Finished

Thank you for all of your comments on the previous post regarding this house. I liked the depth the blue gave it, but didn't like that it made the whole piece a bit too dark.....

so I decided to add the blue by adding more pan pastel to the image....

and mounted it on a more natural piece of paper.

Undecided

I am working on a piece that has a house on a tea bag.

but, I can't decide if the tea bag should be mounted on a piece of blue or straight on the off white piece of paper.

when it is on the blue, you can see more of the blue through the tea bag

as well as the white paint I have added down the side of the house.

Here it is on the off white piece of paper.

It still contains some bits of blue that I have added with pan pastels.

I find it sometimes helps to take pictures of a piece and look at it from a distance. I am still undecided.......

Cherish the Small Things

I love creating small items, but this lovely creation was not made by me but rather gifted to me by my blogging friend Micki.

The outside has this wonderful face that she created

and inside the perfect words.... "cherish the small things".

This lovely little gift that I so cherish, arrived at my house when I was first laying on my couch trying to heal from a concussion. It brightened my day and made me smile. It continues to make me smile and reminds me constantly of the important things in life.

It has been 2 weeks today since I received this concussion, and the symptoms are still with me - headaches, dizzyness, fatigue and some struggle with thinking. I continue to get better, just not as quickly as I would like.

I have not been as creative as I would like to be, but wanted to share this small thing with you that I created a little while ago.

It is a small accordian book

that opens up to contain some images of flowers I drew.

It is as usual covered with tea bags. (I LOVE tea bags!)

In my mind I have another tea bag creation in the works.... I just hope I am able to create it in real life soon!

Another Happy Collision

A couple more of my bird drawings collided with tea bag and some colour.

I continue to enjoy working on tea bags and as I am a constant tea drinker, and also have friends that collect them for me, I don't see running out for a long time.

I hope to be able to put both of these in my shop later today.

Rusting Away

My world has been quite wonky this week, and I haven't been very creative. Last Saturday I played in a hockey tournament, and ended up with a concussion that has made me dizzy, lightheaded and unable to do much. Fortunately I am starting to feel better.

I have been intriqued by creating marks on fabric by rust, and thought this would be a good week to experiment with that - as I was only able to do something small, that didn't require too much energy ( I didn't have too much). So I found some rusty washers that I picked up some time ago and layered them on some fabric and a long tea bag that I had soaked in vinegar.


.... before I continue.... here are the long tea bags that I have purchased for using with loose tea. They are fun as they are about twice the size of a regular tea bag.
(For those that are asking.... I bought these at a cafe that sells tins of loose tea. I have also seen them for sale at kitchen stores)


I wrapped everything up with lace ,and let the rusting begin.

Two days later, this is what the bundle looked like.

and this is what I found when I unwrapped it.

I have no idea what this will become, but I am sure it will come in handy in one of my creative ventures.

Lace Bound Book

I always find it interesting where inspiration comes from. This book came together because of 2 things that inspired me. One was an aged piece of a thin lace like doily that my mom came across when working at the local small 2nd hand store. The other was a oh so lovely book that you can see at this site.

I added colour to the pages, and bits and pieces of lace and aged doily.

I added bits of lace/doily to the spine to soften up the hard cover,

and tie it into the decorated pages.

More decorated pages.

and then the back cover.

Available for purchase in my Etsy Shop

When Birds and Tea Bags Collide

My drawings of birds and my love of using tea bags in my creations collided this week and ended up as the images below.

I transfered my drawings onto the teabags and then painted them

but I didn't want the colour to show up too much

which is always easier said then done (0r at least for me)

I mounted them on a piece of watercolour paper.

I am pretty sure I am not done with these yet.... but that is all for today.

I am hoping to add them to my Etsy Shop today.

Scavenger's Book

I enjoy making books, and I enjoy creating with items that are heading to the recycling bin.

So using paper and fabric that was ready for recycling I made these books and sent them off

to GreenCraft Magazine.

They invited me to write an article on how they were made, and that article is in the recent edition (February 2012) of GreenCraft.

The soft covers are made with layers of fabric and paper all glued together on which I paint and stamp and when finished I cover with paste wax.

The pages are from the stack of old posters that are blank on one side. To make pages I put two together (blank side out) and sewed around them to make one piece of paper.

I really enjoy making these books, and was happy to be able to share how I make them.