New Challenge at Moo Mania and More

Hi Everybody!

Today we are beginning a new challenge at

Moo Mania and More:

Autumn Mood

Projects of all formats are allowed, not just moos, and as always, you have 2 weeks to get your creative juices flowing and join us. That should be really easy with the colours of autumn all around us.

I made a giant (12") tag. I used an image from Alfons Mucha, centred it on the tag, and painted the edges with a mix of Vivacolor rust and gold. As his painting is very extravagant, I decided to add some flakes of gold leaf in various autumnal colours along the right side. For the embellishments I used natural leaves which I embossed with Utee gold and Frantage copper, some seed pods, and a few scraps that were flying about my table.

For Art Journal Journey, architecture,  I made an A3 mixed media journal page with a haunted house. The house, tree and fence are TH die cuts. The witch and bats have been drawn in black ink, as has the tree. Perhaps you are looking for a house to buy? This one is available!

The Photos were all taken on Sunday in Kettwig, a jewel of a town on the Ruhr, the river which gives its name to the Ruhr Valley. I am linking  the collage to Wen's  Simply Neutrals

Have a great day you all, take care,

and thanks a lot for coming by!

Trees, coffee and cake

Hi Everybody!

Today I am sharing the tag I made for Tag Tuesday, where our theme this week is 'trees'. I used an 8" tag, distressed the background with a mix of DIs - wild honey, rusty hinge and shabby shutters. Then I used a CWS trees stencil and TH's spider's web, and went over them with rusty hinge. My 'trees' have been made from some oak-leaves and twigs picked up outside our house and dried in my giant Webster's dictionary. I glued them on with a hot glue gun, and am proud to say I did not burn my fingers this time. In October, trees are places for Halloween fun, so I added my witch and some bat die-cuts. I cut the fence wider than the tag, and glued it so that it gives a 3 D effect. The cat seems to have drunk some engorging potion and is probably wondering how he will fit through the cat flap when he goes home. The toadstools were in my stash.

On Sunday when I was out with my neighbour in the forest, the sun sometimes shone though the trees, making a wonderful and almost surreal atmosphere.

Inside the  grounds of Landsberg Castle were several fountains, but this was my favourite.

I enjoyed seeing the plants and flowers, too:

Love the figure on the wind-vane:

Today is also Elisabeth's T stands for Tuesday, so a big welcome to her and the T gang. My neighbour gifted me a 'Stollen', a German Christmas cake. Alas and alack, it will not last that long! Anyway, help yourselves to a slice or two!

And my drink is, of course, coffee with foamy milk and chocolate sprinkles - what else?

I wrote this 'ode to coffee' some time back, and am repeating it here for those who don't yet know it.

Give me coffee, but not tea,

Tea is not the drink for me.

Coffee, frothy, brown and hot,

I can always drink a lot.

Coffee topped with whipped up cream -

This with joy will make me scream.

Café au lait with chocolate sprinkles,

Makes me happy, stops my wrinkles.

And if the point you have not seen - 

A day without coffee makes me mean!

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

Architecture

Hi Everybody!
Hope you had a good weekend!

For Art Journal Journey, architecture; 49 Faces and Kim Dellow's show your face I have another A3 Journal page. The face was drawn, coloured with water colours, and stamped with some architectural stamps from LaBlanche. I added the diamonds, squares, flourishes, birds and flowers with various stencils.
I am also linking to Moo Mania and more, show patterns

I played around and made 2 digitally altered versions:

This morning it was not raining, and the sun was peeping through the clouds here and there, so my neighbour suggested we went for a drive, and we visited Schloss Landsberg (Landsberg castle), which is in the middle of a forest. The castle dates back to the 13th century, but was rebuilt at the beginning of the 20th century.

The huge gates at the entry looked rather forbidding, but we marched through and along the drive:

Steps led to this gate leading into the bowels of the castle - perhaps the dungeons?

We went up more steps:

through a gate:

and through a tunnel:

Then we were in the park, and the sun was shining.

The buildings are all rather huge and overpowering:

This tower reminded me of Rapunzel, but her knight in shining armour did not come along and ask her to let down her hair:

Visitors can walk through the gardens, park and forest, but are not allowed into the castle.

I took a lot of photos, so will be showing them in the course of the week.

Have a great day, take care,

and thanks a lot for coming by!