Author Archives: zefiart

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About zefiart

Blogger, DIY-er, poodle lover, graphic designer, dog groomer, recycler, artist, wonder woman in my spare time.

cocktail {forks} anyone?

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I just love this one!
When Wayne knocked down the old stable in the back paddock, he re-used as much of the wood as he could to rebuild the stable. The unsuitable bits were piled into a heap to be burned.
At least that was the plan. You know how it is, time goes by, things get put off… The pile is still there. Partly cause its either too dry (fire restrictions) or too wet, or perhaps its cause I won’t allow Wayne to burn it.
That pile has a ton of interesting old bits of wood in it! 
A few weeks ago I went out and brought about 10 large pieces of wood in, to the casita, to dry out so I can make stuff with it.
Wayne saw me sneaking in with the wheelbarrow and I swear, he sounded just like Homer Simpson.
“Oh No! I knew I should have burned it! Don’t take it all inside!”
Not all of it! Just a bit at a time!
Anyway, I’ve had this box of cocktail forks for years. Never used them, just had them cause they’d come in handy one day… 
I had a chunk of wood I liked and wanted to put hooks on it for keys. I didn’t have enough matching hooks so I started thinking what I could use.
Viola! Cocktail forks. A bit of bending and you have key hooks!
I mixed up some flat white paint with some blue artists paint, a bit of black and a bit of unsanded grout to create a colour I liked. I brushed it onto the wood without worrying about full coverage. I wanted the old wood to show.
When the paint was dry I drilled holes into the bottom of the block, filled them with liquid nails and glued the forks in.
I then drew the keys on with pencil and painted them using black artist acrylic.
I drilled holes in the top and used wire as a hanger, hung it on the wall and had a look. Hm. Something was missing… I went and got the two barbed wire hearts Wayne had made and added them to the top.
Much better!
A different colour wall would have been good, but this was the only spot I could use given its too dark to photograph outside! 
z

incredibly hard to photograph

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Have you ever tried to photograph a suncatcher? Let me tell you, its not easy. You have to find a background which allows the crystals or beads to show up, allows you to see detail, the right light to show off the sparkle… plus they have to be hanging up.

I tried photographing them flat in the lightbox. Nope. They just don’t look right lying flat. I tried photographing them against one of our timber walls, that was too distracting.

Finally, I climbed up onto a chair, put a nail in the deck frame and hung a hook from it.

I now have somewhere to hang stuff to photograph. I hung the suncatcher there. It worked better than the previous options. The sky and trees on the distant hill are a nice backdrop.

So here is the first of the suncatchers.

This suncatcher was made by Wayne, he bent the wires to make the intricate shapes. I then added the glass beads to make it sparkle. These are wire wrapped beads, all in different colours.

Wayne really is good with wire and metal. I did a little wire work today and punched a small hole in my finger. Fun.

The photos really don’t do it justice but they’re better than my previous attempts!

z

retro look tins

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While ‘indulging’ myself I managed to take some photos of some stuff I finished and haven’t had a chance to share. First is this retro tin project.
A while ago I saw an image on Pinterest which I just loved.  It was a collection of tin cans with vintage evaporated milk labels on them used for storage. I just loved it.
I had tin cans. Doesn’t everyone? I searched online but couldn’t find any evaporated milk labels I could print out. I did find some jam and vegetable labels…
I resized the images in Photoshop so they would fit on the tins, cut them and used craft glue to glue them on.

They needed wire handles to hang them with, so I asked Wayne to help. I was going to make something simple but Wayne is a bit fancier than I am. He made me these handles.

I drilled the holes for him before gluing the paper onto the tins.

 
I used a strip of pine left over from my kitchen table make-over for the tins to hang off. I didn’t have any huge nail-like spikes like in the image, but I did have 5 matching hooks – though they weren’t all the same colour. I liked that. A bit more interesting.

The timber strip is fixed to the door with a screw on each end (its not meant to hold great weight so that’s enough).

