Ok I know I just blogged yesterday but I have to show you something amusing :)

Last night was a busy night for me crafting since I couldn't work during the day.  I started the Harry Potter fireplace and let me tell you-I had no idea what I was getting myself into!  Does anyone know what the Gryffindor common room fireplace looks like?  Yikes.  When I went back to the first movie last night to take a look I was totally freaked out over what I had undertook.  Holy crap, that's a fireplace and a half! 
I'll see if I can add on a couple pics of the common room:

I'm not quite sure why I decided to make this piece but I am....and for added interest I'm going to make Sirius Black's face coming up out of the fire the way it did in Goblet of Fire when he spoke to Harry about if he put his own name into the goblet or not.  Sherry makes this really great miniature fire like no one's I've seen (she has a great technique I haven't seen anyone use before) so I'll have to ship the piece to her so she can help me with the actual fire part of it.  I've not seen a fire like she does it and it's wonderful without needing electric lights or whatnots to look good.  I cut out the back board of the fireplace and painted it solid black and that's as far as I got on that one so far.  I also started putting together the common room Christmas tree last night but the one in the movie is so horribly plain to me!  There's next to nothing on it :(  I really like staying true to the movies but this is ridiculous!  I CAN'T make a totally plain Christmas tree, what would be the point?  I did do the base as it was in the movie though, it was a potted tree with the pot wrapped in orange tissue paper.  I started making that and got my miniature tree potted in the same manner.  I also made the red and gold ornaments as per the gryffindor color scheme as shown in the movie.  BUT, that is the end of my loyalty to the movie tree.  It must have stuff all over it, things they would be getting for presents like rememberalls, snitchs, candy, poppers, and all manner of things mentioned in the movies.  I was thinking of making a snitch flying above by a thin wire, like it's circling the tree top.  Not quite sure yet what will be but it is started.  And I think I'll have to add on a rug of sorts under the tree to hold the presents.  

But enough about that until I get somewhere with it, which surely isn't now :)  What I wanted to show you was this funny little project I started out of a bad purchase my husband made.  My daughter has a very small fish tank my husband had bought her with this pretty little fighting fish in it which looks like this blue one:

My daughter wanted this spongebob aquarium decoration for it, which he bought her:

This is the little guy's house under the sea.  What it did when he put it in the water was turn the water cloudy.  He took it out and washed it off and tried again.  Cloudy, super cloudy!  He took it out and changed the water, crystal clear without a hint of clouds.  Ok, so out it sat-this ridiculous little thing in all it's hideous glory on my counter.  What was to be done with it?  What good was it now?  I thought of throwing it out but I knew he'd squawk.  The thought of another thing being tossed into our basement filled me with ire.  So instead I put down a towel on the counter and gave the thing a knock right on it's little vent pipe.  Off it clattered across my counter top, leaving nothing but a small dent where it used to be.  Then I did the same thing with the foliage on top.  Basically I broke pieces off of it, the ones that I knew wouldn't work for what I was planning on doing with it.  Then I took it upstairs and sanded and painted it and then began the building process.  I am far from done, but I think it'll be super fun when I'm done with it.  What did I do with it, you may be wondering?  Ok I'll show you :)  It's all about taking something laying around your place and thinking of a new way to use it.  Look at your object and think to yourself what else it could be.  What does the shape of it lend itself well to?   Here's the answer I came up with for my ugly little tank decoration although it's far from done right now because it's way too brown and blah:
   

I have so much more to do to it, and I have to make a base for it and decorate that.  But this will be a lighted fairy abode :)  Lighted how?  With this:

Battery powered tea lights :)  I will make a base that will have this little light coming up through the bottom so the batteries can be changed as needed.  The house will have a fairyish looking door on it with a small window in it so light can come through that plus all the windows.  There will be moss and mushrooms and flowers, etc.  I'll make it sweet :)  Like I said, this is the very beginning stages of it.  It looks pretty basic right now and very boring.  It won't be in the end.  What a fun project!  And it will be a cute little decoration when I'm all done. 
   

Far more elaborate and fairyish in the end.  But I thought it was a great thing to show you so that maybe you could look around and see if you had anything of your own that you no longer like that could be revamped :)  Just use your imagination!

My tree got taken down today that was struck by lightning :(  Bummer.  Good tree service though, if you're anywhere near my area of Illinois!  The yard is so cleaned up it looks like they were never there except for the tree being gone.  J & J Tree Service, in the phone book.  Here's one of the guys up in a bucket truck cutting on my tree:

Now I'm down to 34 trees in my yard, sheesh.