Recycled Storage for Mists

I'm slowly building up my selection of Lindy's Stamp Gang spray mists and up until now they have just been sitting in the original plastic bags that the sets came in. While functional they weren't exactly pretty... so I decided to do something about how I was storing them.
I had a box sitting around from some bulk baby wipes I bought at the supermarket. The box was the perfect height for the Lindy's bottles. It had a lift up lid so I removed this and cut the sides on an angle so it still retained the strength of the box while making the bottles easier to see. (It looks more like a display unit now).
The top edges were a bit rough after cutting the extra bits off, so I covered the upper edge on all sides with some leftover Kraft cardstock strips folded from the outside, over the top and then inside the box. I painted them with a mix of acrylic paints - KasierCraft Antique White, Plaid Champagne Metallic and Pebbles Inc Yellow.
I covered inside and outside the box with some old patterned paper from my stash. I distress inked the outside pages only with Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Walnut Stain and Black Soot.
Around the bottom of the box, I adhered red buttons of various sizes with Helmar 450 liquid glue.
To finish the box off I adhered three flowers from I Am Roses to the top right hand corner which I had misted to add some shimmer.

Don't my Lindy's mists look great... and with them out on my desk where they are so easy to reach, they will definitely be getting plenty of use.

Organising the Studio - Papers

It's not that I have been intentionally ignoring you... I've just been busy working (I had a week's temping work and travel to and from work - up to 3 hours a day!!!) and I've been cleaning, rearranging and organising my craft studio in preparation for some upcoming classes and crops.
A couple of weeks ago I managed to pick up a real bargain through an auction website here in New Zealand called TradeMe. You can buy and sell just about anything on there and from time to time I've been known to sell the odd scrap booking product or two myself.
I haven't been on there for a while, not having a great deal of the old folding stuff means you don't really want to look at temptation too much but I went for a nosy just to see what was happening.
Someone had listed some paper racks for sale at a really good price... including a really good "Buy Now" price. The bargain was so good that I bought now.
I contacted the seller and arranged to pick up the one paper rack and somewhere amongst all our correspondence, she mentioned that she had a few paper racks for sale though at the time she had only listed one. I said I would interested in maybe getting a few more from her.
Long story short... I have now ended up with six times the paper displaying/storing capacity I previously had at less than what I paid (wholesale) for the original four racks I had.
The bad news was that I then had to find somewhere to put them all.
After a couple of weeks of deep thought and contemplation I made up my mind what I wanted to do and so over the past week (though mainly this weekend) I've started to rearrange the studio to fit everything in.
I'm not going to show you the before shots quite yet... they will just have to wait until it's all completed and you can see the full effect; but I will show you some part-way through shots as I complete the various areas of the studio.
So here are the paper racks and the cubby unit that they now back onto.

I've created a little paper alcove in the corner by my desk. I wanted somewhere out of the way of the laundry area (reduce the chance of any accidental water damage) and out of the general traffic area as these are just wire racks stacked on top of each other. I have two solid concrete block walls and I have created a third wall by using the back of the cubby unit to provide some support - just in case.
The cubby unit previously housed a huge pile of scrap booking magazines and other scrapping junk that to be honest I had really just forgotten about and totally ignored but it is soon going to gain a new lease of life... coming up in a future blog!!!
I've stacked up all the paper racks and tied them together with cable ties for a little more stability as well, and then rearranged them all this morning before stacking them with paper. That was easier said than done as each wall of racks has to be moved as one due to being cable tied together... yes I admit I should have thought about the design aspects first... but we all learn from our mistakes.
Then once I was happy with their placement (and having added another two stacks to the end of the cubby so all the racks now had a home) I then filled them in with all my cardstock and patterned paper.

The end racks and just a hint of the cubby unit behind and the racks that back onto the cubby unit. The racks to the right are less than a third full, so plenty of room here for more cardstock. (I'm slowly building up my Bazzill holding).

 The racks backed onto the cubby unit and one of the end racks.

The racks underneath the window. I intend to give the window a good clean inside and out and then add a net curtain to reduce any chances of fading. Still a few racks free for more paper!!

And the final racks on the far side of the alcove. At the moment these are full of bargain and discounted papers, so some great deals to be had on these shelves alone!!
My perfectionist self already wants to rearrange all the papers and colour coordinate or do something with them, but I've told myself to behave and just leave them as they are for now. I have a lot more cleaning and rearranging still be done and as they are at least now in paper racks I can live with things as they are for now.
It feels great to be able to cross this off my project list!!

TradeMe Bargain

For some time now I have been looking for furniture for my craft studio aka the Dungeon (yes it comes complete with spider webs). I don't care if the furniture looks pretty or not, or whether or not it all matches just as long as its functional.  
As money is pretty tight (damn this recession, hurry up and be over) I really haven't been looking at that seriously for furniture though I have managed to pick up some bargains over the past couple of months.
First there were the lovely soft padded chairs and my wheelie chair that I picked up from the place I am working at the moment. Nothing is worse than sitting for hours intent on creating and scrapbooking only to try to move and your butt has gone to sleep cos the seat is too hard.
I got the chairs for $10.00 each... a real bargain as far as I was concerned but the bargain I picked up today beats them hands down. My apologies if I sound like I'm gloating but I'm just so stoked with my purchase.
I was on TradeMe when I spotted a listing for a magazine rack thingey. No one had bid on it and it was listed at $1.00, no reserve so I put on my watch list. I thought it was smaller than what I wanted, but that it would still do the trick - what I wanted was somewhere to store and display packs of paper and the like (cork sheets, double sided adhesive sheets etc). 
So the auction ran its course but no one bid, so it was offered to me at $1.00. I accepted only to be offered a second matching magazine thingey also for a $1.00 so I said yes to that one as well.
This afternoon I picked up the 2 magazine racks and the tri-fold screen I also won. Let's just say they were much bigger than I expected and only just fit in the back of the van with the seats folded up... thank goodness for people movers.
Anyway here they are... not in their final position, I need to rearrange the studio again, but they are at least at their new home.

 Yep... so considerably bigger than expected...

 Loving the drawers at the bottom for extra storage.

And my very cool screen which I have some interesting thoughts on what to do with this. Watch this space!!