Mail Holder from the Red State

It's gettin cold outside so the season of making crap out of crap begins again:

Over Thanksgiving weekend I helped my folks move to another apartment. As a result, I acquired lots of trash. Among these things was a tin mail holder (forgot to take a before picture).

I bedazzled this on a sleepless night to cope with the fact that my life has become one endless episode of The Young and the Restless (or Roseanne, depending on how you look at it).

National Lampoon Magazine Coat Hanger

My mother loves to shop around in the housewares section at stores like Marshalls, HomeGoods, etc etc so it must be at one of those places that she picked up a tacky sailing-themed coat hanger/wall mountable coat rack.  

It was made of shitty, conveniently distressed wood planks that were painted and scratched to give them a salty "weathered" look.  The metal hooks are secured with old-timey looking rope. It was pretty bad. She gave it to me hoping I could spruce it up, but unfortunately, it turned into this:

The images are collected from a 1980s issue of National Lampoon Magazine. In case you are unfamiliar with the class-act that National Lampoon Magazine used to be, get an idea here: http://lampoon.rwinters.com/Lampoon1982.htm

I picked up a couple of old issues of NL Mag at a South Philly flea market down the street from my house:

The guy wanted 5 bucks for each one, which is kinda hefty in my opinion:

The banknotes and the yellow decorative paper are from my growing collection of Chinese joss paper from the local Asian supermarket:

Foxy ladies:

Anyways, point is my mom didn't want the coat hanger back.

Ads

Computer was broken for a little while. The Apple Store looks more sanitized than most hospitals.

In other news, advertising is a pretty wacky concept, if you really think about it...

Bedazzled Touch Lamp

In May, a friend down the street in South Philly said she was moving to a smaller room and needed to get rid of a lot of crap, so naturally I took some assorted trash off her hands, such as old buttons, rubber duckies, and this stupid Spongebob touch light:

 http://www.unitedspongebob.com/pictures/merchandise/light.jpg

 Using some RigidWrap plaster cloth, bedazzles, glue, and a green lighting gel, it became this:

In action:

This lamp is being mailed out to Los Angeles as a housewarming gift to a good friend who finally got his own place out there! Nuthin says welcome home like tacky trash that lights up.

Beddazled Owl Fan

I love where I live because of the many food options I have within walking distance. There is the ACME grocery store nearby, where I can actually afford to buy basic grocery items, the Whole Foods on South Street where I can't afford to buy groceries ever, and the Italian Market where I can buy a bag of onions for one dollar.

But last week, I was introduced to the glorious Wing Phat Plaza on Washington Ave, which houses the Hung Vuong Supermarket, where I plan to buy all of my groceries from now on:

Aside from the amazing supermarket, the plaza has a small shop where customers can purchase various Chinese home products, such as incense and statues for their alters as well as assorted crap. While digging through the boxes of assorted crap, I found a small plastic toy fan that I purchased for a whopping two dollars. Using some RigidWrap plaster cloth, it eventually became this:

And then this:

The image in the center of the fan is from some decorative paper that I purchased at the same store, that is used to be burnt at alters (known as "joss paper"):

The fan is battery operated and fully functioning.  I'm going to rig it up in my car because I am the dumbass who bought a car without AC.

The end:

Tattooed Anti-Christ Hanging Baby

One day, I came home to find a plastic baby on my bed. It was another dollar store gift from my housemate, Sally.

I gave her a little paint pen makeover as practice for a tattooed leg lamp that I am still in the process of finishing.  She's one of those dolls where the eyes close when you turn her upside down, just like Satan.

Front:

Back:

I never had much talent at drawing but, given the right materials, I can trash something in minutes:

The anti-christ baby now hangs in the middle of my bedroom (which may explain why I rarely entertain guests in my room).

Foxy Motorcycle Boys (on Motorcycles)

For Easter 2011, I went to Canada to visit my cousins in the burbs of Toronto and I finally got to revisit my favorite Canadian thrift spot: the Value Village in Guelph.

This time, I found a cool illustrated children's book from either the 70's or 80's about motorcycle riding.  Back in Philly, on a sleepless night, I painted some wood board that I found in our house with spilled and scraped India Ink.  The foxy motorcycle boys eventually found their place among the ink (and glitter):

 Handsome men, showing off:

Check out that butt:

I enjoy glitter, foxy boys, and vehicles of various sorts, so this one was conceived quite naturally.

Cassette Tape Christmas Cards Revisited

One of my good friends in California who received a Christmas cassette tape sent over a couple of pictures of his cassette card after seeing the blog! His had a baby boy on it because of his obsession with baby dolls.

It was definitely one of the cuter ones:

front - 

back -

Thanks, Hank Cockpit! You are the coolest, duhhh

Bedazzled Skeleton

Post-Halloween shopping at Walgreens or CVS is something I look forward to. While still in Boston, I bought two discounted plastic, dangly skeletons at the local Walgreens.  A nice boy worked there whom I only remember as Walgreens Will. He would later give me boxes to help me move.

My first winter in Philly was the coldest winter I have ever experienced in my life. Since we couldn't afford to turn the heat on, the hot glue gun was the only reliable source of warmth:

In silly poses:

There was also a plastic skeleton that danced to a Gloria Estefan song at that Walgreens but I didn't have the cash for one of them at the time. If you happen to have one of these, I will pay top dollar (cupcake) for it.

Mother Mary Night Light

My housemate Sally is as much a fan of dollar store trash as I am, so I was totally stoked when she came home one day with a plastic Mother Mary night light from a dollar store in North Philly. It gradually became this:

And now hangs in my bathroom:

In action:

(If you're religious and this offends you then that sucks, but I answer to a higher power: plastic googly eyes.)

Cassette Tape Christmas Cards

When I first moved to Philly in November 2010, I was hopelessly unemployed for a long while. This left me lots of spare time to make some detailed Christmas/holiday cards. Unfortunately I didn't  take pictures of all of them before I mailed them throughout the U.S. but there was roughly 20 of them (some were cassette tapes, some were cassette tape boxes) and they looked something like this:

 And there were lots of them:

Not Fine Art

Hola

This is an internet home for pictures of stuff I've started to make since moving to Philadelphia.  Mostly weird lights, bedazzled crap, and tacky furniture. Why not.