Gothic Arches

I have admired Gothic Arches from afar - the new "craze" -and decided to join a Mingle to try them out. I made 3 arches using Altered Pages transparencies. The theme was "Vintage Romance". I didn't have any couples, so I went with romantic women.





The arches are about 5" tall, 3 1/2" wide (not true measurements)
They have been mailed out to 3 different countries!

ABCanada

ABCanada-or Altered Books Canada-my Yahoo Group, seems to be enjoying making their altered board books! Most have completed their first page. Here is my first page. I have a quote which will go over the 6 pages of the book. The first word of the quote is "Creativity". The background we did was a painted background.

Mermaids

We had our fist Altered Artists meeting of 2008, at my house! With my newly arranged art room we were able to fit the 4 of us comfortably, and I was very happy! Usually we meet at Marg's house, which is in her beautiful and huge basement. A little more cramped at my house, but it worked! We made Mermaids from the Somerset Studio Gallery. Here they are!







I'm not sure yet what I will do with mine (the one with "wonder" on the tail), but the first one I made (last weeks blog entry) I have since put into an altered book!

New Journal Pages

Here are my Journal Pages from the last 2 weeks.

My Marilyn page uses a transfer I did a few years ago - I can't remember how we did it though. The transfer was lying around, so I used it.



I've been on Atkins for awhile now -lost 25 pounds so far! So this page is about food, which I love!


I had a wonderful calendar last year by Jerry Uelsmann who takes fabulous photos and then manipulates them into these wonderful surrealistic scenes. I couldn't find his calendar this year, so I'll probably be using a few photos from his last year's calendar in my journals. This page is also about how every once in awhile, from nowhere, I smell my Dad, who passed away in 2001. very strange, and very strong, then it goes away. I always say "hello" and "I miss you!".



I love the black gesso on this page, and one of my new stamps that I got in a set of 9 from Michael's for under $8!! The border around the flower are some scraps from Wednesday night's Kingston Altered Artists meeting when Bev showed us a new technique using oil pastels and glitter embossing powder.

Snow Day

We woke up this morning to beautiful snow!! I felt nice and warm and cozy, and ready to create all day! I worked on my page for ABCanada (will post tomorrow), finished my Dictionary Page for my group that meets on Wednesday, and made a Mermaid from Somerset Gallery 2008.

This is my Dictioary page for an Altered Book Swap we do once a month. I had "B" and I chose "Blueprint". I was inspired by a Michelle Ward article in an old Somerset Studio, and I used Michelle's archetecture stamps on the page. It actually looks better in person, I think!


I also made this lovely Mermaid, using a template that I had bought years ago but rarely used. I had to draw the tail though, because the template had legs! Hopefully this will be our project on Wednesday and I will get to make more then!



This past Friday was my day to do ATC's for TIGAPF (Thank God It's Altered Pages Friday). I chose RETRO as my theme. It was hard breaking away from browns, swirls, vintage and crowns! We had to use an image from Altered Pages.

Altered Board Book

In my Yahoo Group, ABCanada, we are doing a step-by-step altered board book! If you are living in Canada, and would like to join us, please do!




Right now it's a fairly small group, and we would love to have more people join us! Just click here and hopefully it will get you there, then just click on "join". I will have to approve you (just tell me where you live) and you'll be in! Other than that, not much happening this week! Probably because I am back to work (teaching) and I am once again exhausted at the end of the day. I do try to get some journalling in before I run off, however.

Two more Journal Pages

Here are my first two journal pages of the new year:


My birthday is on the first of January, so I always start the year out right! The crown is actually bright pink, my daughter gave it to me on my birthday morning. I love Ellen and watch her whenever I can!




I loved this little row of Gingerbread Houses! The big one seemed to go so well too. My brother just bought a house, so this seemed apt. His would be one of the little gingerbread ones though!

New and Improved Stamping Room!

I am lucky enough to have a whole room (the 4th bedroom in my house) as my stamping room, I think the room is 9X12. When we moved in there were floor to ceiling bookshelves on 3 walls. This is the second time I've re-done this room. I don't think I have the "before" pictures on this blog, but my work table was a long (' maybe 5') teak desk, with only one place to sit because of the drawers. It was also rather thin. I covered it with a plastic tablecloth because I was so worried I would ruin it. The floor was covered with a beautiful Persian carpet. Very dark, also worried I was going to ruin it. if I dropped anything on the floor, it was a miracle if I found it, as the patteren on the rug is so busy! So I rolled up the rug to use in another room, moved the desk to my DD's room for a sewing table, and my Mom bought me a big 6' craft table for my room! No worries now! And I could potentially have company to play with as I could fit 4 people around this table! Here are the photos:

view through the door

My favourite stamps -these shelves used to be just storage

My iris carts. This wall used to have a desk with my sewing machine on it. I could hardly move to sew, so I didn't. I bought one new iris cart and the grey set of drawers.

