Peeps Wands

Do you know what time of year it is? Its peeps time. Here is another fun peeps project I created. This time I used Rit Dye for the lace ribbon and pom poms, paper straws and pink bunny peeps. A great recycled project using left over ribbon, paper straws and peeps. Perfect for all ages. Now let's get started.

Materials for the Decorating:

• Pink bunny peeps, Peeps and Company
• Paper straws
• Pom poms
• Ornate pearl stick pins, Lisa Kettell Designs
• Tools/Glue: hot glue gun, hot glue sticks, scissors

Materials for the Dye:

• Liquid Dye, Petal Pink, Rit Dye
• White lace trim or ribbon, Joanne's Fabric and Craft Store
• Plastic table cover
• Paper towels or old towel
• Measuring spoon, measuring cup
• Large glass or plastic bowl

Directions to Dye the Lace and Pom poms:

1. Prep your surface. Lay plastic table cover on the surface you will working over. Put on your rubber or latex gloves.
2. Mix 2 tablespoons Rit liquid dye petal pink with 1 1/2 cups hot water in a plastic, or metal bowl and stir. Let steep for 20 minutes. For good hot water, heat some in the microwave in a glass bowl for 2 minutes.
3. Place lace ribbon and light color pom pom in the liquid dye solution, let set for 5-10 minutes stirring occasionally. Remove the dyed ribbon when desired color is achieved and place onto a foil pan. Let dry. Reserve your remaining mixture for more dying by pouring into a glass jar or container, keep sealed

Directions To make Peeps Wands: 

1. Push a paper straw into the bottom end of a pink bunny peep, secure in place with hot glue or glue of choice. Attach a pom pom to the back of the peep, tilting to the left side, secure with hot glue.
2. Cut a piece of the dyed lace ribbon about 12 inches and tie around the bottom of the peep ( at the top of the wand). Then push in a pearl stick pin into the top center of the peep.

Tips/Tricks: 

• Fill in any white areas of the peep with a decaupage medium mixed with petal pink Rit dye and add pinkish sand to finish. 
• Try adding sugary pink clear or German glitter on the peep.
• Add a crepe paper skirt and other fun details to your peep wand.

To see the original project I created and to learn more about using Rit Dye visit my project link inside my Rit Studio at: www.ritstudio.com/2014/04/04/peeps-wands


xoxo
Lisa

A Summer Party!
Its that time of year, Graduations, Birthdays, Weddings, Showers, Circus, Carnival's, Fete's, Bazaars, Flea Markets, Festivals and Unique Events, it must be summer time.Let's not leave out the joys of summer camps and crafts, library crafts and lazy day fun. Do you remember heading out to that fave amusement park or carnival, collecting prize tokens and tickets, to trade in for the toy of your choice, years ago those toys would have been cowboy hats, toy sets, penny dolls, Kewpie dolls and carnival cupie dolls. These kitchy items have become quite collectible now and have always sparked my inspiration, something so unique about a cupie doll, which has lead me to create my own versions, which my customers have been enjoying for years. Each style in my line has been carefully hand molded, hand pressed and hand painted for you all to enjoy.

My pieces can be used in everything from doll making, scrapbooking, assemblage, altered art crafts, children crafts, party wares, party supply, jewelry making and more. Choose between, un-painted and painted styles, rounded or flat back depending on your project. Some designs come in paper mache, bisque, polymer, resin or foam body clay, and states that in each listing.For craft ideas using my products, please visit some earlier posts, my blog on Artfire and my other sites, stay tuned for some new ideas here on my blog. To purchase my products until my Etsy Site is restored to normal due to the hacking incident, please visit my artfire store, my websites or my store front in Lafayette, NJ.
http://www.artfire.com/users/MoonfairesWorld
http://www.moonfairesworld.com/curiosity_shoppe.htm
http://artoperanj.com/

I revamped my Online Stores: Ebay, Etsy and ArtFire!

I finally got around to fixing my online auctions, updating many of them with new pictures, pricing, shipping adjustments, etc. I even opened up a pro ArtFire shop a few days ago.

In the process I de-activated listings, removed some that are no longer available and added new items. Here is the breakdown of the shop pricing:

Ebay: My Ebay store will be more for auction style works such as more non-handmade works, etc. It won't be as filled as my other stores due to pricing and fees.