The finished product is great. I’ve used it to hold my drawing supplies – pencils, water colour brushes etc.
I have been using the old door on our timber shed as my ‘hanging place’ when photographing things for the blog. Its the perfect setting – an old door with peeling paint. Gorgeous.
Not too bad I think.
I wish I had more room in our house. I’d love one of these in the kitchen to hold the smaller utensils. But there’s no room. sigh…
z

PS: These tins are now for sale in my etsy shop and they’ve been featured in 2 Treasuries so far. I’ve also entered them in the Knick of Time’s Tuesday Vintage Style Link Party. Go check it out.

lost sheep and pecking orders

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Here I am. On the morning of the first of two whole days I have to myself to do whatever I feel like doing.

And I’m sitting on the computer cause I can’t think past what I have to do. A friend of mine calls it ‘lost sheeping’… the act of being totally bewildered by the choices of things to do. (I seem to spend a lot of time lost sheeping.)

This is the kitchen table at the moment. Bits of breakfast and a collection of glass, ceramics and crystals I’m using to make garden stakes. Along with some correspondence, the netbook, and – wait – there may be some tools on there too.
 

The office is way worse. I stopped short of taking a photo of that. I mean, you’ll be understanding of some messes… but there has to be a line somewhere. This morning I found another pee spot on the carpet. Its now beyond a joke. If I walked into a house with carpet that looked like this I’d refuse coffee and have a tetanus shot.

I banished Barney from the office when I blamed him for the pee spots a few weeks ago. Last night Mischa slept in the office alone and yet there’s another pee puddle. So Mischa is now banished as well. I cannot wait to rip out these carpets and either polish the floorboards or put in vinyl. I’m so over floors that are hard to keep clean.

This is the coffee table in the living room. You’re allowed to see that. I cleaned it off last weekend but then over the week things crept back onto it. I use that table to do beading while I watch TV.

No way will you see the kitchen sink. There are 2 days worth of dishes there… We need a bigger sink. And more dishes.

Actually, I need a new kitchen with a dishwasher.

Wayne says I don’t need a new kitchen for the amount of time I spend in this one… grrr. And I already have 2 dishwashers – on the end of my arms.

That man sure does like to live close to the edge!

So, here I am. There are clothes to be washed. The kitchen to wash up and clean up. Animals to feed… all before I can even start to think of indulging myself.

Speaking of chickens (we are now!)… Yesterday afternoon (after spending a scintillating hour packing chicken frames into freezer bags for the dogs) I went up to feed the animals and found a red hen sitting on the perch acting ‘off’. I picked her up and looked her over. She had tons of broken off feathers and an area of baldness on her right thigh.

Off to Alcatraz she went.

Let me explain. We inherited a chicken coop up the back and a dog kennel. When the 5 light sussex roosters we were given to eat but couldn’t grew up, they started visiting the neighbour’s hens and digging up his vegetable patch. So Wayne built Alcatraz – a timber and wire atrocity off the side of the casita – to pen them up in. Eventually captivity turned nasty and we gave away 2 roosters to a chicken breeder, then had to separate the last two due to fighting. We kept the 2 picked on roosters cause they were the injured ones.

Yes, you can count. That was only 4 roosters accounted for. One rooster had been dispatched to the big perch in the sky by the poodles, I’m sorry to admit.

Boris No. 1 moved to Stalag 13, the ex-dog kennel. He shares his life with Clarice, one of our Isa Brown hens who was lame and picked on by the bantam rooster who has no name.

Boris No. 2 had to spend some time in a cage to get over his injuries but eventally moved into Alcatraz with 3 new black poulets the breeder gave us in exchange for the roosters.

So last night, when I picked up the injured red hen I had to put her somewhere. Stalag 13 is really too small for too many chickens so I put her into the more natural (ie not cemented) Alcatraz with Boris No. 2. I then moved 2 of the black chickens up to the old chook pen and shut them all inside so they could bond and get used to the coop.

Then I stood back and saw the bantam rooster have a go at them! So I got him out and closed in just the hens.

