a shabby chic education

hello crafters,

i'm an avid youtube watcher. i love finding great craft channels to subscribe to. one of my favorites is livelovescrap, which is Bona's channel. i fell in love with the beautiful page swaps and tag swaps and mini album swaps she would host and feature on her channel. and i thought one day, i'm going to participate in one of her swaps.

now i have to pause and say-i don't like doing multiples. i loathe making the exact same thing, the exact same way more than once. i did invitations for my cousins birthday party once and it was torture-i don't know why i'm like that i just am. . . anyway back to the point. . .
given my despise of making multiples i jumped at the opportunity, when i saw that she was having a what's in your vintage purse swap. i only had to make one purse and ten unique items to go inside. PERFECT! i was so in.

side note. . . i have a tendency to jump into things without always thinking them all the way through. LOL! so what hit me like a ton of bricks after i'd signed up is that, the theme of the purse is vintage shabby chic. . . which is gorgeous, and beautiful, and so NOT my style.

so i had-not a problem, but an opportunity. to learn vintage shabby chic, and that's what i've been doing all week: studying.

here's what i found out so far. . .
-lace is a BIG deal. these shabby chic-er's love their lace, and it truly does make their projects look delicate, beautiful and romantic.
-vintage trinkets: keys, bookplates, buttons, cameos-all vitally important
-pearls-oh the beautiful pearls :)
-doilies-which are pretty trendy right now, even if you're not a shabby chic-er.
-flowers, flowers, and more flowers. and don't forget to adorn them with sprays and swirling rhinestones, and to coated with glimmer mist so they have just the right shimmer.
-certain companies are perfect for vintage shabby chic: graphic 45, prima, webster's pages to name a few.

so what am i going to do with all this information?
hopefully make a really cute vintage shabby chic purse! i'm going to spend all day tomorrow working on it. and i'll be back with a video to show you how i did.
wish me luck!
shawnte, the avgscrapgirl