Blossoms, Snow, and Custom Envelopes

Posted on March 13, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Meet my friend Lisa, who adds another dimension into making your own envelopes 🙂

arlingwords.wordpress.com

Late this week, I noticed some of the daffodils doing face plants in the dirt. They are optimistic, tough little flowers and can withstand the cold. But I think they may have heard about the snow.

DSCN4791 Ooooh Noooo. It was so nice a few days ago…

These crab apple blossoms have not heard yet and are at a stage where the snow will not be helpful.

DSCN4796 Blossoms. Leaves too. Aaiiieee….

The latest forecast I’ve heard is for a nor’easter up the coast dumping either 2-5 inches or 10-13 depending on storm track. I don’t mind; it’s kind of exciting. And given the lateness of the year, the snow won’t be around long. Nor will the blossoms and buds that were tricked by 70 degree weather in February. I haven’t thought much about the storm, since I will probably just hunker down and enjoy it. What I did think about today was getting…

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Make Your Own Custom Envelopes

Posted on February 28, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Wow – Inky Doodle Note Cards are proving popular! Thank you, thank you to my loyal supporters who have purchased a set or two I am so thrilled you like them! And yes, it’s true, the no-envelopes choice has been the preferred way to go.

Today I’m showing how I make the promised custom fit envelopes without any special tools. I saw someone do this on YouTube two or three years ago and I’m sorry to say I don’t remember who it was. I already had an envelope template but found it restrictive in sizing. Since learning this method I never used my expensive envelope template again!

Let’s talk about paper first. It’s possible to use any kind of paper. Flimsy paper may need a security insert or to be doubled. You might wish to use matching paper or plain white copy paper. You might want to make your envelope out of deli paper, newspaper, a brown paper bag or fancy pre-printed crafting paper. I’ve used them all and then some.

My friend Alys likes to use her old calendar leaves as envelopes. I’m a bit given to using my paint wiping papers as envelopes. Newspaper is fun, especially if it has a special occasion announcement to accompany the card. If you use newspaper you will need to place a white ‘address label’ on the front of your envelope, as you will need to do with any dark or ornate paper. But anything is possible – we can be as creative as our imaginations will let us be!

So. let’s start.

All you need is your paper of choice, a ruler, pencil, scissors and either glue or double sided tape. Plus the card you are making the envelope for. (I usually make an envelope out of a piece of copy paper to start, just while I remember the steps – then I use the fancy stuff.)

Today I decided to go with a plain mauve heavy weight paper for an inky doodle note card.

Work with the inside of the envelope facing up.

The first thing to do is measure your card diagonally, corner to corner and add 2cm/1″

Cut along the ruled line

Lay the envelope as a diamond in front of you and lay the card long ways across it. The ruler is shown in the photo below to draw your eye to the need to move as accurately as possible the bottom point of the diamond into the same line as the top point as you fold up the bottom of the envelope.

Crease the bottom fold lightly then fold in the sides. Don’t fold in too tightly, you need to be able to slide your card in and out with some ease. But also don’t leave too much space or the envelope simply won’t work out. Crease lightly in case you have to adjust. Once you have made a couple of envelopes this won’t be an issue for you, I promise.

Trim the pointy end of the bottom of the diamond as shown.

Fold the top over to fit the card. We haven’t glued anything into place yet. If you are happy with the fit

remove the card and open the envelope out. You will trim those little triangle areas as shown, just to make a neater finish to your envelope.

Now use your glue or double sided tape as shown

Give the glue a few minutes to dry, then check the card fits in nicely.

As a finishing touch you can use this stuff to put a proper sticky edge to your envelope – or just tape down with sellotape or a fancier decorative tape if you have that to hand.

I added a strip of my own decorative tape to the front, left side of the envelope and voila!! One custom fit envelope that took me twenty minutes to make with posing and photographing but less than five in ordinary circumstances.

If you would like the opportunity to receive this card and envelope with a hand written letter from me please mention it in your comment and if there’s more than one I’ll do a draw and use that random choice thingy if I can find it. 🙂

Please do let me know if anything isn’t clear.

And if you make your own envelope, let me know how it turned out.

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Inky Doodle Note-Cards, the Winner

Posted on February 23, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Thank you to all my friends who commented and did the poll thingy on the last post. Of the fifteen who voted, fourteen went for option 1: no envelopes. It was a low voter turn-out, but given the way voting has gone globally recently, who wants to vote any more?

