Sorry I haven't posted for a bit....been busy when I can be busy and taking it easy when I can't be busy.
My thyroid will be taken care of the 12th of August and then I might have a bit more energy!
I have been making a lot of postcards lately for the simple fact I can sit in my comfy chair in the living room with my lap desk and cut out magazine pictures and glue them to chipboard with the glue stick. Easy to make, easy on my old body cause I can sit in a comfy chair.
There are a few ATCs here as well. I am so far behind on the 365 Project right now it isn't even funny! I intend to get caught up with that but ATCs are not on my muse's radar right now. It's handmade books and postcards she relishes at the moment.
Enjoy!
Oh, those new babes? You'll meet them after the artwork.
postcard
magazine pictures on recycled greeting card
Bad Kitty
ATC
markers on recycled cardstock
14 july 2010
365 Project Day #188
Barry
ATC
markers on recycled cardstock
13 July 2010
365 Project Day #189
Book Cover
July 2010
Not sure when I made this one....it is gauze colored with markers, glued to cardstock and gorilla glue put on the lines. I didn't know gorilla glue would foam up like it did while it dried. It's a kinda cool effect. I made this to be a postcard but the gorilla glue makes it not suitable to mail as a postcard so I'm going to make a book cover from it and see what happens.
Blue Pentium
Magnet
July 2010
The square part is from a computer tower, silver round thing is from a watch, the gold plastic piece with the hearts is from a cheap brooch and the blue thing is a plastic gem. I slapped a magnet on the back and stuck it my fridge. My brother brought me the square piece when he junked a pc tower a few weeks back.
Playing in the Orange Room
ATC
markers on recycled cardstock
14 july 2010
365 Project Day #190
Single Minded Success
Postcard
magazine pictures, gesso all attached to recycled chipboard
Not sure on the date...Late June, I think. I had a few to scan that are from last month.
Slightly Dangerous
postcard
late June
magazine pictures and words
Sunshine Cat
ATC
14 July 2010
magazine pictures and white paint pen on recycled chipboard
365 Project Day #191
Three Fish in Love
ATC
13 July 2010
markers on recycled cardstock
365 Project Day #192
We Chew Up Anything!
Postcard
late June
magazine pictures, words and white paint pen on recycled chipboard
Three Handmade Books
18 July 2010
These guys are 4x4 inches, 20 pages of manilla drawing paper, japanese stab binding. the covers are upholstery and drapery fabric glued to one side only of recycled chipboard. They're sewn with cotton yarn.
The dinosaur looking critter they are sitting on is the front cover of a little book still in the works that is made out of two brown paper bags. I'll show it off when I finish all the components for it.
Gangster Book
16 July 2010
Magazine picture glued to recycled chipboard for the front cover and two different border stickers covering the back of the book. It has 20 pages of manilla drawing paper and is japanese stab bound. It is 4x4 inches.
Next is a series of pictures to show you the paper fabic book I made on 15 July 2010. I found the tutorial for this binding style on YouTube a few days before making the book.
First thing I did was make some fabric paper on the 14th of July. I cut the text block out on the 14th as well. The fabric paper is nothing but a conglomoration of the little bits and bobs that made it into my scrap box. I took all the supplies needed to the burned house so I'd have some room to work in and it didn't much matter how messy I got. And messes will be made making fabric paper!
The instructions for making fabric paper (or is it paper fabric? I can never remember!) say to use muslin for the base fabric but I didn't have any muslin and I prefer to use what I do have so I improvised and used gauze bandaging material. (I bought a big roll of it at the thrift store a few months ago for a buck.)
The pictures show you the construction of the book.
There are many different things that make up the fabric paper. The little box that holds scraps holds much more than just paper! Some of the things include: purple nylon netting, black nylon scarf material, little drawings done in markers and ink pen, british postage stamps (all the same stamp), magazine pictures, various types of paper, purple mylar, red velvet ribbon, calendar sayings, stamped butterflies on yellow tissure paper, silver foil paper, whatever was in the box!
I'm really not pleased with the way the back of the fabric paper looks. The back shows on the inside of the book. It doesn't look like this now. I scribbled all over the backside that was showing in the book with a purple sharpie to tone down that yellow some! There is a pocket in both the front flap and the back flap of the book.
I needed to stiffen up the fabric paper a bit so I used purple duct tape to fasten the components of the book together. It was a perfect base for the sewing. The book itself is about 4 1/2 inches square, 2 1/2 inches thick and quite stout! The page block is made from 13 signatures making a total of 130 pages in the book. Paper is manilla drawing paper. There were only supposed to be 12 signatures, but Donna can't count and punched 13 holes instead of 12. It's sewn with thick cotton thread.
