Giving a second life to old plates

My mom bought for me a long time ago some plates from one of those dollhouse collections that were made week by week.  Well, those plates never had a place of their own.  Some made it to Mrs. Lovett's kitchen, but they were not there for long.  They had been in storage most of the time.

But now, with Kassandra wanting a place to hang out with friends, she said she needed some crookery, because some of those friends are human and as such, like human food.

"Nothing much", she said.  "Just some big and small plates, and maybe some serving trays?  I am sure you have around something I can use".

And she was not wrong.  I immediately thought of those old plates.  But my goodness, I could not for the life of me give those to her, in the condition they were:

They look very cheap, and not fit to my friend's taste...

So I took it upon myself to give them a second life so they could finally be used.  First off, I went and bought a lovely printie from Little Maggie Shop.  It was great that she offered some advice on how to do these plates.  Good thing I did not need to start from scratch!  I chose the first model, as it is very similar to my full-size plates, and adjusted it to the size of my plates.  The tray design came in handy as well.  Then, printing and cutting off the plates one by one:

I glued the printies to the plates with white glue, and let them dry thoroughly.

Then, I used my new Mod Podge to give them a shiny glaze.

And the final result is fantastic!

Kassandra was very happy when I gave them to her.  She said she does not have yet a nice place to store them, but she most certainly will buy something nice and suitable for them.  As of now, they are in the cellar, on top of the fridge.

So happy to have learned a new technique, and specially to have been able to use some plates that were going to the trash for sure!

Trash to treasures - Egyptian jewel

Have you ever notice that when you want to make something in miniature, you have stuff laying about that is just precisely what you needed to finish your piece?  That happened to me today.  Let me explain.

I have decided that I am making an scene as a curator workshop: lots of ancient artifacts, everything mixed together, in an ecclectic collection.  Remember the Natural history cabinet?  It will be the first piece of the collection.  I may also include the chest with the coin collection. It really is out of sight in Kassandra's study, so I hope it will be more visible in the curator's shop.

Well, as usual, instead of starting putting floors on thinking about displaying furniture on the scene, I started with a minute detail.  I bought this golden crescent finding from Bindels Ornaments long ago.  I always knew it was going to be a jewel, but wasn't quite sure about what kind.  Today the answer presented itself.

Here is the finished piece: 

My husband uses microscopy covers that are 12 mm round, and they come in these cute clear plastic boxes.  Naturally, they have no use for the boxes once they are empty, so they discard them.  But I had a couple of them and I could upcycled them, which gives me great satisfaction.  I thought it would make a great display case for a recovered Egyptian jewel, and voila!  It was super easy to do.  I simply covered the protective foam with red velvet paper, and inserted it in the box:

Then I simply added some red "rubies" to the golden piece, and glued it to the case.  It measures 2 square cm. Love it!

Some time ago I used another one of these boxes to make a Ferrero Rocher box for my mom's patisserie.  This was so much fun, and she loved the final result.  I simply baked some small polymer clay balls (18, to be precise), covered them up with golden paper from a Ferrero Rocher chocolate, and used the tiny sticker in the bonbon to make the label for the box:

You  can't get more authentic than that!

I hope this is the first post of many in the making of the curator office.  It is such an out-of-the-ordinary scene that I can't wait to start crafting!

ETA: I have just found out that Bindels Ornaments is on Etsy, selling beautifully handmade lamps and some other knick-knacks!  Go get yourself something, you won't regret it!