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Shoebox: Painted CDs, Cards, Kid Crafters

From "Carol Duvall Show"
episode CDS-1526F

By Carol Duvall

More good crafty surprises in the Shoebox today, starting with some interesting photographs from Donna Breuning of Towson, Md. The first photograph of one of Donna’s paintings was rather amusing. I figured it to be of a man with a bowling ball or maybe a woman with a crystal ball. When I read Donna’s letter in which she referred to the painting as Agatha, I decided it must be a woman with a crystal ball. I thought it had been painted on a piece of plywood with holes drilled into it at various spots for a ring toss game.

I couldn’t have been more off base. It turns out that Donna paints on CDs, and those holes I saw were the holes in the middle of the CDs! Donna went on to explain that she works in an office where there is a long hallway that is...or was...totally devoid of any decoration, so she decided to change things. Her painted CDs were her contribution. Some are painted after gluing a number of the discs together, as in the painting of Agatha, and others are painted separately, like several that she sent along with very cute and clever snow scenes of snowmen and the like. All were charming.

Donna said that she first paints the CD with two coats of acrylic paint...brush on or spray, whatever she has on hand. When dry, she pencils in her subject and then paints it with acrylic paint. When the paint is dry, she protects the surface with a matte finish. Some have magnets on the back, but on those that are meant to be hung, she adds a pull top from a soda can.

Twelve-year-old Jenn Mryasova of Bradford Woods, Pa., also contributed to the Shoebox today by sending in a pretty bracelet that she made from a short length of ribbon. Jenn mentioned that the very first time she saw the show we were making necklaces from gourds, and it inspired her to try to craft something. The bracelet was the result, and we were all very impressed with what she had done. Jenn wrote that she first measured her wrist to know how long to cut the ribbon (it was satin ribbon about 3/4-inchwide with a filigree type edging on it), and then she decorated the length of it with little beads. The beads were sewn on and not glued! She then added a length of cording at each end to tie the bracelet; the cording looked like something she might have made by twisting embroidery floss. Most would say the bracelet was done, but what impressed us even more was that Jenn cut another length of ribbon that she glued to the back of the bracelet to cover the stitching from sewing on the beads! It was all very beautifully done. And she seared the ends of the ribbon so it wouldn’t ravel.

But that wasn’t all...we also had a delightful card from Nadine Kurio of Honolulu that she made following the technique I used one time to decorate gift packages. Starting in the middle of a piece of paper, I folded it into accordion folds working from the middle out in both directions. This went on top of the package filled with cut-outs from Christmas papers. Nadine used the idea inside a card and filled each of the accordion folds with different items related to Hawaii...there were stickers and cut-outs of flying fish, palm trees, flowers and hula girls, etc. It was totally clever, and Nadine said that she used this technique in making birthday cards, anniversary cards--even a Mother’s Day card!

And even that wasn’t all. Our next contribution was sent in by Kathleen Kreuger of Doraville, Ga. Kathleen is obviously a faithful viewer, because she wrote that she has seven 3-inch binders full of our instruction sheets and over 70 video tapes that she has made of the show! Oh m’gosh! But it was Kathleen’s little 5-year-old neighbor who did something that Kathleen felt was worthy of the Shoebox. When the little girl, Molly, asked Kathleen if she could have some of the adhesive-backed dots that she was using in a project, Kathleen had to say no, because she was almost out of them. So the little girl asked if she could have the part that Kathleen was throwing away. When Kathleen gave them to her, she proceeded to cut the leftovers up into even smaller pieces and then used them in the same way that Kathleen was using the big dots! Kathleen went on to say that they both craft together and use both the dots and the leftovers, and that she was so pleased at the little girl’s ingenuity that she took her out to McDonald's for lunch! Cute story.