Floppy Disk Book
12 July 2010
this book is made from a hard floppy disk that is 3 1/2 inches square. I covered the bright yellow floppy with purple duct tape. Then I painted over the front cover with rose colored glitter paint and put the design on with gold dimensional paint and slapped a plastic gem in the middle. It has 6 signatures of purple writing paper sewn in the coptic stitch with the same thick thread as the fabric paper book that I colored with a purple sharpie so it wasn't that slate blue color. This little book has a bookmark, basically the string used to sew it all together has been left long and I tied a little wooden tag that says LOVE to the end of the string. The book has a total of 60 pages.
I still have enough of these floppies to make another 6 or 7 books so you'll be seeing more of these in the future. The floppies make excellent covers because they are rigid and you can cover them with whatever floats your boat! This isn't the first book made with them.
LOLA HAD HER KITTENS!
On the 16th of July. She had six of the little kids!
The oldest kitten is about 4 hours old and the youngest is just moments old in this picture.
She's a happy little mama! She was tuckered out when this picture was taken. All the babes are cleaned up and nursing well!
Fred absolutely adores these kittens! He adores them so much he stole one of them before all of them were even born! I had to hide them from him cause he was way too interested in them while Lola was in the process of having them. I put them in the cutting room so Lola could finish the job at hand without Fred's help. The door to the cutting room doesn't close properly so I put some duct tape around the door knob and stuck a long length to the wall to keep the door closed and that fool dog out. Didn't work! He pushed so hard on that door when I wasn't looking and broke the duct tape! I heard him at the back door, wanting to go outside. I went to let him out and he was sitting in the kitchen. At first I thought he had one of his rubber rats in his mouth, but he walked to the back door and sat an orange kitten on the floor between his front feet! I retrieved the kitten and let him know it was not his! The kitten was none the worse for the wear and he's doing fine. Fred is now not a happy camper cause I put the kittens in my bedroom closet (where the door does close properly and he can't push it open with his big head!) He sits in front of the full-length mirror on the closet door, staring at himself, woofing ever so softly to be let into the closet so he can see those babies!Whenever I go in the closet to check on things there isn no keeping him out when he decides he wants to take a look! He just barrels his way through! He's very gentle with the kittens, licks them just a tiny bit...he has to get a taste, you know! Wags that tail like he's gonna fly to China! He's gonna wish those babies weren't so big in a month's time when they're climbing all over his hide!
This picture was taken today. Two days after they were born.
The little fellow to the right of the second orange baby already has a home when he gets big enough. My mother will be taking him. I call them all 'him' at the moment...they're too little to determine what sex they are yet.
That's one content cat! She's a very good mama! She can come and go from the closet at her leisure. All she has to do is come out under the closet door. All the doors in this house have a gap of about 4 inches at the bottom of them. Plenty of room for a skinny cat! I'll keep you updated on babies!
I've not worked on this canvas for better than a month but I haven't shown it to you all either so here it is. What comes next? Who knows! This canvas is not speaking to me at the moment.
It's a big mess of gauze fabric, gorilla glue, gold glitter, bronze glitter paint, gold glitter paint, green metallic paint....I forget all what is on there! I'm pretty sure there will be fishes on this canvas but like I said, this one isn't talking to me at the moment!
I was going to talk about a roadtrip today as well but I think this post is quite long enough already! So I'll leave you with the coolest find of the week! I'll show you pictures from the roadtrip taken on Saturday tomorrow or the next day. Hopefully, I'll have some ATCs to show you as well. Cause I really should be making some ATCs soon to get caught up with 365...all I'm doing is falling farther and farther behind at this point! Need to remedy that! This grasshopper is my cool find! Sammy and I were cruising the back roads in search of junk the other day. We came to a spot in the chalk road where water had made it quite rough. There was also junk at this point in the road so I got out of the truck to walk up the rough spot and see just what kind of junk was up there. I got out cause to have ridden through that rough spot would have made me sore as all get out. I tire out fast enough as it is. Walking was an easier option. I was checking out the wild flowers and spotted this huge grasshopper on a plant stalk. He was right in front of me! I reached out, grabbed ahold of his hide and said, 'This is going home with me!' He spit tobbacco juice (grasshopper puke!) all over my left hand! Grasshopper puke isn't pleasant! I wanted him for my insect collection! He looks like he has frost on his backend cause he does have frost on his back end. I took him out of the freezer to take his picture. He's better than an inch across at his thorax (that would be the part right behind his head!). He's about 2 1/2 inches long. I had only ever seen grasshoppers of this species at the county fair in an insect collection. The ones I seen (there were two collections with this species) were not green like this one...they were more brownish. I have yet to look this fellow up to identify him. I probably should have done that before posting the picture, but I didn't.
Get your hugs! I got a boatload of them on Friday evening when the kids came to visit. I'll show you pictures of Lil A and her people next post as well.
Yep, get some hugs! They feel wonderful to the giver and the getter!
Peace, my friends!
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