One last post before the kidnapping....

Hello Readers!

I thought my kidnapping would happen today but it got put off for one day. So the kidnapping will happen tomorrow and I do not know when I will be returned home. 

I've packed a number of things to keep my hands busy while the grandchildren are at school. I'll be the chief cook and bottle washer while I'm at my son's house. Thankfully, there really are no bottles to wash, just have to cook for the younguns, get them off to school and make sure the laundry is kept up. Grandson will be helping with dishes and cooking too. 

I will have a few things to choose from as far as creating goes. I've packed sewing things, embroidery stuff, bookmaking supplies and the wire kit with a few beads in case I decide all that sewing isn't my thing at the moment. And of course I have packed paper, pencil and markers so the children and I can do some arts and crafts together. I might take the felting things with me too....

I really wish I knew how long those kids think I want to be kidnapped! I've really no clue how long they expect to keep me. No one will give me a straight answer!

I've accomplished a few finished things since the last post about a week ago.

This little book is about 3 x 4 inches. I don't remember how many pages it has....100 or so. It's made from a chocolate pudding box, white copy paper pages, holographic gold tape and white crochet cotton thread.

And since the first one turned out so well I made another book out of a box. This one is a Jello box covered in glittered gold tape (that shed glitter everywhere!) I covered the gold tape with clear packing tape to tame the glitter. It has a string and button closure as well. The button is metal and plastic. This one is a bit smaller than the pudding box book above.

I actually made this crocheted jute and plastic rope basket before the last post was posted but I forgot to show it off.

Just a small basket about 4 inches across, 3 inches tall. Here's a picture of the inside. Getting it started was a bit of a bear and the next one I do with the plastic rope I will do somewhat differently. This plastic rope is used for making bows and wreaths and what have you. You can untwist it and it turns into a sheet of plastic about 4 inches wide. I just left it twisted tightly and crocheted the jute twine around it to form the basket. 

I have quite a bit of that plastic rope in lots of different colors. I also have three spools of jute twine. I used less than half a spool crocheting the basket above.

I came across my glass dip pen the other day and decided to play with it a bit last night. 

Nothing special here. Just doodling with the pen and ink.

I will let my grand daughter color this frog.

Not sure what will happen with this face. Maybe some color...paint? markers? collage? I don't know. Maybe nothing at all!

I'll let Annie color this one also.

Embroidered balls will be featuring heavily in future posts. When I get home from my kidnapping I should have a few finished balls to show you all. I spent three days sitting in front of this computer making balls from scratch and sewing the covers on some of them.

These two show what a ball looks like without its cover (the green one) and what one looks like with most of its cover sewn on. I did most of these balls a bit different from the norm. The basket in the following picture was filled with seam waste from cutting up different garments to use the materials for something else. I took all that seam waste and wound it around the bottle caps inside of these balls instead of the usual plastic grocery bags. That eliminated the need for the thick cord layer of the balls. 

As you can see there are seven balls with their covers finished and a boatload (basketful?) of half done balls. I'll be taking all of these with me to my son's house. If memory serves me correctly (that can be quite doubtful some days) there are a grand total of 23 balls I'll take along.

That is a cat paw trying to steal one of the blue balls. That's Murray. She got that ball and ran off with it too. I gave her a different ball to play with and took my ball back from her! 

The grayish blue balls are covered with part of a wool sweater that I cut apart before I started making balls. You'll see more of this blue sweater material on the fish picture later in this post. I honestly did not throw away one bit of this sweater. The seams went inside some of the balls, the buttons are in my button jar and the pockets (which are all wool) are slated to become little pouches of some sort. 

I have a big monster to make while I'm at my son's house. Not sure what day I will be able to go get the sweater my sister has for me to make that monster out of. I can guarantee there will be a few balls done when I get home though. And a monster to show you all as well.

I plan a trip to the craft store while in the big city. Embroidery thread is on my list for sure!

I started a new fish picture yesterday. This is #12. It's 8x8 inches and an inch or so thick. 

I used one of those home decor pictures I told you all about in a previous post not so long ago. This one didn't have a fabric cover because I had already removed it. No clue what color it was or where that piece of cotton fabric wandered off to.  I used wool sweater remnants instead of cotton fabric for the reef. (That blue sweater from the balls.) There's some knotted elastic, bulky yarn, some soft purple yarn, red acrylic yarn and green cotton organza on the reef shelf.

