WOYWW 122

Ahem, I've been thinking about Christmas here - big time! Firstly, I did manage to commandeer (today's biggish word) - for that read swipe - our chrome vegetable trolley, used purely to house cleaning things, that I'd been hankering over. A swift trip to buy a robust plastic one to house the cleaning things, which are kept out of sight anyhow (just the way they should be kept - out of sight) freed it up and into my gleeful sticky little paws :) The increasing amount of Christmas stuff I wanted to hand was driving me nuts on my desk and this is a great solution:

Stamped and coloured images, papers, sentiment, lace, seam binding, glittered poinsettia - all selected ready for a couple of cards.

The lot popped into a little grey plastic basket.

Then tucked into the chrome trolley - which also has Christmas glittering bits, ribbons, plastic boxes with ready made and glittered poinsettias etc in (need a load more of these!)...and the trolley still has plenty of spare space, for now at least.

Pushed under the desk - it actually goes right back leaving plenty of room for my short little legs but no way was I going to push it right back then crawl round on the floor taking a photo - I might still be under there next Wednesday :) Brilliant solution!!

Ha, that leaves space for me to carry on making these:

Sparkly brads! I can't recall where I saw this idea, so if it's been on a WOYWWer's blog already I apologise. I think the original idea used plain gold or silver coloured brads but the plain metal ones I currently have are really tiny, so I raided my coloured ones. I've used nail polish to colour brads in the past, but these are something different. The makings are in the photo above, heat proof mat, embossing powder, sparkling stuff (a bit like 'less fine' Glamour Dust but no label on the pot although it came from Art of Craft), brads, looooong tweezers, piece of polystyrene (just the stuff they pad parcels out with) and a heat gun.

Hold the brad by its legs firmly in the long tweezers and heat with the heat gun for about 20 seconds. The colour of the painted brads will change slightly as they're painted, but the paint didn't bubble or even smell. Then dip the hot brad into the pot of clear embossing powder and straight into the glitter. I did try giving a quick reheat once the embossing powder was on, and even after glittering the brad but it wasn't necessary, I found that the brad is hot enough to end up with a coating of melted embossing powder on anyhow. Neither the embossing powder of the glitter suffered by me dipping straight into the pots. Then, stick the brad into a piece of polystyrene to cool. I found I could do all of this holding it in the long tweezers - do not touch hot brads! I'd already poked some holes into the polystyrene using the end of an embossing tool. And the result:

Some more centres for poinsettias, snowflakes, flowers and such! I used clear embossing powder but you could use coloured which would be fun to experiment with. And/or coloured glitter - lots of possibilities!

That's this weeks offering from me - a good use for a vegetable trolley and making glittered brads. For more ideas, or just to nose at what folk have on their desks, hop over to Julia's here. Make a cup of tea or coffee first as you could be a little while :)

Di
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