card.

Halloween magnets on recycled Museum map
with my vintage bat stamp for accents.

So true.

ox
joon