This section hasn't changed much., but as you can see at the bottom,
I now have 3 empty shelves (let's go shopping!!)

My new table! The board with the mat on it that you see used to fill the whole
of my old desk, so I do have quite a bit more room.

This is where I keep my cardstock, in the filing cabinet. Scrapbook paper,
Paper pieces (large) and collage images are in these 3 boxes on top.
You can also see some unmounteds in the CD rack.
I have to put a carpet or someting under the filing cabinet because it keeps
moving when I open and close it!

This shelf is to my left. It used to hold all my inks, because tho only place I could sit was at the left end of my desk. Now I have some trays of stamps there (right side). The left side of this picture hasn't changed much. All my ephemera and findings are in these boxes. Tags, coin envelopes, dominoes, cards, etc. The one thing I did change is that I bought this set of 5 see- through boxes (Canadian Tire) and labelled them Plastic, Wood, Metal, Asstd and Paper. This is my general collection of found items, which preveiously were all mixed together in a 3-drawer box (the one you can see below on my table). I like this becasue not only are things separated, but I can see through the boxes for inspiration. All my alphabet stamps are in the rolling 5-drawer cart under the table.

Close up of the see-through boxes

These are the shelves directly behind me. The back of my chair broke off a few months ago, andI like it better this way, much easier to manouver. And without the rug, my chair moves nice an smoothly! So everything I need at my fingertips is directly behind me, or on my table. These shelves hold all my inks (divided into colours) and all my brads, eyelets, beads, jewels and other tiny things (in the black drawers). Also my embossing powders, and most used stamps. Glue stick, sandpaper, sponges, etc are also right here.

This is a view of my table from one end. All my pencils, and paintbrushes are on the table in cups that are in a basket. Everything I need all the time (scissors, gel pens, Krylon, rulers, etc) are in this lazy susan thing I got at a garage sale. I can easily take everything off my table when I have company over to play.

Here are my magazines. Two years ago I put them all into binders with those magazine holders. I never read them! They were also very heavy binders, and it wasn't easy removing a magazine. So I put them in the plastic shelf magazine holders instead, and already I'm using this resource more!


This is my new sewing room, aka my DD's room when she comes to visit. Thses two desks were in my stamping room, the one on th eleft was my work tables, and the sewing machine was againt the wall where the iris carts are now. This is much better! I'm already half-way through a sewing project for school!
So there you have it. My first New Years resolution done!! Now for the rest...LOL!

CHALLENGE: I would love to see what you have done with your stamping/crafting room! Please link through my comments to your pictures!

Happy New year!

I have been rather tardy adding to my blog! Christmas was very busy, and I decided to completely re-vamp my stamp room, and added a new big craft table. I removed all my sewing stuff and made my DD's room into my sewing room when she's not there (which is most of the time!) This was my room when I was a teenager, so it is rather neat working back in my old room! I will post pictures shortly.

TOYS!! I got lots of new toys for Christmas:

These were in my stocking!

These were presents form DH and DD, plus the stamps below~aren't they wonderful!!

I made this Birthday Card for my step-father using my new Pirate stamps:

Inside:

Pull up on the coin...

Here are the other things I worked on this week :

December and January ByHand This and That Mingle:

January-Kahlil Gibran, I didn't know who he was (a Lebanese/American artist/poet) but now I do! I love the quote I used!

December-Beethoven's Birthday- I actually made this design a few years ago on a 4X4 canvas. I liked it so much I thought I would reproduce it for this Mingle page. I learned a lot about Beethoven, and that he used a special rod attached to the piano so that he could feel the vibrations of the notes, since he went deaf as he grew older.

A Journal Cover swap for ORSA, I took a cheap journal and re-vamped the cover. TIP: Be sure the journal is right side up when you do this!! (experience...!!) I just used scrapbooking paper, stamped the quote, layered the quote, put an eyelet in the corner with fibers and a charm and attached the quote (this is when I should have checked to see if it was right side up!)

Christmas Gift Cards:

I had 3 gift cards to give out this year, and wanted to do something special, so I made these pouches to hang on the tree, that can be re-used by the recipient:

I used a stamp of Santa for the hats, and just cut the hat off. I think they turned out well!