Do you ever get sick of all the things that seem to gather and multiply on your kitchen bench? I do.

And one of those things is the $2 wire paper towel roll holder I’ve had for years. It gets shuffled over this way and that but its always there, another bit of clutter.

So while I’ve been running around moving furniture and painting rooms (more on that later) I got sidetracked and made a new roll holder.

I’m like a magpie with ADD when I’m busy, but I got inspired when I was looking for something in my workshop and knocked down a pile of wooden junk useful items I’ve collected. Among them were these spindles which I looked at and thought, “hm… that’d make a great paper towel roll holder…”

I had the perfect cast iron bracket (only one) so I cut a bit of timber for the top. Naturally I painted it the minty green I’ve used in my kitchen as a highlight colour.

It was all going great till I realised I’d cut the spindle too short.

I do this all the time! Nothing I make is ever quite perfect. Its always a bit off or a bit too long or a bit crooked… I did measure. I just cut off the wrong end of the spindle to the right height…,

In full solution mode, I looked around for something to add length. I have a broken shovel handle which was perfect. I cut a slice off that and joined it all together.

… I won’t bore you with details, lets just say it wasn’t pretty. The result is this odd looking chunk of wood at the bottom but guess what? It works! The thicker bottom bit holds the roll in place so it doesn’t rattle around too much.

I capped it off with one of the knobs from my kitchen cupboards (again, a little crooked cause I can’t drill a straight hole…)

My methods aren’t exactly professional, but in the end it worked out great.

When I asked Wayne if he liked it, he said “Its cute.”

I’m pleased with how it turned out. Now I just have to put in the shelves above the coffee tray and the kitchen will be finished.

After 2 years.

Meanwhile, I know I’ve been really silent on the blog. I’ve got great excuses. Firstly I was sick with a bad flu for about 2 weeks. I felt lousy and really didn’t feel like doing anything at all, must less finding interesting things to post about.

Then I went to Victoria for a week, where I stayed with a friend and groomed her toy poodles for 3 big shows. The shows went great, I got a good fix of toy poodle love and then I got back to work just in time for a week off!

Way to plan! 🙂

My week off has been flat out. Grooming dogs I had to put off while I was away or sick. Swapping out the office and guest room. Painting walls. Moving furniture. Mowing grass that seems to grow a foot overnight. Replacing plants which didn’t make it through winter.

I’ll leave you with some photos of the poodles I groomed – I love the smell of hair spray on poodles!

Armani

Kismet

Zena

I miss having a toy poodle… I almost stole a baby puppy Iris had at home. Maybe one day again…

z

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Below are a couple of simple stainless steel jug suncatchers. I made these as part of a commission for a birthday gift. Basically I had an order for one so I figured I may as well make two while I was at it.

They’re really, really simple.

1. Find stainless steel coffee pots, milk or water jugs at an op shop.

2. Bend wire into spout.

3. Attach chandelier crystals (or beads, or whatever you want) to the wire.

4. Admire.

The second one had a broken knob on top so I glued on a broken earring for added bling.

Easy and pretty. Normally I’d use old teapots but my collection was low on those so I used what I had.

Another variation, for when you have a jug without a lid, would be to put a succulent in the pot – suncatcher with plant! What more could a girl want?

z

Its definitely not what I envisioned. I had plans to groom and work in the casita, tidy the house (which needs it, believe me) and generally be active. Instead, I’ve been in and out of bed since Thursday.

Seems I have one of those illusive flu bugs going around. It started with a kind of premonition type pain in my head and throat on Monday night. Tuesday I had headaches and a dry cough. Wednesday I was getting chills, coughing and sneezing and feeling irritable.

Then Thursday I woke up with a chesty cough and feeling like I’d been hit by a bus. I stayed at home most of the day but had to go to the chemist in town.

I thought that taking a day off would nip it in the bud and I’d be back at work on Friday…. Uhuh. I woke up worse on Friday. So I went to the doctor. She gave me some antibiotics just in case there’s a bacterial component, said drink lots of fluids, don’t skip eating and rest, rest, rest.

I’ve had to cancel all the grooming appointments I had this weekend and the worst of it is I don’t even have the energy to work on my own craft projects in the comfort of my armchair!

What makes it worse is that I’m having elective surgery on Tuesday so I need to be well by then… and then I’ll be recovering from that!

Talk about it all hitting at once.

But enough of my woes. Thought I’d share something with you that didn’t turn out as planned and, though its not a total failure, it sure ain’t what I envisioned.

I had this little tray. I wanted to make it into a key rack. So far so good, right? Easy.

It was painted in a cream oil paint with some acrylic over it, not very good, so I sanded it, cut out a key shape in contact paper, then sprayed it using a black and then ivory. I sprayed the hooks ivory as well.

I then sanded it back to distress it.

I hated it. It was bland.

So I decided to use oil based blackboard paint to liven it up.

This is what happened:

The paint just chipped off!

Ok. I love chippy paint, but I didn’t want to lose it all!

So I rubbed off the loosest paint, then sprayed it all with clear varnish.

This post isn’t about something made with wire!

This is a little project I’ve had on the go for quite a while… Took me ages to finish it, then ages to get around to photographing it. But here it is…

I started with a plain box on castors I picked up at a tip shop. I couldn’t find any before photos and, natually, I didn’t take any before I began work on it. It was all the same colour you can see inside in the pic below – an orangey stained timber.

Yeech.

Here’s the front view of the box – its made up of three offcuts glued and nailed together, then stained to match the interior orangey colour. I also dry brushed the front with some of the grey.

I chose a rusty antique handle from my collection. It had some green patina on it but I added to it to give it more character.

Here it is finished.

z