Etsy: Will have many of my handmade wares and handmade supplies, some custom listings, etc. But it won't have the huge value packs and doll part value packs. I will keep my Etsy for all the Etsy lovers and my years of listings there.
http://www.etsy.com/shop/moonfaires

Art Fire: I have recently opened an Art Fire Shop, In here you will find my complete catalog of handmade works, Hand made doll parts, art supply, Handmade party picks, toppers, party wares and huge value packs of items, the pricing will be lower here, due to lower costs.
http://www.artfire.com/users/MoonfairesWorld

My Website Store: This is the site for pretty much everything above, but not as stocked as the Art Fire Shop.
www.moonfairesworld.com

Piddlestixs: My Store Front in Lafayette will have many of my works, along with workshops and a plethora of other items that I won't list for online, exclusives, etc.
www.artoperanj.com

Lulu: I have had issues with zine orders coming through, so I will solely sell zines through Lulu, you order direct from them and your zines, some collage cds, downloads, etc will come directly from them.

My Scrapbook Papers: The parent company of my papers will sell direct wholesale to you if you are a store, company, etc. Otherwise they will be available at stores, my store front, etc.

Party Time Box!


“Wish on everything. Pink cars are good, especially old ones. And stars of course, first stars and shooting stars. Planes will do if they are the first light in the sky and look like stars. Wish in tunnels, holding your breath and lifting your feet off the ground. Birthday candles. Baby teeth.”

-Francesca Lia Block (American Author)



I have been on a crusade to re-invent: "Sweet" aka "Kawaii", to re-invent the circus girl in me, the Celebration inside. October is a magical month, for me it brings forth a new journey in my life one filled with new opportunities and works. I have found myself mixing color palettes and themes, especially loving the idea of blending orange and pink, aqua and red, metallics and chic, cupcakes and grunge.

This new art piece: "Party Time Box" blends a little grunge aka spice with some sugary nice. I covered a papier mache box with printed parchment paper shreds, then topped with a sugary bunny, vintage chicks, tiny pom pom fringe, feathers, tinsel chenille, papers, glitters and more.


This piece is supposed to bring a smile to your day, to celebrate being you! It doesn't have to be your birthday in order to have a day of celebration, to have a slice of cake, drink a milk shake or get a present, how about creating a celebrated piece of work and dedicate to yourself.

Have a celebrated day!
xoxo
Lisa!

The New Boxes on the Block!

Lately I have been drawn to decorated boxes, ones with cute assemblages on each box top. After searching and searching for the right components for the boxes, I found some of the items were too cute to use only on one box, so once again I hand molded my items and poured some of them with paper mache, others pressed with my handmade clay and others with a blend of paper clay and apoxie clay.

The first of these new boxes are:
-Blue Bear's Party
-Lady Primrose's Tea Party


Blue Bear is on his way to a party in Pink Valley at Sammy Petalsmith's house located at the tip of Pinksby Mountain, where Sammy has set up a Pink Wonderland filled with sweets and treats!


Lady Primrose is on her way to a Garden Tea Party at Abigail Brewster's Arboretum in Sunnyvale. The Tea Party begins at 12noon inside the Climbing Roses Gazebo which will be glowing with Oriental lanterns and twinkling lights laced between layers of roses and vines.



Both were made from my molds and a paper mache mix, then sanded, hand painted and decorated, not to mention loads of glitter. Blue Bear's Party has vintage multi tinsel glitter I had from Woolworth's and Lady Primrose's Tea Party has fine German glitter from Art Glitter.

Hope you enjoy them!
Magic and Joy,
Lisa!