This morning I watched as the remaining black hen in Alcatraz pecked on the injured red hen over food. Thats it. I grabbed her and moved her out to join her sisters in the chicken coop.

Then the older hens picked on her.

Damn. I can never win. I feel like its musical chickens around here. Is it really meant to be this hard? Or do farmers just let them work it out themselves and let the feathers fly where they may?

So – to recap:

Alcatraz houses Boris No. 2 and 1 red hen. Both limping though he’s halfway to getting better.

Stalag 13 houses Boris No. 1 and Clarice, both of whom look healthy though if you watch closely, Clarice still has a slight limp.

Chookpen houses all the red hens (5 or 6, I’m sure we had more..) and the original black hen and 3 black poulets.

Plus one very pissed off bantam rooster strutting around outside the chookpen with his chest out.

And as if that wasn’t enough, there’s a wallaby eating grass at the bottom gate. In broad daylight. Another blind wallaby. And its Saturday and I refuse to go out into the quagmire that is that part of our land, mud up to my knees, to try to catch a wallaby and drive it into Hobart for the vet to (most likely) put down.

Sigh.

Times like this I long for a house in the suburbs with a tiny yard.

z

PS. Its funny how the breed of chicken really does make a huge difference… The isa browns are very friendly, easy going chooks. The black ones won’t come near us and are very skittish. The light sussex roosters are calm and lovely natured where the red and black bantam rooster is a pushy arrogant little b**&^%d.

i am being selfish

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Yep. This weekend is all MINE.
I’m not taking grooming appointments. I’m not socialising. I’m just being. I’m doing whatever I want, when I want. 
I might watch Dexter (series 6) which I just got… or I might paint. Or I might create… I don’t have to decide! I can do what I want! 
I have a couple of dogs to do on Monday morning but I won’t take any other appointments. I have an appointment of my own to get my tits squashed.
I figure I deserve to be selfish and indulge myself over the weekend since I’m going to be put through the wringer (literally) on Monday.
Being a woman sure is fun at times, huh? Once we hit puberty we have a lifetime of fun things to look forward to: 
– wearing padded surfboards in our undies
– inserting cotton plugs where no plug has been before
– stirrups… need I say more?
– cold, metal, duck bill-shaped medical instruments
– thrush
– childbirth (one I’ve managed to avoid!)
Then, as if that lot wasn’t enough, we have to get our mammary glands squashed on a regular basis.
“Tell me when it hurts”, the radiographer says.
“IT HURTS”, you gasp. And he/she squishes it just a bit more for good luck.
If you didn’t have saggy breasts before that, you surely will afterwards.
Personally, I always worry about them popping. I mean, that’s a lot of pressure. What if they explode? Like a balloon… or…  more like… a melon!
Yeech. 
Don’t think about it.
It’ll only upset you.
So… what other fun stuff have I got to share?
Romeo threw up last night. 
They all ate their food and then Romeo and Montana started playing in the living room. I knew it would end in tears, so I kept yelling at them to “stop it!” and “settle down!” but did they listen? No. They kept playing till eventually up it came.
There’s nothing quite like the sound of a dog hacking up his meal to get a person moving. Fast. I was up off that chair and running before it hit the ground.
It wasn’t too bad. It was only part of his dinner. Like I measured it, to evaluate whether I needed to re-feed him. 
I was so angry I hurled accusations at them, pointed fingers and swore as I mopped it up. Our carpet is way beyond repair…
Amazingly they settled right down. Wayne came in and they looked so guilty and chastised he could tell they were in trouble right away.
Now, that was a way better subject than mammograms, wasn’t it?
z

do i look like my dog?

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We all know how dogs and owners look like eachother, right? Well, so they SAY.

For instance, everyone thinks Winston Churchill had a british bulldog cause he looks like a british bulldog – but in fact he had a poodle!

So, its obviously not true… But there are plenty of people who look like, or have similar characteristics as their dogs.

