Crayon therapy!

Happy Friday! Anyone have big plans for labor day weekend? Unfortunately I will be working all weekend (except sunday!) and I seem to have developed sniffles! Nuuu I hate little cold symtoms, or maybe it's just allergies? Or maybe it's just from working in a fabric store all week? Am I allergic to work?! POSSIBLY

Taste the rainbow! I will probably try to cover these in corresponding fabric or scrap book paper.

Anywho! I haven't had much time to commit to crafting this week sadly! But I have been working on some friendship books for a swap! I also have been thinking about some fun mail art for envelopes! 

Here is one idea that I actually tried! I got the idea from a link on pinterest where a mother put down painters tape in an "I <3 you" form and let her little kid scribble all over it. When she peeled off the tape it left and impression on the white paper. It looked really neat! So I had some circle stickers from god knows where and I thought I would try a gradient polkadot look.

I love the smell of crayons don't you?

Starting to scribble after putting stickers on my envelope. Its an old business envelope that never got used hence the address. I have hundreds of these from when they went out of business for some reason.

scribbling complete! Now to peel off those dots!

The finished product! It kinda goes with my bedspread don't cha think? I don't mind the old address since i can slap a label on there.

I highly recommend crayon therapy. Everyone can scribble!

I also discovered THIS! It's on tumblr and since I'm a bit of a tumblr newb I have no idea what each err page? user? is called. Anyway it's pretty awesome for finding a few mail art ideas! And pretty typewriter pages!

I also thought I would post the finished  product of the letter I sent off earlier this week in its pretty packaging!

Before

After! Ipod was covering her address.

Hope everyone has a spectacular three day weekend!

Incoming and outgoing!

It was a big day for my mailbox! My parents are starting to wonder why I get so much mail. They don't know about swap bot and its probably better that way haha

FIRST UP! This is all the mail I got today! I finally remember not to tear through them without taking pics first! I got some really cute ones at the end of last week but opened them before remembering!

Mail Pile!

I got two postcards today from my boyfriend while he was at ocean city. He was worried the frog one got lost!

I got two letters from my best friends from college today! They're awesome and get me! Oh and they're twin sisters so that's pretty cool too!

One had stickers on the front with some stickers inside and a note!

The other had a dielik (spelling?!) postcard and a  cool note. (she always has really cool stationery!)

Pure awesomeness.

admire the prettiness!

I also got some mail from swap botters! The first had friendship books from a recent private swap I did. She made hers out of notecards! The other was a notecard swap, so now I have pretty notecards to send around!

Friendship books!

Pretty notecards!

As for outgoing mail, here is what's being sent! I wrapped some of the packages in sample fabric before wrapping it in magazines so it would have more cushion. There are 3 packages of atcs (for a big swap,) 3 packages of notecards (notecard swap and private swap,) and 2 letters to a new pen friends! One letter is not "wrapped" yet=) I have to get that done before I make my post office run tomorrow!

A new re-purpose for all that fabric I have around! YAY!

The before picture

And after!

All of the notecard packages!

An introduction letter to a new pen pal!

The letter on the bottom is a swap bot pen pal letter!

Mail always makes monday blues better! Anyone else get cool mail today?

Sunday Fun Day!

So I went on an adventure today with my boyfriend to Old Town Manasas! Naturally we managed to get lost and drive for over an hour when it only should have taken 10 minutes. I blame smart phones, it will always be their fault! Anyway this weekend was the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Bull Run, so we found a bunch of civil war reenactors hanging out in front of a Manasas civil war museum. It was an interesting experience sitting with people pretending to be historical figures from over a hundred years ago. You could ask them a question about a specific day during the war and they could tell you exactly what their character was doing. It was very interesting.

I was fascinated by all the furniture that some of the "generals" had in their tents! (typical interior designer)

Found this in the museum, there were a few ladies that were all dressed up too but I didn't manage to get a shot of them.

Manasas is kind of a random town. Sadly this museum was closed today. Cool sign though.

I finally found some Manasas postcards of the stone house! Its one of my favorite local landmarks and I pass it all the time. Unfortunately the gift store at the museum didn't have any that were of the actual battlefields. They always look so pretty when the seasons change. I can't wait to send some of these off to people on postcrossing, swapbot, or other friends I come across!

The ocean city one came from my boyfriend while he was on vacation. He always indulges me!

