More Arting Attempts!

I cannot believe that ANOTHER month has gone by so fast!...no wonder I am feeling my age...which is all downhill now...LOL.

Altho' it is now JULY, I am only just catching up with adding work done in April!  The ATC swap theme was Bees Waxed Vintage Woman and also one of a Vintage Man. It was a "double-bunger" as there were not many of us in the swap.

           We had to adhere lace to the woman's ATC and a metal object to the man's.

This was my first attempt, which is OK, but NOT ME! Way too prissy!

Using a beeswax candle I adhered tissue paper to a hand dyed background, added the image, some netting and then lace with red "jewels" (which I see now that one is missing) and a gold sticker corner and trim. I gave her a feather and a jewel in her hair but she still didn't look too happy so I put her aside and made the ones below as a "set".

                                   Aaaah!!..now THESE are more me....LOL

We also held a swap of houses of our own theme, using the pattern of Lynn Whipple's, featured in a CPS magazine, Spring 2005.

I chose to make mine in a Zetti theme.

All images have been digitally compilated, using mostly png. images from Crowabout StudioB at DeviantScrap

The birdy in the nest, which is wired to a grape-vine twig, is there to act as a "handle" to lift the roof off the house. The wire goes through the roof and has a plastic egg and feathers added to it for balance. The little "window" flaps either side of the roof have tiny wooden eggs as knobs to raise them. I wired a larger plastic egg to the entrance and made a wire loop on the other side to act as a closure of the walls/doorway.

Some of my latest ATCs

I was once again one of the lucky ones invited to take part in Marion Bockelmann's annual ATC swap.

This year the theme was "Mona and Friends". I am looking forward to getting the returns.

We were asked to use images from the same era as Mona, and alter them....not just use Mona as the main image.

This is my entry

Art with Friends

Back in late January, two of my friends came up from Melbourne to stay with me for a few days.
We had a wonderful time arting and just enjoying each others company in general.

We decided to create a canvas each in the style of a Pam Carriker's workshop, "An Angel's Anthology".

Here are the two of them doing their best to look like they are working hard on their projects....LOL

This is my attempt ...I think it could have been a bit more blue in tone but I like the textures that we incorporated.The crackling was a bonus of using Gesso that was old and dried out....quite a bonus really!

This is a closeup of the crackling...would be good if it happened more often on other work.

This is the cover I made for everyone's PaperArts group "Night Before Christmas" book swap.

Hand made/painted paper background.

A Zetti piece of work

I have been  purchasing and downloading images from "Crowabout" for quite a while so I thought it about time I did something with some of them.

I usually prefer to make up weird images from various other images for my collages, but I gotta admit that using PNG images to make digital art sure saves a lot of time!

Anyway, if nothing else, it makes me smile...vbg.

A few more pieces of me....vbg

  This ATC swap theme was "Out Of The Mouths Of Babes" in January 2011. She looks like I feel whenever I have to deprive myself of all the good tastes in life!

February 2011 ATC theme was "Queen Of Broken Hearts". I think she has to be almost at the top of the list even tho' she married one husband twice! ( does that mean she actually broke HIS heart TWICE????)....vbg.February 2011

Marchs' ATC swap theme was "Bird In A Cage". This is a very rare bird indeed!

Some Mixed Media Art Dolls

Recently I was in a swap  to make a mixed media art doll from recycled jewelery.

 I enjoyed this project so much that I made a few more and I WILL be making more of them in the near future.

I have been scrounging thru' my stash of old jewelery and on the look-out for more treasures to pull to pieces at our local op shops but am finding it hard to get any there these days. I hope you enjoy looking at them as much as I did making them.

I have tried to keep them all around 6 inches long...some are a little shorter than that tho'.




This little pretty was my first. She was the one made for the swap.

 This one now lives with my dear friend Bevlea in Melbourne.

This one has a vintage mother of pearl butterfly brooch as her "crown". She looks like she is ready to "spring into action" at any given moment....LOL.