I always thought it was bull when it came to me and my poodles. We couldn’t be more different! They’re gorgeous, graceful, elegant, sleek, slim, fit, athletic creatures.

I’m not.

They’re high maintenance with their trims. I put off getting my hair done even though I’ve found a bargain basement hairdresser who will cut my hair sitting outside her caravan.

But apparently I’ve been approaching this similarity thing the wrong way entirely.

This morning the subject of dogs and owners came up. Wayne believes its true. He said he could see it with his dogs. Barney is a doofus. Ok. He’s not the prettiest dog around, yeah, he’d accept that too. Mischa has big stomach bones… yep. And both will bowl you over for hugs and affection. (When you scratch Wayne behind his ear he’ll even kick his back leg!)

My dogs? Well… they’re creatures of their own comfort, they listen to no one, they want things their own way and they rule the place. Plus they bark at everything, even when its clearly none of their business.

Hm.

I’m not sure I’m liking where this is going…

z

kangarat has gone to a new home!

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Kangarat sold at the exhibition/competition! Apparenlty he’s gone to a good home, which is good, and I get $55 which is great!

Elmer the Emu is coming back home. He feels a bit down at the moment but apparently people did like him.

Other than that, nothing much new to report. Its been cold. Its been wet. The yard feels like a soggy sponge when you walk on it. We have muddy rivulets running through our paddocks in places. I’m sure the dam is leaking.

We desperately need a drainage expert to come and fix our problem. Know anyone willing to work for food?

Anyway, we took Ben up to a friend’s house in Westerway yesterday. We hired a float from Dumb and Dumber (yep. It was a real experience) and took it home. You should have seen Wally’s face. He was so excited. The last two times a float pulled up at our house a new playmate stepped out.

He was disappointed this time. Not only was there no new playmate, but we actually took one away!

So we loaded up Ben. He walked in beautifully. Then promptly turned around to hang his  head out the back!

I blame the others. Wally and Dancer were thumping around the paddock flat out, whinnying in distress “BEN! Come back! Don’t leave us! We didn’t mean it!”

Which only set Ben off into a lather. We were worried he’d jump out! We had to holding him back, open the ramp and jump out of the way as he lept out.

So, I ran up and shut the gate so Dancer and Wally couldn’t run down the paddock along side the driveway. I then drove the ute and float down to our gate and Wayne led Ben down, further from the pitiful crying of his paddock-mates. We walked him back in, did the gate up in record time and drove off before Ben could try anything stupid.

He travelled well and I did well too considering I’ve never towed a float before.

A few locals would disagree with that as they got stuck behind me on the narrow winding road doing 60klm per hour…

Ben is now staying with Sharon and she and her son Christian will be working with him on a daily basis. They have a brand new round yard which they made so they could work with Ben (and other horses in the future). I’m so excited.

I’ve been so wanting to start riding again. Just walking around on our own land or up the dirt road. Just enjoying the fresh air and being outside on a horse.

I’ve been so down about Wayne’s fall that I didn’t think we’d ever ride. I asked him, “Will we ever ride again?”

Wayne said, “Sure we will. Elevators. Escalators….”

Grrrr.

z

its just how it is

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Its been a really busy weekend. And a tiring week before that where I found myself falling asleep by 9pm rather than work on anything. That’s partly why I haven’t blogged for a few days. And I’ve started to feel guilty about not blogging regularly! I’ve put this added pressure on myself to blog about my day, the small (or big) things I’ve done or made. That in turn leads to pressure to actually DO or MAKE things to blog about. Its a vicious circle.

And its not like I haven’t got enough on my plate as it is.

Another reason I haven’t blogged much is that sometimes I just don’t feel like it. I mean, I generally love talking about myself, my life and the stuff I do. Its just that sometimes I’m tired or not in a good mood, and what I write isn’t interesting or amusing, just flat and boring. So I apologize for the boring blogs I’ve written when I’ve forced myself to write out of a feeling of obligation to ‘blog’.

Blog: a versatile word for the 21st century. It can be a verb (I blog, do you blog?) or a noun (I read his blog.)

