Cleaned up and working again…
Finally, I think I have my space in the basement cleaned out and organized enough to actually get some work done. Imagine that! Currently I’m working on a storage box for some of my ATC’s. While I work on that I’m thinking of themes for my next altered book. I have the book that I want and I know the sort of format I want to use, as far as cubbies and alcoves within the frame of the book. Now I just need some inspiration for a theme. I’m also in the middle of another altered art piece that is beginning on the base of a frame. I am in need of another foraging trip to the scrap store for some more supplies, plus I always like to visit their art gallery for a little inspiration. AHHHHH, next week the kids go to summer camp all day, so I’m free to browse with another artistic friend of mine. Can’t wait!
I’m trying to get active again and keep this blog up to date and provide fun and interesting new information. So stay tuned, more is on the horizon!
Short and Sweet Handy Tip
I hope I can keep it short and sweet. I remembered this very simple but extremely useful idea for use when altering books. I can’t believe I hadn’t thought of it, but try using bulldog clips… the ones that look like this:
for holding your books open while you gesso or design pages. Simple, yet extremely helpful. I don’t think I have any new wisdom to impart this week. I’m still prepping for the scrapbooking convention in Charlotte this weekend! I had to go get some last minute supplies for some of my classes. Only two more days and counting! Now let’s just hope I don’t give myself a hernia carrying all my supplies, lol!
Back in Business, Sort of…
We finally finished with our church’s Lay Renewal Weekend. I have to tell you, it was Wonderful! My first thought was… “three days of church? Hmmm.” But, it turned out to be one of the best things I’ve ever been able to participate in. I met a lot of great new people and got to know some of our new friends from church even better. The people in our church seem really close now and I can’t wait to see what happens in the next few weeks as new programs start and hopefully more people get involved. If you live in this area (Cary, NC) and you want to experience one of the most open, friendly and encouraging churches around… please visit North Cary Baptist Church! Let me tell you, I’m married in a bi-racial relationship with two step children and we both have tattoos, including myself who is working on a full sleeve, and everyone there accepted us with open arms from the second we stepped through the door.
Anyway, now that all those activities have past I have to spend today cleaning because the pastor and his wife are coming tonight to give us some new member paperwork and talk to our daughter who is 7 who told him she wanted to be baptized. I’ve been working on getting the inside pages to three of my altered books coated with gesso. I decided to try and get the entire inside prepped so I can create whenever the mood strikes and can also take at least one with me as a journal. I think this has been easier than doing a page and then prepping the next page and so on. It lets you get some continuity going with your design thoughts if the pages are already ready to go. I won’t have much time this week though for new projects because on Friday afternoon I’m meeting some of my meetup scrapbooking ladies to go to the scrapbooking convention in Charlotte for the weekend. I’m so, so excited I can barely contain myself. Needless to say, I probably won’t have much in the way of updates until next week. However, I hope to maintain my blogging through this Thursday with more tips and tricks, so please stay tuned. I can’t wait to tell you about how the scrapbooking classes went! Some of you may be thinking… I’m into altered art, not scrapbooking, why does she keep talking about scrapbooking? Well, I started out making artist trading cards at the scrapbook meetings, as the group is really for anyone into any kind of paper crafts. But then after seeing some of the projects done by other people I started to get into the scrapbooking. I’ve noticed that there are many similarities between scrapbooking and altered art. They are beginning to use many altered art techniques in scrapbook pages these days. So, there are many things like including pictures, journaling, memorabilia, found items, etc. that are being shared by scrapbooking and altered art techniques.
I hope everyone had a great weekend! Thanks again for reading!
Scrapbooking, Altered Art Techniques
We were doing some massive cleaning yesterday. I was working on the basement and I was moving all my photos from boxes that were falling apart to large shoe boxes and plastic storage containers to put on the shelf in my little craft area when I decided that there are a lot of scrapbooks waiting to be made. I will have no problem with scrapbook material for the next couple years! lol. After dinner time, something bit the heck out of me! I have at least 12 bites on each arm and leg and I am so itchy I can barely stand it! I wanted to get some altered art or some trading cards done today, but I may spend the day scratching. The really bad thing is, I don’t know where or what got me so I don’t know how to avoid getting more.
