Hearts Mail Art

I love heart art any time of the year.  But February is the best.  This card has a full boat of mixed media and was inspired by Pinterest (as usual).

It has Color Burst, watercolors, acrylic paint, Washi tapes, stitching, embossing, rubber stamping and stenciling.  Posca Pen and Zig Writer for my fake splatters.

The inside needs to be fun too.  I wasn’t real thrilled with how that sentiment worked with the specialty embossing powder, so I jazzed it up with more Washi Tapes.  Finally I have new uses for Washi Tapes.  They collect so fast.  

I made this postcard at the same time with the same techniques and supplies.

A successful experiment for me.

And then there came this postcard.

Again, many of the same techniques with the addition of texture paste and shading with a graphite pencil.  

This paper art stuff is hard.  It does not come naturally or easy to me.  Many of these techniques are out of my comfort zone.  I’m trying to be more brave these days.  Some experiments are filling the trash bin.  So when I have a success, I celebrate with a very happy party feeling inside me.

Happy Valentines Day!

Play Time!

Finally some time to play!  This is about how much sewing I feel like doing.  And that’s only because Antoinette likes it when I sew for her.  It’s been a while since I baked a fabric birthday cake.

This mixed media cake has fabric, thread, a bead string, rubber stamped candles, gem stones and Washi tapes, all on card stock.

From there I went to Pinterest for some inspiration to play some more.  I was inspired enough to try new techniques and supplies that have always seemed scary to me.  

I love the Tim Holtz paper dolls, but now I have them I don’t know what to do with them.  That baby is an odd shape.  I thought I was being pretty clever putting her on the man’s shoulders.

This is all watercolors and the dreaded Gesso.  I’ve set my mind to get along with Gesso.  We have not been friends.  I used texture paste over an alphabet stencil.  I tinted the texture paste too dark.  Painted over it with Gesso.  Then it was too light!  So, more watercolor then some shading, added lines behind the family with rubber stamping and finally some “fake” splatters in white and black.  

This was all experiement and not comepletely unfortunate.  So out into the world of mail art it went.

That was encouraging, so off I go to try more!

January 2018 Calendar Journal

January 2018 is now history.  I mentioned that I wish I hadn’t done a little extra embellishing.  That would be the circles.  Well, that wish is history too.

It was a much more fun month with not having to work quite so much.

My dragonfly got lost in the writing, just as I knew he would.  All learning lessons.

Moving on to February with no regrets.  Every month is a new opportunity to begin again.

Definitely another learning experience here.  But fun too.

Happy February!

Hearts Runner and Potholders

I have not been sewing much lately.  This is a table runner and potholders I made a lot of years ago.
Before my days of blogging.

I dug these out of their long sleep in storage.  After all, it’s the month of hearts now.

Things that have been in storage a long time are like new again.

Calendar Journals

I haven’t done much in the past couple of months except to barely keep up with my calendar journals.  

November got filled in...

December got filled in and somewhat embellished throughout the month.  Mostly I had to take notes on little post-its for the day then catch up later with writing in the daily block.  But it did get done.

And now that I have more time, January 2018 is ready and being worked on daily.

I got some new stencils to help me embellish the scrapbook papers for a more creative look...even though designs get lost when they get written over.  But it’s fun to do and that’s what matters.

I’m adjusting to having more time for myself.  You wouldn’t think that would be a hard thing to do.  I just hope it lasts a while.

I’m hoping to sew more.  But my new tiny space is not very user friendly.  I doubt anything large is going to come out of it.  Luckily I like small sewing projects too.

Thanksgiving Card

I managed to make only a couple of Thanksgiving cards this year.

I also needed a Get Well card.

I wish everyone well.

and have a

Happy Thanksgiving

Calendar Journal and Sewing

My September calendar journal is complete.  You will see we were moving back home and I’ve been swamped with busy ever since.

I do still get some reading in while having lunch and before going to sleep sometimes.

October has been ready and I’ve managed to keep notes until I could fill in the blocks.

While having coffee and looking through Pinterest, I saw that my cousin-in-law pinned soup bowl cozys to her sewing board.  I’ve seen them many times and never felt a need for them.  Don’t eat much soup.  But while I was eating my morning mush for breakfast, I suddenly HAD to have a bowl cozy...more as a bowl potholder than to actually cook with it in the microwave.  (A person must sew with 100% cotton thread for the cozy to be microwave proof).  I didn’t have any of that thread for my first couple of cozy’s.  I have since purchased some for those who might want to use their cozy in the mic.

These cozys are so quick and easy.  An internet search will bring up a variety of ways to make them.  Mush is much more fun to eat now!

Scrappy Sewing

As packing to move narrowed down to getting the fabric scrap drawers and sewing machine ready, I had to to stop playing.  But just before that had to happen, I made a few new potholders.

This one came from the green scraps drawer.

This one from the pink scraps drawer.

And this fun set came from the scraps from a couple of quilts.  

Of course they had to have the black and white striped bindings for added fun.  

And now everything is packed and ready to go.  So this is it from me until I get "home".

Now I'll be reading and watching your creativity and collecting inspiration.  These things are already happening and it's driving me crazy that I can't play!

oxoxo

August / September Calendar Journal

August 2017 went along like so...  

I've painted some watercolor around the edges of the pages.  I like how it looks and that it adds fun to the page.  There's not a lot of room to design on a single sheet calendar.  Sometimes I like the challenge and sometimes not.  August was difficult.  But September was fun.

This particular September is pretty exciting for me.  I'm looking forward to filling in the days with my doings.

XOXOXO

Scrappy Sewing Fun

Two little fabric boxes and one nail polishing mat have not satisfied my desire to sew ... right now!

BUT!

I'm in the middle of packing to move back to my home in Wisconsin!  My fabric is already packed!  Scraps are all that is available to play with.  

Of course a postcard always comes to mind first.  My sweet cousin-in-law is figuring out a way to carve out a dedicated sewing space in her home with red and teal as her color theme.  And I want to be virtually in that space with her.

So I mailed her a small bit of me to display in her new space-to-be.

I also wanted to share with her some of my vintage wooden thread spools for Decor.  They needed a little padding in their box so that they didn't rattle so much.  A quick potholder would do the trick.  Who can't use a new potholder?  I hadn't yet packed my printed Miracle Fabric pieces.  How perfect this piece of collaged recipes is.  She likes neutral colors too.

So I've managed to fractionally satisfy this desire to sew things.  But far from completely.  I've dug out more scraps.  I've been watching my sewing friends share scrappy projects on their blogs and I have the desire to make scrappy fabric too.  I need a soft cover for my sewing machine.  It would look so much nicer than the dish towel I throw over it.

I have chosen neutrals and low volume color scraps for this project.  I don't really have a lot of patience for improv sewing with scraps, but as this piece has grown, I've enjoyed working on it more.

Here is where I have paused this project.  I now needed something smaller and quicker.  You know...more instant gratification. 

So, back to sneaking in a little more sewing play time in between the packing of boxes.  It is so hard to put "everything" away then wait until it can all come back out again.   

XOXOXO