See, I’ve been reading lots of blogs over the last few months and I let myself become infected with the ‘grow your blog’ bug. There are some incredibly talented women out there doing amazing stuff with furniture, paint and all kinds of things and blogging about it. They have busy blogs with lots of followers and host link parties and, and, and…

I started to think “hey, I could be like that.” After all, I make stuff and play with furniture and paint. I’ve rennovated. Am constantly rennovating as a matter of fact.

So I started to push myself to do more, blog more, share more of my adventures. With everything else I do in my day to day life, another load of  ‘gotta do’ wasn’t putting me in my happy place. I realised that I blog cause I like to talk about myself and my life in a fun, upbeat way. Plus I like to show off, an added bonus.

Make blogging into a job though, and the fun’s gone. I’ve never been good at doing things over and over again and maintaining enthusiasm for them. Which is why I make one or two of anything and move on.

It was the same with everything I’ve done in my life. I learned to ride, got good. Moved on. I learned to dance, got good, won some competitions, moved on. I learned to roller blade, conquered that, moved on.  I never quit, I get good, then I go onto other things.

Get the picture? I’ll do anything that interests me. I’ll learn and work on it till I do it well, then I’ll find something else to work on. Maybe its why I can’t seem to make mega bucks selling a product. At least with paintings, even if I’m doing 5 poodles or 6 dobermans in a row, each painting is new and different. Each painting is an original.

I guess that’s why I’ve been planning to open an esty shop for my recycled/re-used items. Every time I make something it will be different cause I work with things I find.

I sure can ramble can’t I? I think my point is that I’m not going to worry about growing my blog and keeping up with the blog superstars. I’ll blog when I want, about what I want (and I don’t care if that’s not grammatically correct!) and I won’t worry about how many people read it.

Anyway, this last week I had a moment where I could not help myself. I’ve been thinking about how I could use an old metal object I found in a tip shop a while ago. I think its from old fashioned weight scales but I’m not sure. Whatever it is was originally, I thought it would work as a kitchen tool hanging rack.

I’d been thinking of moving the spice cabinet and putting the hanging rack near the stove, but I hadn’t had time to do it over last weekend. I thought I’d do it this weekend but during the week I was overcome by that feeling where I just have to do it now.

Do you ever get that feeling? Where you look at something and sensible you says “do it on the weekend” but the impulsive you starts pushing couches around the living room at 10pm at night?

Maybe its only me…


I fixed the rack thingy to the bottom of the top cabinets and used wire hooks Wayne had made to hang a few older utensils. It looked quite nice.

Yep. It looked nice. But this is my kitchen and I need to cook in it. I don’t have enough space to just hang items on display. So, although it looked nice with all the old green and metal utensils, this is what it really looks like.

I hung the oven mitts back where they usually live, on the hook beside the stove. I moved the slice of timber chopping block I made under the hanging rack. I put all our wooden spoons in an old dripping pot I found at a 2nd hand store a few weeks ago. And I hung our plastic utensils from the rack.

We have too many utensils. I think I need to go through my cupboards and drawers and get rid of things we no longer want or never use. We have too much STUFF.

So, there’s another spot in the kitchen that’s had a ‘Zefi’ touch. I need to rip the whole kitchen out and redo it.

