House and home

Hi  everybody!

We had a very hot and rather sultry day here, and it looks like this weather will be staying with us for a few days,  probably bringing some thunder and lighting, too.
It's good to be able to go out in summer clothes and sandals.
Hope you are enjoying good weather, too.

This month's theme at AJJ is houses, and at Mix it monthly, homes, so I have combined both challenges in this mixed media piece.
I used a photo showing a house which is closed up prior to demolishing or 'renovating' it, in order to build luxury apartments. This phenomenon is happening in many  big cities around the world. The example shown is in London, but it is unfortunately not the only one. Property dealers and  owners want to make money regardless of how many people lose their homes in the process. For many 'normal' people, it is getting more and more difficult to find  places to live at a reasonable place. There are millions of homeless people sleeping in shelters, doorways, under bridges or where ever they find,  and that in a rich and civilised society. Not having a house or home is for me an important aspect of the theme, even if it is sometimes rather uncomfortable to think about it.

I cut into the edges to symbolise the destruction, and added a homeless man who is begging, again a familiar sight on our streets these days. The background has been painted with acrylics and gelatos, and I outlined the images with a neon yellow gel pen.

And here are  a few more summery pictures from my walks today.

I like this last photo, showing the houses from the opposite side of the road reflected in the window of our shoe-shop:

Have  a great weekend, take care,

and thanks a lot for coming by!

Memories, blue skies and sunshine

Hi everybody!

We had a great day here, sunshine and blue skies, and for the next few days we have been promised temperatures up to 35°.

I made another piece for my memory wall. I used corrugated cardboard for the backing, which I painted with a mix of acrylics in terracotta, dark brown and gold. I drizzled Utee gold all down the right side, and added some patches of gilding flakes, and some scraps of old letters, which I pressed into the folds of the cardboard. The photo shows my Mother and my eldest sister, probably taken in 1940. I fussy cut the figures, and added some white burlap, lace, a button a bow, some feathers and a flower. I made the tie with some pretty fibres. I still have the brooch my mum is wearing there.

I am linking to Paint Party Friday, Paper Saturdays (sorry, Manon, I forgot last week!) and Moo Mania and more, feathers.

Here I watched a big mobile home driving onto the ferry.

The horses were happy, as always:

The castle ruins were full of birds swooping about:

The skies were wonderfully blue:

And the moon was visible at 4 in the afternoon.

I hope the sun will shine for you over the weekend!

Have a good one, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!

Tags and Trees

Hi everybody!

We had another warm and sunny day here, great for walking. Tomorrow will be cooler and probably wet, we've got bad weather coming to us from the British Isles! I can understand my countrymen not wanting to keep the weather there, but please, folks, send it in a different direction next time, okay?

I have to go for a day of examinations at the local hospital tomorrow, so I will be round to visit your blogs when I get back.

I made these tags over the weekend. I used scrap card and covered it with a paper napkin showing a detail from Michelangelo's  'The creation of Adam' from the Sistine Chapel. I divided it into two pieces, which I matted with blue and brown cardstock. I added some fragments of old letters, and used my diamond stencil to texture the sides. I used a mix of embossing paste, bead gel and terracotta paint. (I can't recommend this mixture, it was way too sticky!) When it was dry I added some gilding flakes in between (I am totally addicted to them) and glittered the embossed parts with stickles in blue and cinnamon. I added the text by hand. I punched eyelets into the top and threaded some fibres through, using beads from broken jewelry to pick out some of the colours. The tags are each 8" high.

Today I was fascinated by the size and fullness of the trees, they are just magnificent. This one looks like it has three legs:

The hay is drying on the meadows by the Rhine:

And this little guy was kind enough to land right at my feet for a photo:

Have a great day, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!

Roses at Tag Tuesday

Hi everybody!

Another week has flown by, and it's once again time for a new theme at Tag Tuesday. I used corrugated card again as a base. The card was partly peeled, painted with white gesso and then given a sprinkling of glitter. If I may give you some good advice, please try NOT to sneeze while sprinkling glitter, although the kitchen floor looks beautifully sparkly just now.

The image I have used is one of Astrid's wonderful freebies, which she very generously offers on her blog. I distressed the edges with vintage photo DI, and added some bobble trim, white burlap and some roses and flowers. This was a quick and easy tag. I am also linking to Moo Mania and More, corrugated cardboard.

I just love all the front gardens along the road at the moment, and am always most impressed how much time and effort people put into them to make them so beautiful.

And the hedgerows along the fields and the Rhine are lovely too, full of wild flowers and grasses.

I have captured some of the wild-flowers in this collage.

I am linking to MiFoc, colourful.

That's all for today!

Have a good one, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!

Colourful

Hi everybody!

We had another sunny day here, for which I am thankful. I always go out walking, whatever the weather, but it is definitely more pleasant when the sun is shining....

Today's tag is one of my DT pieces for Gecko Galz for June. I had a lot of problems, as my printer decided never to work again just after I started printing the items I needed. I now have a 'new' second-hand printer, which was an enormous bargain at 15€ including cartridges, so am back in business again!

But for these pieces I had to make do with the few things already printed and some older images.

I have used an 8" tag, onto which I glued the masked beauty paper from the carnival paper pack, which is full of wonderful designs, which can be printed out at any size. The leopard is from my stash, and the steam punk lady is a Digi stamp from GG. The text was written using a stencil, and outlined with pink gel-pen, as were the figures.  I fixed the tag onto a slightly larger one cut from black cardstock, and put a  metal eyelet through them both, fixing some recycled clock hands under it.

(Material list: tags, images, BG paper, metal eyelet, clock hands gel-pens)

The new MiFoc challenge at Manus Mikrokosmos, which starts tomorrow,  is 'Colourful', and I found some nice graffiti on my walk today which fit this challenge very well.

And here are some more pictures from my walk today:

  

I just love this house with the red geraniums:

And Saint Swidbert looks freshly painted:

Here's wishing you all a good start in the new week!

Take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!