Bad day box

Finished my first altered matchbox.  The ones that I've seen on Craftster are done with the smaller matchboxes, but since I have issues with dexterity in my hands because of Psoriatic Arthritis I decided to start with a larger one.  I still need to make a matchbook to describe everything in the box for her, but otherwise it's done.

This is my sister's Bad Day box.  When she's having a bad day there's things in here to bring her a smile.

Finished box.  Her favorite flower is a Alstoemeria and this is my attempt at making one out of clay.

Inside we have a mustache (sometimes we just need to pretend we are someone else), tea (tea makes every day a little better), kitty(she loves cats but her hubs is allergic), flying pig (sometimes things will only happen when pigs fly, and recognizing that is a good thing),  daffodil (my favorite, and her other favorite),  key (she has the key to every problem inside her),  fairy dust (it might not fix everything, but throwing it on someone who's giving you a hard time will sure make you laugh),  glittery flashlight (sometimes we need a light to show us the way out of the dark),  tea house (again with tea makes things better),  teenage mutant ninja turtle (no reason, it just makes me laugh),  and finally the picture of herself because she should always remember she is who she is and that is a beautiful, wonderful thing.

Poker/ favorite things altered matchbox in progress

I'm making some progress on the boyfriend's altered matchbox.  Here is the cover..

The player's hand is attached with string to the box so it can be flipped over to expose the hand. 

The player's hand exposed to show the Royal Flush.

I'm really happy with how it's turning out.  Now I need to decide on the handle and get it attached and start working on the favorite things fillers.  I have skulpey clay to make a lot of the things like  pool balls in a rack, a soccer ball, tea in a cup.  Also have some wood tiles to mod podge some miniature pics for mini frames.  I hope he likes it.

Baby's 21's Christmas ornament

My daughter's ornament is done and has her 21st birthday jewelry inside it.

Secret squirrel stuff right here...

Ok Inspire folks I'm using my long dead blog to post these pics.  Hopefully my honey, daughter and anyone else I'm crafting for will not stumble on here.  Shhhhh don't tell anyone...

My "good day" crafting area.  When I'm mobile and able to sit at the table to work this is it.  Isn't my antique dining table awesome!!! 

My plastic drawers of greatness and crap.  My lap desk is on top there for my  "bad day" crafting.  LOVE that thing and it was on sale at Michael's for the bargain price of about $3.  Me and that lap desk spend a lot of time on the couch together.

And here you have the crafts I worked on today.  Literally this was ALL day.  I woke up at 7 this morning for some reason only known to God and probably my cat (I have NO idea why) and after a shower and some toast with Trader Joe's cinnamon sugar out of the special trader joe cinnamon sugar grinder I got to crafting.  I did need 3 naps today so I guess all day minus 3 hours if you are being particular.  These are out of order so I'll put some captions on them to explain what is going on.  

This is going to be my oldest daughter's annual Xmas ornament (I make her one every year).  I need to add the ribbon still, but it is pretty much done.  I know you can't see it, but the whole thing is glitterfied with the Ile De France in a raised glitter.  This will also serve as a gift box for her 21st bday present.  She and I used to get Camembert when we would go to restaurants in Germany.  Today we still get it sometimes and it always makes us happy.  This box is actually from the last time she was home and we had Camembert, toast and jam.  YUM!

This and the one above are the backside of the mini playing cards.  The design on the top one will probably never be seen, but I have a OCD issue.  I was getting tired and decided I should probably at least get the 2 that would be seen on both sides done tonight so I stopped adding to the "board" cards. I was originally going for a plaid look, but that was harder than I remember it being, and maybe with swollen fingers and some shakiness just isn't possible.  I'm happy with the super texturized look though.

The 3 above are to give you an idea of size.  Should have put a quarter on there too, but one of the other pics has a quarter I think.  ANYWAY, the larger card is an actual playing card I used as a guide for drawing the pics on the smaller cards. These are done on shrinky dinks so no I did NOT draw the miniature stuff all crazy nuts and stuff.  I taped the actual cards on the back of the shrinky dink, copied onto the shrinky dink and colored it all in, and then shrunk them.

The backs of all the card tiles.

The cards before shrinking.

Shrunk cards before doing the backs.  These are on clear plastic so I had to do a few layers of white before actual starting the texturing.

Cheese box ornament in progress.  Adding glittery felt lining.

Using white nail polish to put base level on back of cards.