Happy Veteran's Day

Happy Veteran's Day to all those past, present and future who have and will have served our military.  To quote Mark Twain "In the beginning of a change, the patriot is a scarce man, and brave, and hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot."

To celebrate Veteran's Day, I trash-picked a beautiful metal milk jug, originally from "Supplee" dairy in Philadelphia.  This beautiful red "chippy" piece has an eagle with outstretched wings...nothing says American more than Philadelphia, veterans, eagles and milk :)

Thanks again to all who have served!

Love and Luck 4 Picture Locket Necklace in Silver

A few years ago, I bought some vintage never-used silver lockets from a closing jewelry store.  I loved their shine, their ability to hold four pictures, their heart design that morphed into a four-leaf clover when they were open, etc. 

I hung these lockets from a sterling silver-heart link chain and the results are fabulous (if I do say so myself).  They have also been selling with frequency and since I only have a few lockets left, I thought I would share them here.

You can purchase these necklace here

Happy Monday!

Vanity Chair Makeover - and a new venture

As I do every year as the calendar nears its end, I have reassessed my commitment to my jewelry business.  While I love the (the majority) of people I have met through "Basil the Cat" and I'm super proud of my original designs, I realize that the key element to my business, passion, has started to lack.  My creative eye has started to wander and I have fallen in love with refurbishing furniture.  While I intend to keep "Basil the Cat" open, I plan on scaling down my designs, especially my one-of-a-kind creations and focusing more on pieces that I can more easily reproduce.  The majority of my creative juices will now be cathected to housewares, as "Elie the Cat" is born.

A couple of months ago, my cousin was throwing out this vintage vanity chair:

Not being able to imagine this piece ending-up in a landfill, I decided I needed to rescue it.  It was in pretty rough shape, it has been repainted green (which has begun to chip) and the vinyl seat was stained when I used it as a step stool to strip my curio cabinet.

I decided it was time to make this piece over.  My first stop was Jo-Ann fabric where I found a gorgeous remnant of vintage fabric for $2.00.

I took the seat off and removed all the staples that held the vinyl on (which I don't believe was original to the piece).  I then used the vinyl as a template for my fabric.

Starting on one side, I stapled the fabric on in overlapping pleats

I continued this all around the chair, cut the extra fabric, and voila...the new seat looked amazing!

 

 

I then took the metal part of the chair outside to spray paint it.  I had originally purchased a blue color to tie-in a small bit of blue in the fabric but I decided on a more antique-y white.  I covered the chair in white spray paint

 



and then I took some wood stain in "Dark Walnut" and brushed it on with a sponge brush and wiped it off before it dried to give it an aged look.  If some of the spots looked too dark, I reapplied the stain (counterintuitive, I know) and wiped it off again.  The result is a subtle aged look which I am totally in love with.

Not feeling like the seat was finished enough.  I decided to add a dust cover to the bottom

The End

Museum Collection - Teensy Tiny Silver NJ State Necklace

Vikki, my contact at the Old Barracks Museum contacted me to let me know her patrons have requested my state necklace in silver...voila:

This limited edition necklace will only be available in NJ museums and for a limited time in my Etsy shop: Basil the Cat

Happy Weekend!

Butterfly Parade Then and Now

A very special Kindergarten tradition at my children's school is for them to raise Monarch butterflies from caterpillars and release them "to Mexico" and then parade around town as butterflies.  It is so sweet!  This past week we celebrated Charlie's parade:

Pre-Parade Photo-Shoot

 

Pre-Parade festivities

Charlie's beautiful MALE butterfly

Brotherly-support

 

 



 

 

The Parade Proper

Flashback to 3 years-ago when RJ paraded - notice the butterfly on his head in the last pic

Ahh, this was such a nice experience, I'm enjoying reliving it in the blogosphere!

 



 

First Day of School 2014

Today is the first day of Kindergarten and Third Grade for my big boys.  It is also the first time they are attending the same school...yay!

Charlie:

RJ:

Brotherly Love:

Happy 2014-2015 School Year!

Back to School Backpack Sale

I have been wanting to get my soon-to-be-a-Kindergartener a new backpack for some time now.  I got my older son one from L.L.Bean, which I love, because of their 100% satisfaction guarantee.  From their website "Return anything purchased from us at any time.." Boys can be extremely hard on backpacks (or anything really) so this totally makes sense to me. 

I received an e-mail last week about their Deluxe Book packs being 25% off (which they still are) but by the time I had it in my cart, with a monogramming, it was still kind of expensive, even with a 20% coupon and free shipping so I wanted to wait on it.  Also, camouflage is not allowed at the Friend's school but I figured since it was orange and not "typical camo" it would pass, but this was further adding to my ambivalence. Here's the one I was eyeing-up:

 

A few days later (today), and still without a backpack, I decided to go back to the L.L. Bean's website and low and behold, there were three backpacks that were on sale for $14.96.  These are the "original" backpacks not the "deluxe" but they are better for a 5 year-old anyway.  I chose the perfect backpack for him, with his name embroidered on it, with free shipping and a 20% off coupon and it came to $20, an unbeatable price!  On the left is the special one I chose (yay!).  The other two are also available for the same price: