MajorTiggerScraps

Newest additions....

2012-01-14T14:17:00.002-05:00

I decided to take a break this weekend from my closet building. I've decided to remodel the bedroom closet and I've been cutting, drilling, sanding and painting every day this week. I'm taking a weekend off. lol

With a completely clean table in the craft room (which is where I've been laying the wood for painting) I decided to do some book pages in one of my altered books. I played with a LOT of stuff.

One of the things that I ordered recently came wrapped in a newspaper page that had these crocuses pictured. Perfect for a day when it has been snowing since 4 am. Yes.... I know this first hand. I ran out of melatonin two days ago. :(

This next one was just painting a lot of things in white that I consider prettier than all of this snow we're getting. Just simple outlining and shading with white paint and stencils.

This one started as an exercise in resist painting. I did the right hand side by first stenciling some gears with Perfect Medium, then heat embossing with UTEE. Then I layered some turquoise paint, waited for it to dry, then wiped off the embossed area with a baby wipe. Then I did the embossing thing again and painted with the yellow. Baby wipe. Then embossed, painted and baby wiped with the white.

On the left hand side of the page I did because of something in one of my Somerset Studio mags that they did with pictures from fashion magazines. Well, I haven't got any fashion magazines.... but I do have some old pattern books. The most interesting part about this is that I didn't consciously look for a dress pattern that matched the colors. I only had in mind one that the pic wasn't overlapped with another model. The mind works in mysterious ways.....

I traced and cut out copies of the model, one in cardstock and two out of discarded book pages. I sort of stenciled some black outlines, then glued down the book paper models, then the actual pic from the pattern book.

Then I used the cardstock version to trace and stencil on this page. I smeared a heavy coat of Perfect Medium (from the re-inker bottle), then put down a heavy coating of UTEE, heated it up, then painted around it in black and then did a bunch of stenciling around the empty space.

That's it for today. After cooking breakfast, doing the dishes, shoveling the driveway (EW), sanding two boards and then starting laundry.... I think after this post I deserve a hot coffee, a chocolate bar and a blanket. ;)

Stay warm!

Happy New Year

2012-01-01T15:45:00.004-05:00

Yeah....I'm a bad blogger. But I have been making stuff.

My best friend Amberlee got me a fabulous Christmas present. A hat shaper ! Follow the link to see what a hat shaper is and then buy one!!! I have no affiliation....just a very happy customer!

I should start by saying that I have never made a hat before. And I don't know any of the "proper" methods for making a hat. I know how to glue, I know how to sew, I know fabric and I know paper.

I'm going from there. lol

I made a quick layout to show you the bowler/derby hat I made using frayed denim scraps and Mod Podge. It's a very stiff hat. In order to attach the fabric under the brim (which is also part of the lining) I had to use a tiny hole punch all the way around the brim so I could do the blanket edge stitching. It took some time but it came out just the way I wanted. And that is what matters.

For the Mod Podging of the scraps to make the basic body of the hat I covered the hat shaper form with plastic warp to protect the form. I didn't want to take the chance of permanently gluing the fabric to the form. I want to make lots of hats.

The next hat I'm working on is using buckram, concentrated liquid starch and stretchy fleece that my daughter picked out. She wants her hat to be orange and fuzzy. lol I'm sewing this one for most of the construction after I make the sturdy underlayment from the buckram. That'll be another post.

So here is my new hat:

Not bad for a first hat. I've got two more hat shapers coming to me. One is a fedora. I think I'll use my Valentine's day novelty fabric for that one.... Or maybe the natural colored felt...

So many wild possibilities!

Self portrait...

2011-10-06T10:16:00.003-04:00

OK well...sort of. lol

This was just a little more practice drawing. I was sitting where there wasn't anything interesting around me to draw so I started drawing my left thumb. Then I thought I'd draw my right finger and thumb turning the page of the book.

Just a little bit of cool looking silliness. And as close to a self portrait I'll ever get.

Next...

2011-10-03T23:42:00.006-04:00

Acrylic paints: Light turquoise, Medium turquoise, dark turquoise, dark turquoise shimmer paint

Acrylic gesso, white

screening(small piece), sequin waste

baby wipes

Liquitex matte varnish

Here's the Roman page from yesterday. I started by varnishing the pencil sketch so it wouldn't smear. That dried fairly quickly.

I gessoed the facing page and then painted it. I did a swoosh of very light turquoise over the gesso. Then I used a baby wipe to smear it a bit. Then I did a swoosh of medium turquoise and smeared that with the same baby wipe. Then I swooshed (technical, eh?) the yellow and baby wiped that with the same wipe. Then a few blotches of the darkest turquoise and baby wiped that. The baby wipe is fairly saturated with different paint colors at this point and is still wet. I smeared the residual paint onto the sealed pencil sketch. It looks kind of like sky now. Cool.

Now back to the painted page.

I took some screening and some sequin waste to use as stencils.

I took the screening first, blotted some dark shimmery turquoise on it and then applied the wet screening onto spots on the page. I did this a few times. Then I wiped off the screen and did the same thing with the gesso.

Then I did a couple of spots the same way with the sequin waste and the gesso.

I finished it off with some Liquitex matte varnish. I'm trying to see what will work the best to keep the pages from sticking together.

I also discovered something else really nice. If you do the gesso and the paint layers first, THEN glue your pages together the page doesn't hardly wrinkle at all. It's nice and flat and straight.

I think this book is going to turn out to be one of my best.

Monday sketching....

2011-10-03T11:40:00.004-04:00

Well, I did these yesterday but I was too tired last night to post them so here they are today.

I was at the library yesterday waiting for DD's class to finish and decided to do some drawings from a book. I picked a book on medieval architecture and did the arch on the right.

I did the Roman building on the left from a teeny, tiny photo from a magazine article that was talking about concrete mixes that date back to ancient Rome.

So I guess I did alright for not having picked up my pencils for quite a long time. I still have it in me. Nice to know.

Failbook Volcano Day

2011-09-26T12:28:00.000-04:00

I wonder...what sort of person runs a company with total disregard to the satisfaction of its customers? Probably the sort of person who hasn't been told 'NO' for a very long time.

And one who never learned that just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean you SHOULD do it.

Failbook Jumps the Shark

2011-09-24T12:18:00.000-04:00

This is the one that started all of the recent artwork here mocking Facebook. My darling husband with his bizarre sense of humor said something to me the other night that made this image pop into my head.

Failbook Hindenburg

2011-09-23T12:10:00.000-04:00

There is no other site more deserving of mocking than Facebook right now. Their constant unannounced, unwanted changes are going to backfire on them. There is only so far that people are willing to be pushed before they walk away. I am walking away.

There is nothing that is so important that you can't walk away when abuse begins. Women walk away from abusive relationships every day and they are always the better for it. Walking away from Facebook isn't even near that scale of life and death but when the Facebook 'developers' started to abuse the users of Facebook with these random changes, that's when the spark happened that is going to cause Facebook to go up, or rather down, in flames.

And I made some mocking artwork using historical disasters to amuse myself. I hope you find it amusing as well.

Failbook Titanic

2011-09-22T11:59:00.004-04:00

Is anyone else as disgusted with Facebook as I am? I am supremely glad that I never depended on their functionality for any business purposes.

Facebook is a sinking ship. And judging by the articles and posts complaining about the constant worthless changes that are being made, I am not anywhere near being the only one who hates Facebook now.

I tried to post this on my Facebook page. And it shows up on my page, but not in the news feed that will show all of my friends what I made. So Facebook now decides what is important to be on my (and everyone else's) feed by popularity while stripping out the option for chronological sorting.

Google+ here I come! Even in beta testing it's better than Failbook! It almost seems as if Google is listening to the complaints of Facebook users and including all of the things that have been removed from Facebook. You know, all of the things that we complain to Facebook about only to be completely ignored? Yeah, all of that stuff is back and in Google+.

If you get an invite to try Google+ I highly recommend that you try it. I'm a total dummy with new things and this took me about 45 minutes to get the hang of it.

My new shelves!

2011-09-15T23:16:00.000-04:00

I needed a shelf for my kitchen window above the sink. I bought the wood and everything. Sometimes I can be a bit thick. I've had this little bench for quite a long time and had never measured to see if it would fit over the sink. Sure enough it fits. Which means I have a lovely pine board to add to my wall shelving up in the craft room. COOL!

So here is the before pic:

Ordinary. Blah. So I grabbed one of my throwaway paperback books and started gluing paper. That took me about three days. It was worth it.

Then I varnished it with Liquitex Matte Varnish. LOVE that stuff! Nice finish. Not at all sticky. I think my herb pots will like it there. I think I'll start with the chives, the stevia, and maybe a small pot of green onions.

And they'll grow nicely right here in the south facing kitchen window. Like my box of Hungarian peppers? They're mighty hot!! And fabulous with my fresh tomatoes when I make my salsa. Yummy!

And my sink is even clean for the picture! How cool is that?

Colors!!

2011-09-13T22:55:00.004-04:00

This didn't start out with Vincent Van Gogh in mind....but he fits very nicely there.

I think I might add a few more darker colors in here. A bit too pink for now.

And I'm not very sure of those two little arrows. But I'll live with it for a bit and see what might come to me later. I do love my tatted lace frame there surrounding Romeo and Juliet.

And after working on a purple Rapunzel dress for my daughter I found myself in an irreversibly PURPLE mood. I just couldn't help myself. Random stenciled letters, an old nudie photo (naughty bits gessoed over), and a roman style statue. I'm quite pleased with this.

Different sort of art today....

2011-09-12T12:54:00.000-04:00

This isn't your normal sort of art but it still looks good enough to eat. And it was quite yummy. This is my way of having a hamburger without the bread.

I can hardly wait to do this again. Tasty with no tummy ache. You just can't beat that.

Giggles.....

2011-09-06T12:28:00.005-04:00

I think that this just might end up as a really big art piece for my living room. All of these photos that I am altering are turning out really nicely!!

Ordinarily these would be reject type of pictures because of the backgrounds. The people look really nice but then you see the print and say "yuck!" to the background. Or the Pepsi bottle on the table and the candy wrappers on the floor (Christmas morning) or the great picture of my daughter and me at her first baseball game with the really cranky guy in the background of every picture. How can someone be that cranky through an entire ball game that our team won?

But this sanding and painting technique is great for getting rid of all of that. I'd show the before on the baseball game pic but I don't know the guy and you can see him too clearly and I haven't got permission to publish his face so.....

....of course I guess I could show a before with his face obscured so you can see how prominent he was in EVERY SINGLE PICTURE. lol

See that big blurry spot by my face? Yeah, crabby guy. The whole game. You gotta wonder how bad life must be for some people when they can't even enjoy the home team winning. Sure it was a super cold night but....we won the game! lol

Anyway, this is great for getting rid of messy living rooms on Christmas morning too:

See all of that painted space? The Christmas morning carnage is now hidden and ready for art making. This is so much fun! I can't wait to see how this turns out!

This was seriously fun!

2011-09-01T13:29:00.003-04:00

Once again I am short on inspiration so I have delved into my seemingly endless stack of Somerset Studio back issues. One article I keep coming back to is one about altering photos by sanding away the background on a photograph and then painting the sanded parts with splooshes of paint.

My late dog Kodi had these magnificent blue eyes. Some days they'd look like a really deep blue and other days they'd look like ice with a hint of the sky reflected. So the three shades of blue were natural for the background.

HERE'S HOW:
I just dipped my finger in the acrylic paint and smudged the paint around until it looked good. I did the medium shade first, then the lightest shade, then the darkest, then I used the medium shade to smudge the dark shade a little bit. Then I took one of my large embossing stylus' and dipped it into some gesso and made the white dots.

There's no particular reason for using the gesso except for my laziness. My paint container is currently buried under a mountain of paper and my gesso was within arm's reach. See? Lazy. lol

I did the white dots just because I thought there needed to be a pattern. Then my friend Amberlee said it looked like snow. Yeah, she's right. I must have been remembering way back in the forgotten recesses of my brain how much Kodi loved the snow. Naturally, he was a Siberian Husky. But towards the last four years of his life he did give the mountains of snow in the back yard some mighty evil looks. I think he was just thinking "I'm getting too old for this".

So don't be afraid!! If you have a photo where the subject looks good but the background looks crappy..... give it a try! Sand off that background (very fine grit sand paper) and paint a background that looks WAY cooler than what you started with. I started with a patio that had weeds between every block. Yucky! Now it looks ready for an altered book page.

And I think I know which one. GRIN

Doing a bit of digital drawing

2011-08-31T10:10:00.002-04:00

I was in a bit of a mood for this calendar layout. Drifting between anger and apathy all day. But no matter the emotions I still love the red and gray together. So being in such a weird funk and having the deadline of August being almost over I needed some inspiration from other artists. So I used some of my scrapbooking stash that I've accumulated on my computer over the last couple of years. Now.... of course that was AFTER I had to walk away from my computer for a couple of hours because I had been sitting....STARING at the screen without a single idea for almost three hours yesterday. LOL

DD wanted to watch cartoons with her grandma so I decided to grab a random holder full of art magazines (Somerset Studio) and I went down to watch X-men. She really loves Wolverine.

