Good morning you all. The sun is shining again, although it's still cold here. but it's good weather for going for a walk, so perhaps I will do that.

I have a lot of old books at home, really old ones, from the 17th and 18th century, and some of them are in a very bad condition - the leather covers have fallen off, the pages have darkened, and they look very tatty. I have repaired a lot of them but some are beyond repair, and one of them I have used to make an altered book. It's an old theological book, and a lot of the pages are missing. I used the covers and a few pages for my book. The covers stayed as covers, after being coated with Ranger's Matte medium to seal them, and I used 2 pages to make the insides of the covers.
I cut new pages from torchon water colour paper, and distressed them with TH inks in ancient linen and brushed corduroy. I used a small piece of one of the book-pages on each page, and stamped them with flourishes and scripts in espresso. Then came the next layer, floral rub ons, and then some images, which I tore rather than cut before distressing the edges. I distressed the pages again after decorating them, rubbing ancient linen well over all the images, to tone them down and make them look old. Some pages have added beads and/or gem stones, prima flowers and butterflies, and I added some *bling* to the flourishes with bronze liquid pearls. I decided to use my BIA to put the book together, as I like the contrast between the antique covers and the modern wires. I have added a few ribbons to the wires and a key as a charm, perhaps I will add some more when I find something suitable.

The arrangement of the images is rather surreal, but that's something I like. And I forgot to say, that the head of Buddha has been added to the cover with matte medium.
All in all a fun project! I am entering this book into an altered book challeneg on Pages in Time, and into *Simon Says Stamp and Show* some distressing challenge. Thanks for looking, and have a great day!

GC98 - Mists

There's a new challenge beginning today on Gingersnaps, where the command is *Let us spray*. Here you need to dig out your spray mists and start work on something with a Japanese flair. Here are some of the things I made this week using different techniques:

These remind me of Gilbert & Sullivan's *Three little maids who all unwary, come from a Ladies' Seminary....*
I used the tutorial from Juliet on Gingersnaps to make the bookmark dolls, and the instructions for the fan were given in a tutorial by Petra, also on Gingersnaps.
I used one of the dolls to make the simple sprayed card here. I used a mask for the moon and the tiger before spraying with some home made perfect pearls mist in spiced marmalade, and then stamped the bush and tiger with archival black before adding the doll on the left.

These are variations on a theme, using a misty picture from my stash. I made the card three times, just using different embellies.

I often use one basic layout which I alter when I need to make several cards in a short time. I wrote the Haiku - a Japanese verse with 5, 7, and 5 syllables - to finish it:
*The rising sun's warmth
Dissolves the grey fleece of mist
revealing the dew.*

Thanks for looking, and have a great day!

A sketch of a bird, and what became of it....

Another day, another post. Yesterday the weather here was almost like summer, but is has changed overnight and is now cool and grey - sort of normal again. I had a nice walk through the woods with my friend's dog, Emily, and had a great evening watching DVD's of Harry Potter.
But in between I did manage to get some crafting done.

Actually, I wanted to draw a bird for the Sunday Challenge at *Blue Chair Diary*, which was to do just that. But then I started to work on the bird. Drew it again twice onto patterned paper, stamped them, and decorated them with rub ons.
Then I decided they had to be part of something else, so I covered a canvas with strips of old magazines and printed paper, painted it with gesso and let it dry. The sun got it dry in no time. After distressing it with TH ink in tumbled glass I put the birds on right and left, and they reminded me of Frida Kahlo, who so often painted birds in her wonderful creations, so I fixed a picture of her in the middle, and then decorated it with everything I had to hand - lace, beads, flowers, rosettes etc. And I like the results, as I adore Frida Kahlo's work.

And I promised to show some of the stash I bought from Alyson, who makes beautiful mini books, and who has started to put together kits, which she sells from time to time at very reasonable prices, and they are really packed full with goodies and papers and acessories etc. Here is the first one I bought, with Basic Gray papers and coordinating embellishments:

As I am taking part in a mini book swap over at Lenna's Creative Swaps Blog
I will have plenty of *ammuntion* for making them.
Okay, enough for today. Have a great day, whatever you are up to, enyour yourself, and thanks for stopping by!

Less is More, Sunshine and Mexican Fiesta Feelings....

Another sunny day filled with sunshine and bird song here, a real SUNday. So I will be going for a walk, and doing some painting out on the balcony later. Right now I am just enjoying my first latte and watching the view while I type.
First of all I have thee cards ready for *Less is More*. The challenge this week is to do a one layer card with the focus on the sentiment, so here are my attempts:

This one has an embossed edge to focus the saying, which means *The years have left you untouched - it was the weekends that marked you*

The saying here means *Love is the best sort of madness*

*God didn't want to do everything himself, so he created mothers*

Then I wanted to show you pictures from my big Mexican sunshine package which arrived on Friday from Donna, so here are some of them:

As you can see, not only an exciting envelope, but really stuffed with pictures and little artefacts, ribbons, postcards - I especially love those of Frida Kahlo - and some beautiful, brightly painted tin objects and ribbon. And a tiny little nicho with glass in it, I will be able to push a picture behind the glass. As you can imagine, all things for me which are very inspiring, and I want to do a large painting /mixed media piece this week and incorporate some of my new treasures into it. Thanks again Donna, for my lovely bundle of inspiration, and I hope you don't have to wait too long for yours, which is on its way.