The stamping books that I picked up at the library have some really good ideas in them, not only for stamping but for creating backgrounds. I also need to get back to work on my altered books. I’ve just had too many projects going to get anything finished. I still am a little stumped for inspiration. However, in one of the books I checked out, not one of the stamping books, they had some ideas on how to incorporate a photograph into your altered book without it looking like a scrapbook page. As they collaged/painted the background of the photo to match up with the pages of the book, so only the subject is left. I bought some clear credit card sleeves to use as little show pockets for small fragile items like pressed flowers/leaves in scrapbooks and altered books. In cleaning the large room in the basement, my small craft space got a bit torn asunder, so I need to pick up the pieces so I can create in there. I can’t create when stuff is heaped all around me and under my feet, I’m a bit anal that way.
Here are some more techniques for you to try: (Some of these are definitely things you’ve heard of before, but it is always helpful to get a reminder every now and then)
1. Sprinkle salt on your wet watercolors.
2. Place crinkled saran wrap on your wet paint and let dry.
3. Draw with designs with wax crayon and then paint over with watercolors.
4. Use non-permanent felt markers and then wet to blend together.
5. Tear paper and use as a mask to create interesting white space to stamp or draw in.
More Nature Journals, Altering Techniques, Fishing…
Boy, time is flying! I liked the nature journal that I made so much that I picked up some supplies to make a few more. I want to put some small ones into some nature themed Geocaches. Almost done with two walking sticks, just need to seal two and then I can start on mine. We are getting up early in the morning to go out fishing at our favorite catfishing hole. Ok, it’s a lake, not a hole, but it’s our spot. I think I’ll take my new nature journal to start filling it up. Hopefully I won’t have too much down time while we are fishing, I’m hoping to catch the “big one.”
I went back to the scrap exchange to try and get some photo slides and they were all gone! DANG! They sold a couple boxes full! Oh, well, that’s what I get for being slow at choosing. I still found a basket full of stuff to buy though, and that didn’t include the stuff I wanted but didn’t buy, can’t go too far over budget. I found some stuff for my altered art, but also for my scrapbooking.
I took the kids to the library today and was looking for a certain book when I happened upon about 6 books about stamping techniques that were really cool! I am still looking through them, I was disrupted by going out to eat Mexican food for dinner, then coming home and getting all the fishing gear ready. I need to get inspired to make some more ATC’s. In the meantime, here are some more altered art techniques:
1. Use unusual things as stamps/stencils, bubble wrap, plastic mesh or screen.
2. Embellish with gel pens, sparkly and other metallic inks.
3. Glue on texturing materials such as used dryer sheets, crumbled tissue paper, old mesh or net material
4. Spray paint comes in many interesting textures like stone, metal, rust, etc.
5. Make copies on transparencies for cool layering or window effects.
Have a great weekend, thanks for reading.
Geocaching, Walking Sticks, Altering Techniques
I had a busy weekend and haven’t been able to get back to the computer until now. Whew! This past weekend we went out to reset the coordinates on the two caches that we hid last week. While we were out I decided that we really needed walking sticks to help us over obstacles and to poke around for hidden caches. I am not about to buy any kind of walking stick, so we looked along the trail and found three decent sticks laying about and took them home. I’ve been working on them to turn them into useable walking sticks. I am almost done with my son and daughter’s. I sanded them all down and then got out my woodburning tool and burned some designs into their sticks. My son’s stick had a rotten/bug eaten trench in it, that I decided to line with red beads and little white skull beads. Then his stick got pirate themed sayings and a treasure trail with an x at the end. I’ve been using my heat gun to bend some plastic gold pirate coins into the shape of the stick to glue them on. My daughter’s stick got ivy and flowers with hearts, then I took the drill and drilled a bunch of random holes that would fit a round sparkly bead, which I then glued in there. The top had a hole, so I glued a small shell into the top. Before I started with the beading, I stained them with some light stain and when the beads are completely dried on, I’ll varnish them. I think I’ll finish their sticks before I start on mine. I’ve sanded mine down, so it is ready to burn a design on, but I’m not sure what I want to do with it. Needless to say, between Geocaching, laundry and walking stick making, I’ve been uber busy.
Here are some more techniques that I promised, sorry they are a little late:
1. Glue on crumbled tissue paper and paint over
2. Tear instead of cut
3. Try adding pockets
4. Fold pages into different shaped pockets
5. Use eyelets to attach things to the edge of pages as 3D tabs
I hope I don’t end up repeating techniques as I get into this. LOL. I’m really wanting to pick a book to hightlight text on a page to use as a theme for each layout. I don’t know if everyone reading has seen that technique, I’ve seen it in many books. But, basically, you circle words on the pages that you like, that perhaps form a meaningful statement to you, then paint over all the other words on the pages and connect the remaining words and use that as the theme for your images. I really like that idea. I’ve got so many projects going, that I have a hard time getting any of them finished. Of course, an altered book takes a while because there is a lot to it. But it is fun and rewarding, so we just keep working.