While thumbing through my back issues I came upon one that was devoted entirely to black and white. That got me thinking of using a nontraditional photo for my layout. So I started to draw from a picture of DH and DD when we were sitting in the stands at the demolition derby at the fair two weeks ago. I had intended to do the whole black and white theme until I found an entire folder on my computer of red and black themed kits.

Crumpled and torn paper, old jean pocket, stuff that goes INTO the pocket...lol. And a really cool butterfly. This turned out well even if the only original artwork of mine is the drawing. Sometimes we all need to work with other people's ideas in order to stimulate our own creativity.

I'm going off now to sand the backgrounds away from some photos and do some doodles around a main subject or two.

Enjoy your day!!

Key: Gunhild Storeide, Boxed Words: Chantal Taake, Magnifying glass: Secondhandangel.wordpress.com, Deco butterfly: LK Designs/Sophisticated Scraps,
Gray crumpled background by DigiScraps(kit Amore), Black hand print, gray jeans pocket, and red torn edge paper by http://latetedanslescrap.wordpress.com, Flower clip and dangling beads by Scraparoni by Toni (kit Metro Retro),

Playing again

2011-08-26T23:25:00.000-04:00

This page was fun once I got the template right for the torn circles. I made a template that has the larger torn circle around the smaller one with a gray filler spot in between. Now I can do this kind of frame using any of my papers.

I made the torn circle quite awhile ago and didn't know what I wanted to do with it. This came out kinda nice.

My latest page....

2011-08-24T23:15:00.000-04:00

I haven't picked up my book that I am altering for quite some time. I did a couple of pages in June and then I got distracted again. This one started off as a little drawing practice. I have a stack of landscape flash cards and there was one of a snow peaked mountain. So I did my sketch and colored it in. Then did the coloring for the stone window frame. And then after DD went to bed I decided to watch some Dr Who and the episode I picked was the one where they landed in Pompeii on volcano day. That's what was missing! So in the reflection I turned the mountain into a volcano to show what that mountain probably was not so long ago.

There's still more that I want to do with it but I'm not sure what yet. I'm sure it'll come to me.

A bit of a self confidence boost...

2011-08-22T22:47:00.000-04:00

I have been on a diet for quite some time. But then, haven't we all? I got down to one weight and I have been stuck at it for a long time. About 6 months without budging. And lately I have wondered if this is the size I am meant to be. I am not drastically overweight. If I told you my weight you might gasp but I am just a couple of inches shy of 6 ft tall. And I used to deliver auto parts which gave me a lot of muscle mass. When I swim in the summer I slim down two sizes in about a month but my weight doesn't change. We've calibrated our scale against the one at the doctor's office and it's reading right. And the doctor is somewhat stunned that my cholesterol (LDL) went down 210 points just with diet alone. lol

So all of this got me thinking. Why am I doing all of this? I have a healthy diet now. I have gotten rid of the wheat products that have been hurting me for so many years. I eat good meats, seafood and lots of veggies. Get this, I even like green beans now. Go figure! I've hated them all of my life but now that all of the sugars are gone from my diet I actually like green beans. I actually have to make lots extra or DH and I end up in a tug of war over the last of the green beans. lol

Anyway, the only reason now for me to be on a diet is to maintain what I have. If I try really hard to lose anymore I get weak and I think it's from muscle loss and I don't want to lose muscle.

I am never going to be the size I was when I was 19. I'm headed to my late 40's now and trying to reach anything that I had when I was 19 is completely unrealistic.

So I sat down and decided that I like me just the way that I am. And I am not going to continue to make myself miserable trying to reach a goal that someone else thinks I should reach. The doctor thinks I should weigh 120 pounds. I don't think so. I really would be scrawny and anorexic looking considering my height. And getting there would make everyone around me miserable. And it would make me miserable. I didn't spend 6 years of my life building and toning muscles just so I could diet them all away when I got old. Now is when I need those muscles the most, right?

So how do you like my "I Like Me" layout? I thought it says exactly what I wanted to say about me. And that is my most recent skinny pic of me in the red top and jeans. I think I'll stay right here and be a happy mommy for my little girl. And we'll just follow our main food rule from now on. Eat when you're hungry, Stop when you're full.

Just too funny....

2011-08-20T22:46:00.000-04:00

I wish I could find the rhyme or reason behind why blogger posts pictures in any order it wants to. I had them selected for upload in the order that I wanted them to be on the page. I could understand if it was in reverse order but they were totally scrambled when I finished the upload. The first one was third and the last one was first.....eesh!

Anyway... this one I was in something of an abstract mood. And blue. I made this one near my late dog's birthday so I matched his eye color for the blue. Yeah.... I still miss him.

Again I used templates and stencils to make the white space on the page. It can be for pictures or for writing or for doodling....whatever. Then there is the white parchment between each painted page.

I'm having a lot of fun with these old board books. Especially since I gave up trying to peel the old surface off of them and just started sanding and gessoing the critters. Much easier to do and much faster!

The parchment between each board page came about as I discovered that even flat acrylic paint will stick the pages together. Darn it! So I added some fancy edged parchment that I had sitting in a box, all lonely and unused, practically crying out "use me!" It's all used up now. All I have left are the envelopes. I'm sure another project will come to me for the envelopes. lol

And rather than post every single page of the book I'll just cut to my favorite two pages.

I think I might have to do a bit of digital scrapping for the other books I have to show off. Blogger's picture scrambling is a bit annoying and I spend half of my time re-arranging the photos. And honestly, the pictures are the main thing and you want them in order with their descriptions, right? lol

Still doing digital, too

2011-08-18T22:14:00.000-04:00

The last desktop calender that I did for DH's computer was in January! And it stayed there until I got motivated enough to do one for August. I used a combination of things from my kits and some things from Malacima's Altered Art kit. When I am stuck for ideas her kit gives me the push I need to get going again. I love it. She has many new things on her blog while I've been away and she is as good as ever.

Now, as far as this layout the background paper/fabric is mine, the vellum is mine and the button flower cluster is mine. The antique cards, the blank journal, the black ribbon, the newspaper stem and leaves and the frame stamp(around the photo) is Malacima's.

The journal was blank when I started. I extracted the blank page and did some digital paint splattering to it. Then I put the August calender over the colors. Then I played with the merged image of the journal page. I have a script that comes with PaintShopPro that is called Watercolor. It makes a really neat effect that looks like watercolor paint that has spread across the paper. It kind of looks like it dissolved some of the black ink of the calender numbers. Which is what would happen if you did this with real paints over freshly printed material. Cool.

Anyway, September is coming up and I have to go make a new calender for DH so he doesn't have to wait for another 6 months again. lol

I've been off playing with paper.....

2011-08-17T00:16:00.003-04:00

Is it just me or has this year just been sort of *blah* creatively speaking. I have had the WORST trouble with finishing stuff. I get a super idea, start it, get half way through and then the idea just completely abandons me.

I just hate it when that happens.

Recently I bought a little binding machine to see if I like it and I do. I found it as a close out at a local store. It used to sell for $80 and I got it for $20. Not as good as free but it'll do.

I have to admit that not having to worry about how I'll assemble the binding on a book gives me a lot more creative room in my brain.

Here is one of the cute little books that I did when I was in a very colorful mood.

I used one of DD's old board books as my base. Gessoed the heck out of it and then started painting. Then I found my puzzle piece templates and traced the pieces on the painted pages. DD still has one of those giant floor puzzles so I traced a couple of the edge pieces to make into pages. I kinda like the way it turned out.

Here is the front cover. I've been doing some of that tangle doodling and thought I'd try doing a bit of it with paints and wild colors.

Here it is standing up. I added some white pages for journaling space. I think I like it.

It turned out very well. It's colorful, it's small, it has space to write in and it makes me smile.

I could get used to some of this paper stuff again.

New Store is Open!

2010-10-11T00:01:00.004-04:00

I'm starting off with putting up some of the things for sale that were very popular in the past while I bundle up all of the new stuff. I'll really be rolling when I get back from visiting my Grandma. It's October again and my grandma will be 91 next week. WOW! She has seen some history and I write down more of it every year that I visit her.

Anyway, here is the link to my store blog,

This blog here (MajorTiggerScraps) is going to be purely a personal blog with just chit chat and layouts from here on.

Go check out the store and tell me what you think. I'm starting slow and we'll just see where this road leads.

Something's Coming....

2010-09-16T12:30:00.003-04:00

I am making plans for a shop. I have to call it something other than MajorTiggerScraps for obvious copyright and trademark reasons. So I'm going to call it, NightOwlScraps. I also have to change my profile name to Night Owl so that the Tigger name doesn't appear on anything that will be in or attached to the store.

I'll be doing all of my freebies and sales from that site when the time comes.

Stay tuned!

Extraction Tutorial (sort of)

2010-07-31T23:38:00.003-04:00

I really ought to find a tutorial on how to do a tutorial. LOL

The best way I've found to do a really fabulous extraction is to use the freehand select tool. I use PaintShopPro so I don't know what the tool is called in Photoshop.

It's a simple procedure though it does take some patience. I draw around the parts that I want to get rid of and then invert the selection, copy the image that I want and then paste it as a new image or into another workspace that I've got open.

If you are using a mouse with your computer you'll be zooming in very close when you draw your selection. Even with a Wacom pen I still zoom in for the cleanest edges on my extraction.

I hope this how-to will be helpful. Leave a comment if you need any help or if something isn't clear.

Gardening is Exhausting! Part 2

2010-06-07T23:21:00.003-04:00

Well it seems that whenever you make plans about what you want in a garden life conspires to turn everything upside down.

The lily bulbs will have to wait until the fall since I got everything ready just a week late to buy the bulbs I wanted. That's ok though. I'll do all of the bulbs at once and that part will be done.

The center of the garden has changed unexpectedly too. I found a rose. Rather, I should say that it found me. I was walking into my grocery store when I smelled this amazing rose from several feet away. I followed the scent and it was a hybrid tea called "Oklahoma". I put it in my mental file for future reference but a week later it was still there and I just had to have it. So it is now the centerpiece of this part of the front garden.

Since I still have bulbs to plant I decided that annuals would be the way to go for this season. I finally stopped into a nursery that I pass all the time. I was in heaven, I wish my mom could be there with me. Maybe in another month or so. I bought Alyssum, celosia, marigolds and dianthus. I also planted some broccoli seeds and a few are coming up. There is absolutely no rule that says you can't plant veggies with flowers, so there! LOL

We had another tree cut down. Actually it fell down on our fence and we had to have it cut before it totally destroyed it. I have to wonder what it is about people sometimes. When you have a lot with trees, isn't it your responsibility to survey it from time to time and remove the trees that pose a potential hazard? This tree had been leaning for the past two years. It's not like this was a surprise to these people. But since I'd like to live here for the next few decades I'm just going to suck it up and keep in mind that this neighbor is a complete boob about the upkeep of his backyard and I'll keep my tree guy's number on speed dial.

And since I had to have the tree cut and I'll have to pay for my fence I decided that I would keep the wood for my own use. So PHLBBTTT! to that neighbor. LOL

I asked my tree guy if he could cut the larger part of the trunk into disks that I could use for stepping stones in my garden that I was building. He did and for no extra cost. My tree guy is FABULOUS! And my wood stepping stones look wonderful. Very rustic and natural looking. I can't wait for the alyssum to fill in around the disks.

Today was the big planting day. We filled in all of the empty spots with the annuals. Some adjustment had to be made because I discovered today that the broccoli seeds that we planted actually did sprout. They were just a little slow. LOL I can identify with that.

It's beginning to look good. And the best part is....less grass to mow!

Gardening is Exhausting!

2010-04-29T14:47:00.004-04:00

I do seem to be getting a little better at it. I finally got the one flower bed built that I wanted. It's where the big pine tree used to be. Tomorrow I get to go buy some lily bulbs to go in there with all of the hostas I planted. I'm hoping to find a perennial hibiscus or two. I love those. The flowers on the one I had at my old house were the size of dinner plates. Then I need something in the center of the bed. Like one of those trellis pyramid things for a nice vine. Maybe clematis.

Well, I did take pictures of the spot and its progress from tree to flower bed.

So far so good. And I've been able to keep up on the weeds. About every other day does the trick on keeping them out of my flowers. YAY!

You know who these guys are...

2010-03-28T15:09:00.002-04:00

I think I finally got the 'pencil tip' just right in PaintShopPro. I've been working on it for the past few days. Then I figured that since I ended up with four finished drawings of the Beatles I'd make some digital art with my digital drawings. Cool.

Drawing practice

2010-03-28T03:50:00.001-04:00

My daughter from a sleigh ride this winter.

Just so tired of snow....

2010-03-25T23:49:00.002-04:00

I was in dire need of something RED! I picked through some kits and found bits and pieces that I liked. I made the page tabs out of boredom one night. I still don't have the creating bug back. I like the tabs and all but they don't thrill me like my art once did.

It never matters much to an artist if there's any money made. Just expressed appreciation is enough to keep the work going.

I wish I still had it in me. I know it's there because I've made some stuff privately for myself and a few friends. But I still get no joy out of it.

Late at night, like it is now, was when I always had one of those *bang* ideas that would get me furiously working with all of my different digital tools. All of those *what ifs* going through my head until I had a whole set of somethings to share. Zipping the file at 3am when I should have been fast asleep. Excitedly putting together the post while waiting for the file to upload to box.net. And once I hit that *publish post* button the rush that my work was out there to be seen.