Wedding and Party Glass Vignettes!After my book signing and project demonstration at ACMoore in Allentown, PA, I started making more and more jar fairies, finally completing a custom bridal shower order for a customer in Massachusettes, who ordered 22 medium sized jars.She had wanted vintage wedding shower/garden tea lady style images, with a bit of sweetness, vintage and German Glitter. After my signing I came home and was re-energized, since I did a load of jar fairy demo's. The more you do of something, the more the ideas start to swirl around in your head, always flickering back and forth. As I looked at the jars during the demo, I said their lids need a little dazzle and height, that's when I decided to go with an opera theme, using chipboard pre-cut signs as that added height, layered each one w/designer paper, their first name initial and glitter.When I came home I looked at the half done jars and said they need some height, when you get married, a Bride's head has lots of height, from a tiara and veil. So I decided to do the opera sign on each jar, using the chipboard base, chipboard letter: W (her name is Wendy, and its for her Wedding, so the letter "W" worked perfectly. I layered each jar w/creamy shredded paper, a sheet from a vintage wedding book (1920's), a vintage wedding doll image, vintage reproduction millinery forget me not flowers, German Glass Glitter in Silver and in Gold, with a mini beige tulle veil on the doll. Finally I covered the lid's center w/more glitter. These main photos are the example I made for myself and to show variation on the wedding and fairy glass vignettes!Now I have an order of 12 princess glass jar vignettes for a party in California. The customer has requested they be prodominately pink, creamy, beige, lemonade yellow and silver/gold glitter, lots of sparkle and bling w/ a princess theme.

These jars will have the creamy beige paper base, vintage princess story book pages, a vintage princess doll image, extra pink tulle, and the jar tops will have a handmade rhinestone/pearl and mercury silver seed bead crown/tiara, glitter and sign. These pictures will be up when I'm done in about 3 weeks.

When starting your own glass vignettes aka captured jar fairies, remember the possibilities are endless.
Here is a photo of the jars I did at my book signing and demonstration, these are what sparked my newest jars!These are the original wedding/bridal party jar vignettes I made several yeasr back for the members of the bridal party that I was in. These are the ones that have spun off my jar custom orders. Each one of these was made w/excelsior, vintage images, digital painted opera cover from my image collection, vintage wire, simple embellishments and vintage silk flowers.

Tips:
-Try shredding vintage book pages and use that as the base, what about natural raffia or excelsior for the base, model magic, craft batting, moss, reindeer moss, shells, sand, paper mache, floral foam modeling material (comes in pink color in a bag, when mixed water it hardens to a floral foam texture, but it can also look like cotton candy) the choice is yours.
-try coating a vintage image layered on cardstock with gel medium, let dry. Then glue to inside of glass jar, fill jar with resin for a cool paperweight.
-Use a glass jar as the body of an art doll, build a scene inside the jar and on top of the jar's lid.Here is a smaller jar vignette I made for a dear friend Rose, made from an old jelly jar, excelsior, vintage image (this image is from a larger vintage image that I digitally colored in, tghe full image is available in my book altered art circus and is the image I used for the Pageant Crown in the book).

I also used dried flowers, and a huge wire ribbon that I tied into a bow shape. The chandelier piece is handmade by me, using a mold I made and resin, and a few simple techniques.

I could go on for days, if you want to learn more jar fairy/illustrated jars, glass vignettes, jar fairy cozies (like tea cozies), captured fairy wands and more visit these projects in my book:
Altered Art Circus, Quarry Books!

Have a magic filled weekend!
xoxo!
Lisa!

Seahorse Gardens, My Final Destination!Post Five
Wow, the gardens are located on the other side of Neptune's Gate, I didn't realize just how big it was here. You have to walk down Coral Arcade and through Crystal Towers, to the veranda which leads to steps down the rocky terrain to Seahorse Gardens and Water Park. At last I see the curtain, to my tent, this is where I will be all day!Everywhere you look are Mermaid Tea Party Signs and invites turned into programs.People, Pixies and Mermaids are partying all over the place by the sea, the tea party ponds, under the canopies and frilly umbrella's. So many familiar faces, all waving hi!Inside the tent I found Abigail and Tracie Killian, my two friends from Coral Reef Island, They swam in yesterday to beat the party traffic. Aren't they too cute.Abigail added some magic pops to our tea, for some extra magic, its amazing, I choose a pot of Cherry Almond Tea from Hollow Moon Tea Emporium, Abigail choose the Cherry Cheesecake Tea and Tracie choose Indian Mocha Chai, all yummy flavors.Here are our party favors, silver shell containers filled with edible tea candy shaped like a tea set!Plus as an added bonus I donated Dollie Wands to all the guests at Seahorse Gardens, everyone was excited. Don't worry, I saved one for you, visit my last and final post of the party and for the giveaways and info! See ya in a few!
Xo!
Lisa!