And I received another parcel yesterday, full of lovely things which I bought from Alyson, in England, I will put the pics on my blog tomorrow, so watch this space!

So, here's wishing you all a great day, take care, and thanks for looking and leaving a comment.

Paint Party WEEKEND

Well, I would love to tell you all that I have been painting to my heart's content, but I haven't as I am staying with a friend who likes playing cards.
But as it was Paint Party FRI Saturday, I thought I could at least show a pic of a painting I made 20 years ago. I was in a very bad mood when I painted it, and was listening to a German Group called *Die Toten Hosen* - the Dead Trousers, who did - and do - lovely, aggressive punky hard rock. And for some reason I needed it that evening. I had a basement flat, where nobody could here me, so I rocked my corner of the world and this picture came out of it:

I called the painting *Industrial Sunset*, and it seems quite appropriate today in view of what has happened in Japan.
It has been painted using oil on Canvas, and is def. not a masterpiece, but it is a memory of a bad mood and some great musik, even if I don't anymore know WHY I was so bad tempered!
I am entering this into paint party Friday.

Thanks for looking, and have a great day you all, take care!

Friday already....

Well, this week has flown by, it's Friday already and I haven't managed half the things I wanted to do this week. But I enjoyed the week, so I suppose that's something.
Yesterday I got a parcel from Mexico, with lots of pictures and little artefacts in it, there was so much in it, that I still haven't been able to take it all in, but the colours brought so much Mexican sunshine with them, that I feel very inspired to do some things in this style. Thanks a lot Donna, pictures will follow on Sunday!
Yesterday I managed 2 challenges, the GCSP07, Gingersnaps *once in a blue moon* challenge. There are more than 100 challenges to choose from there, so I chose GC 12, *Journeys*. While sifting through some old family papers, I discovered a photo and a postcard, sent to her in 1939, and decided to use these for my LO. The paper is from Making Memories, and I have just used some ephemera as embellies, and a tag for the journaling.
The photo of the 2 rather ragged Beduin children intrigued me, and I wonder what happened to them later in life?

The second piece I made is for the *Three Muses - Victorian Elegance* challenge. I have used a photo of an Aunt of my grandmother, Lily, taken about 1890, when she was 16 years old. I cut the photo out and placed her on a background which has been distressed in gradient colours, and then stamped with flourishes and script in Victorian velvet. I added some floral rub ons, paper lace, a cameo and some paper roses.

I was amused to read in my comments yesterday that a lot of post office workers seem to disapprove of *fancy* parcels and envelopes, I really thought that it could only happen here!
Have a great day you all, thanks for looking, and take care!

Taking a parcel to the post....

Good morning everybody! It's a lovely, warm and sunny day here, and I've just been watching a whole swarm of coal tits chasing a magpie away. I suppose that bird was getting too close to a nest.... They all seemed to be shouting at each other, and although the magpie is much bigger, it was sheer outnumbered.
Yesterday I took my parcel to the post. The lady in the post never looks happy, but this time she looked thunderstruck. I gave her the parcel.
She asked *What's that?*
I said *A small packet*
*You've DEFACED the whole front of it!*
*It's not defaced, it's art. I like it!*
*I don't. Where I am supposed to stick the stamps?*
*There's room at the top and all round.*
*If I had anything to say, I would forbid it!*(Swatting the stamps on like she was trying to kill a cockroach)
Thank God she doesn't have the power to decide!
What a miserable woman!
In the afternoon I visited my friend for her little birthday party, where we had lots of different cakes and coffee and enjoyed good company for a couple of hours. Emily the dog was there, too - with B, and after checking us all out and lots of tail wagging, positioned herself under the table chewed her leather bone and was happy. If anyone mentioned her name, she thumped her tail on the floor, so she was evidently keeping up with our chit-chat,too!
This is the mirror which I made on Sunday for Inge's birthday, didn't want to show pics of it before she had got it. It's a *less is more* mirror, she doesn't like too much decoration, and as she plays the piano and is very musical, I made it black and white like music sheets:

The frame was covered in strips of music paper - printed from Lindsay's Stamp Stuff - and strips of my old magazines, painted with gesso and decorated with TH's musical tissue tape, and stamped with some music notes and a head of Mozart, which I covered with glossy accents to make it stand out.
Yesterday evening I NEEDED to do some crafting, so that I didn't get withdrawal symptoms. And I needed some exercise after eating all that cake!
I altered another little picture frame. This time using gold structure paste, which I heat dried till it bubbled and burnt, and then toned down a bit with Stazon *timber brown*. I polished the sides of the frame with inka gold. I made a flower from gold metal using TH's *tattered florals*. Some of the petals were embossed using a Kohinoor paper stump, and I distressed them all with Stazon again. After curling and layering the petals, I fixed them together with a brad and hot glued them to the frame. For the picture inside I distressed a ceramic card using TH inks in gradient colours, stamped a setting sun with colour box and the houses and balloon with archival black. The row of houses wasn't long enough for the card, so I did some doodling right and left, and added to it. Then I wrote a quote along the left side, from a song we used to sing when I went to school: *Golden gleams the western sky, where the sun is sinking*. And I am entering this frame and picture into Hel's *Sunday Stampers* Challenge, which is *Golden slumbers* this week.

Well, enough for today. Tomorrow I will put up some pictures of my arty kitchen. Thanks a lot for looking, and have a great day, whatever you are up to. And take care!