But no one ever said hello anymore. No one took the time to say one word anymore. I kept going, kept creating until one post from a woman, anonymous, in Gilbert, Arizona said that she didn't feel that she should say thank you. She felt that just her taking what she wanted should be thanks enough because that shows the appreciation. I guess in the same way that a shoplifter shows their appreciation to the store owner when the store gives away free coffee and donuts. And she comes in to take the whole box. Every day.

I wish I still had it in me, I miss creating and giving away. But it's gone. Stone dead. I really miss that rush I had when I hit that *publish post* button.

Credits: background paper by http://sweetblossomdesigns.blogspot.com/
heart by Designs by Angelica E
puppy by Mamrotka
newspaper branch,lock,key,ticket stub by www.malacima.blogspot.com
spiral journal by NBK Scraps
paper frames, page tabs by Majortiggerscraps

It's Warm!

2010-03-20T21:16:00.003-04:00

Well, warm enough anyway. I can't tell you how glad I am to have all that snow melted and gone. Granted, we may still get more snow but for now, I can see my grass. And even though my grass has mole trails through it already, it's way better than snow.

And I've even got my plants started. I did it way back when we had nearly two feet of snow on the ground. wait...I think that was just last week...

I've got broccoli, onions, tomatoes and one little apple tree all started from seed.

I'm just dying to eat some of that broccoli. I'll keep hoping for a better growing season than last summer. Of course, I'm doing more cold weather stuff, too. Hedging my bets, you know.

A new bird?

2010-02-09T13:10:00.004-05:00

I finally got pictures of this bird!!!

It's a Junco, slate colored with the usual white underbelly. Really adorable little birds. But this one has a white head. A slate Junco with a white head!

It's hard to get a good picture of him because the whole group that he hangs out with is always flying away when I come near the window to look at them. But when I can manage to look at him (before he sees me) I can see that his markings look very much like a parakeet I used to have. And his head shape is just a little different from a Junco. A little like a parakeet in that respect, too.

It'll be interesting to see if any females find him attractive enough to breed with him. We could end up with another set of Juncos.

Finally some pics!

2010-02-02T22:53:00.005-05:00

It's about time, eh?

I've been trying to get some stitching done on my coat and finally I've made some progress. It's really hard to do this on a coat that I need to wear all the time. With all of this global warming I find very little time to be able to stitch and still be able to go out for little luxuries like...food...

The large part in gold is my daughter's name in Chinese. I was looking over some of our adoption paperwork and actually found her original name (the one given to her by the orphanage) written in Chinese script! I scanned in the name, cleaned it up and made a pattern from it. This is one part of three that will be on the back of the coat. I'm doing a sort of couching with the gold thread. Crazy couching I guess you'd call it.

The rest of the borders are combinations of stitches. One of the borders I did the foundation stitches wrong so I had to work around them a little differently than what my book called for. It still came out nice.

Next time I'm hoping for pictures that aren't so blurry. I think I'll have to try one of the macro settings on the camera. Or maybe I'll try taking them BEFORE 1 am. LOL Maybe I was the blurry one!

I have a few tatted pieces that I want to use but I haven't found the right spot for either of them yet. I may have to make something new. I guess I'll be practicing that over the next few days so that I can remind myself on how to read the tatting patterns.

The best part about this coat is that it's WARM! I used a double thickness of polyester quilt batting all over the body of the coat. With that it turned out that I didn't need to do anything with the sleeves except to cover them with the new fabric.

And with that thought I'm going to go off to bed. I'm a half hour earlier than last night so that's progress! I did my back exercises and my ab exercises today and stuck with my diet for the most part.

I think my friend Amberlee is doing better than I am on the diet this time around. It does stink, though, when you lose weight, actually lose fat, in the wintertime. Why, do you ask? Because when you lose fat....you feel colder. Your body fat helps keep you warm. And right now I'm freezing. Time for me to go find a comfy quilt!

This was a better day

2010-01-27T23:05:00.003-05:00

It didn't start out to be a good day. I probably should start by mentioning that DH loves to play WoW. Those of you who are WoW widows know what I'm talking about. He's also an insomniac.

Can you see where this is going?

You see, I'm making an effort to get to bed earlier, get up earlier, get more work done around the house and spend more creative time with DD every day.

DH is a tall guy. He has size 13 feet...you can imagine that the guy has never successfully tip-toed anywhere in his life.

I never know exactly what time it is when he stumbles in to the room...I do know that the usual time that I've been waking up has been about 4:30 am. I don't know if it's the noise of him moving around or the burrito spinning he does with the covers. Let me tell you I think the guy actually defies gravity with that one sometimes.

So today I just said 'to heck with it' and got up....at 5:30 am. Up before the sun. And the birds. And the snow plow....Yeah it's still snowing. Thank goodness for global warming, eh? Ha! I wish!

I've been operating on about 5 hours of sleep but the day was mostly productive. I got DD to work on a lot of worksheets for reading and writing. I called for a repairman to come see if the dishwasher will live. Imaginative low-carb cooking is easier if I don't have to mess around with doing the dishes afterward. It's the one thing I hate the most in my housework routine. My hands hurt even when I put lotion on after having them in the dishwater. *ouch* Dishpan hands in the depths of a bitter cold winter. *ouch* again

I found my boxes of oil pastels today. Gave DD her first lesson using a blending stump. Then I made a background paper out of a map of England. I drew the outline of a gothic arch stencil onto the map and then colored it in. Then I blended everything so it looked shadowy on the map where I visited a castle and an old Benedictine abbey 10 years ago. *sigh* I do hope I can make it back there someday.

I also got a set of inchies scanned in so I can show them off. While setting them up into a layout I got distracted and made a really cool paper. It doesn't go with the inchies at all so that layout is in the *crap I gotta start over* stage. It may go pretty well with a steampunk kit request that I'm working on.

So in the interest of getting the post done I reset them in a plain old background. These inchies are a bit different. Supposedly they're to be done using glass microscope slides. NOPE! I have a phobia regarding glass.

Specifically broken glass. 144 stitches will do that to you.

Anyway, I decided that I'd try using the plastic from all of the packaging from DD's Christmas presents. I had lots of that. LOL

The plastic worked like a charm. I found the foil tape *finally* at the new craft store nearby. They were also clearing out a bunch of Pearl-Ex powders so I'm playing with those a bit, too. I did the bird stamp on the left using the Pearl-Ex colors but it doesn't show up really well in the scan. If you're familiar with the pigments then you know how they shimmer.

I had fun with these little things. I'm going to make more stuff like this. Maybe not so small but definitely the sandwiching part. And DD got a lot of things that came in plastic packaging this year so I have no shortage of materials. LOL

Now it really is time for me to try to get some sleep. Wish me luck.

Mondays....blech!

2010-01-25T16:39:00.001-05:00

It's the sort of day where you just want to hide your head under a blanket all day and sleep.

I love discarded books

2010-01-06T02:00:00.003-05:00

I have two sources for cigar boxes. One store sells them for $3 and the other sells them for $2. I got this huge box for $2. Actually I bought two and covered one with bright colored papers for DD to put her crayons in.

This one I covered with more pages from the Reader's Digest novel. I'm glad of it for two reasons one being that the story that I'm tearing up is absolutely wretched. The timeline of the story jumps between four generations of the same family. Just when you think you might be able to understand what the heck is going on then the timeline switches to another generation. And it isn't even a science fiction story. Just family melodrama. *yuck*

So now I have a terrific box to keep my unfinished board books in. Yes, I know. I just ended that sentence with a preposition. It's 2am. Sue me. LOL

Here's my funky layout showing the before and after of this box. I love it. I hope I find more of these boxes whenever I can manage to get out of the driveway in between snowstorms.

Snowman making

2010-01-05T21:55:00.003-05:00

Our friends from SuperMomScraps came to help us ring in the new year. I made chocolate chip cookies and had them still warm from the oven when we plunked the ice cream on top, drizzled the hot fudge and counted down the seconds until 2010.

I gotta tell you, I'm glad to see the end of 2009. I've had way better years.

But while everyone was here we got snow. Actually we got more snow than any of us ever wanted. But the kids had fun with the first little snow of the weekend.

They played out in the back yard and made snowmen. DD made her very first one and gave it a nose.

Another larger snowman was made there in the yard further back to keep Kodi company. Thanks guys. I miss him a lot and I know you do too.

Wow!

2010-01-05T17:01:00.003-05:00

And I don't mean the online game either! It has been snowing here for four days straight. It hasn't stopped except to catch a breath. We're supposed to continue getting snow for the next six days. And judging by the satellite pics...they just might be right for once.

*sigh*

I'm getting quite a workout shoveling snow, though. Unfortunately we won't be making it to DD's karate class this week.

I had to reschedule my dentist appointment. They called last night to confirm the appointment and I said I had to reschedule it since I don't drive in this kind of snow. My truck needs new tires. I can do without the weight in the back of the truck but with tires that aren't all that great I'm staying in when it snows like this. So the "lady" on the phone was irritated with me saying that I'd need to reschedule. Now mind you, the office is five miles north of us. They're getting the exact same snow that we are. I just know that this isn't the same lady who usually calls to confirm appointments. The usual lady is nice.

So it makes me wonder just exactly what this wench was thinking. I have to bring DD with me since I am a SAHM. Just what level of endangerment to my daughter's safety is OK with her? *sigh* This year the township sent out a notice that rather than raise our taxes they'd be salting the roads a bit less because the price of salt per ton went from around $40 to $65. That's quite a lot of money. I'm personally glad that the township officers are taking some responsibility and telling us ahead of time that in the interest of us citizens keeping our own money they're going to plow a little more and salt a little less. Fine with me. I stocked up with food all summer. I don't have to go out.

Oh well, when I do get to my appointment in two weeks I'll let the doctor know that the attitude was not appreciated. I'll never take my daughter out into dangerous weather and no amount of berating will change my mind. And the lady who normally calls, who is always at the desk when we go in and who just LOVES our DD, will be grateful that we didn't put our girl in danger.

I also suspect that a great many appointments will go unkept this week.

Did I mention that it's still snowing?

*sigh*

Time for me to brag!

2009-12-26T14:52:00.002-05:00

DD decided the other day when she saw me thumbing through my encyclopedia of stitches that she wanted to learn how to stitch. So I started her off with a simple stitch and a simple letter to make up.

All straight lines, capital letter E, and crossstitch. The E is outlined but the rest she had to sort of count, you know, she had to keep track of where to put the needle on the aida.

And she did a marvelous job!

I'm so proud!

I got an award!

2009-12-20T22:59:00.005-05:00

Thanks to Miggins for sending this award to me. This was truly a surprise. It did take me a couple of days to get around to this post. You know...Christmas stuff... LOL

You should go over to her place when you have a minute and check out the scripts she has for PaintShopPro. I love using her scripts for the doodles on my own scrap pages. And I saw that she has a couple that I haven't tried yet. I'm falling behind.

So I guess I need to do the award thing. I have to tell 5 things about myself and then send the award to 5 others. Well, here's the 5 things about me:

And now for five blogs to get the award:

Easy Custom Blogs - my blog would look ordinary and dull without all of the blog beautification tips from Jeanette
Elegant Word Art 2 - In my opinion the finest word artist on the web. Bethany knows words!
Gunhild Storeide- Gunhild doesn't just have freebie elements on her site. She gives art tips, too. And she knows her stuff! I've made some really gorgeous stuff because of her tips.
The Scrappin Cop- I get the greatest little animal templates from here. My favorite so far is the penguin. Buy her commercial use license if you want to make stuff for distribution. One look at her designs and you'll see it's well worth it.
SuperMomScrappin- And the best for last, my friend Amberlee. I would not even be here designing if not for her influence. She got me started in the digital world. I can design individual doodads and papers, but Amberlee can do what I frequently fail at. That's putting together layouts that really POP! She can do so quickly what can take me DAYS to do. She's awesome!

Layout trouble

2009-12-18T23:40:00.001-05:00

Have you ever had a picture that you really wanted to journal exactly what you were thinking when it was taken? A picture where it is very clear in the expression on your face that you want to really kill the person holding the camera?

I have one of those pictures, well two actually, in a layout that I'm working on right now. I can't just leave it out because it's part of a larger project that documents the first year after we adopted our daughter.

The layout is going to be in a bound book but the journaling probably shouldn't be as truthful as I would like for it to be. Or should it?

I wonder if I should print off a copy of the layout, traditional scrapbook type, and put a sticker on the back journaling my exact thoughts at that moment the picture was taken. And then make the book version, um... sanitized.

This is intended to be a history for my daughter. Ultimately it will be a set of books documenting as much as I can for her. I have to tell the truth, but where should I journal it? There's always the chance that a certain person will pick it up and read it.

But the pictures are there. And it was an important night being that it was the first night in our new house. But it was really the wrong time for a photo-op. After a long day and a 350 mile drive with a baby with a cold, it was REALLY the wrong time for pictures. But the picture taker just wouldn't wait until morning. I still had a flippin' crib to assemble and there I am sitting through 'Just one more dear'. Even DH got....ticked after a bit.

How would you handle it? Two separate books? One truthful for the history and one...sanitized for outside eyes?

*ugh*

Mmmm...yummy!