There's also some plastic rope (same stuff the basket above is made from), yellow crewel yarn, folded paper origami units from a failed bucky ball. I painted those orange. There are different sizes and colors of beads tossed in there and some little green paper strips too. It's all glued on with either hot glue or school glue, depending on what I was gluing.

The background was covered with a layer of paper to hide the design that was there. I painted it red and hit it with the heat gun to make it bubble up and get some texture to it. Then I glued on a layer of paper confetti (little tiny strips about a centimeter long and a millimeter wide in all different colors) across the middle of the canvas. I put a thick layer of school glue over it so all those little papers would stay put. After it had dried I dusted the whole thing with some gold resin powder.

I'm working on the fish still. He'll be purple with blue spots with yellow spots. He's drawn on chipboard and painted with fingernail polish. He'll go smack dab in the middle of it all. I'll show this one finished when I get home from my kidnapping.

If an address comes through, I will mail this altered envelope off tomorrow to my January partner in the Envie Group over at AFA (link is up on the sidebar). If no address comes along today, then it will be mailed out as soon as I get the address. This is the front.

This is the back. 

I drew the monsters, colored them with markers and then cut them out. They are done on drawing paper. I made the envelope out of painted newspaper wrapped around a sheet of cardstock. It's all glued together. The back has a coat of sparkly varnish. As soon as the address is added, the front will get a coat of that same sparkly varnish. Painted newspaper isn't the strongest paper. Might not of been such a great idea to choose it for making an envelope. I figured the extra coat of varnish couldn't hurt it. Besides, I like the sparkle! I do hope it survives an international trip through the postal service!

Wish me luck on the kidnapping! I'm sure I'll have a few more gray hairs when I return home! I shall miss my kitties. Fred dog is being kidnapped right along with me! He will be happy to get back home as well. The kids have a puppy and that old dog will be worn out playing with that puppy all the time. Fred THINKS he is still a puppy but, at 14 years old, he is quite far from puppy-hood! I had better not forget his pain meds! He will get a reprieve from stairs while we're away from home and that will be a good thing for his old hide!

I'll be back in a few weeks with something to show. I really don't know how long this kidnapping will last. I'm hoping to be back home before February. 

Thanks for sticking around!

Remember....

be good to one another!

It matters!

Peace

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Here We Go Again! Happy New Year!

Hello Readers!

Happy New Year to everyone! 

As usual, my hands have not been idle! Let's take a look at what Donna's been up to, shall we?

I told you all about the origami books I made at the end of the year and forgot to take a picture of....well here's one of them.

This is the same one as in the picture above. I really did make two of them but damned if I know what became of the other one. It's nowhere to be seen on this desk where I found the one in the pictures. This one has both brown and white paper in it. The other one has only white paper. I made this one out of a 4lb paper sugar bag and a flyer that came with my last order from AS&S. There are two layers of paper to a sugar bag. I thought there would be enough brown paper to make the entire book, but it turned out that wasn't the case. This book is 1.5x1.75 inches with 10 pages. 

It's nothing special really, just a cute little book. I'll find the other one one of these days! Unless one of the felines has carried it off. It was made with the same red flyer as the one pictured but it has copy paper pages instead of paper from a sugar bag. 

I finished the clothespin snowflake ornament. Better late than never, I guess! It needs another coat of glitter and a coat of varnish before I can call it done. This is pretty large; about 7 inches across.

Someone over at the Altered Envie thread on AFA (link is up there on the sidebar) posted the tutorial to make dollar bill hearts. I cut sheet music to the same size and made these four. I still have a few more to fold before I use up all the sheets cut to size. 

I finished a couple of wool balls since the last post.

This is the one I showed you all in the last post. 

I added a lot of thread to it since then.

I didn't completely cover it, but I did hide all those sloppy seams from sewing the wool cover on with embroidery thread.

It turned out great! I'm very pleased with this one.

And I did another one as well.

Just random lines of chain stitch going willy nilly all over the ball.