Alys, in a private email, persuaded me to offer an ‘envelopes included’ option in my shop for those countries who have a different measuring system to the one I use. So that remains an option in the shop along with the no-envelope option. They are up, you can see them here.

However, in my next post I shall show you how to make a custom fit envelope for those odd shaped cards we sometimes end up with and wish to send. It’s easy and gives you the opportunity to make your card, or letter, or any odd thing you wish to send, entirely original and you maybe won’t have to purchase another envelope, ever!

So, I carefully wrote out all your names, cut them into neat little slices ……

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…….and threw them into my favourite coffee cup – emptied of coffee I hasten to assure you and newly washed and dried…..

The cup was shaken, vigorously, but not stirred and then I hooked one piece of paper and tried my best to photograph the action simultaneously

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Sometimes a third hand would be very – er – handy!!

Congrats to the inestimable author Geoff who blogs at TanGental. A pack of note cards will be winging its way to you as soon as your preference is known and your address too please. Also everyone else – do pop over and read his latest offering You’ll be hooked! 😀

Here’s a pic of Siddy and his newest friend whispering secrets into his ear at the dog park

siddy-meets-spook-18-2-17

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Inky Doodle Note Cards

Posted on February 15, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Do you remember a couple of posts back I mentioned a give-away? And where I showed you the beginning processes in the creation of my new line of Note Cards. Yupo paper, alcohol inks and hours of doodling went into completing four A4 sheets. Each sheet was then cut into four pieces and, when the note cards were all made up there is a grand total of 16 different designs.

I already showed you the first four completed cards. When Susanne made a comment on that previous post about them reminding her of ‘Swinging London’ in the 60’s their name was born. Here they are again, sporting their new look. Meet ‘Note-Cards ‘Carnaby Street’

Here is the second sheet of Inky Yupo paper

And here the doodling work is completed

Here are the four cards that utilise that design ‘Note Cards Summer Garden’

Here is the third ink dropped sheet

Doodles completed

And here are the four cards ‘Cosmic Time’. I think this is my favourite one

Here is the fourth sheet, remember I had started the doodling work

This one took the longest to complete, there is more than 15 doodle hours here:

And here are the four note cards ‘Evening Garden’

You can use any card upright or top hinged, it is purely personal preference.

Every A5 note card comes with a writing paper insert, allowing you to write fully on three leaves. After much experimentation and contemplation I decided to stay with white card and ordinary printing paper for the inserts. It was simply easier and more affordable.

Every note card is hand made by me. I cut the card, slice the original design into four and trim it to fit the card. I ink the edges of each little printed design. I alone score, crease and fold the card into shape, wrestle with my double sided tape gun (which is being extremely temperamental at the moment) and adhere the card and printed paper together. I then cut the paper insert to size, trim and finally adhere that inside the card. Slight variations and imperfections are inevitable.

Now to the give away. Which isn’t really a free thing at all, I’m asking for your advice and in return your name goes in the draw for a set of note cards, design of your choice. So, to enter you must humour me and help me solve a terrible conundrum. Please do read on if you want to play…….

Will you pretend with me that you want to purchase a set of four note cards. You are ready and champing at the bit to get into letter writing again, these doodly cards are the perfect size for a chatty and cheerful note to get the ball rolling. You feel that the cost of $NZ17 is affordable, you know, that’s just $4 per card and 25c per envelope, cheaper than most mass produced cards.

And then you check out shipping costs. (We’ve been here before recently, yes? Well, here we go again!)

You discover that four note cards with envelopes costs $17 + $15 shipping for International customers and $5 shipping for domestic customers. Suddenly the cards from the corner store are looking way more appealing!

The thing that pushes the cost up is the size of the envelopes, they take the packet from letter rate to small packet rate, which is the same rate I send small light catchers around the world for. And there’s a big difference in size and weight between 4 note cards and a triple strand light catcher!

So what if you just bought your own envelopes from the local store?

Four note cards with no envelopes costs $16 + $3 shipping – anywhere in the world.

Which scenario would you prefer?

Hit your option choice in the poll box

*$NZ16 = $US11.50 / $Ca15.11 / $Au15.05 / UKP9.20

Double your amount for total cost inc shipping of option 1

But talk to me too – I love you to talk to me 🙂

Do you have a favourite design or colour way?

All regular chatterers will go in the draw, your choice of note card pack:

*Carnaby Street

*Summer Garden

*Cosmic Time

*Evening Garden

*Mixed Notes {one of each collection)

And finally, Siddy says “Helllloooooo!” to his fans

March 16 3

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

On Being An Artist/Designer

Posted on February 9, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Well, it’s partly exciting and partly not…..

