Happy Easter!

M for Mallard

The letter "M" is the next one up for the Alpha Challenge at The Craft Barn. Actually we had to pick a word between MA and ME. Since I am running late I thought I would do something easy this time. Well, easy didn't happen but I had a good time.

I found the mallards in an old bird book and tried to make a background similar to the one on the page I cut them from. I took a sheet of white tissue paper and stamped it with my Tim Holtz Distress Ink pads. I used several colors and then spritzed water on it so the color would spread and blend together.

Here are my leftovers. I forgot to take a picture before I cut it up.

Then I cut it into tiny pieces and used a gel medium to glue them down on the page. I didn't have any yellow ink so I watered down some acrylic paint and used that on the tissue for the sun. Then I used some of the tissue as is to make the clouds. I bunched it up a little so you could see them because they were so light. I forgot to mention that I mixed some light blue paint and gesso to cover the dictionary page.

I like how the distress ink made such pretty colors on the tissue!

Thanks for visiting and thank you to The Craft Barn for adding my "H" page to the 

Wall of Fame!

Sugar Blocks

I'm just getting caught up with my blocks for the Sugar Block Club which was created by Amy Gibson at Stitchery Dickory Dock. Amy is using these gorgeous FreeSpirit solid color fabrics from Westminster Fibers. My sister bought me a stack for my birthday which is not till May but we wanted to use these for our blocks. They are so pretty they make me happy to look at them.

This is the January block.

February

My seam ripper saw a lot of action on this baby. Trying to match those points and seams made me nuts. I had to stop at "close enough" before I ended up tearing the fabric.

March

The fabric didn't come in till February so I got a late start. With the March block Amy announced a giveaway that we could enter if all three blocks were done. That was enough to get me moving. 

I'm happy to work with these bright colors since the sun rarely shines anymore. I really miss it!

H for Housekeeper

 "H" is the current letter in the Alpha Challenge hosted by The Craft Barn. I read all the "H" words twice before I saw "Housekeeper" and thought of my stash of Good Housekeeping magazines from the 50s.

They have the best advertisements in those magazines! I left the bottom of this first ad in tact and cut around the top and glued her in my dictionary. That was after some gesso and yellow acrylic paint. Then I added lots of bubbles or "suds" to help her promote her product.

This lovely housekeeper was part of a starch advertisement but I sat her on a new and improved General Electric iron instead.

She is probably a definition #2 kind of housekeeper.

I showed this to my mother and she said she liked to wear house dresses in the 50s but she said she never looked like that!

Check out the other creative entries here.

Have fun creating!!

Alpha Challenge Letter E

I'm working on the Alpha Challenge at The Craft Barn. The challenge is to alter an old dictionary one letter at a time but it does not go in alphabetical order. The current challenge is the letter "E".  I chose the word "Embroider."

It was a good idea in my mind but it was harder to do than I thought it would be. I had to limit myself to the running stitch so I wouldn't tear the paper. I did a little stem stitch too but then decided to keep it simple. The flower is my go-to doodle.

It needed more color so I added some chalk. Oh, I did double the page so it would be harder to tear.
Then I put a little ink on the page edges and a running stitch around the border.

I won't be doing any more stitching in this book but I am glad I tried it and completed it without tearing the page.  There are lots of beautiful creations with the letter "E" so check them out here.

Have a great weekend!

Happy Valentine's Day!!

For Love of "Cake"

I've had a hard time getting started creatively this year. I wasn't sure what I wanted to work on besides sewing. I signed up for two Block of the Month classes. Like I needed two! I am also taking some Craftsy classes to get me back into making clothes. But I needed something related to paper. I love cutting and gluing too much !  I stumbled upon this Alpha Challenge at The Craft Barn and I knew right away it would be fun for me to work on this year.

We're making an altered dictionary and I had the perfect tattered dictionary for the project. Since it is already a wreck I don't mind working in it.

Every two weeks a new challenge will be posted. They started with the letter "V" but I came in late so I started with last week's letter, "C." They are not going in alphabetical order so you can't go ahead of everyone.

I looked through the Cs and saw the word "cake" which is my favorite food so it was the perfect place to start.

I gessoed over the page but left the "cake" definition uncovered. It is split between the two columns. I covered that with some thin acrylic paint and then cut out some vintage pictures of cake. The woman is also from a vintage magazine.

I also added some little pieces of the index from an old cookbook where all the cakes were listed.

Don't you feel like having a slice now?  Great! I'll join you!

Here is the letter "C" challenge  if you would like to join in or to see what everyone else created. Don't worry if you don't have a dictionary you can alter. There are other ways to do the Alpha Challenge.

Now I need to do the letter "V" so I'll be caught up with everyone.