This one reminds me of an Amazon woman...don't know why cos she doesn't really look like one ....LOL

This one isn't all jewelery (obviously...vbg). Her body is of a sheet of tin that already had the all over pattern pressed into it and in it's original shape...goodness knows what it was originally but I have 4 pieces of it. It is coloured with Alcohol Inks. 

 This bright little Sprite is made using a large jigsaw    piece that I textured and then coloured with paints. She has a bottle cap head and printed wings.

I am off to bed again now so I will add more  tomorrow. 

And so I continue...

 So let's see if blogland treats me more kindly today...vbg.

(surely it couldn't have anything to do with me forgetting how to do things on it...could it???...vbg)

OK..where did I leave off??..Oh yes....the one eyed Mermaid,(which for her, is better than two because it has a built in torch for travelling through the water at night.)

This next ATC is my attempt at Zetti art.
September- 2010

Another Zetti style for a "Marie-Antoinette" theme.

November-2010

  And another...December 2010, using an image of the well endowed 1950s movie star, Jane Mansfield for the theme of "Queen of....."

This is a soldered pendant I made back in August 2010. I used an actual Tintype photo, added a copper German Scrap wing and some rub-ons. I cut the outer wings from copper scrim. The death notice in the back of it is from a 1909 newspaper.

And yet another "zetti" styled ATC...I think I have fallen into the Zetti conclave and can't get out! Good thing I LURV IT!!...vbg. This is a transparency of a vintage woman over alcohol inked BG with a printed head and nest added. The blue bird is 3D mounted.

This ATC was quickly created from bits I had on my desk. The BG music manuscript has a tranferred image on it but I added a printed headover the original one.

 Even though this poor fellow... and his seven brothers... didn't make it to the Macabre Corpse book swap due to having been ruined by my leaking ceiling whilst we were away over seas, I wanted to include him here. It took me all day to compile him in PhotoShop ( and I have a witness that can verify that...vbg) so you can imagine how disappointed and peed-off I was to find nearly all of them stuck together and had to make up another lot!

THE TIME HAS COME.....!!!!

WOW!!! Can you believe this????....I am FINALLY adding something to my blog!When I first decided to do this...only a few minutes ago, I was tossing up as to whether I should just "dump" this blog and start again but I realised that as it has taken me sooooo long to get back to THIS one, creating a new one could be too daunting and may NEVER happen.

At the risk of sounding both egotistical and im-modest, some of you may have been wondering where I have been, and why I have not been keeping up with blogging here.  I WAS going to go into detail as to why, however, I have decided not to bore you with my excuses.....even tho' they were legit... and just get on with adding images of what "arting" I HAVE managed to get done in-between "life  events".

I would also like to thank those of you that have continued to "check in" on me, I feel honoured but very guilty...vbg.So....where do I start???...I guess I will have to go back to where I left off...November 2009!....LOL

This ATCs theme is  "Diamonds Are A Girls Best Friend"

November-2009

"Something Fishy" -December 2009

"Gypsy"-January 2010 

"Beach Babe"- February 2010



Medieval ATC- May 2010

Altered Sardine Tin- May 2010

Black & Silver Gothic ATC-June 2010

Twinchie- Paper Napkin BG,Frinkles & Rusted Metal Dragonfly
July-2010

 

"Steampunk" with moving parts
July-2010

This is another Zetti style ATC

August - 2010

OK!...I give up! I don't know what has happened to Bloggerland since I last posted but it is driving me crazy trying to set out the pics!!! It has exhausted all my good intentions for tonight...I am off to bed to refresh the nervous system and the grey matter....not to mention my aching foot.

But, like that famous saying...I shall be back, hopefully tomorrow, to add more of my creations.

MY SANITY HAS BEEN TESTED!

I have been feeling emotionally stressed
this past month....and probably a little
jet-lagged from our trip to Egypt,
and actually felt like tossing out
my stash and giving paper art away!

My muse had taken flight and I just
felt miserable all day.

Having to do the November tute on
our 2cre8art blog  really seemed such
a chore when I thought about it, but,
depressed or not, I knew I HAD to
do it or I would not be able to "face" 
our followers ...or for that matter,
LIKE myself, so at the 11th hour,
I forced myself to do it and found
that by the time I had finished, I
was back into the "zone"...almost!