A couple of weeks ago I received an email from an on-line designer store named ‘Vida’ inviting me to become one of their designers. They had seen my art work the mail said and were very excited by how it would translate into bags, cushions, scarves, wraps and tops.

I, of course, was hugely flattered and not a little sceptical and asked three people whose opinions I trust implicitly to check them out too. Two were my daughters and the third my friend Alys.

The daughters were spending time together in Wellington and a couple of days later sent me this ever so slightly tongue-in-cheek response:

We think it looks very professional and very inviting.

We think it would be a very exciting thing to be a part of! We love the idea that everyone involved in the process matters equally and is remunerated accordingly.

Regardless of whether you do sell anything this is a great opportunity to showcase your artwork to the world. Also we think your artwork would stand up very well against anything else on the website currently.

And some of your pieces were made for this medium.

Do it!!!!!

Love YD and ED XXXOOOXXX

Alys responded:

So, I’m pretty excited for you after reviewing this site, checking out some of the press and following them on Facebook…………….

She went on to give an impressive breakdown of the companies background and the legalities involved in being a designer for them.

With such thorough researchers and information like this who would not hit the ‘sign me up button’ and throw themselves in boots and all?

I was really impressed by the fact that the company stated they treat everyone involved in the process equally. Items are made in Pakistan and the workers have access to literacy and numeracy programmes as part of their jobs.

This morning I received a note from Vida with a $15 discount code attached which can be used by anybody purchasing anything from my collection, from now until the 12th of February.

I was keen to buy a ‘Small Things’ tote bag, a great way of advertising my work I thought, plus I still like that painting even though it is now three years old.

There’s no perks being a ‘contributing artist’ to Vida, in fact one is invited to spend up to $US250 purchasing samples of ones own work to show potential customers when touting ones wares….

Any how, I went through the check out process, obtained my $15 discount from my $60 tote and it all went rather swimmingly until I hit the shipping bit. $US50!! But, that’s more than my purchase!! That is ridiculous!!

In short – I can’t afford to buy my own stuff 🙂

C’est la vie!!

Below is an example of my Inky Doodles ‘Summer Garden’ transformed into a simple top.

Update 16th February 2017

After working with ShopVida for just two weeks I decided to delete and close my collection with them. Nothing that was stated as the support given to their artists was forth-coming. Help was not forth-coming even when asked for. The demands made on my time became ludicrous and there were multiple and contradictory emails sent to me by several different people, none of whom seemed to know what the other had said or done.

The final straw was broken when I received an email that stated that even though they did not have a high resolution file (they did) for an item that had been sold, if I did not supply one withing 48 hours the item would be made up and sent to the customer ‘so they would not have to wait any longer for your lovely art work.’

I blew my top and sent an email listing all the questions I had previously asked, all the assistance I had previously requested and ended by saying

If you got this far, my thanks for reading. I’d like to think the three items that have been sold can be sent to the people who purchased them as high quality products, otherwise I would hope you would refund them their money. And then I would like to remove my work from your site.

The reply to that email contained an apology: yes they had the files; an excuse: he had been sick and omitted to tell any one he had the files and a cajoling plea not to leave

We definitely value you and will work on to provide better support since we don’t want lose a talented and valuable artist as your self. Please let me know what I can do to alleviate your frustrations with the company that I caused and I’ll do my best to work it out.

I momentarily felt sorry for him, the poor bloke had been told to fall on his sword!

But, as I had, on several occasions, stated what I required from them to feel supported and reiterated it in the email to which he was responding, I didn’t feel like going through it all again and never replied. I deleted all my designs from the collection except for the three that had sold. And those will be deleted as soon as the orders are filled.

There’s more, the incompetencies continued even after that, but I won’t bore you with the details.

So that was an interesting little sojourn into a modern pyramid selling scheme, one where the artist gets to figure it all out by themselves, do all the work required in uploading their art, placing it on the ‘designer clothing’ advertise the company, market their own products, purchase their own samples and respond immediately to every demand the production team make of them. All this, while (I imagine) the entrepreneurial folk swan about in their airy and bright offices spending all their time searching Google on their iphones and ipads for uplifting and inspiring quotes, writing wonderful treatises on how the company values and supports their contributing artists and makers and having excited and voluble conversations about how they are changing the world over long and tastily trendy lunches paid for out of the gross income earned by the hard work of the artists and makers.