I still have three naked balls, needing their wool covers and one ready to be embroidered. I've decided I need to make 52 of these things this year. I'm going to visit my eldest son for a couple weeks beginning next and will take enough raw material with me to make more of these balls while I'm there.  So you have fair warning that embroidered balls will feature heavily in the next few posts.

I have no clue what possessed me to sit here in front of this computer for two days cutting maps into circles. This stack is about 3 inches tall. The rounds are 2 5/8 inches. I don't know what I'm going to do with them yet. 

This morning I got up at 6:30, made coffee and was sitting in front of the computer watching Coronation Street and cutting out about three dozen 1.5 inch circles from chipboard. No picture of those. I do know what I'm going to do with those, thankfully. I acquired some more pistachio shells! Stay tuned for that endeavor! It will be a few weeks before I commence with that. Sometime after I get back home from my son's house.

This looks complicated, but it's very easy! A paper origami spiral. Here's the tutorial. I made mine out of colored writing paper. I hung it from the ceiling in my desk room.

I still haven't put the Christmas tree away.

Good thing, too. I got a new ornament today in the mail.

Last month Nanner was my envie partner and sent her a few things in our trade. She felt as though she hadn't sent enough in the trade. I loved the Day of the Dead Skull ornament she sent me. It's hanging from the ceiling in my desk room too! She loved all the goodies I sent her so she made me something else to add to that trade. Isn't it adorable? It's made from a plastic wine glass! The little tree inside has teeny tiny lights on it! I just LOVE it!  

In five days I will be kidnapped. I'm going to my eldest son's house for a few weeks while his wife goes to Alaska to help her friend out after she has surgery. I would love to go to Alaska! She will have the time of her life. I'll be looking after the children; getting them off to school and cooking for them while my son is at work. And while they are at school I will sit in the playroom, ignoring son's Father-in law while I do my own thing. Fred will be kidnapped as well. The cats are on their own while I'm gone. Ma will come down and take care of them and probably give my house a thorough cleaning while I'm away. 

I won't be able to make a post while I'm down at son's house cause I don't know how to do that from the tablet. Not even sure it can be done from the tablet....so might be awhile before I can do so.

Until next time......

Remember.....

be good to one another!

It matters!

Peace

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Last Post of 2014

Hello Readers!

There are only about four hours left of 2014. Not sure how this year flew by so fast. Seems like yesterday it was January. 

I haven't done my count of art for 2014 so I'll give you that in the next post. Each year I keep track of how many things get done during the year. The numbers are usually pretty high. Last year's total was 576, though the actual number of things made is higher. I don't always count EACH item separately. If I do a dozen of something--like the peanut humming birds--I only count that as one project, not 12 projects. As I haven't written all projects down yet, I can't give you a total. I can tell you that the last thing written in the book are the pistachio flowers I showed you a few posts back. 367 is the last number in the book at present. 

I have almost finished Brenton's monster pillow.

Monster is still blind at this point. I'll be sewing his eyes on within the next two days. His new owner is supposed to be coming to visit on Friday so I better get cracking on giving this fella some eyeballs! 

Brenton requested a hugging pillow. I asked him if he wanted a new monster,big eough for a hugging pillow. His eyes lit up, a big grin spread across his face and he said, "Yeah! Can you make him striped?" I couldn't promise stripes but the monster gods smiled down on Brenton and my sister gave me this striped sweater the next day. This monster cost me nothing to make! Not a dime! He's stuffed with green polyester filling that came out of a dog bed. Ma found the dog bed somewhere. She said it came out of a dumpster behind a store in Norton. It was a brand new big dog bed that was slashed open with a knife on both sides of it. There didn't appear to be anything wrong with it otherwise. Don't know why they threw it out. It had never had a dog sleep on it. Ma was going to sew it up, put a new cover on it and give it my brother for his dog, Flomar. She changed her mind and was going to throw it in the trash. I confiscated it and stuffed the monster with it. There's still enough of the filling left to stuff a regular sized monster. I could have saved the fabric covering from the dog bed but I didn't save that cause I really don't like sewing with cotton fabricand it really wasn't anything special. I did save the zipper that was in the cover though.

I finished an embroidered ball.

A different shot of the same ball.