2009-12-17T23:21:00.000-05:00

I just had to show you the layout of my very first pies. I made these for Thanksgiving when my friend Amberlee and her family came to visit. I'm truly grateful that she has two growing boys... it kept me from growing too much eating all of the goodies that I made for that weekend. LOL

Oh but it was all so good!

I had never made pies before. I never really had the need to do it. I've always watched my mom make pies so I knew HOW to do it, I just never had the occasion to do it.

So for a first time making pies, these turned out very nicely. The crusts are just a little rustic, but I like things distressed. Ya know?

Old Sewing machine legs with a new life

2009-12-16T23:45:00.000-05:00

You've seen them at garage sales or antiques barns. You'd love to buy them but hadn't the first idea of what to do with them. You even cry a little at the thought of disassembling an old treadle sewing machine just to discard or sell the legs. Those heavy, cast iron, indestructible legs.

Hmmm...

Well, many years ago I came upon a garage sale that had two legs from an old sewing machine. $10 and they were in fine shape. No rust on them at all. That usually means that the machine was kept inside for a long time and was only just dismembered. *cringe* I love old treadles. I have one that's still in one piece and functional. I even have extra belts and stuff.

But back to the $10 legs. I didn't know what to do with them but I couldn't resist them. It's a good thing that I bought them. Later that summer, another garage sale, there was an old, homemade tool crib for $5. It was a little musty and stinky but some scrubbing and baking soda will take care of that. What to do with it?

Believe it or not, it didn't occur to me to put the two things together and make a table until two years later after a flood wrecked our basement. After the basement got redone (very nicely I might add) I ended up with extra paint.

BZAP! You might think that these ideas BZAP-ing me might be painful. No unsightly marks as of yet but they do have a tendency to keep me awake at night.

I painted the tool crib with the extra paint. I then attached the tool crib to the sewing machine legs and looked to see what the weak and wobbly spots might be. That's when I noticed that I had more screw (or bolt) holes in the legs. I could have another shelf under the tool crib. I also needed to put a board along the back for stabilization. So I was off to find scrap in the garage. Which I found. Measured what I needed. Cut, painted and screwed the boards in place where the holes in the legs lined up.

That table is the one in the top picture in the layout below.

The table in the lower picture in the layout is a more recent creation.

There are some folks that live not too far from here who have this huge barn and they have frequent sales of antiques. I've gotten a fair amount of old photos and really old sewing patterns from there. And a jar or two of antique buttons.

And the legs from an old Singer treadle machine with the pedal and wheel all still attached. Just no machine. $15- SOLD! It was pretty rusted. But rusted cast iron really only needs a good wire brushing and scrubbing to bring it back to life. Since the antique value is dependent on having the original machine still attached (and even then this one would have only been worth about $100) I went ahead and spray painted the iron legs with matte finish Rustoleum paint.

And then it sat, in our entry way, for about a year until I could figure out what I wanted to do next.

When I did my shelves in the craft room I ended up with the extra sheets of plywood. I asked DH if we could team up to clean the table saw so I could get this wood cut down to the right size.

Once it was cut I started Mod Podging the book pages to the plywood. Then I attached the wood to the top of the treadle legs with nuts and bolts.

I just might go back and take a look at the other treadle legs they have at that barn next summer. I have another spot that would look wonderful with an unusual table.

I'm so impatient!

2009-12-15T23:17:00.000-05:00

I love how certain things look when I paint them. I really do. I do a pretty good job when I feel like taking the time to paint. I'm like my mom that way. More than a little bit of a perfectionist when it comes to a paint finish.

But more often lately I haven't got the patience to wait for paint to dry. Not to mention all of the surface prep before you even can get the brush wet.

I needed two boards for my shelves in my craft room. I got tired of the big plywood sheets being up there. It was just too difficult to manage all of the stuff that ended up there.

Sometimes a huge flat space isn't the right thing to have. I needed to make it smaller. You know, so that there is less of a chance that little stuff doesn't end up hidden right behind something just a little taller.

I can't tell you how many times I've tried to find something only to find it AFTER I've finally given up and gone out and bought another one. Granted, you can't really have too much Mod Podge in your stash...well....

So I went and got the two boards from Lowe's. They didn't have to be perfect because the wood was going to be covered with paper. Two plain 8 foot long pine boards for $20.

I have quite a stock of old Reader's Digest Condensed Novels. The library had a whole shelf full this summer and I cleaned them out. I use the covers to make other books of my own (more on that another time) and the uncovered guts have been piling up, just waiting for an idea to hit.

BZAP!!

I spent about a day and a half pasting the pages of these books onto the wood and now I have two fabulous shelves. No sanding down the edges to avoid splinters. No priming the wood so the paint will cover evenly. Just Mod Podge and an old book that would have ended up in the landfill anyway.

I even had plenty of pages left to cover some Slim Jim(beef jerky type of snack) cans to keep all of my tools in. The cans are like Pringles (potato chip) cans. But that's another project that needs its own layout.

I'll bet you'd like to see what I did with the plywood that I took down, wouldn't you?

See you tomorrow!

I just have to brag

2009-12-14T19:29:00.000-05:00

Sometimes having an only child can get a bit exhausting. When you haven't really got any kids around for them to play with and no family nearby then the mommy and daddy become the only playmates. For the most part this is fine except for those times when work actually has to get done.

I'm the first to admit that housework gets pushed aside so that more creative and intellectual pursuits may fit better into the schedule. I'd much rather spend the days expanding her knowledge base than cleaning the cobwebs from the corners. Though when those corners start looking as if they might spring to life on their own, that is the time for said child to find solitary amusement. Even for just a few minutes.

Well, last Friday the whining began. "i'm booooored!" she says to me. "You have more toys that I had when I was little" (this is true) "How can you be bored?" "I don't know. I'm just bored. I don't know what to do"

Now I'm at the point where if she's bored, with three rooms full of toys and a craft room full of paper, crayons, pencils, fancy scissors and glue, then I'm putting her to work on folding the clean towels.

At that moment I was on chat with DH while he was at work. After determining what time he'd be home so that I know when to start dinner, I relayed the above conversation to him.

He quipped, "Tell her to build the Parthenon with her blocks"

Hmmm...that's not a bad idea. So off I go to Google the Parthenon, found two images. One a photo of the front(I think it's the west portico...I'd have to check), and the other image was a floor plan diagram of where everything is located in the building. Pillars and all.

I printed the images and gave them to her and said build this.

And she did:

This is one smart kid. I can't wait to see what she can build next.

I really need to buy film

2009-12-13T20:21:00.003-05:00

Digital cameras are great and all but they really have their limitations. I need to buy real film for my real 35mm camera.

We have a juvenile male red-tailed hawk just hanging around on the neighbor's tree across the street. And the zoom on the digital camera just isn't cutting it.

But here's the picture as best as I can present it.

Isn't he a beauty? He pounced on something one of the times that he was perched there on the neighbor's brand new tree.

I hope this bird decides to stay.

It's ready!

2009-12-13T13:08:00.003-05:00

I'll be wearing my coat tomorrow if it's cold out. Hah! "if" it's cold out. Now THAT'S comedy!

And I finally have pictures!

I'm still thinking about what to do with the wrist and waist bands but for now they're ok against the new material. Actually the waist band is perfect against the black material I used. The front flap looks a little weird but I might cover that too and then put frog closures and new buttons. I wasn't in the mood to try to cut and sew around each little snap on the front. I just have one little seam on the right sleeve to finish and then I can start with the real fun. Decorating my coat.

I've got a bunch of copies of Belle Armoire , that altered clothing magazine from Somerset Studios. I've wanted to make something artsy to wear for a long time but for me it needs to be something functional. I'm a blue jeans and t-shirt type of girl. I don't dress up. I just don't like wearing things that are purely ornamental. I love looking at them, but my clothing HAS to have a function. At last I have both!!

So the first bit of ornamental sewing has to be the quilting. I have to find some line drawings to fiddle with...oooh! I've got it, I have the Chinese symbols that make up my daughter's name from before we adopted her. Plus all of the other calligraphy that I've done in the past year. Those will make superb quilting designs.

I guess that means that I'm off for today to make up my quilting patterns for the coat. Plus I have to find my white tracing pencil....

OK so I'm really getting behind

2009-12-07T16:06:00.002-05:00

I was supposed to put up a picture of my coat. I didn't even get a chance to work on my coat this weekend. I got the family room cleaned up and ready for the Christmas tree. I even *gasp* cleaned out the fireplace. That hasn't been done since before we moved in. But it is now very clean and loaded with large pillar candles. It looks lovely! I'll have to start looking for more candles on sale.

We don't burn wood fires because DH is allergic to dust, DD is allergic to oak(so no burning the stuff), and I'm allergic to ever cleaning out that fireplace again.LOL

This year I drafted everybody for the decorating. Usually I'm the one doing all of the cleaning and decorating and this year I just wasn't up to it. So DH brought up the tree from the basement. That's a heavy tree. I set it up. (DH, dust allergies...you know) Then I put up the garlands on the mantle and hearth. Arranged the lights through the garland. Then set up my growing collection of nutcrackers. DH and DD were in charge of decorating the tree and they did a lovely job. This is the first year in a long time where I wasn't completely exhausted after setting up the tree. Though I did take a short nap with the candles and the Christmas lights going. It's so relaxing in there.

This week I hope to finish my coat. It's very nearly finished. And it's so very cold outside. *brrr*

New blog-wear for Christmas

2009-12-04T21:53:00.002-05:00

I've decided that even though the Christmas spirit isn't quite with me yet that I'd give it a try to decorate the blog for Christmas. Tomorrow I'll try to tackle the tree.

I'll include the credits for all of the frames in a sidebar a little later. I did a book for a family member for a Christmas story that was written many years ago. It turned out well. I wanted to play on the artwork that I did for that book here on the blog. It goes well with the theme of Christmas with family over the years. It won't be easy for me this year. This is the first year that my shopping won't include the pet store.

Well, nothing will change that and I'll just get my keyboard wet. :(

I heard that it snowed today in Houston. And that it was all of 32 degrees outside. *ouch* I always try to count on it being warm somewhere in the northern hemisphere in December even if it's only 50 degrees out. That doesn't seem to be the case this year. I checked the weather where my aunt lives and it was just as cold. I know she can't be happy about that. She's like me, can't stand it if the temperature is below 87 degrees. hmmm...wonder what it's like in Ecuador....oh! Volcanoes...never mind. I'll put up with the snow and cold. I don't want to deal with seismic instability of any kind. I like boredom. Really I do.

Good news! After several months of dread we finally called a repairman to see about fixing our television. WooHoo! It's fixed and for only $240. Just one of the electrical connections that finally wore out after all of these years. There's every possibility that it just might last another 12 years. Movie night is back!

I'm down to the last three little tiny strips of fabric before the basic covering is done on my coat. Just in time, too. The temps are dropping quickly out there. I came up here to do some computer stuff and my Wacom was cold. It doesn't like to respond when it's cold.

Well, I'm sort of bored with computer stuff today so I'm going to grab my coat and do more work on it. I'm hoping that it'll be photo ready tomorrow for the first "after" pictures. Just remember, this is just the fabric covering. I haven't done the fancies yet so it still looks a little rough. But it's so comfy that it'll keep me warm in spite of my weight loss. You know, that is the only thing that sucks about losing weight. Losing that insulating fat layer is not quite so comfortable in the deep chill of winter. And it technically isn't winter yet.

See you tomorrow for coat pictures, I hope.

Another great Template!

2009-12-03T02:57:00.004-05:00

Scrolling through the freebies at Digifree tonight I spotted a layout and followed the link for a template. WOW! The blog is Passion Scrap de Sandrinette and the post with the template is here.

I did two layouts based on the template. You know I can never do anything without tinkering with it a bit. I always change things around. This template and layout that she came up with is fool-proof.

I can't wait to do some more like this. It is so elegant and easy. This is very pleasing to the eye and I am so glad she thought of it.

What a great template!

2009-12-01T00:52:00.002-05:00

I'm taking more time to play and look for templates to help me put together some layouts. I might be a pretty good artist but sometimes I'm just a terrible scrapper. I really need templates sometimes to help me remember how to compose a pretty page.

So I went looking around at Digifree and went to Les Digis de Steph for her newest template. She had several layouts that others had done using the template and one of them inspired me to scrap a couple of pictures from a few years ago. Pictures of DD and her first snow. She was 18 months old, home with us from China for only 6 months at that time. Gosh she was so little! I'm so glad that I stay at home with her. I haven't missed a thing that she's done. I've been here for every minute of her life since we adopted her and I am so glad of it. When it means that we eat hamburger and chicken, I have to recycle old coats to make them warmer to last longer, anything at all to save money so I can stay home with her. It's so worth it to do with patchwork clothing to be able to watch her grow up every day.

And yes, that is me wearing the old coat that I'm fixing up. This is the before picture. LOL

Making some progress

2009-11-30T23:01:00.002-05:00

Today was karate day. I did my mea culpa for not being there all of last week. The teacher understood when I recited the list of baked goods that I created for Thanksgiving last week. I think he may have been amazed that I actually baked that much by myself.

It did take a few days to get everything done but it really is fun for me to spend days on end baking stuff. At least as long as I don't have to eat it. I love everything that I bake but after two cookies I start feeling a bit woozy from the sugar.

