For the past couple of months I have been tinkering with vintage tins making earrings:
When I was a kid I’d play a ton of Tetris. Mainly because it was the only video game we owned. My sister and I would joke that as we slept at night, all we would see is the Tetris shapes flipping around in our dreams. True story. We definitely played way too much Tetris!
A similar thing happened to me this summer. I started making these tin earrings and then all of a sudden, all I was seeing in my dreams were tiny pieces of tin! All day I would be looking at the kitchen and consider pulling apart our mustard tin, coffee tins and tea tins. My daughter was drinking a Starbucks Frappuccino and she yelled at me for stealing the cap. She wasn’t even done drinking it yet! It’s an understatement to say I had gone into thrifting overdrive. I was scrounging in the basements of antique shops, Habitat for Humanity’s store, Goodwill, Savers and church thrifts hoping to score old tins. I get in a certain mode and do not stop until that specific creative energy is spent.
So it was in this mode that I started looking at all sorts of things differently. My kids and I were playing rummy 500 with an old deck of cards and for the first time ever, I found myself looking closely at the card deck patterns. I didn’t realize how cool they are and the small motifs hidden in their patterns. So as I was scouring all these little shops and flea markets… I started collecting card decks.
Do not call me a pack-rat. That is not nice!
Like Mr. Reese’s chocolate bar falling into a peanut butter jar and creating the best candy ever, I naturally fell into cutting up these playing cards and wanting to turn them into earrings.
With Valentines Day coming, of course I thought “heart” and used some of the card motifs to make Valentine Earrings.
How cool? There were hearts, cupids and even a mermaid holding a heart! And that fantastic red. It just screams Valentines Day.
I’m pretty sure this new obsession isn’t over yet. Not even close. I mean just yesterday I scored 3 new decks of cards!
So, while your playing cards or sifting through your junk drawer, take a closer look. You never know. You might be amazed at what you find!
