21 Secrets SALE

I'm still working my way thru the 21 Secrets classes, and hoping to win a free spot for next year's classes.

If you haven't signed up yet for this year's version, it's ON SALE now. Worth every penny.

two more

I made a couple more postal ATCs. One of my original 3 got called away to a private swap. I'd already made several dylusions inks backgrounds that were kinda bright but I took one of the tamer ones and made it go postal, then I found a partially finished one in my ATC box, so I finished it.

5 for the swap and one to P in SF! I'd forgotten how much I like doing ATCs. Funny how you get away from doing something you loved for a bit and forget all about it. Oh fickle heart! Or more likely, old mind lol.

going postal

THESE ARE RHONDA'S

An upcoming MMSA swap is postal themed ATCs. When Rhonda came to visit for the day, we pretty much had no idea what we were going to work on so she just brought a bunch of supplies.

We always spend a lot of time showing each other new blogs we've found, or new/cool/usefull sites (instapaper!!)  and running our mouths about whatever we've been up to since we last got together. (She's been to Alaska and Oregon. I've been exactly nowhere except to work and back.)

AND THESE ARE MINE

But we finally got around to doing some art and one of the things we did was make postal ATCs for the swap. I scored several packs of ATC watercolor blanks for a quarter a pack in some closeout bin or other so we used those.

Rhonda immediately put a lot of color on hers while I glued Italian book text to mine. I have a bunch of postal theme rubber stamps and lots of used postage stamps (remember that yard sale?), plus some postage info pages from an old Almanac so between all that we had a lot of stuff to use.

You can *so* see our art styles reflected in our respective ATCs. Anyone who knew us a bit could tell whose was whose at a glance.

still in love with my gelli

all scanned at 300dpi to download for your personal use

MMSA zine swap

A zine (/ˈziːn/ zeen; an abbreviation of fanzine, or magazine) is most commonly a small circulation self-published work of original and/or appropriated texts and images usually reproduced via photocopier.

The above is compliments of Wiki, the dictionary of the 21st century. 

Mandy's original painted paper

Karen at MMSA comes up with some really fun swaps. I vaguely knew what a zine was, and when the swap was announced, I thought meh. 

I had this idea that zines were mostly comic-style little books that kids - ie all you lucky people still under 25 - were into. But after I got all caught up on the swaps that were due before this one, I checked it out a little more and ended up doing one after all. Old dog, new trick! Yay. 

For the base paper I used a lovely hand painted (by Mandy) paper that I'd gotten in a previous MMSA swap. It had all sorts of great markings and needed no further embellishment from me. It's just busy and colorful enough to be a great background without detracting  from the images.

I have a stash of old magazines and since I like vintage stuff, I chose random images and words from two 1947 issues, an American Home and a Popular Science. After gluing everything in place, I did some doodling and added words here and there.


I was quite pleased with it when I was done but then about had a heart attack when I thought that my printer doesn't print full-bleed - edge to edge - but it does so I printed off one copy, folded and cut it, then very carefully glued it to make sure it turned out all right. It all worked, so I made the rest of them and will send them off to Karen tomorrow. 

PS can't believe I haven't posted since June 30. Where DOES the time go?

orange!

One of the current MMSA swaps is the color orange. Your postcards have to be predominantly orange, altho they can have bits of other colors on them. 

I made a few collage cards but became disenchanted with them while adding some doodles. Two of them went in the trash, which left me a few short for the swap so I got out the washi tape - something I tend to hoard instead of USE - and made 3 cards.

I paired 4 various orange tapes with a turquoise stripe, birds on a wire, graph paper with math, and gears. It was fun taping up the cards, overlapping and butting tapes to get various effects. I think there's more washi tape cards in my future.


I added the word 'washi' in ransom  letters cut from a magazine, then gave them a coat of Liquitex Gloss Medium and Varnish to make sure the tapes wouldn't peel up.

Added a bit of stitching and called them done. They'll be in the mail to Karen on Tuesday. 

yard sale score

I love yard sale-ing. The thrill of the hunt. Pulling up to the curb while scanning the tables and piles of stuff. Will there be something really cool or is it all gonna be old baby clothes and chipped coffee mugs? Our small-town newspaper comes out on Fridays, and first thing I do most Friday mornings is walk to the bottom of the drive and get it. The yard sale section is sometimes 4 listings long and sometimes 15 but there's always a few. 

I was poking thru some stuff on a table when I spotted an old wooden trunk with a little sign that said 'antiques'. This wasn't the sort of sale you'd find antiques at but I went over and started rummaging thru overpriced not-very-old-never-mind-antique books. At the bottom of the trunk was a small Whitman's Peppermint Patties box marked $5.

$5 for an old mint box? I took the lid off and saw 8 small matchboxes. Intrigued, I opened one and it was jammed full of old canceled postage stamps. Bingo! I got it for $3 and looked thru it more carefully when I got home. Lots of cool old stamps including one for a half cent. I'd never seen one of those before.

The photo of the stamps is the layered contents of 4 of the 8 boxes. If you need me I'll be in the studio making postal art.