ATC Christmas Ornaments-2012

As some of you already know, I belong to a Yahoo group of artists called In My Vintage Room and Beyond.  I recently hosted an exchange in our group - ATC Christmas Ornaments.  Nine artists, including myself, played in this swap.  We had to create three Christmas themed ATC's with a hanger for displaying the ornament.  The girls outdid themselves - the ornaments were wonderful.  It was very difficult to give them up!  With my DIL's help, we sorted out all the ATC's and everyone received three in return for the three they created.  I packaged all the beautiful ornaments and put them in todays mail.  This is an annual event that we have been doing for at least three or four years and, I for one, look forward to this swap every year.  So feast your eyes on what the artist's created:

Doris - fronts  

Doris - backs

Donna - fronts - creative packaging as well!!!

Donna - backs

Mary - fronts

Mary - backs 

Janice - fronts

Janice - backs

Maura - fronts

Maura - backs

Ginger - fronts

Ginger - backs

Miriam - fronts 

Miriam - backs

Lori - fronts

Lori - backs 

Fran - fronts --- forgot to photograph backs

I told you they were wonderful!!!  Thanks girls for playing in this swap.....

Altered Vintage Cookie Cutters

For those of you who know me you know I'm a Pinterest Addict.  Yes, I will admit it, I am - I cannot help myself.  If anyone knows of a Pinterest Anonymous Group in my area let me know quickly.  I don't care much about Facebook or Twitter, but I love, love, love Pinterest!  There I've said it again.  

One morning while pinning, I came across a couple of photos showcasing altered vintage cookie cutters, which were then turned into Christmas ornaments and my mind went racing.  Now I had a desperate need to have vintage cookie cutters - and I had to have them right now!  So I put in a SOS to my friend Lori who is a antiques junkie and asked her to be on the lookout for cookie cutters in her never-ending search for unique antiques.  Lori's home is filled with beautiful finds and she displays them with such detail.  Her home really should be featured in Country Living or Country Home!  She mixes new with old in a way only Lori can do!  

Back to the cookie cutters - well, Lori, Bill [Lori's husband] and her sister Beth found me dozens of these cookie cutters at different antique shows.  Along with the cookie cutters Lori gifted me with a large book of vintage sheet music and Beth with buttons [great friends, by the way].  I had all I needed at this point to recreate what I had seen on Pinterest.  I have a specific goal for gifting these treasures and in a future post I will share who the recipients are.  For right now it's a secret.  

So here they are....I'm sure not everyone will be as excited about these as I am, so be it!!!

The first three pictures are some of my
altered cookie cutters

This was my inspiration from Pinterest

By the way folks, I am not responsible for anyone's addiction to Pinterest!!!  But you should give it a try.....

Witches Hat Reveal

Due to the storm Sandy earlier this week [thankfully this area of New York was spared major disasters - my heart goes out to all those who are suffering the effects of this terrible, devastating storm] the Yahoo Art Group's Halloween Gathering had to be postponed.  We were given a witches hat to alter and were to reveal them at this gathering.  I had posted the hat as we received it on Sept. 19th.  Here it is again:

Here is my finished project:

I cannot wait to see all the witches hats finished.  Everyone will get a chance to reveal their's when the gathering is rescheduled.  Who knows, we might be celebrating Halloween in January!!!  That will be fun, too!!!  I think a witch would love to wear this hat, don't you???

Falling Leaves

Falling Leaves

Isn't that what fall brings?  With all the leaves floating down to earth also comes a great opportunity for play!!!  Remember being a kid and that great feeling of jumping into a big pile of leaves that your dad just raked only to have him get flustered - but there was always a little smirk on his face as he probably remembered doing the same when he was a child.  To this day I love taking a walk in the fall and shuffling through a pile of leaves....I love to hear the crunch and watch the leaves scatter about...there is that inner child in my that would love to jump right in.  But as we get older we are more unlikely to through caution to the wind as we did as children.  My grandchildren had no fear of anything this fall afternoon and used the occasion of my husbands efforts of raking to  foster some old fashioned play.  I then had to run for the camera.   I had almost as much fun watching them as they did finding a new outlet to expel some energy.....

Niko diving in...

How did you find me in here?

Mahina swimming in the leaves...

One, two, three  

GO!

Look how many I have?

Nonno and his helpers...

Now Sandy blew through earlier this week [thankfully without much fanfare in my neck of the woods] and all the leaves are wet and yucky.....a few days of sun and maybe another romp through the leaf pile before we start building snowmen!!!