z

letters the old fashioned way

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I used to love writing (and receiving!) letters. Back when I was a teenager I used to write letters regularly. I had a pen-pal in Germany for quite a few years, and later I always stayed in touch with people I met by mail.
I’ve always been a social person and love to meet new people. I make friends everywhere I go and love sharing even a few simple words with people in passing in the supermarket or the post office.
Summers on Paros were the best back then. There were always so many people on holidays and I was there, waiting to befriend them and show them the best beaches. Among the many friends I made over the many years I lived in Greece and summered on Paros, a few stand out:
Mark, an english guy who came back to visit a few times and with whom I exchanged many fun, imaginative letters. One memorable letter he wrote to me was on toilet paper. I wrote him a letter and glued all the pages together. We had that kind of relationship.
Another was Inge, a lifelong friend. We met on Paros one year and then spent the next few years catching up on Paros or in Holland, exchanging letters in between.
Believe it or not, while we wrote real letters we were in touch way more than we are now, with email at our fingertips. sigh.
Going to the letterbox was a very exciting time. Nothing compares to finding a letter in the mailbox, ripping it open eagerly on the spot, or taking it to a quiet corner to savour every moment of it…
Back then I would make and send Christmas cards every single year. Now I still make them. but I email them. I post the bare minimum of cards. If you’re not on the computer, sorry. Too hard.
Now, email has taken over letters, but somehow, getting an email doesn’t have the same thrill as find an envelope with a stamp from foreign regions had. Email is quicker, faster, more efficient… but its soul-less compared to real letters….
I spent many days sitting at a table at home, in a cafe or library, pen in hand… picking favourite pens, different papers which would inspire me to write… the smell of new stationery… folding and placing a finished letter in an envelope, addressing it and sending it on its way.
I miss those days.
Back to reality and the era of the word on a monitor!
This is the story of an old in-tray.
I found this little beauty in an op shop somewhere along the line. It was plain and boring. I thought it would make a really pretty wall-hung letter holder.
I did a mock-up in Photoshop to see if it would work.  I liked the idea.
So I got to work. I painted it blue. Hated it. Painted it pale green. Hated that. Ended up a pale grey. Liked that. Distressed it a bit on the corners. Then I painted the inside of the tray with black chalkboard paint. I did it in a way that the edges were rough cause I liked that more casual look.
I then used some old wire, threading it through some holes that were already there and adding a few more. Originally I was going to just put the wire across in a kind of zig zag pattern, using the unevenly placed holes. Then I spontaneously crossed wires to create a rather more unexpected effect.
Like a letter holder on drugs.
I liked it! I did a trial run with a letter I just got in the post. It worked. Good!
To finish it off, I added a wire hanger, then wrapped it with jute string to match the string I tied the chalk with. I wrote “letters” in my bad handwriting. Dressed it up with some old postcards and letters and its done!
So, do you like it as much as I do?
z
PS: You’ll find this item for sale in my etsy shop (in links above). I’ve also added it to the Knick of Time Tuesday Vintage Style Link Party. Go check it out.

photo wheel

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I haven’t been inspired to get out and make stuff lately. I mean, I’ve gone to the workshop and looked around and did a tiny bit here or there, but somehow nothing seems to click. I always have a ton of ideas when I’m at work or lying in bed trying to get to sleep. But come the light of a day when I’m at home and can actually take out a drill or the circular saw, even looking at my list can’t shove me into gear.

Its sad. At least I’ve had a more or less restful weekend.

However, I did manage to do a few smaller things lately – while watching TV in the evening. I love multitasking, don’t you? Here is one such small project.

 
While looking for some old barn wood in the area around the stable, I came across this round, greasy, red metal object. 
I have no idea what it is, other than its most likely part of some tractor the previous owner used to keep in the old shed. This is what it looked like when I found it in the dirt.
I picked it up and gave it a good wash with dishwashing liquid to get rid of the grease and I was happy with how it came up. Clean but not pristine looking. There was a bit of rust on it, but as you may have noticed, I quite like rust.
I decided to make it into a display item. Or a paperweight. I’m not entirely sure what it is. However, it is now a photo display as well as whatever else it wants to be.
I found some photos of myself and Wayne from our first year on the farm. I put them together in a strip using Photoshop. I then reduced the saturation till the image was almost black and white.
Since I wanted it to look old and discoloured, I went to town on it with some tea and coffee grounds,.
I think I overdid the distressing…
 As an afterthought, I found a metal thingy with a point on it amongst my stuff and put the ‘wheel’ on top of it. That way you can spin it around to see the photos.
I know I keep showing the same side of the wheel, but its a photo of me and Billybear, my toy poodle who died a few months after we moved here. I miss my little boy.
z