And I started another one. I sewed the wool fabric on this one a bit different than all the others. I sewed it with embroidery thread instead of regular sewing thread. I'm going to attempt to cover this one completely with embroidery stitches. What you see is all that's been embroidered thus far. Might be awhile before this one is completely done.

I worked on the newest fish picture for a few days. This one is 8 x8 inches. The canvas started out life as a home decor picture. It's actually a plastic box with 2 holes in the back, made in China. On the front of the plastic box was a design done in a thin sheet of rubber. You can see the pattern if you look real close at the red background. I didn't really try to hide it, just wanted to disguise it so it wasn't so blatantly there! 

Someone brought these home decor pictures to me. There are three of them. Apparently someone else didn't think they were anything special. When I got them they were covered with thin cotton material. This one had yellow fabric stapled to it around the back of it. The other two are white and brown, I think. I have no idea what design is on the other two. I'll figure that out when I take that fabric off.

I used the yellow fabric for the reef. I tore it into strips and made 'blobs' from it. Kinda like flowers, but not quite. I covered the bottom third of the canvas with the fabric and then started adding things to it. I actually painted the whole thing first and added the blue sticks before the reef. The blue sticks are toothpicks, glued willy nilly. The yellow on the sticks got there after they were already glued down. There are sequins, crewel embroidery yarn, origami paper modular units from a failed bucky ball or two,  some wire doodads with beads red yarn  and some other things I'm sure I'm forgetting. I drew the fish on chipboard, painted it white, cut it out and then painted it with fingernail polish before gluing it to the canvas with tacky glue. This is the 11th fish picture I've made. It's also the smallest fish picture I've made thus far. 

For the new year I am making the goal of doing 6 fish pictures. The big ones take weeks to do! This little one only took about five days. 

6 down, 30 to go...

3.5 x 5 inches

Guitar cat

cat is drawn with markers on drawing paper, cut out and glued to sheet music that is glued to cardstock.

3.5x5 inches

The Eye

markers on sheet music glued to cardstock

I'm still working on hot cocoa ornaments. Three are ready to be assembled. Five more are waiting ...waiting...waiting.  Eventually I will clear these off the work table and move onto something else. I've painted all the papers I need to finish these. Just need to sit down and put them all together. 

I made a couple of little origami books last night. I forgot to take pictures of them before I downloaded pictures for this post. I'll show them to you in the next post. 

My intention for the new year is to blog more often so my posts aren't mini novels. Whether that intention happens or not remains to be seen. 

I have not made any resolutions for the new year. I never stick with them so what's the point? I make little goals through out the year. And I don't fret too much if things don't work out as planned. 

I do wish for the new year to be a good one. The older I get, the more I worry about the state of the world. I worry for my grandchildren's future especially. What kind of world are we making for them?

I thank each of you who come to read my ramblings. And those who comment always make me smile! May you all have a wonderfully healthy and wealthy 2015!

Remember to be good to one another. 

It truly matters more than any of us really think about enough.

Peace

831

Art Dolls, A Finished Fish Picture , Some Drawings and a Bunch of Birds

Hello Readers!

It snowed last night. It all melted today. It is cold as the dickens out there though!

This morning when I got up there were dozens of little black birds in the front yard, sitting in the trees and scattered heavily across the roof of the burnt house. I'm guessing there were upwards of a couple a hundred of them. They aren't necessarily blackbirds, just black birds of some variety. 

Murray saw them!

This is the only picture I got of them. I was going to quietly open the door to get a better picture of them but a big truck went by on the highway and they all flew off! I really wanted a picture of them standing on the roof of the burnt house. It was so crowded with birds, they could hardly move around! And the trees were full too! I saw them all later sitting along the high wires between my house and Sister Susan's house next door. All lined up in a row. The phone was on the charger so no picture of that spectacle! What the heck are all these little black birds eating? I'm glad to see them, but why didn't they fly away to warmer parts? I wouldn't let the kitties out until after the birds flew off. That was about noon, it's now almost 11 pm and that dang Murray cat still hasn't come home. Dang fool critter will be gone for a couple days.

4 down, 32 to go. That would be 3 x 5.5 inch marker drawings on cardstock.

The Colorful Robot

Big Eyed Fishes

Apparently I have my act together somewhat tonight. Here's that fish picture with its fishes attached.