My plea – don’t buy from ShopVida or believe any of their beautifully worded and presented ethos. In my experience there is not a word of truth in it.

Gah!! I should have known better! My work will continue to sit in the little shop on my blog if you ever want to own any of it. Otherwise I will do as I have always done – make for the pleasure of making, tell you about it and give it away when I think it might bring a bit of light to someones life.

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Yupo Fun and ‘Believe’

Posted on January 27, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

Wow, lookit me go! It’s still January and here’s another post! I hope it won’t be too much of a shock for you.

I’ve been pottering, and the silver lining to the no-show summer is (Ta-da!!) the tiny house has now been entirely decluttered. I mean ENTIRELY! There is nothing in this house now that is not useful or beautiful and probably both. The laundry was the last space holding onto ‘someday’ things. The last drawer has been sorted and tidied and there is nothing left to do now but keep it all ticking over nicely. Can you see my halo, isn’t it bright and sparkly ……..

I rocked up to my local stationers a couple of days ago and had them scan all twenty of the pieces in the art journal I worked on for the last three months of 2016. Plus print out copies of all the yupo paper/alcohol ink pages I had made. I’d decided to copy the ink spreads and then doodle so that I have lots of options to play.

Did those last two sentences sound like a foreign language to you? Read on my friend, read on.

Yupo paper isn’t paper, it’s a synthetic, a plastic pretending to be paper. It is therefore classed as a non-porous surface and things can be done to this stuff that can’t be done on paper, no matter how many gsm’s it is.

It’s also, at this end of the world, horribly expensive and something I intend to try only once in this life. Hence the photocopying before doodling remark. I treated myself to fifteen sheets and waved a fond farewell to $25.00.

One of the really fun things we can play with is alcohol inks, dripping drops of different colours onto the page and watching what happens. The ink spreads out and ‘blooms’, changing colour somewhat at the edges, more with some colours than others. Mixing different colours together results in different spreadings, different blooms, and sometimes even no blooms. It’s like taking part in some mysterious class in alchemy and is totally fascinating to observe.

When the dripping and watching and wondering is done and the inks are dry (which doesn’t take long at all provided you don’t over drop in the first place) you doodle. Doodling is also fun! It can be done in front of the TV if you are so inclined, or can just be a quiet, meditative activity that steals hours from your life 🙂

Here’s some examples of the ink drops

Here’s one I have started to doodle on

And here is the only spread that is finished so far.

And here is that last spread cut into four pieces and note cards made using different coloured card and with writing paper inserts. The following two photos taken at the desk, under lamp light, in the middle of a dreary, wet day:

Notecards 1

Notecards 2

I’m not complaining though, we had three lovely sunny, warm days on the trot. It was quite exciting!

I have to say I really like these notecards, and in the interests of encouraging the renewed interest in letter writing, I’m going to package some up and put them in my shop. And do a giveaway. Stay tuned for that.

‘Believe’ is finished.

This is a texture rich piece and there’s also a ton of gold metallic paint in there so it looks entirely different in different lights. This is a slightly skewed scan, which is entirely unexciting as far as mood lighting goes. You must therefore use your imagination to see all the gold glimmery bits. Sorry about that.

I’m quite pleased with this one.

I hope you like it too.

So what do you think, are you tempted to play with yupo paper and alcohol inks? Have you done so already? How did it go for you? And what do you think of those notecards?

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

I Wonder Where Summer Went?

Posted on January 20, 2017 by thecontentedcrafter

She was here for a couple of days earlier in the month, Lady Summer, but seems to have given way to a resurgent and surly Winter who still has something to say.

I used to call the city where I live ‘The Riviera of Antarctica’. I had good reason for doing so, low rainfall in the extremes of the year and high sunshine hours too. Lately though it seems we have been upgraded and now reside as the Capital of Antarctica.

There were, I was told a couple of days ago, four cruise ships coming into harbour to dispel their thousands of well-heeled patrons into our fair city to enjoy a day or two of Southern Hospitality. (Please bear in mind I don’t read the papers or listen to the radio so all my gossipy news is picked up at the dog park, where I loiter around with a mismatch of folk while our pets chase each other round in ever decreasing circles in an attempt to keep warm. So I may get actual facts slightly wrong.) Anyway, they picked the wrong day to arrive. For a ‘Weather Bomb’ also chose this time to put in an appearance.