We also managed to find a really awesome antique shop! Antique shops are one of my happy places and luckily there are alot around this area, but this one had decent prices and a really random variety, which I love looking through! It makes me feel like one of the people on American Pickers! I actually ended up buying a few things that I found for my dollhouse in progress that were just too good of a deal to pass up. The display cabinet was only $8 and the drop leaf table (with working drop leafs!!!) was only $3. The table is missing a drawer, but I don't mind since I have a dresser that is also missing drawers. I plan on being crafty and finding a way to make drawers for them so they are pretty like they once were!

The dishes are Rement sets that I got for my birthday! I think most wooden dollhouse sized display cases cost a heck of alot more than 10 dollars!

Drop leaf table with REAL  drop leaf action!

I also bought an antique stamp that was probably from a letterpress that I plan on using to make pretty paper for letter writing. I think the dot design was just used as a decoration for titles (think bold newspaper print). I seem to be starting a collection of antique letterpress stamps! This is the second I bought this summer! I also have a few metal ones that I bought at the DC Flea market this past winter. I can't resist awesome old things!

Had to get it since the price was acceptable and I hadn't seen this shape/pattern thing before!

Anyone know anything about these types of stamps? I'm pretty sure they were shaped this way so they were easier to slide around when they were making a page, bit other than that I don't know much.

Do you all have a happy place where you can buy little things for your crafts or collections? Or do you live anywhere with a historic background? I'd love to know! =D

Time to Swap...FBs!

Hey there! I have created a swap on swapbot that is newbie friendly if anyone is think of giving the website a try! The swap is for friendship books (or FBs as they're known in the internet world) Where you would be making 3 new books for your partner and sending out one already established fb.

An owl FB I made! I just used some card stock and recycled paper!

If you are interested in joining the fun, please head over to swap bot Here! The deadline to sign up for the swap is September 12 and the deadline for sending out is the 29th. Plenty of time to make things!

I know some people may not know what a Friendship book is, so let me explain. Essentially it is a small book that is usually stapled together with blank pages. The front is often decorated. On the inside you will find the address of the person the book was made for (or the person who made it) whichever of these addresses is first in the book, is the owner who the book gets returned to once the book is full. The book gets passed along through swaps and pen pal letters until the book is filled up with addresses of people who want to be pen pals. Once it is full, it is mailed back to the owner!

Under each address people usually mention what they are looking for. Like if they want a pen pal, like talking to people world wide, or like sending different postcards. Their are abbreviations that swappers use since the FBs are usually pretty small and if you take up less space then there's more room for other people to fit into the book!

There's alot of different ways of doing these and some have their own names. They are called sticker bags, decos, mom fbs, and friendship sheets. They all are a little bit different but I think right now I will stick to FBs as they seem the simplest!


I always thought it would be cool to have a pen pal and this seems like an interesting way of meeting alot of different people. Is this something you would ever try? Or does it seem safer to find your pen pals in other ways? Let me know what you think!

Happy Friday!!

ITS FRIDAY! Yay we all survived! I had a close call this morning with a deer on the way to work, but luckily the little guy made it to the woods just fine =)

While Andre the Giant is waiting to be finished (I've been too tired after work the past few days to help him!) I figured some people may be wondering how the name of this blog came to be!

WELL! Too make a long story short, OMAHGOD CRAFTIES is what I would often say to my friends and my poor roommate who had to live with me for four years when I had a really good craft idea. It is often paired with excited jazz hands and maybe a little happy dance. My very awesome boyfriend actually brought it to my attention so I really have to credit him with coming up with the idea, even though it's something I've been saying a while so I'm not sure who gets credit! I figured it was the easiest thing to name a blog and still keep to my general excitement over doing crafts!

Picture from 500motivators.com

Hopefully Andre will get finished up tomorrow! I can't wait to show him off =D

Recycled Plush Doll!

During my relatively uninteresting day of work, I started trying to think of some kind of softie I could make that would use up some of my massive stash of rescued sample book fabric from over the years. I work at a fabric store so thinking about fabric projects seems pretty logical =)

Sketching out ideas while watching the history channel!