Something I found in a geocache gave me an idea for something else I’d like to make. It was a little copper wire dog, here’s a picture:
Isn’t he the cutest?! Maybe I’ll try bending some wire into the shape of some little animals, people, whatever, looks like it might be fun! Of course, I would need to “alter” it by adding all sorts of buttons, beads, whatever to it. I’ve been trying to collect little items out of the geocaches that we’ve been finding so I can use them in a piece of geocaching themed art. I found a 7 stage cache, where the first 6 have clues to the location of the last one, the last one being a two gallon pretzel container full of stuff! WOW! I think I’ll make a small nature journal, like the one we learned how to make this past weekend to put in there. It is all nature themed items, so that would work really well.
Gonna go finish watching Wipeout now, plus… dessert is calling me. Thanks for reading!
Crazy Busy! + Nature Journal
Boy! I’ve been crazy busy the past few days! I’ve been taking the kids Geocaching every day, Wed – Friday. I let them each make their own cache to hide also. Saturday we had to go back out to their caches and redo the coordinates because it seemed that they were off by about 50 ft. Yikes! While we were out I picked up three sticks that I could turn into walking sticks for the three of us to go Geocaching with. I’ve started sanding them down and I have a woodburner to make some designs on them, then I’ll just need to drill a hole and get some leather straps to loop through. I need to go to Lowe’s today and get some sandpaper refills for our sander. My husband got up early yesterday (Saturday) and took our son fishing at a local lake with one of our friends, where they caught a lot of catfish! They had a great time and barely got home in time to go to the Family Fun event that they have every Saturday at the Museum of Art! You can sign up for a Saturday workshop that they have at the Art Museum and you and the kids can make a craft to keep, and the best thing is, it is all for free! Yesterday’s project was a nature journal. It was quite a bit more complicated than I expected, considering that kids are involved, but we still came out with cool projects. Actually, doing this nature journal gave me some great ideas for making my own journal/art books. Here’s a couple pictures of our journals that we made. It shows the back of my husband’s and the inside of mine.
They had some cool ideas for features of the books. The books were made out of cardboard with wallpaper scraps glued to the outside and inside covers, then fabric scraps were glued to the cover to make the spine. You then sew the sets of pages with buttons on the outside to hold them in. They gave us a pocket protector to fasten into the back cover to hold pencils and a paper cd sleeve with the clear plastic circle to paste into the back pages to hold leaves and other little nature items you might pick up. Sewing the pages into the book was too challenging to let the kids try and do it themselves, so my husband and I had to do our own plus theirs. Got to go get ready for church, will add some altered book technique tips later today.
ATC, Altered Art, India Journal Pictures
Here are some pictures of some of the ATCs, Artist Trading Cards that I’ve made recently:
And… here are some picture updates for the Altered Geocaching Book that I’ve been working on:
And last but not least, here are a couple pictures of the handmade paper journal that my husband brought back for me from India. It is so cool, it will take me a while to figure out what to put into it!
All Day Scrap
Just got back from my all day scrapbooking session. I finished my step-daughter’s disney autograph album and started working on the interior of my geocaching altered book journal. We had the most people to date come for the day, 16. We had to spread out into two rooms, so it wasn’t quite as much fun as when we all get to be in one room, but we still had a really good time. I was so hungry today, I couldn’t stop visiting the snack table! I didn’t get as much done as I would have liked, I felt kind of stumped on what to do with the interior of the geocaching book. The lady who runs the group has a couple boxes of free stuff, that people have brought and left that they don’t want to use. I must have gone through those boxes about 4 times today, just looking for anything that might spark some ideas. It did work! I found a medium size leaf stamp that I used to stamp a couple shades of green leaves over and over again on the inside cover. I was thinking that it was looking a little too scrapbookish, instead of altered book artsy, but I think it is still looking good.
Hopefully, my husband will download the pictures off the memory card tomorrow and I can start taking pictures to update here. I have two jewelry items finished, two milk jug totes, two gatorade purses and the beginning of a couple altered books and their insides. Still trying to decide if I’m gonna sign up to go to the Tuesday night scrap in two days. Decisions, decisions. Right now, I’m exhausted! Gonna go get ready for bed, hope to work some more tomorrow. I’m pretty sure things will go quicker now that I’ve gotten started. That always seems to be the hardest part, breaking the creative ice.
Hope everyone had a great weekend!
