September COF Swap

Another swap completed!  This month, September's swap, is hosted by me, and of course I picked Halloween for my topic (no big surprise there!).  Recently I was at the Renaissance fair in our area, and while there, saw these fun "Skeleton Fairies".  I almost bought one, but for the price they were asking, I couldn't really stomach it, knowing that I could make my own custom one for a fraction of the price. (that seems to be my problem a lot.  I love to support other artists, but sometimes I just end up making my own version, either directly or indirectly influenced).  Anyways, I wanted to make a Halloween themed fairy, so here it is.  I found these great Monarch butterflies to use and gave a orange and iridescent halo along with (which is hard to see) a sparkly black "Boo!" sign in the left hand.  I finished it off with a leather cord for hanging.  I had a lot of fun making these and I hope the COF gals like them too! 

Time for another Round Robin journal to get started!

As I have mentioned in a previous post or two, I'm part of a group of stampers/mixed media artists that have been together for what, 5 years now?  Anyways, we have decided to do another Round Robin journal project and this time I've chosen a very different theme.  I hemmed and hawed (spelling??) quite a bit this go-round, and finally decided to settle on the idea of multiple characters/personalities.  Recently hearing about Lady Gaga's alternate persona sparked something in my mind that I've had hovering there for some time now (ever since I realized Garth Brooks became Chris Gaines, anyone remember that?).  Questions like, how do they start? How many different ones can there be? Who has them?  Do we each have our own different characters and personalities and not even know it? etc., etc., etc.  And I'm not just talking about medically diagnosed multiple personalities necessarily, just any time that an individual takes on another character in their life to perform a task, cope with something or just for fun if they're living in some type of altered state.  But enough about that. 

I chose for my journal this time to have this "theme".  I have created a base or original character/persona, "Molly Winters", a quiet, shy librarian on the surface (directly inspired by a series of books I've been reading recently) and the task for each person that gets the journal is to create a new character/persona for her.  I needed to create an example and her first persona, so I created "Addison Black", saucy show girl extraordinare.  I have attached a couple of pictures of the journal, so if any COF journal participants are reading this, sorry for the spoiler!  :)

Baby Card

Well, I had a spare minute tonight, so I finally had a chance to sit down and make a baby shower card for a co-worker that has a shower at work this Friday.  She's not finding out the sex of the baby, so I went ahead and added blue and pink into the traditional green and yellow for some variety and punch.  Here's the finished product on the left.  There is this company, Stamps by Judith, that makes these really cute little chubby/stump stamps and this year at the scrapbooking convention my friend and I decided to stock up on a variety of the styles.  I had plans to use these little mini stamps as ornaments for my bare tree.  We ended up getting for a variety of occassions and holidays, so I'm sure you'll see more of this type of style over time.

Busy, busy, busy!

Yikes, so I just looked at the last date I posted somthing on here, nearly two months ago!!!  Shameful!  Not really I guess, but I've really fallen off the wagon with posting.  You know how it goes though, I've been so crazy busy with so much stuff going on that I've been buried and am trying desperately to dig myself out of a hole. 

Anyways, so what have I been up to lately?  More needle felting!  I am signed up to do two craft fairs, one at the end of this month and another at the start of next.  I LOVE love love Halloween and all the cutesy, crazy stuff that comes out around this time of year and I decided that since I love it so much, why not just primarly focus on it for the items I'm making for the fairs.  Here is a pic of some of the needle felted creations that I've been working on this past week or so.  I actually really like them (which I don't say very often at all about anything I make) with the exception of the witch's head.  She ended up getting too big and needs to get refined a bit more, nor did she photograph very well.  I've also been up to making a whole crapload of mini cards to sell as well, I'll post some of those soon.  What do you guys think of the felted creations?  I'm planning stiching a type of bail on it and using them as the focal pendant on a necklace. 

More Minis

Okay, I think I am a self-professed mini card addict.  I absolutely LOVE working in this format!  I have been working with the square format for my larger sized cards as well lately.  Maybe it's a phase...

Anyways, I got my new Lawn Fawn stamps in the mail last week and finally had a chance to sit down and use them today.  I really like the quality of the stamps as they have a nice clear, solidly inked image.  Some clear stamps have a so-so image quality when they are inked/stamped, but not these ones, it was like stamping heaven using these ones.  LOVE them!  Here are some of the designs I came up with today. 

Hope everyone is doing well and surviving this humidity!

Cupcake Birthday Cards

Tonight I had a chance to work on some cupcake themed birthday cards.  I think they turned out alright.  On the two larger cards, I wish I would have made the actual cupcake figure dimensional, so I am going to have to remake them and try it that way.  The "lady" card and the small card each have some glitter pen added and a little bit of bling, but it's hard to tell with the lighting I had to use.  Normally, I've been trying to work during the day so that way I can take my photos with some natural light, but that just wasn't happening today, ah well.  Anyone that's actually taking a look at these things, I would love to have some feedback about them, any feedback, good, bad or ugly, I can take it all.  I'm planning on signing up for a couple of art/craft fairs in the fall and would love to know what the general population thinks about them and so on so forth.

Another Mini

Had just a little time to myself today as little one was napping, so I had time to do one mini card.  I chose to do a pregnancy/expecting card as I have a few people I know that I could send this card to.  I love this stamp and it's matching sentiment (from Stampin Bella again).  I'm looking to order some new stamps very soon, so I will have some fresh inspiration to do some new cutesy cards.  I am planning on signing up for some craft fairs this fall, so I need to get my butt in gear!