Apparently old man Winter was really p***ed off about something and he hurled a few icicles our way along with torrential rain and winds that drove the rain horizontally against the landscape. I spent yesterday with the heating on, tucked in a blanket watching the one hundred videos saved to my ‘watch later’ tab on You Tube and pretending I lived in the far north of Canada where I was enjoying a really pleasantly mild winter.

I have no idea what happened to the hundreds of well-heeled tourists, but I imagine they retreated back to their cruise liners and waited patiently to be taken to a more salubrious part of the world. I did hear that one of the ships, an especially large one which sometimes has trouble making port due to time and tides and its immense size, nearly keeled over in the wind, but that might just be an unfounded rumour.

Just bear all this in mind if you ever meet somebody who says they went to New Zealand one summer, had a cold and miserable time and the hurricane level winds almost caused their gigantic ship to capsize. They were probably on that particular liner.

Any way, with all this inclement summer weather I’ve spent a deal of time playing about in the art room and trying to find my painting mojo again.

I made cards. I cleaned up and cleared out THE STASH…. We crafters never throw anything away because it can be used on something, somewhere, one day. I have stuff I’ve kept for ten years or more and, as I’ve cleared out everything else in my tiny house, it’s now time to clear out some of the ‘someday stuff’ that makes up a lot of THE STASH. I figure that if I live to be 100 and make a card every day, I still won’t have used up all the stuff lurking about in that pile of ‘someday I might be just what you are looking for’ stuff. So, I used a ~~lot~~ teeny bit of that stuff on the cards I made, which slowed me down no end and made me realise why I’d never actually used it up before. I’d spend so much time sifting through piles of stuff I’d forget what I wanted it for by the time I found it.

To be honest, I was also prevaricating. Delaying the actual moment when I would start work on an actual canvas……. it’s always so terrifying for me – I wonder if it is so for every other person who paints.

Any -hoo, back to the cards, here’s a selection of cards ready for next Christmas – made using the same embossing folder and different paper remnants, some worked, some didn’t……

The onto the stash scraps and bits and pieces. Small note cards to start

Large greeting cards, all made using my hand made papers and various ‘stash’ items

In between card making I spent some time acting as Chief Consultant and Shopping Assistant to my daughter, the Official Photographer who is doing up her new flat and who had decided she wanted a ‘pinkish’ bedroom.

We made the headboard and used that as the jumping off point for what ever came next. While we were busily attending to the fiddly bits, young Sidd-Arthur was also busy making sure the bed was nice and comfortable for her…… that’s his rear end you are looking at

Furiously digging his way through duvet, sheets and pillows

Thoroughly rumpled and immensely satisfied

Sigh! So funny! Pure gorgeous furriness!

I managed some sketching. The last two while I was keeping warm and indulging in that ‘Watch Later’ channel on You Tube I mentioned earlier

The birds got doodled in when I tired of sketching in wrinkles…..

And finally – I have to tell you – finally, I did some work on canvas…….. it’s not finished yet, but it’s a good start. Oh the relief!!

Unfinished ‘Believe’

So, that’s January up to date. How’s your January going?

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Mandalas and Dream Catchers

Posted on October 18, 2016 by thecontentedcrafter

I’ve been drawing mandalas for many, many years. Once it was a tool that helped focus me and bring me into a quiet and meditative space. Another time mandalas became a way of connecting with and working through my feelings in a troubled time. I kept a book filled with my intricate drawings for years until I felt it was time to let them go as I moved on with life. I thought my time with mandalas was done – I turned instead to doily making, a kind of crochet version of a mandala if you freestyle it and work with form and colour as your heart dictates. A thoroughly satisfying and restful occupation, mainly done during long winter evenings and eventually ending up, not with a book, but a blanket – a more cuddly and useful product formed from many hours of quiet contemplation.

And then recently I fell somehow into the idea of painting little dream catchers – a version filled with doodles and shapes of a repetitive nature emulating the work of a mandala. Here are some I’ve been working on. They are not quite finished yet…….

Then my journal page got a workout with this

I thought I was painting a mandala – which goes to show you never quite know when you pick up some colours where you might end up ………

The process, if you are interested, was to lay down a mixture of colours over the entire double page spread. You see them now just as the background of the mandala. Then I used a circle template to pencil in three circles, the rest is done freehand. The mandala grew from the centre outwards, with lines and doodles and black, white and gold pens. When the sixth ring was completed the remaining page was painted black. When the black paint was dry I continued drawing and doodling the pointy outer shapes and finally the ribbons and feathers – at which point I realised my mandala had become a dream catcher. I felt the black was too heavy so finally I made lots of squiggly marks all over using a white gel pen.