I tried looking up some simple softie patterns online that would work, but I didn't find anything that I liked. The problem with working with recycled or sample size fabric is that you are limited to very small projects if you want everything to match. Most of the book fabric that I have is maybe 8" by 6" (or something like that) and each piece in the book is a different colorway or pattern. So you can get a bunch of different fabrics that go together pretty easily, its just the matching them that is hard. And I don't want a super hard patchwork project. SO the person above is the simple "pattern" that I drew out. I figure if I make it small and mess around with a few diff fabrics it should be good.

My little man and his materials!

I was boring today when I picked out fabric since I just grabbed the first book I found and a random fabric sample (probably leftover from an interior design class) and picked what looked good enough from it since this is pretty much a practice run. Have I mentioned I am a softie virgin? Anyway from the top down is hair, face, shirt, and pants. Next I trace my drawing on to trace paper (that was Definitely a design school leftover)  and cut it out.

Coming to LIFE

Then you do all the boring things like pin your pattern to your fabric choices. Watching Dr Who during this phase is optional.

I cut out a hair shape from the brown velvet and just hot glued it on. I wanted to sew it on with some embroidery floss, but the fabric was being stubborn.

Safety pins do the trick when real pins are MIA!

Starting to come together! =D

 Then you just have to sew it together! Watching Dr Who is MANDATORY for this part! Well ok, anything on tv will do just fine!

sew wrong side to wrong side!

Yay now one whole side is done! I'm a bit too tired to finish him up today so I'll put a picture up when I finish him tomorrow! Any one else think  that that he looks like Andre the giant from princess bride a bit?

So what do you do now?

GREAT question. It might be easier to answer with what I don't do, since I try my hand at pretty much everything and have supplies to do most things. (I'm a bit of a craft supply gatherer)

Just this year I have tried:
Embroidery, clay miniature, to make a ball jointed doll out of clay (so far a miserable failure,) artist trading cards and altered playing cards (ATCs and APCs for short), a bit of mail art and pen paling, friendship books (as of last week), sending and receiving postcards and the awesomeness that is swap bot!

A friendship book (FB) that I made over the weekend

Swap bot is a website where you can sign up to send your crafts to other people and receive something someone else has made. Its a great way to try new crafty ideas and to motivate yourself to be creative! I know my brain sometimes needs a creative jump start, and I find that it really helps! Plus EVERYONE loves getting mail! Unless its bills, those stink. The worst day in the world gets so much better when you have a present waiting for you at home!


So in case you haven't guessed yet, I'm a little all over the place.  My art journals are living proof! I always keep a sketchbook (AKA my "Journal" with a capital J) which is like the master plan of all my crafts, creative musings, and ideas. I tend to fill up a Journal in a year and a half, or at least I used to while I was in college because I used it in art classes. Any who. This is what my current Journal looks like, and some of the silly things that are in it!

This was how I studied for a few history tests. I'm more likely to study if it is pretty!

journaling while I was studying abroad in Paris this past spring!

Ugggly ball jointed doll diagram

Happy 4th!

My best ball jointed doll diagram and  instructions that I ruined with sharpie doodles on the other side. Darn.

I also started smash booking this year! Well kind of. I don't know what else it would be called! I started by making a book (something else to add to the list of tries this year!) out of recycled paper from the school year because it was the last week and I was stuck in the dorms. I didn't plan on it being a junk journal, it just happened as I filled it up with trinkets that I held on to during the year and other pretty things that I like. It still has plenty of empty pages to work on!

I had this great plan earlier in the summer that I would make this book full of uplifting and empowering quotes to make myself feel better about the horrors of job hunting in this economy. So I got an old ad book that someone was getting rid of and started my work! Too bad I didn't really get much farther than the first page! I love the cover that I did, it's painted with scrapbook paper at the edge. But I guess the whole idea of the project was too long term (I'm best at things I can finish in a week or less) and I just wasn't sure how to continue. Here are some pics!

I also keep normal written journals, though I use these much less than any  kind of visual journal. I have two! one is for writing down dreams (some crazy ideas there) and the other is just your average "this is what happened today" journal. There are HUGE gaps between when I write in these probably because when I doodle something in my Journal, I can look back years later and remember exactly what was going on and know how I felt. Words just take more time for me =)

Both were gifts from friends! They know I like green and blue (like my bedspread) the one on the left is for dreams, and the one on the right is everyday.

Is anyone else craft or journal ADD like me? I'd love to know what you do or what you journal about! Or are swaps more your thing?