Because of the tute and the images
I used for it, (which I ALWAYS print
too many of ), I decided that I  needed
time to regain some sanity in my life! 

So, I would get all the normal (well...
not much is really "normal" for me here
at present, but that's another story...vbg)
household chores done of a morning,
then head off into my cluttered
creative space to see if my muse
really had come back!

After the first half dozen ATCs
came together, I found I couldn't
stop! I even had to go print out
some MORE images...LOL.
Fortunately, as I have
mentioned before, I always
have a stack of  ATC backs ready
 to play with, so I kept creating
until I had used all the appropriate
coloured ones.

So, now I have 15 new ATCs , of the same theme, added to the 3 tute ones!  I am sure each one of them contains a part of  my emotional being and I am also sure they will show the state of my mind at the time of making..nutters!!...LOL.

And here they all are.... I would love to see your cawments on them.

THIS MONTH'S ATC for GROUP SWAP

This month our theme was "Fractured Fairy Tales"....
and me being me, got it wrong and came up with a
"Fractured Nursery Rhyme" ATC.

However, after running it past the boss lady, Bevlea,
I was granted permission to use it!

I sourced a 1950's Pin-up girl from the inter-net then went surfing for three suitable fellows to take a bath with her...I think they are just the right ones, don't you? She has brains, culture and last but not least....swashbuckling good looks!

The BG is of my hand dyed paper and the 3 is a Cuttlebug die cut, using silver cardstock. The edges are distressed with Ranger ink.

Mr. Einstein is 3D mounted, both at the head and the
left arm and I coloured in the bath bubbles with a white marker. 

SPOOKY ANCESTORS UPDATE

This is my FINISHED 6 x 4 inch book page for our PaperArts Sept Swap,which, due to a change of themes, is late in being finalised.

We all had to use collage sheet images from Itkupilli , so our completed book will have a great uniform look to it.

There are 13 participants which is just the right amount for the theme...don't you agree?

All the images on my page are 3D mounted onto the background. I used medical gauze for the "grass" and painted over it with a yucky mix of acrylic paints.

Here we have the Bonehead family in a family portrait.

Mother, altho' a little shaky on her old bones, is dressed in her best old gown and is sporting a beautiful black rose hat which I think really enhances her wonderful high cheekbones!

The children were on their best behavior as they were promised that they could watch the DVD "How Frankenstein Met his Death" after the photo shoot if they stood still and put on a startled face!

Little Hedra was always Daddy's favourite so she was given the privilege of holding what was left of him so he would be included. You can see by the smile on his face that he was thrilled to be there.

  Hannibal took along his pet, "Blackie" who was kept on a short rein so as not to creep off out of the camera's range. It also ensured that the nasty black crow that was eying him off would not swoop down and take him for his supper!

Hannibal's twin sister, Lucretia found the whole time boring as...she just wanted to get it over with so she could go back home and pull off some more doll's heads!

DOWN on the FARM

This was last month's Mixed Media swap, altho' I used mainly paper.

It measure 3 inches x 11/2 inches and is ,obviously, an accordian book.

Both Bevlea and I played a part in making this...she found some of the images and printed them out and I placed them onto the backgounds.

The "reins" on the stubborn mule on the front allows the book to be tied closed...unfortunately I don't have a pic of that tho'.

These pics were taken before I added my signature to it...a black crow flying above the ducks...maybe the recipient of the book will send me an image of it if I ask nicely...vbg.

POST SCRIPT:
Debbie has sent me a pic of the crow on the page...and it has a mind of it's own as to where it wants to be positioned  here on this page so I apologise for it being out of order.

RUSTY "STEAM-PUNK"

September's ATC Theme is RUST so I used some of my rusted paper as the back ground for this little Punk style courier of love.


He has rusted metal Dragonfly wings on his back and on the rusted cog wheels, and a rusted tin heart to carry.
 
He also has a wee rusty (cog) monacle to cheekily peek out thru'.