The fishes are done in fingernail polish on cardstock.  This canvas is not very big. 11 x 14? I don't think I ever measured it to be honest. Somewhere around 11 x 14 inches.

I'll be doing another fish picture before long.

I made this wild thing the other night. It's the front of the envelope Nanner will get her goodies in! It's very strange and I really have no clue who that fella is nor just where he came from. He's a happy fella though!

I'm pretty sure the mohawk was inspired by

this kid. My youngest son. He was on my mind all day yesterday when I did this painting/drawing. This is as close as he ever came to having a yellow mohawk and I doubt the boy's ever worn a striped robe of any sort! RW was about 17 in this picture, taken I believe sometime in 2002 or 2003. At any rate, I do believe that crazy envie was a result of this here boy being on my mind. Thankfully he's outgrown his rebel teenage years! I don't know how either one of us survived that!  He's a responsible 30 yr old now.

And here's that ATC I said I would take a picture of.

ATC

Green Eyes

I showed you all a bucket of junk in the last post. I dragged out the glue gun and played with some of that junk.

I sorted out the junk in the bucket and gathered a few other containers of little art fodder from the cutting room. I had stuff scattered all over the kitchen table. I tried not to drag out too much other than the stuff in the bucket cause my goal was to use up some of the stuff in the bucket.

I accomplished that, by the way.... 

Everything but the wooden bead, one of the springs and the ball chain came out of the bucket for this little battery girl. She's about 2.5 inches tall. I didn't really measure any of these, all the measurements are totally guesstimates on my part.

All of this junk came out of one appliance, electronic, dead corded machine of one sort or another. Your guess is as good as mine as to where my brother got some of this stuff.  This one has a large capacitor for a body, rubber stoppers for feet, copper wire, a couple buttons. I have no clue what her arms originally were. There were 8 of those in the bucket. She didn't want to stand by herself so I glued her to a plastic cover of some sort that I found in the bucket too. She's wearing a rubber grommet hat. Everyone's head is a wooden bead. Wooden beads came out of their own container. This one stands about 4 inches tall.

This one is about 3 inches tall. Her capacitor body was originally black but the covering was torn so I did away with it. She has a tiny resistor on top her head. Her silver arm came out of one of the junk containers I brought from the cutting room. The rest of this stuff came out of the bucket.

This one stands about 3 inches tall. Everything but her ball chain hair and her pendant hat came from the bucket. Her arms and hands are all one piece. Should have used these arms on a taller kid.

This one is about 4.5 inches tall. Everything but the pink glass bead, her boobs and the ball chain came out of the bucket. Her boobs are a pair of sterling silver enameled earrings that someone removed the backs from. They make perfect boobs for this little lady! I'm pretty sure all of her components with the exception of the capacitor came from a computer. Her neck and shoulders are plastic doodad out of the bucket too. Her head is a huge wooden bead.

This one is about 3.5 inches tall. She's holding a tiny wooden pencil in her hand. Her hair is thread fine copper wire. All of her came out of the bucket, even her hair.

This guy is my favorite one! He's about 6 inches tall. His feet are Ken's tennis shoes, legs are bullet casings, his hips are a plastic gear, his body a capacitor, his arms are springs, his neck is a plastic lid from a tube of something and his hair is copper wire. He's wearing a motherboard necklace and has a rainbow heart made from glass on his chest. 

I ran out of capacitors big enough to make people out of. I'll pack up all the junk and drag it out again one day. I'm thinking I need to make a junk picture on one of those many canvasses I have in the cutting room. We'll see. 

I made another aluminum bird. The larger one to the back is the one I showed you all in the last post. The red one here is only about an inch and half wide. It's a cute little bird! Wasn't any harder to weave a tiny one than it is to weave a big one!

I made two more photo paper birds too. These are about 2 inches wide.

Cookie baking did not commence today like it was supposed to. I keep telling myself I still have a few days before I need to have those cookies baked and ready to go! Which means I'll be scrambling at the last minute. Happens every time so it really is nothing new. I work best on a deadline! 

That's it for me today. 

Thanks for hanging in there!

Remember....

be good to one another.

It matters!

Peace

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