Happy Leaf Jumping...

Scrabble Tile Art

Scrabble Tile Art

Two gals, Beth and Doris, from one of the art groups I belong to, In My Vintage Room [which you can find on Yahoo], are hosting a "Halloween Gathering" at the end of the month.  I thought it would be fun to gift all the gals attending with a scrabble tile pendant in the spirit of Halloween.  I had found directions on how to make them on the Internet.  There are many sites that will give you the all the info you need but I found one that has very easy steps to follow.  You can find the instructions and what supplies are used here.   I purchased the collage sheet, scrabble tiles and aanaraku bails from different shops on Etsy; very easy to find if you do a "search" on Etsy.  They are a fun little project to do.  I think I'll do some tiles for the Christmas Holidays, too!

 Halloween Collage Sheet 

Scrabble Tiles - Images - Aanraku Bails

Tiles with Images

Tiles with edges painted black

Adhesives

Tiles after Diamond Glaze Dried

Tiles with Aanraku Bails attached with E6000

Finished Tile Pendants

Steampunk ATC & Watercolor Flowers

Steampunk ATC Swap

I received my ATC's from Maura a few days ago.  I really can not tell you how impressed I was with all the little pieces of art that were created for this swap.  As I mentioned in my previous post, I had a hard time getting my head into "Steampunk" and had a difficult time coming up with ideas for my ATC's.  After seeing what was created I only hope that the gals who received my ATC's were not too disappointed.  I tried, really I did!  Check out all the artwork here at the "In My Vintage Room and Beyond Blog".

I have been busy with my grandchildren these days as my DIL has been traveling for work and haven't really had too much time to create.  I am working on the witches hat I posted in my previous post and also planning 3 ATC Christmas Ornaments for the exchange I am hosting over at In My Vintage Room and Beyond in November.  I have managed to squeeze in some Halloween scrabble tile necklaces to give as gifts at the end of this month and will soon post pictures of them.  Here are a couple of watercolor's I had painted a while ago and just framed.  These will be gifts; one for someone who is always very giving and the other is for a friends mom:

These are both watercolors

These are in my comfort zone - I love doing these little watercolors.  These are a result of a You Tube video I had seen a couple of years ago from one of my favorite artists Martha Lever...check her out, she is amazing and very witty!!!

Hope everyone enjoys the weekend although the weather people are calling for more rain.  I guess the rain we didn't get all summer is coming now - all at once.  

good wishes . . . 

Steampunk & Halloween Art Swap

Steampunk & Halloween Art Swap

I have been working on two art exchanges this past week for one of my art groups  inmyvintageroomandbeyond.blogspot.com- trying to get things "in" before the day after the deadline.  One of the challenges was to create a Halloween themed Little Fat Book Page, [a 4" x 4" chipboard based "canvas"]; and the other was to create 3 Steampunk ATC's [artist trading card - a 2-1/2" x 3-1/2" chipboard based "canvas"].  Halloween was not too much of a problem - but, although I love Steampunk, my mind has a hard time creating Steampunk!

The way the challenge's work are to create however many pieces of art the hostess request for a certain challenge.  For instance, Doris is the hostess for the Halloween swap asked for one for one LFB - so each participant will mail her their LFB and she will exchange one LFB for another and send it back through the mail.... the same for the ATC's.  Maura is the hostess of the Steampunk swap and she asked for 3 for 3 ATC's and whoever participates in the swap will receive three ATC's in exchange.  Let me tell you, this group of gals is so very talented....if you check out the blog [link is above] for pictures of the Steampunk ATC's after the 30th of this month you will see some amazing work.  The Halloween swap is not due until the middle of October but if you go to the above link you will see other excellent  creations from this talented group from past challenges.  There is a list of upcoming swaps/challenges on the right sidebar.  This group is always welcoming new artists to join in with us and share their talents.

With all that said, I'll share my exchanges - hopefully the gal who get's one of my "canvases" will like it.....

Front of the Halloween Themed LFB page

Back of the LFB page

Steampunk - ATC

Steampunk - ATC

Steampunk - ATC

I'd like to add that there is a group of us from In My Vintage Room who are altering this paper mache witches hat....the reveal will be at our October Halloween Gathering Party on Oct. 29th - I'll post pictures after this event.  The blog has a post of ideas on Altered Witches Hats....here is the "naked" hat.....

good wishes ......