Not to mention the pain the next day from the flour. I've learned that when I eat any wheat product, even bran flakes or whole grain stuff that contains wheat that every joint in my body hurts the next day or two. I love fresh baked bread, but I like being pain free much better so I've said goodbye to all wheat products. I like it that my back doesn't hurt so much though after this past weekend it is going to take me until Wednesday to get back to normal. *ouch*

I spent some more time working on my coat. I have most of one sleeve covered. The piece I was using is just a wee bit small but that's the beauty of doing a patchwork. Even if it doesn't match....it'll still match. LOL

Once I get the fabric all attached I'll take a picture so you can see how it looks so far. The seams look a little rough right now but that will get covered up with the fancy work later. I already have many years worth of before pictures. Hopefully the after will be an improvement.

I think I might dig out my tatting needles and make a little lace trim for the collar...hmmm...that would be easy to work on during DD's karate class. I can get about 5 inches done in one session. That would be a nice touch. It's a good thing I have plenty of time to decide because I keep changing my mind. One day I want white embroidery and lace and the next day I'll want all wild and funky colors and bright patches and stuff. I especially want to try some fancy goldwork couching somewhere on the back. Like a Tudor rose done in gold threads. Goodness knows I have the threads hidden away in my vast stash of needlework supplies. We'll see.

This coat will evolve much the way the 'A' that Hester Prynne embroidered in 'The Scarlet Letter'. Golly, what a reference! I did enjoy that series that was on PBS many years ago. The one with Meg Foster was the most riveting. I particularly enjoyed the evolution of the embroidery of the 'A' as if it were a badge of honor rather than a mark of shame. It makes for an interesting message. That people have power over you only if you allow it.

Well, that's enough jabbering for today. The soreness in my fingers has subsided for now so I'm going to pick out a movie and start stitching some more. The best way to get back into shape is to work it out just as the pain starts to ease up. Works for the gym and works for sewing.

I'm thinking a period film...either 'Taming of the Shrew' with Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor or 'Gone With the Wind'. I watched 'Vanity Fair' last week. A version that was on A&E a few years back. Not the newer one with, what's her name, the blonde....Reese Witherspoon. I rather liked the one from A&E. The actor who played Rebecca's husband, oh I wish I could remember his name right now, he's in a BBC mystery series...nope, it's not coming to me. But he was wonderful in the part. And a gorgeous rogue very much like Rhett Butler until he'd finally had enough of his wife's shenanigans.

Well, I'll pick something odd in any case.

Correcting a boo-boo

2009-11-30T22:54:00.005-05:00

I was doing a little scrapping tonight when I discovered that in one of my mish-mash sets I included the wrong size of a paper that I made. Sometimes I make several different sizes depending on the use of the item. I goofed and put the small version into the set.

Here is what the paper looks like:

Download the correct paper here

Changing Hats

2009-11-29T21:44:00.004-05:00

Feeling like I need a change so I'm going to start doing a few things crafty outside the computer again. I have a coat I have to finish so that I don't freeze to death this winter. I'm thinking that I might make a matching hat. I have the materials leftover.

I've had this same coat for going on 15 years. It was my husband's ski jacket 20 years ago. It's an old but mostly comfortable coat. It's got plenty of room for me to wear my baggy sweaters and multiple layers in the winter time and still can be zipped up. I've worn that coat everywhere and it's like a trusted friend. But the padding was wearing out. And even fresh from the washer it was still dirty looking. It was time to consider a new coat.

So I went shopping and was never so repulsed in my life as I was at the selection of women's coats out there. UGH! And not one was warm enough for me. I've lost weight in the past two years. There's a warm, protective layer of fat that just isn't there anymore and the past two years I've been freezing in the winter time.

Then there was the issue of cost. There was no way that I was going to pay over $200 for a coat that I thought was ugly that wasn't going to keep me warm. I'll take ugly and warm any day of the week. I'm a very functional type. If something doesn't provide a function then I have no need of it.

So I turned back to my old faithful, 'stolen from hubby's closet', worn out ski jacket. The construction is still solid, just the padding has worn down too much to keep me warm. So....I took some fancy denim remnants that I'd been saving up and started a bit of a patchwork until I had a piece large enough to cover the outside body of the coat. Then I cut some quilt batting, double thickness, to fit the patchwork cover. Tacked it to the coat and started carefully, hand sewing all around the edges of the coat until I got the body covered. Then I had to wait a bit.

For the cold weather to hit. I had to make sure that it was going to be warm enough in the body before I finished the sleeves. I didn't want to cover the sleeves until I knew whether or not I needed to pad the sleeves. And I didn't want to pad the sleeves if I didn't need to. So I had to wait until it got cold so I could stand outside in my coat for an hour to see how warm it was.

Verdict: MMMM Toasty!

So the next step is to cover the sleeves and hand sew them into place and then I get to quilt everything so that the batting doesn't slide around. Then the fancy work....embroidery. That's the part that'll be fun. Over the next 20 years I get to do spot embroidery whenever I get bored and have a coat that I like that is one of a kind.

And it will have cost me only $12 dollars.

So Often

2009-11-29T02:19:00.001-05:00

Time to sign off

2009-11-24T01:04:00.004-05:00

I've been wrestling with a decision for some time and I think it's time for me to stop doing the design freebies. For the last few weeks I've been noticing that more people have been downloading but most leave nothing for a thank you. It's sad that all I've ever asked for in return for my designs is a thank you and that seems to be too much for 98% of the people who download. I'm sorry for the 2% who do say thank you, but I hope you'll understand my decision.

An artist loves to hear praise for their work. All I see lately is thousands of downloads and 3 comments, two of which come from the freebie search engines. I can't help but think that if I sold my designs for only $1 each that I'd be pulling in quite a tidy sum to help with the household finances.

Lately I've lost my desire to create because of the feeling that 98% of the downloaders see my work as not being worthy of a simple thank you.

I am canceling my Box.net account at the end of the year. After that I'll just post my artwork and write for the benefit of my family and friends who live so far away from me.

I've had a lot of fun overall but I just don't have this in me anymore to create for anyone else but my family and friends.

So as a freebie designer I am signing off. I thank all of you over this past year and a half who have indulged me in my crazy artwork and enjoyed playing with my creations. I'm glad that you were able to find fun and useful things here.

Bye, all.

I'm playing with stuff again

2009-11-06T17:48:00.002-05:00

I've been playing around with some of my real life (non-digital) art supplies and finally dug into my light modeling paste. This stuff is WAY cool to play with. It gives me ideas every time I use it.

The big project I am working on is the altering of a children's book cover to make it look like a cave wall. So far so good. The inside pages are rough watercolor pages that will be run through my printer. Ever try that? It's a neat effect.

Anyway, as usual when I get a cool texture I try to reproduce it digitally. I think I did it. This little set of letters, numbers and a couple of frames is gloppy looking stuff on corrugated cardboard. The edges are really rough and they look best on a pale background. But play around with it and see what you can come up with. Have fun!!

Here's the preview:

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This is too fun

2009-11-05T02:11:00.005-05:00

No sooner do I finish one Mish-Mash set then up springs another one! And I already have stuff made up for the next set! Yikes! This is seriously fun, though. I hope you all are enjoying these sets as much as I am enjoying their creation.

I really am having more fun doing things this way instead of trying to come up with a set of coordinating stuff. It's stressful to me trying to make everything match. Now I find myself giggling a little bit more when I'm at the computer. And that's as it should be.

Art should be fun. It should make you giggle. You should look at your project at all phases of creation and smile. And lately my creations have been making me smile.

I've got a few quickpages included in this set. One very interesting one includes a green glass bottle from Marta Van Eck. I embellished the bottle with paint splotches and it turned out well.

Another quickpage started out as a study in circles that looked very space-like. I'm going to use it myself when I go out to star-gaze within the next couple of weeks. The Taurid meteor shower starts Nov 5 and runs through Nov 12 and I've been told they are spectacular. And according to the star map it looks like I'll have a fantastic view of the show. Especially with all of the leaves gone from the trees.

I haven't got a proper camera for photographing the meteors but DH is going to take some pictures of me watching them. You see, the sight of me out there on the back deck is quite amusing. I bundle myself up in warm clothes, I take two afghans and lay them on the picnic table, then I lay on the afghans and DH takes a quilt and tucks me in. So there I am...all laid out on the back deck, in the freezing cold, watching meteors and comets. I'll show you when it's all done. LOL

Then there's the day that I just got it into my head to make a brick wall. That was sort of easy so I took out some of the bricks and it got more interesting after that. There's a full sheet of brick, a half sheet of bricks and the quickpage with the bricks missing and a little graffiti added.

The little finish nail is really little. I mean really little. But the creative application of drop shadows makes the little bugger show up very nicely. It's just that I needed a really tiny nail...

Although what I could really use right now is some water. As I'm writing this we've been without water since 8am. I had plans for a shower and a really nice fish dinner today. I'm just about caught up on laundry and THIS happens. *sigh* It appears there was a really big water main break and it took out the water supply for the whole township. Well, it's good that we have a pool full of relatively clean water. I just have to figure out how to siphon it without removing the winter cover. hmmm.... I think that might be the best use of that pool all year. It sure didn't see much swimming.

I'll be happy just to wash my hands with something other than wet wipes. Of all days I decided that today would be the day to ModPodge an 8 foot board for a shelf that I'm putting up. I'll be doing the same with another board the same size. I have a bunch of old Reader's Digest condensed novels and I'm tearing out the pages to cover the wood. I really hate having to sand when I can't do it outside so I'm just gluing and papering over the whole thing. Voila! No rough edges or splinters and no sawdust up my nose for a week. Over all it'd be a win-win if I could wash this extra glue off my fingers.

Well no matter what, I HAVE to cook the fish for dinner. I'm going to go do some recipe hunting...maybe I might try one of the recipes in my Indian home cooking book. I LOVE the chicken recipes and the pastries are all wonderful. mmm...

Well, anyway let me show you the preview for this set:

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This file took a really long time to upload. That's unusual for Box.net unless there's a high amount of traffic. It is a larger than usual file so let me know if it's taking too long to download and I can go split it up.

Fun with a new template

2009-11-03T20:41:00.004-05:00

Designs by Sine has some really fabulous templates. What else is there to say, the templates are unusual and inspiring. I just love them and more often than not I end up making a layout with the templates the same day that I download them.

And today was one of those days. And today she had two templates so it was really difficult to decide which one to do first. I decided to do the one that hadn't been scrapped by other artists yet. I used all of my Mish-Mash stuff for this template layout. I had a blast!!

I naturally scrapped my favorite subject....my adorable kid. She has just been expanding in her knowledge and reference base lately. She is truly an information sponge and she's been using all of this learning in very creative ways. She makes her own books because from the beginning she's seen me making books. She's working on a book right now that when it's done it is going to be photographed and posted here. It is GORGEOUS! I wish I had made it. I love it and I'm already studying her designs so that I might improve my work. My wish for her to be better than me is coming true.

I just love that wonderful girl of mine.

Doing a little family history scrapping

2009-11-01T01:18:00.006-04:00

I might have mentioned that my brain doesn't work the same as everyone else's. For the life of me I can't figure out why I can watch Dr. Who and come up with Pennsylvania Dutch style designs.

How did I get there? LOL I wonder what I'd come up with if I watched Little House on the Prairie? I'm not sure I want to know the answer to that one right now. LOL

I had a couple of pictures I wanted to set up in a layout and this style seemed to suit.

The pictures are of my Uncle Jimmie, Uncle Max, Aunt Carole and my mom in the winter of, I think, 1945. It's pretty common to get really bad ice storms in NE Arkansas but snow is rare. The full photo shows that they had about 4 inches of snow that day. I bet they were ecstatic.

I got the layout done and thought that it might make a nice quickpage for you so I copied it before merging it with the pictures.

I kinda like the modern application of Pennsylvania Dutch. I went to the Library last week and checked out a book on the history of American design. Fascinating book. It's a great reference for designs going back to Colonial times.

So now that I've rambled on, I'll put up the preview and link and head off to sleep. I'm getting over a cold and I still feel a little loopy.

Here's the preview:

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A Halloween Layout

2009-10-31T01:31:00.003-04:00

I just got this from Daynaba and I LOVE it! I love seeing what lovelies can be made with my kits.

SWEET!

I am not normal

2009-10-28T16:45:00.003-04:00

But that seems to be why everyone likes me. LOL I do seem to make a lot of stuff that walks WAY off the beaten path.

We're a house full of sickos this week. Just colds, nothing to worry about. But it is making the prospect of Trick or Treating a bit of a nail biter. I have the wings for DD's costume almost ready. Actually I just have to wait for her to wake up so I can position the velcro and then I can work on the embellishments. The only indoor trick or treating around here is at the mall and it's tonight. Well, she's not well enough to drag around a mall for two hours so we'll hope for the weather to cooperate on Saturday. Yeah right. I'm going to buy her new snow boots tomorrow. LOL

But she'll be so cute as a flower fairy and I have plenty of warmies for her to wear under her costume so that everyone can see how pretty she is. I made the costume with the warmies in mind so it'll fit well enough, too.

And once I have the pictures of her in her costume I'll make the papers and elements I need for the Halloween layouts and show her off to you.

But for now....the weird and wild papers!

