Monday, January 26, 2015

Cribbage Board Key Holder

Last week Chablis was cleaning out her closet and pulled out a bunch of her old games.  One of them was this vintage cribbage board from the 1960's.  I have no idea why she had this in the first place as she doesn't even play cribbage.  The graphics are great...



All the original game pieces were tucked inside the little hidden compartment in the back.  It sat there staring me in the face and the wheels started turning....  First I attached a hanger so you can hang it on the wall....



Then I screwed in some hooks to hang keys from and I glued the original game pieces into the board....



And there you have it - a key holder for a lover of vintage games, especially Cribbage.  Won't this look awesome hanging on the wall?


And there's still a hidden compartment in the back - for love notes maybe??


Currently for sale in my Etsy Shop.

Thursday, January 22, 2015

Geocache Number 3000

Finally....  We found our 3000th geocache!  And we slid it in just before the end of the year.  I was determined to hit 3000 caches in 2014 and I felt like everything was working against us.  Since we started geocaching in 2009, this was actually our worst year ever, with the least amount of finds for the year.  So hitting 3000 was a big deal for me.

We took my mom and dad with us and headed out to Bolingbrook, Illinois for a morning of caching....




As you can see, we haven't been getting a lot of snow this year.   This cache was a fake apple hidden in a pine tree, hence the cache name "Pineapple."  How funny is that??


Mom and dad enjoyed being about to look for geocaches without trampling through the snow...


Montana Charlies is a famous area landmark and it's been there for years.  I remember going there with my grandparents when I was a kid.  It's not open this time of year, but I thought it was the perfect place to find my milestone geocache.......



Afterwards we went to White Fence Farm for a delicious chicken lunch.


The restaurant still had all of their Christmas decorations up.  It was just beautiful with the lights twinkling and decorations every place you looked...




White Fence Farm is famous for their mouth watering chicken.  One of the things I like about this place is the appetizers they bring to the table while you're waiting for your meal - fresh beets, cottage cheese, coleslaw, kidney bean salad and the best corn fritters in the world.  They sprinkle them with powder sugar and they are  soooo good!


 Now I call that a great day!

Saturday, January 17, 2015

Keepsake Wedding Box

Ever since my son Tony got engaged, I've wanted to make Alex a keepsake box to put wedding items into as they plan their special day.  Then after the wedding they can use it for storage and decoration.  My first problem was finding a box.  Originally I was planning on finding a vintage hope chest and refinishing that, but I decided against it because of its large size.


Then one day last summer we were up in Kenosha, Wisconsin and we stopped at a yard sale where Chablis spied a box filled with old baseball caps.  I almost tripped over my own feet as I rushed over to check it out.  I quickly dumped all the baseball caps onto a tarp and purchased the box on the spot - for $ 3.00!  It was in really rough shape, but I fell in love with it and thought it was a steal!

I know, it's pretty sad looking, but I could just see what I wanted it to be.  First I scrubbed it down with soapy water and bleach, and let it sit outside to air out for a few days.



Next I got out my electric sander and smoothed out the entire outside of the box.  Next up I started painting.  Tony and Alex have chosen blue and gold as their wedding colors, so I picked out a pretty blue and got to work....



I wanted to line the inside of the chest with some wedding themed paper, so I got some scrap booking paper with a wedding dress and tuxedo theme.  I cut down the sheets to fit around the inside and glued them in and then coated with a couple layers of modge podge....


Once the paper was all dried, I glued lace trim around the edges and then added gold beading around the entire perimeter.  I spray painted some buttons gold and finally glued gold and white buttons and white pearls along one edge.  I also added a vintage skeleton key and a vintage number nine in one corner, to signify their anniversary date....



I wanted to stencil a quote onto the chest and Tony and I kept kicking around ideas, until one day I happened to see a Bible verse that Alex had pinned on her Pinterest board and as soon as I saw it, I knew that was the quote....


I added 2 lovebirds on a branch.....


And afterwards I distressed the entire chest and gave it a light coating of stain to age it....


At the last minute I decided I didn't care for the silver hardware, so I removed all of it, gave everything a couple coats of spray-on gold paint, and put it all back together.  I was so happy I did that because the gold hardware looks so much better....







And there it is, all finished  up.  I couldn't wait until Christmas got here so I could give it to Alex.  She absolutely loves it and she said they are going to try to use it for something at the wedding.





  I think that would be such a great idea.  The box is approximately 3' x 2' x 2'.  I hope they keep it and enjoy it for years to come....

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