And here are some details of the piece –

So, even though it’s not quite a mandala and not quite a dream catcher, it was a lot of fun to make! And it might make nice prints – what do you think?

Finally, for his fans – here is Siddy this morning. Patiently waiting for Orlando to wake up and accept the toy that is being offered so they can play.

He did wake up and Siddy did his happy dance, but Orlando didn’t want to play – again……. (sigh)……….

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Has Commercial Christmas Started at Your Place Too?

Posted on October 11, 2016 by thecontentedcrafter

My birthday, as I keep telling you, falls at the beginning of September. A few days later I went into the city – somewhere I avoid normally – and was truly totally amazed to see every store had put out the first of their Christmas decorations and assorted stuff. September!! I thought it all arriving en-masse near the end of October was bad enough – soon we’ll be shopping for festivals and holidays all year round. Are you like me and think this is ever so slightly crazy?

I did wonder if it is just here, where we do not really celebrate Halloween or have Thanksgiving as national pastimes like, for instance, our American friends. Our national holidays are fairly low key and not hugely commercial affairs, so have the corporations decided that, lacking these other two major fiscal opportunities, to make the time of ‘Peace on Earth and Goodwill to All Men’ a spectacular four month long spending spree? Or am I being just a tad cynical in my old age? Maybe you like it! So come on down and share with us – when do you think Christmas should appear in the shops?

So having done my anti-establishment rant about the commercialisation of holidays, I will now jump on the band wagon. That’s the irony of life isn’t it! For there is, purely coincidentally, good news for any of you who were pondering on items in my ‘Contented Crafter’s Gift Shop‘ and maybe put off by the exorbitant additional cost of shipping. For just a short time – unknown exactly how long as yet – postage on any item, to any place, anywhere, is free! And, as just complained about by my good self, in time for the major gift giving season too. Whoot-whoot!! Ah well, if you can’t beat ’em you may as well join ’em as someone famous once surely said!

There are also, of course, pages from the art journal to be shared. I’m beginning to work up so many ideas for proper paintings I don’t know where to start:

There’s this one based on an event from many years ago when my life was in crisis

There’s this one, just playing around with texture and colour

Or this one, where my latest addiction to gold paint and decorative tapes is indulged

And here, where I am just starting to play around with ideas for a proper painting

It’s an eclectic mix isn’t it! Any thoughts? I’d like to find time to make some more bracelets, my wrists feel they are in need of some decorative touches………

Thanks for coming by today, I love that you did!

Back to Work!

Posted on September 30, 2016 by thecontentedcrafter

Hello there blogging friends!

It’s spring here at last and the sap is finally rising. The daffodils are smiling, the blossom is blossoming and the birds are singing enthusiastically by 5 am every morning. It’s just wonderful!

Another short break has ensued from posting here while I had my two week long birthday festival, followed by a mild case of flu, followed by a back that got put out by all the festivities, followed by trying to catch up with everything that had got away on me. All is well again now and we are good to go as we cruise towards summer.

Of course I kept on making stuff all this time – several light catchers got sent off for example – and not a one of them photographed before doing so……. Sigh!!

Miles of decorative tape got made – such an excellent activity when you only have energy to plop yourself onto the sofa and keep yourself amused with doodles and colour – a few cards got put together with said decorative tape and a few note books and journals found themselves titivated up as well. Serious painting duties have now resumed.

Decorative Tapes are made by laying down strips of masking tape onto plastic cutting boards, the kind that you buy from the $2 shop, and painting them or doodling them start to finish. The centre one in the photo below is all doodles, the other two are painted and when dry I used gold paint through stencils. The one on the right has additional doodles. Loads of fun!

Some books got covered with other decorative tapes:
Notebooks

The back and front covers of another notebook:

A journal cover for the official photographer – who incidentally took none of these photos – but that’s okay as I’m not that enthralled with the quality of cover that she received!

Little thank you cards were made from paper painted with left over paint from other activities that piles up until I feel I want to do something with them – these ones were dabbed with paint on a small round dauber I was using at the time:

Storage for little thank you cards made from an empty packet of washing machine powder covered with paper and edged with decorative tape

A journal page almost completed, edged with more decorative tape:

And I’ll leave you today with a small peek at an amazing basket of flowers received from Ms Laurie at Life on the Bike and Other Fab Things for my birthday.