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Rabbit news

2009-10-26T03:34:00.003-04:00

Some of you may remember earlier this year we had a nest of baby rabbits in our backyard. You might also remember that we found it because it was being attacked by a Northern Short-tailed Shrew that had killed one baby and was trying to get another.

We did our best to help the nest to safety and we can finally report that one of the baby rabbits has survived. We took this picture of the two rabbits, one is the mother rabbit, back in July. I never got around to doing anything about it until now because the next day after this picture was taken my dog, Kodi died.

I finally got around to making something so that you could all know that at least one of the baby rabbits has survived to adulthood. He'll probably eat my grapes next year if the vine survives this winter.

And that's probably it for tonight though I'm still up watching DD through her cold. It does seem to be easing up as far as her feeling hot. Her skin feels completely normal and cool. Not sweaty or hot like earlier so that can be written off as her normal blast furnace mode at bedtime.

I'm sure glad I don't have to cook breakfast in the morning. I think I'm barely going to manage the box of raisin bran. LOL

Poor baby

2009-10-26T02:59:00.004-04:00

Well the girl is sick with a cold. Runny nose, sneezing, tickly and sore throat and a general feeling of yuckiness. I'm up late tonight checking on her every hour to make sure she's covered up and not running a fever. She's like a little blast furnace(when she sleeps) when she feels normal so checking for a fever is quite the challenge. So far so good. This looks like just your run of the mill cold. No flu here. But also no karate class this week. She'll get behind her class but making sure she's ok and also making sure she doesn't make others sick is more important.

It's not easy travelling halfway across the country so I'm kind of not surprised that this happened. Everyone is a little run down after this trip. I think it's because the weather was gray the whole trip. When it wasn't raining it was threatening to rain. That's not good for the farmers. I was told that their harvests may run into December because of this cold, wet weather. This is not good.

I'm just fiddling around with some more wild papers on white backgrounds tonight. This time I did a little bit of abstract cutouts. I like it. I saved the main design as a quickpage for another time. Maybe I'll end up with a set. You never can tell.

Another Beatles song, too. I think it goes well with the pictures of our two year sunflower. Well it's been an hour so I need to go and check on DD and cover her up again.

Singing More Often

2009-10-25T00:27:00.003-04:00

Well here I am fooling around again when I ought to be asleep. I've been playing around with some of my texture mediums and am having a blast with light modeling paste. It's got me working out the same gloppy texture for some things that I'm working on for the digital world.

So far I've made a few gloppy textured cardboard frames. Digitally, that is. In real life I'm working on a cigar box that I'm doing up with some tube maps of London and texture mediums to look like a map discovered underneath an old plaster wall.

Anyway, I started thinking about family and old friends and one of my favorite songs. In My Life by The Beatles. I could really get into this idea of scrapping to songs.

Some of these folks are friends that I worked with at my favorite job. I delivered pizzas. I loved everything about that job. The energy. The people I worked with. Even the weird hours I worked. I loved every minute of it. The fact that I met my husband there is the icing, whipped cream and the cherry on the cake.

I know that most memories are dismissed by people as nostalgia. Things looking better than they actually were and all that. But working that job really was a lot of fun. I even tried to quit in order to take a job that wasn't as hard on my car. I just couldn't stay away. We were always a crazy bunch and even during the most stressful dinner rushes we laughed and had fun.

How many jobs can you say that you've had where you actually had so much fun that you forgot to ask for your scheduled raise? I forgot all the time. My manager was forever putting in requests for back pay that I was entitled to because I was a month late in putting in for my raise.

Crazy times.

One picture is from the very last days of high school. I honestly have to say that I can't identify with anyone who ever had fun in high school. I was glad to be rid of the place. I have often said that if I ever hear of my high school being set on fire that I'd bring the marshmallows. Not long ago I heard that it really was on fire but that it wasn't serious. Darn. I had to start the barbecue grill to toast my marshmallows.

Another is a picture of the family with my grandmother (dad's side). She died a few years ago...I can't remember exactly what year it was because no-one actually told me until she had been gone for almost a year. One day my mom mentioned "when your grandmother in Florida died" and I said "what?". None of my letters came back to me in that time. They were all going...somewhere. I still don't know. That's how much I'm remembered by a certain male parent. The picture below is the last time I saw her alive and healthy. I saw her last in 1987 when she was in remission from lung cancer.

But I guess that's enough for now. I do like how that gloppy texture is working out on the digital cardboard. Interesting stuff.

Happy Halloween

2009-10-23T00:04:00.001-04:00

I've had a weird time trying to figure out what sort of Halloween mood I'm in this year. I started out wanting creepy, like Addams Family stuff, then I went to glitzy with rhinestones and glitter, and finally semi-cute stencil like stuff.

A bit schizophrenic of me but considering the holiday I guess it's a good fit for me. LOL

And I'm off because I'm up way too late again.

Here's the preview:

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Time in a bottle

2009-10-18T01:01:00.001-04:00

I've always loved that song. Jim Croce had such a great storytelling/singing voice. There are no talents like him left today.

I've noticed a few layouts around the web using song lyrics as the only journaling and I think it's a great idea. When you consider that the two things that stir the greatest emotion are music and photos of loved ones it then just seems so natural to put the two together.

I put this together for posting quite late, but I think that the bottle, greenery and the string frame are from Gunhild Storeide, as is the template for grunging up the tan paper.

The rest is mine. Which is to say that the background and the white tags are my contribution. Oh...and the really cute kid sticking her tongue out for the camera. She's having a great time with the Made in China stickers that are on everything. She's putting them on her forehead and walking around waiting for people to notice the sticker and what it says. She just has the most fabulous sense of humor!

Fun with gradients

2009-10-16T22:22:00.002-04:00

I came across several sets of gradients for PSP awhile back that I just HAD to have. I now have HUNDREDS of gradients to play with. And naturally I had to use enormous self restraint to keep from doing the grunge thing. It must be that tomboy in me. I just love things that are distressed and dirty. Worn out and comfortable. I love old stuff.

I particularly like the sunburst papers in this. It was sort of a *duh* moment when I realized how to make the sunburst. With a gradient....

I can be a little dim at times. But I eventually catch up! LOL

Well, here's the preview:

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Global Warming- A Farce in one Act

2009-10-10T15:25:00.003-04:00

ACT 1, SCENE 1-
Scene: Top of the stairs at 1am

Me: Mm Mmm! Just smell that crisp cool air out tonight!

DH: Oh?

Me: Go stick your head out the back door. Even you'd be able to smell the winter coming.

(DH goes to back door and opens it)

DH: Ummmm..... I don't have to smell it....I can SEE it.

Me: Oh?

DH: It's snowing!

Me: Grab the camera!

(we spend the next few minutes snapping pictures of the falling snow and then I head back up to bed)

End scene

Friday in Milwaukee Algore was giving the keynote speech at some stupid global warming meeting. You know...the global warming prophet preaching to his flock...

I wonder what God would think about this false prophet.... oh yeah...."BZAP!"

Snow.

In NE Ohio.

On Oct 10 at 1 am:

I am SO not amused...

More Mish Mash

2009-10-09T22:12:00.002-04:00

This one is another one of my wild jumble sets. I find that I'm enjoying these sets immensely. I make little things that I need for a particular layout and then when it's done I put it away. Before you know it I have another mish mash set that works perfectly for altered art looking layouts.

I find myself going in and re-using a lot of these mis-matched items and it's really a lot of fun using things that don't really match. I guess that explains my wardrobe....

So now to be short, sweet and to the point....I'll get straight to it.

Here's the preview:

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Playing with a template

2009-10-04T01:14:00.002-04:00

Just a quickie layout for right now. I got this template at Designs bySine (remember to say thank you if you get the template) today and immediately knew what to do with it. Whatcha think? I'm still on the fence about the treatment I did on the word art. Bethany does perfect word art and it's usually me that fudges it a few times before I get the right paper match to my layouts. LOL

Anybody do Hardanger Embroidery?

2009-10-02T22:01:00.001-04:00

I've done a few beginner pieces and some intermediate pieces. I just love the style of embroidery because it ends up looking a lot more difficult than it is. It looks so intricate and there is an element of fear involved when you get to the point of finally cutting out the holes. I actually sit there for about ten minutes working up the courage to cut. Praying that I got all of the stitches right so that it doesn't fall apart. Once you cut, there's no going back.

So far so good, none of my pieces have fallen apart. I think I might get into that again this winter. DD wants me to teach her some fancy embroidery and I was thinking of starting her on a simple alphabet sampler. I'll let you know how that goes. If she likes it then there's no question that she'll be better than I am at it.

Fortunately these little hardanger frames weren't nearly as fear inducing as the real thing would be. The "undo" button is pure magic, isn't it? LOL

The inside opening of the frame is small, only just under two inches square, but I think you'll like them.

Here's the preview:

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Learning Paint Shop Pro

2009-09-29T11:54:00.003-04:00

My DD is learning to work with PSP and she's doing a fine job at learning all of the tools and how they work. Have I mentioned that she's 5?

I've been compiling a folder full of digital stuff for her to play with and she's making some cute things.

Here's today's artwork:

She loves the movie Tinkerbell so I made some of the characters for her to play with. I don't remember most of the credits...I'd have to come back later with those since she pulls from all over for her little pages like this.

Stuck like glue

2009-09-29T00:43:00.002-04:00

This is the newest member of our family, his name is Blue and he's my mom's new dog.

He adopted her about two months ago.

My mom has been doing a lot of work on the gardens of her neighbors on her street this year. I think she mentioned that she had eight yards that she was planting on. You see, my mom's garden is pretty much finished. She plants new things here and there when she gets bored with something or when she sees a plant that she just HAS to make room for. But her garden is pretty much maintenance now. *sigh* That's my envy but I have to remember that it took her 20 years to get it there so I shouldn't give up after only 4 years.

Anyway, Blue came into the picture when he just showed up in the neighborhood and followed my mom around from one yard to the next for a few days. Another neighbor mentioned that one of their relatives would love a dog so they called and came to pick up this little stray and took him home.

The next morning, Blue was laying on my mom's front porch waiting for her to come out. This dog walked over two miles, across main roads, in the city of Detroit, to come back to mom.

He adopted her. LOL The next door neighbor saw my mom talking to the dog and told mom,"looks like you got yourself a dog". *chuckle*

She says he's very well behaved, but cowers at certain things that lead us to believe that he had been abused before he was dumped. Yeah, he was dumped. Dog dumping is something that has gone on in Detroit since I was a kid in the 1970's. Not just individuals, either. We've seen city animal control vehicles and even the Michigan Humane Society dumping a load of dogs on our street. Before anybody says that the MHS wouldn't do such a thing....I saw it. I was there.

We're heading off to Arkansas soon and Blue is coming with us because mom doesn't want him to think that he's being dumped again just as he's gotten used to a nice home.

Mom may not have wanted a dog but she sure has the right heart to take care of one.

Layout Time

2009-09-25T23:33:00.005-04:00

DD passed her test for her next belt! She's a camouflage belt now. And here I just got pictures done from when she earned her yellow belt.

Unfortunately I won't have anything for her test for yellow 2 (that's with a black stripe) because Mommy Mushy Brains (that'd be me) left the camera on the kitchen counter by the door on the way out for test night. I didn't realise it until we'd gotten there and it's a half hour drive to the class so... I decided to pay really close attention. LOL That's what kids tell you to do when they get tired of mommy always taking pictures of them.

This layout's really busy because of my wild papers that I'm fiddling around with. I used a template from Red Leaf Digiscrapping that is really nice and easy to work with. Naturally I took a liberty or two and departed from the exact template but it was a really fun starting point. Sometimes you just need a good template to get you started, ya know?

The paper flowers are from Rina, the polaroid frames are from Sir Scrapalot and the rest is mine.

Including the little cutie in the ponytails.

Rare pastels from me

2009-09-25T21:44:00.001-04:00

I'm not really sure how I managed to have the self control to keep from grunging these up. It is something of a miracle that there are soft and bright colors left in here. Although there are four papers in here that border somewhere between grunge and antique.

This is part of my autopost series since it's really time to get started on the homeschooling stuff. I think this will be one of the last really big sets of stuff but I'll definitely keep making cool and unusual stuff for you. I'm sticking with the one post per week average until I get into the swing of things.

DD is already learning so much. Is it normal for a 5 year old to be doing math already? She's doing mostly addition and a little subtraction. I just wonder... My mom says she is already way smarter than I was at that age. Gee...thanks mom. LOL

I'm trying to frame the lessons into things that she already likes to do. She loves music, specifically the Monkees, so I'm making up cd's and songbooks that match up so she can read and sing at the same time. She's loving it so far and she's figuring out more words on her own every day.

I'm trying to work out what lessons I can fit paper dolls into since she's really into paper dolls lately. Maybe history? I could scan in the dolls and make dresses for them...and then teach her about that time period. Heck I just did all that Egypt stuff, I should start way back near the beginning, eh?

Well, I'll get to the freebie and get going on some more ideas. There's a lot of stuff in this one. I couldn't decide which shape tag I liked best so they're all in there.

Here's the preview:

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For Australia

2009-09-22T11:29:00.005-04:00

OK...I have the months done for Australia and I'm pretty happy with them. I spent a fair amount of time researching all of the things that go on in the different months in Australia so that the stamps could be more personal than just the reversal of seasons from the northern hemisphere.

