Some pictures and a Sunday sketch

Hi you all, good morning. It's sunny and springlike here, so that's good. Yesterday I got some plants for my balcony, which had been marked down to less than the half, so for 3,20 I got 12 sturdy fuchsia plants, and now I have my two flower boxes, a tub and 2 pots filled. They have survived their first night, and looking really cheerful, so I'm happy about that.
Recently I promised to show some pictures of my arty kitchen, and I have thrown in a few of the rest of my arty place to go with them. Here we go. It started with this - I put a frame round 2 of my creations....

And then some more things arrived....

And then a few more....

The opposite wall was already in use....

And it just went on growing....

And growing....

The green cuckoo clock is not a cuckoo clock but a cowmoo clock: every hour a cow comes out and moos...

You don't believe it? Shame on you!

And in case you think it can't get worse - IT CAN!!

Spare parts....

Bottoms up....

Heads without bodies....

And bodies without heads.

And my Sunday Sketch for *Blue Chair Diary*, done while sitting on my balcony this morning and drinking my coffee: the view of the trees, sketched with Caran d'ache crayons. I added 2 birds which I die-cut, from paper which I painted with metallic colours and stamped and sprayed before cutting. These are to represent all the birds that visit my balcony every day.

Well, hope you have enjoyed your little tour round a few of my crazy pieces.
Thanks for looking by, and have a great day!

Three Mini Books

Hi everybody, the week has flown by again and it's Saturday already. The birds have been singing outside for hours, tried to ignore them, as I wanted to sleep in a bit, but they just didn't care. Lately a magpie has been visiting my balcony every day, which is strange, as they are usually very shy, but she hops about there every day and seems to be enjoying it. I think she has a good view of the birds in the trees while sitting there....
Yesterday I finished the fourth mini book for Lenna's swap, so next week they can be posted - poor me, another trip to that post office!

Here I have bound the pages using my BIA. I used paper from the Basic Grey *Capella* collection. Some of the pages have been stamped with flourishes, some of which I have embellished with liquid pearls. The covers have been covered with some gold satin.

This time I have made I maze book from one sheet of 12x12 paper. The lovely paper is *herne* from 7 Gypsies. If you want to make a maze book, just google it, and you will find plenty videos and explanations. Maze books always have lots of pockets, where you can put tags or photos. I have put a mini tag into each pocket, and decorated with butterflies, flowers, feathers, buttons etc.

This little album has also been made from one sheet of 12x12 paper, this time a lovely 2 sided paper from Kaisercraft. I cut in in half, and then each half into three pieces measuring 6x4. These pieces were then folded to form the pages. I arranged the pages so that two with the same pattern always faced each other, scored them in the middle, punched three small holes along the centre line and sewed them together with string, very quick and easy. I decorated the book with flowers and butterflies again. I have left the darker pages emty, so that the recipient will have space to pop in some photos or whatever, and tried to decorate the flourishes on the cream coloured sides.

It was great fun making all the little books, now I am going to start on one for another swap, but a bit larger this time.
Have a great weekend, and thanks a lot for stopping by. Look after yourselves!

Paint Party Friday and a Mini Book from Mini Book Thursday!

Well, it's party time again over at PPF, and this time it's about what inspires us to paint. I am showing a picture I made in 1995 and then I will tell you WHY I painted it.

Now, here's the story:
I was in town for my Spanish lesson. I always went by tram, because I could travel almost door-to-door this way without having to search for hours for a parking space in the town centre.
On the way back, I just managed to get onto a tram in the very back compartment. It was quite full, but I found a seat near the door. There was a group of tramps at the back, behind me, all rather drunk and very loud and boisterous. Suddenly one of them, a young man, reeled over to me and grabbed my shoulder and demanded that I take a swig out of his bottle. I said *No, thank you* and hoped that it would end there. It didn't. He got really maudling and then aggressive. His mates thought it was funny, and the other people in the tram all moved backwards, away from us. One man wanted to help, but his wife held him back. Then the drunk squatted down onto the floor beside me, and grabbed my leg, At that moment, the tram braked for some reason, I hit out at him with my left hand, caught him on the chin and he flew backwards and landed at the feet of his mates, more through the sudden jerk of the tram than my punch. But they were all extremely impressed, and thought I was some sort of super-boxer. At the next stop I got out and ran up to the front and got the driver to come back with me. He threw them all out, including all the people who had just stood there and watched, but not tried to help. When I got home, I painted myself as Super Woman, and this picture has been hanging on my wall ever since. I love the strong colours, and the motto *Nemo me impune lacessit*. This is the Scottish royal motto, and translated means something like *No one harms me without being punished* or *Who dare meddle with me?* I think for me, painting is very often a result of strong emotions.

Yesterday I made three mini-books (for Lenna's swap) on one day. I used some of the nice things I bought from Alyson, and some of my stash, and had a whale of a time cutting, sticking and playing with all those nice things. Here are the pics of the first book, the others will follow tomorrow.

So, thanks for looking, and have a great day. Happy holidays for those of you who are starting into their Easter breaks, and a good weekend to you all! Take care!

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!