June was a big challenge, though. I was just humming along, having fun with the research and creating the images. I got the crown done and double checked it against the picture that I had....only to find that I had the wrong crown! UGH! I had to start over. I didn't have the crown that Queen Elizabeth wears...I had the Queen consort's crown. You know how they say that doing something the second time is easier? Hogwash. The crown that the Queen wears has more modern settings for all of the jewels and many more jewels. Much more complicated. A really gorgeous piece of art, that crown is.

I had the chance to see the Crown Jewels when we were in London years ago. One of the guards was telling how if you stood in a certain spot and looked at the right angle that you could look into the large diamond in the sceptre and see a flame dancing inside the stone. WOW! It was gorgeous and I am in awe of the soul who cut that diamond so that it would capture the light that way. What a talent to be able to capture fire inside a stone!

So enough of my rambling, on to the stamps. And please remember to contact me if I have anything really wrong with the stamps.

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Diamond layout

2009-09-18T21:38:00.002-04:00

I'm so glad for the stuff that Scrappin Cop makes. Now I can do diamond borders for my pages without working on them forever.

Here's another poem layout. The pictures of DD in her pink jammies always make me giggle. She was just about 18 months old. She had sneaked off and got really quiet. So naturally we followed. She had pulled one of the dining room chairs over to the window and started to wash the windows with a wet wipe. The look on her face when we caught her is priceless.

Some more Egypt stuff

2009-09-18T21:36:00.002-04:00

I started to have a few ideas about elements to sort of go with my Egypt papers. Since I got my new special effects toy I thought I'd see if I could actually get close to some of the enamel work that you see on many of the old treasures from Egypt. I certainly had no shortage of Egyptian clip art from Dover. I went to work and I'll let you be the judge.

I particularly like the gold frame held by the two Isis figures. The four scarab corners are all together but can easily extracted to use for larger photos. It was just easier to leave them together.

Here's the preview:

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Another favorite poem

2009-09-18T20:46:00.003-04:00

When I was a kid I had visions of being famous for something. I'm so glad I got over that. I like being happily anonymous in life. No cameras following me around, no great attention paid to me. Just doing what I like the way I like. Just being me.

And the mom part of me is happy to do one thing right which is to make sure that our daughter grows up happy, secure, smart and strong.

That's enough fame for me.

Going simple...sort of

2009-09-18T18:02:00.003-04:00

I've been making a bunch of really wild looking papers lately. When it's all out of my system then I'll have a paper pack ready for you.

But for now a layout using strips of the paper against white. At the moment it's all I can handle...these papers are LOUD.

I think I'll do this one again with a picture of my kitchen sink in the middle spot. LOL

Just a layout today...

2009-09-14T16:56:00.002-04:00

I always see all of these challenges everywhere. The main trouble with them (for me) is that they require you to use only their kits. I don't usually have any of the kits that they specify so I never enter the challenge.

I decided that I'd just go ahead and do the challenges from now on and post what I do here. I'll use my own stuff and just have my own fun with it.

Well, this one is from a template challenge that I found while following Manu on her blog today. It's a template challenge at a place called Nuthouse Scraps. Go to Manu's blog if you want to give it a look.

I'm just going to do mine here because I haven't got the time for memberships all over the internet. LOL I spend way too much time on the computer as it is.

I used a bunch of my stuff and the pictures are a couple of the paintings from Edmund Blair Leighton, the one on the left is called 'The Accolade', the one on the right is called 'Godspeed'.

The template is really cool. Nice and simple, which naturally leave a lot of room to use wild and gaudy papers. LOL

Stencil Flowers

2009-09-12T00:29:00.001-04:00

I made these quite awhile ago when Dover sent me some art nouveau clip art in my weekly sampler. I think they turned out nice but as usual I haven't the nearest idea of what I could use them for. I really wish I had a little more order to my creativity. I'd like to make things according to a need rather than the whim of "I wonder what THIS would look like?".

I'd really love to see what you all do with some of my artwork. Since I'm always somewhat flailing about making so much random stuff I'd be delighted to see some of the practical applications of what I offer for downloads.

Here is the preview:

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Remember

2009-09-10T23:59:00.003-04:00

It should never be forgotten that there are monsters in this world. Those monsters attacked us and we are now sitting still and reclassifying things as "man-made disasters".

There are things that should always be remembered. That we were brutally attacked is one. That so many innocent people died is another. That we had true heroes stand up to defend us is another.

And that today, we have cowards in our government that just want to forget that it happened because it is inconvenient to their agendas.

We don't need another National Day of Service.

We need to remember who the heroes are, thank them, and promise them that they will not be left in the cold when they are trying to do their jobs by ridding this world of the evil that wishes us dead.

And we need to stand by that promise. They who died, they who fight to protect us, THEY need us to stand up and protect them here at home by flushing out those cowards in our government and by putting them where cowards belong. In obscurity, forever.

Remember.

And then ACT!

Just a quick bit of sunshine

2009-09-10T01:22:00.002-04:00

I'm up again way too late with this but it's done so I'll hurry and post it and then go fall down for the night. I don't know why this happens so much. I'm pretty sure that my brain has an automatic on switch that doesn't work until around 11pm.

I've been suffering some summer deprivation and decided to make my own sunshine since the real sun just isn't cooperating anymore. As of today(August 18) it's 39 days without a sunspot. What a boring thing unless you're one of those that is charting what happens during a deep minimum. Since I'm not eager to chart a solar minimum and I'd like a little bit more solar radiation to hit me I'll just say *yawn*. Although it is interesting to observe the increasing levels of crankiness and lethargy in everyone around here. I keep hearing the statement, "I don't know what's wrong with me. I'm just so TIRED lately." But the sun has no effect on us ... no ... not at all. *yawn*

One of these suncatchers has opaque glass and the other three have glass that is at varying levels of transparency. You get to choose which one to use for your layouts.

See you later!

Here's the preview:

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And the winner is....

2009-09-08T19:02:00.008-04:00

Now is when I have to narrow things down to 10 blogs to whom to pass this award. Yikes! That is so hard to do when I see fifty other artists every day where I think out loud "Wow, I'd like to make art like THAT!"

This award comes from Miggins Does Scrapville who has lots of PSP scripts that are really FABULOUS! I'm playing with a couple of her wildflower scripts until I get an idea of what to do with the finished flowers. Not to worry...an idea will hit me one night about 4 in the morning and I'll be a crazed woman for the rest of the day. LOL There are so few of us PSP folks out here in Photoshop-land that when a good PSP resource pops up we have to give proper encouragement. YAY MIGGINS!!!!!

Only 10. Well...here goes:

SuperMomScrappin of course because without her I wouldn't have started digi-scrapping in the first place. She is my best friend and an artist in so many ways. She can do something that I could never, ever, ever do if I had a million years to work up the courage. She acts. Really! She has been in more plays than I could count and she can sing, dance, and act in front of an audience of real, live PEOPLE! I'd faint at the thought of it. I'll continue with the detail painting on the sets thank you. I prefer the behind the scenes work. You should see her layouts on her blog. She has many more that I've seen elsewhere and she has a real flair for putting it all together. I envy that sometimes. I can make the pieces but then I wonder what to do with it all.

ElegantWordArt I marvel every day at the talent that Bethany shows in creating word art. There have been times when I've looked at a quote for hours and no inspiration hits me. She looks at it and finds art. She's amazing.

Just For Fun Altered art in digital form. Of course! It should have been obvious to me but until I saw Malacima's blog it just hadn't occurred to me. And it should have. This lady is a marvelous artist.

NBK Scrap I could easily provide system backup for Nicole for all of her freebie kits that I have downloaded. She gave me a particularly valuable bit of inspiration...do what style you love and don't fret about the style of the day. She designs according to what inspires her and what she likes to look at and that's the way I try to do things. Her art is varied and amazing and if I only had a hard drive big enough...

Raspberry Road Designs I absolutely LOVE the soft country feel of the designs on Raspberry Road. I can't begin to tell you how many times I've tried to do that style of design only to end up with something edgy and grungy. I'm glad that Raspberry Road is there for those of us who are "pastel-challenged". Beautiful artwork that is soft and calming and always brings a smile to my face.

Easy Custom Blogs Several months back...actually almost a year ago, this lady left a comment on my blog and I followed the link she left for custom blogs. She's the reason why I redecorate my blog so often now. I couldn't have done it without her instructions. If you want to play with your blog look just go see her blog and learn how to do it. She makes it truly painless to pretty up your blog.

Humbug Graphics Galore Humbug has some really neat PSP scripts. Humbug is also the one who has inspired me to write a few scripts of my own to make some of my work a little quicker to do. I haven't made any fancy scripts, just functional stuff that relieves me of some of the repetition when doing alphas and stuff like that. You know how it is...doing the same thing over 62 times gives you one heck of a writers cramp. (I use a wacom tablet and stylus so 62 repetitions can get old fast)

Gunhild Storeide Simply one of the finest collections of commercial use freebies I've seen yet. And the bonus that she tells you how she made some of what she offers so you can make it yourself!! After following her instructions on torn paper edges I made the torn circle frame you saw here a few weeks ago. She is an artist and a teacher...how WONDERFUL!

Scrappin Cop So many commercial use basics I hardly know where to begin. Her true type font dings, her overlays...OH! Her overlays!! They are the BEST! You can make papers with such deep rich texture with her overlays. I need a bigger hard drive.

Racketty Scrappety Last but certainly not least it the template capital of the internet. Well, at least for me it is. She's not producing any new templates for the time being although her blog and the links are still up. The more wonderful thing is how well her son, Crew, is doing now at 10 months old from being born premature last November. He's a little cutie and you should go see how he's doing and give her a shout about her adorable boy.

And now...a freebie...

I've been playing with my new toy SuperBladePro. I like it!

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Now I have to go tell everybody they have an award....I'm going to be a little late with that but I'll get it done. LOL

Well it's been a real day!

2009-09-08T02:20:00.003-04:00

We closed the pool today. Summer is officially over, though I still doubt that it ever actually arrived. It isn't summer if you only have 9 actual hot days fit for swimming. And when the water is rarely above 70 degrees...it ain't hot out.

It appears that I've won an award. I found it today when I looked in my mailbox. I have to pass it on to ten other blogs. Looks like I have to a list to make ...tomorrow. It's almost 3am as I'm writing this. I'm waiting for my uploads to finish so I can go fall down.

I've got some goodies coming in the next few weeks. I just love autoposting. I'll get all of these done tomorrow and be able to play with DD. We've combined reading practice with music. She loves listening to my Monkees cds so I made up a little song book for her with all of the lyrics to the songs she's been listening to. She's learned all of the songs and she's reading!!! How cool is that to combine reading with singing?

Our little township parade was Sunday and all of the antique cars lined up on our street again this year. There weren't as many as last year. I got lots of pictures of DD taking pictures of the cars. She's turning into a car girl like her old mom.

Well, it's off to la-la land for me. Uploads are done and it's time for me to stop babbling.

See you tomorrow for an awards list and some goodies.

Egypt Papers

2009-09-04T15:21:00.002-04:00

I have a friend who travels a lot and she send me pictures from her vacations. I have pictures from Rome, Venice, various parts of France, parts of China that I hadn't been to, and...Egypt.
Once upon a time I wanted to be an archeologist. I was fascinated with digging in Egypt. I still get thrills when I watch any documentary where they've unearthed a lost tomb or city in any part of the world. I love watching Dr. Hawass when he hosts a documentary about Egypt. He has such an infectious passion about the history that I would think it impossible that someone could watch him and not learn something.
I made some papers using the photos of Egypt quite some time ago. I thought I might be motivated to make some elements but I hit a wall. I just couldn't come up with anything and there the papers sat. I decided to just let the papers out on their own since it really is papers that I do best.
The preview that is here is different than the one included in the zip files. As I said in a previous post, I've been trying to make a script for paper previews and it's a long process. Some scripts work better than others.
Here's the new and improved preview

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Dusting off the pencil today

2009-09-02T21:36:00.002-04:00

Working out a few not so long lost skills today. Not bad. I haven't done any actual real work sketching in a few years so this isn't bad at all.

It's amazing what working on real paper can do for you. I had a couple of scraps of rough watercolor paper left from a recent work in progress so I took it with me to karate class and did some detail practice.

Now if only I could get DD to stand still in her uniform for an hour or so....

Taking it out for a spin...

2009-09-02T03:08:00.001-04:00

New wild paper... new wild blog background.

Winner or loser?

I might ditch the stuff at the bottom but all in all not too bad.

My brain is just different

2009-08-30T23:52:00.005-04:00

I started out by looking at the Digifree list for today. I saw a lovely quickpage that was in a softly distressed gray and I decided that I wanted to try making something in gray.

I did some fiddling around with a page from an old history book of mine and a cloud brush. Several jitter and oscillating fade settings and eight layers later I had a neat little paper.

You might think I'd be happy... NO... Let's do more!

So I turned the paper into a layer mask and went to town. I just started flood filling random colors, applying masks, merge all, layer properties, more flood filling, duplicate layers, more masks....

So if you remember...I started with soft grays.

I ended up with this:

All in all a very cool paper, but how in the heck did I get HERE?

Now all I have to do is figure out what to DO with it.

Don't be surprised to see this in the next mish-mash set.

I'm just saying...

2009-08-30T15:20:00.005-04:00

Wouldn't you think that the end of August it might be just a LITTLE bit warm? Just a little?

It's 54 degrees at 3:00 in the afternoon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I just read that there's a frost advisory for Michigan tonight. I'm betting that it'll hit here, too. Darnit.....

I still haven't removed a single quilt from any of the beds. I'm going to be spending the week rotating quilts so that they can get washed and thoroughly dried before winter. I've been trying to hold out for a warm week so that I can take them all in to the laundromat, spend one day washing and drying and then hang them up to air out (and make sure they're fully dry) before putting them back on the beds. In years past I could do that all in one or two days because we didn't need them in the summer. In past summers you didn't generally have to worry about FREEZING TO DEATH!!!!

Yes, I'm a little worn out from the cold. I've been watching this season nearly as carefully as I watched last year. We are in for a hard winter. And an early one. I'm thinking that we're going to see snow by Halloween.

I've noticed that the plants, all of the flowers and trees, have been late in filling out but very early in setting to seed. You know that plants have to get their seeds dropped to the ground before the ground freezes so that germination will happen properly in the spring, right?

It seems that the plants are telling us that this whole process has to happen much sooner than last year. I think the ground is going to be freezing very early and our winter this year is going to be early, long lasting and very very harsh.

The maples in the backyard have been turning leaves yellow and red since early July. The leaves have been falling a lot for the past two weeks. Usually we only get one or two in the skimmer basket for the pool filter during most of the summer. And that's usually only when we have a bad storm.

And the bad storms! We've only had two! Usually we can count on one really good blower every other week. We've had TONS of rain but no storms. We've been getting 4 to 5 days of solid, slow and steady rain at a time. This has been the kind of lingering rain that if it had been just 30 degrees colder it would be enough snow to stop everything for three days.

We're going to get so hammered this winter.

The chipmunks and squirrels are so busy in the woods collecting and storing food that they haven't been out to play much this summer. I can hear them among the trees but they're not taking the time to play this year. Too much work to be done I suppose.

I'm doubting that the few peppers that I have on the plants are going to turn red and orange like they're supposed to. I'll probably have to pick them green tomorrow and have them as is.

I went out today to pull weeds in the front to make the yard look as presentable as possible for next Saturday's parade. I shivered while I did it and I'm wearing jeans and a t-shirt with a sweat shirt over that. I'm inside and I still have the sweat shirt on. It's COLD!

Next week I'll be finishing up on the winter food stock. I just need to get more chicken and sausage for the freezer then I can focus on the canned goods. I'm not going to worry so much about the low-carb thing for this winter. No bread or potatoes for me, as usual. I seem to have trouble with wheat products. Not really a surprise considering my allergies to grass. If you stop to think about it, wheat is really just a wild grass cultivated to be a food source. So if you're allergic to grass pollen then you'll have a reaction to wheat products. My reaction is in my joints. Especially my knees, back and elbows. When I cut out all of the flour, then all of the pain goes away, too. Easy decision...stop eating wheat. Though I do so love a bowl of Wheat Chex with fresh strawberries.... *sigh*

The hummingbird has been eating a lot in the last few days. I really ought to get a feeder for them next year. The other day we spotted him in the late afternoon (which is really an odd time for him) so we watched him from the window. The butterfly bush is right outside the window so we had a great view. Then when he was done drinking, he zipped right to the window and hovered, looking right at us for a good 5 seconds and then zipped away to go to his next stop. Really cool. That's another place where I need to start keeping the camera.

Well, there's my Sunday in a nutshell. I just remembered that DH's laundry is in the dryer and if it went off then his clothes are sitting there....wrinkling as I speak. Our dryer has a magnificent buzzer. It's louder than heck when you're standing right next to it. but you can't hear it from the next room when you're busy doing something else. We get a lot of wrinkled clothes... Good thing we have a surplus of washcloths and towels. Throw a wet (clean) towel in and dry for a bit longer and no wrinkles! I'll do whatever I have to to put off ironing.

Well, here's a layout of a much warmer summer...even though it was October. It was warmer two years ago in October than it is this year in July and August. *sigh*

I need a little help

2009-08-29T15:41:00.005-04:00

I had a request from a reader who mentioned that the seasons are opposite in the Southern Hemisphere and that though my month stamps from the previous post are beautiful they aren't entirely seasonally appropriate.

And she's right!

But here's where I need your help. Since I do live in the Northern Hemisphere I need to know a few things about your change of seasons where you live.

I know that I have some readers in South Africa, South America, Australia and New Zealand so if you could leave a comment about what flowers bloom when, what months are known for heavy snow or ice, when it's usually sweltering hot ( I know, this year is a little different than most) and when the leaves start to turn.

I'm posting a little tiny freebie with this just so I can get everyone's attention for the information gathering.

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Large Month Stamps

2009-08-28T14:48:00.001-04:00

I made these some time ago on my Hubby's computer downstairs. The trouble was...his computer stopped talking to my computer. Bad computer. They're finally speaking now and I got my month stamps bundled, previewed, zipped and uploaded.
These are kind of neat. They're almost full page stamps so they can be used to decorate your paper in the background on your layouts.
I particularly like October. I have a thing for haunted houses and full moons.
Here's the preview:

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Still Stitching

2009-08-26T00:01:00.005-04:00

I think this year I am looking forward to winter. At least the pretense of summer activity will have ended and the expectations to be outside doing something will be gone. In the snowy winter time I'll have no-one expecting me to be outside pulling weeds(the only thing that would grow this year) or cutting the grass.
I can be safely tucked away inside the house teaching DD how to sew. She finally wants to learn how to do some fancy work like what I've done in years past. *bounce*bounce*bounce* I can't wait!
In the meantime I'm chomping at the bit waiting for the snow! And the subsequent excuse to stay inside for a month at a time. LOL
Today I have for you two bellpulls on hangers. The hangers I am particularly proud of. I managed to play around with SuperBladePro enough to get the shape to look like that iron yard furniture that was always painted white and then left to rust outdoors. Yeah, you know the stuff.
One of the bellpulls is a frame and the other is for... journaling I guess. I wanted to do more but I didn't want to overdo it. My good glasses got a huge scratch in the right lens and I've been wearing my old glasses until my new ones get repaired. You remember...the old glasses that when I spend too much time in PSP my eye starts to twitch? Yeah, THOSE glasses.

Well, here's the preview:
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And what do you think of the needle? You'll see when you open it up. I thought it was a neat touch. After all, I'm always leaving my stitching needles stuck somewhere they shouldn't be...

Torn Doodle Frame

2009-08-21T14:36:00.001-04:00

In my last Mish-Mash set I had a torn paper circle that I thought I'd fiddle around with. I combined it with some doodling on what looks like lumpy watercolor paper. I really ought to scan in some of my hot pressed paper. I have some really nice, rough surface paper that I haven't pulled out for quite some time. Maybe I'll do that over the winter.
But this is ready for you to plunk right down on any paper. There are two frames, one with dots around the inside of the checkered circle and one without the dots. It's big but goes smaller if you resize it. Again, within reason but I never needed it really small.
Here's the preview:

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A Surprise

2009-08-15T23:56:00.005-04:00

I hadn't planned to make anything to match the papers I made for yesterday's post but I also hadn't planned on having this new toy to play with either. SuperBladePro is really fantastic. I am really impressed with the variety of effects that you can get from this program. I highly recommend it to anyone who is having a rough time getting realistic metal effects with their basic imaging program. Keep in mind, too, that you can make any sort of special effects if you play with the settings. I'm fiddling with some settings for gemstones and they're getting to look very nice.

I got some brushes awhile back of leaves and thought about making some of those gold skeleton leaves only in copper. Once I made the skeleton I filled it with the papers from Fall is Here and of course played with the layer properties and erasing random parts of each layer. I really like how these look. I don't know exactly what to do with them now, which is really no surprise since you all know that I generally just doodle without any real goal in mind. I just get something in my head and wonder if I can make that on the computer.

Well the inspiration for the leaves comes from all of the leaves that are turning and falling into the swimming pool over these past three weeks. Every time the wind blows I get more red, orange and yellow leaves that I have to scoop out of the water. Which, incidentally, is still only 75 degrees Fahrenheit. If we get three sunny days in a row we might get up to 79 degrees but that's a really big IF this year. I'm ordering the winter cover for the pool tomorrow and we're giving up on Labor Day weekend and closing the pool. Summer didn't happen this year. I'm noticing a disturbing trend and I'm having more than a few doubts about opening the pool next year at all.

So with summer being a bust it's time to make plans for Halloween. DD wants to be a fairy and I got all of the fabric and notions for her dress and wings. She's going to be a pink and purple sparkly fairy in a long dress so she doesn't get cold when she goes trick or treating this year. I just hope she doesn't need snow boots. Good thing I've got extra fabric in case I have to decorate the boots to match. LOL

So here is the preview for tonight:

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Fall is Here

2009-08-14T13:12:00.001-04:00

I don't know about where you live but here in Ohio we have leaves turning and falling. It's July 30th as I'm writing this. I've seen Rose of Sharon in full bloom all around here and if I remember correctly they don't normally begin their bloom until mid August. Then there's the Cosmos. Those don't bloom until late August or early September and I'm seeing some spectacular displays. I think our plants are telling us something. They're blooming early to get their seeds into the ground before the snow falls. That's what flowers do. And they're telling us that winter is coming very soon. I think I'd better go get some more quilts and some plastic for these old windows. We're going to get hammered again this winter.
I've been hiding in my computer for the past couple of weeks. I can't face going in the backyard right now. I cut the grass back there on Tuesday and spent the rest of the day crying. So I've been keeping myself completely drowned in watching the weather around me. Watching the flowers and animals during this miserable excuse of a summer.
The chipmunks and squirrels are so busy in the yard with collecting acorns that I hardly see them. That may not make sense but I hear them everywhere. They're noisy but they aren't standing still this summer. The wild rabbits are breeding faster than I've ever seen them before. The mother rabbit of the litter that we saved is pregnant again. Only one of her litter survived but that is more than would have survived had we not moved the nest from that hill. I just hope that she doesn't pick that darned hill again.
We opened our pool for Memorial Day this year. With the propane heater on for two days we couldn't get the water above 68 degreesF. It took only a week to go through a season's worth of propane. Last year the same amount of propane lasted for half the season. The year before we had gas left over. That tells me that it's getting progressively colder around here.
That and the fact that we all still have two layers of quilts on our beds that we still use every night. I usually can take off the quilts in May get them washed and folded onto the quilt rack and ready for the next winter. We're going straight through until the next winter this year. I need to get more so that I can start a rotation to keep them clean. I think I need to get a proper table for my sewing machine so I can start my quilt making again.
Want a tip for a fantastic warm and cheap filling for a home made quilt? Old pantyhose. Seriously. When you get a run in them keep them for quilt batting. Wash them of course, but save up all your old pantyhose. It makes a fabulously warm quilt.
And I'm beginning to think that this winter we're going to need warm clothes. Especially if our home heating supplies get more expensive and increasingly scarce.
It also looks like I might be able to get some leaves and branches early from my burning bush. It usually doesn't turn red until near the middle of September but it's beginning to turn red right now. I want to make a wreath for inside the front door. I have plenty of branches and twigs for the base but for the color I want the red burning bush. I just have to experiment on how to keep the leaves from falling off once the wreath is made. It's been a long time since I did floral stuff. I'll have to refresh my memory.
Well, thanks for reading my ramblings for today. Here's a set of papers that I made. I have two previews but it's all one download. I'm fiddling with a script for making previews and it's still a work in progress. Actually if I have more than 8 papers open at the same time I end up crashing PaintShopPro. You know the drill, "not enough memory to complete operation". Good thing that Hubby is a computer guy. He'll figure it out.
Here are the two previews:

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A little altered alpha

2009-08-08T01:09:00.003-04:00

I saw about two months ago a wonderful altered book that used some old stencils as the title on the page. It was a wonderful book and I wanted to do something like that but I don't have any of those stencils nor do I have the money to go out and buy a set to splatter paint on.

But I do have Paint Shop Pro. So I set out to make a set that I could use in my digital layouts and I think I really did it. Here's the link for the layout that I did awhile back using these letters. Read the story about the two pictures. It'll give you chills.

Anyway, here is the preview for the letters:

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Whitework embroidered frames

2009-08-06T18:28:00.005-04:00

I found yet another tutorial that required getting SuperBladePro. I thought I'd actually jump in and try it. It's pretty cool. The metal effects are great but I think I like the stitching effect that I used to make these frames the best. It's making me want to pick up my hardanger stitching again. Hmmm...that would make some nice frames. I'll see what I can make up while I'm fiddling around with this program.

Anyway, here's the preview:
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Last night was movie night!

2009-07-29T22:55:00.001-04:00

I absolutely LOVE Mel Brooks. I remember seeing History of the World Pt 1 when it first came out in the theaters many, many years ago. It is so hard to pick what is my favorite part in that movie. I do love Gregory Hines as Josephus. And Madeline Kahn as Empress Nympho was absolutely hysterical.

But when Mel Brooks looks straight into the camera (in pre-Revolutionary France) and says..."It's good to be the king"... is equal to his line to Harvey Korman(Count de Monet) "Don't correct ME".

I just love that!

So much that I made another stamp. LOL Here's the preview.

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