Some art

Here's what I've done in artwork lately:
My collageatcs group did Vintage for December, and I had to use some of my new items laying around.
Starting at the top and going left to right: I used some 'packing tape' I bought at Micheal's for the background and then layered a piece of book on it and then the boy on the turkey from our package.
Next I took some patterned blue paper, colored the lady with chalk, glued her down. I also colored in a black strip on the edge and added the string of pearls. The pearl clusters in her hair are also something I bought at Micheal's. The string of pearls, and the lady were in the package.

On the next card, I layered a vintage dictionary page for a background, and then added the poufy wallpaper, which was in our package, I thought it looked a little dull, so I colored in some areas with black gel pen. The lady was also from the package and she's colored with chalks.

Starting on the bottom and going left to right: I used an old Bingo card for the background, rubbed some red distress ink from my supply swap on it, the beige card and the fish were in the package. The crown is also from my supply swap.

Lastly, the background wallpaper was in the package, I added a light blue paper and layered the Remember quote, which was also in the package.

I decopaged some tiny wooden bowls for a friend for Christmas, I've been reading on other blogs of people doing this and I decided to try it. I learned to use a thinner paper and use my hands a lot. They turned out pretty cute, and my friend loved them.

I'm still waiting on my stocking swap. I contacted the swap hostess and she was infuriated, and said she'd send me something, that was over 2 weeks ago.

I did sign up for a Valentine's Day swap, where you send things to each other. The hostess said she had the perfect person in mind for me and they would not flake out.

Swaps and thoughts

I joined two swaps this holiday season, one was a supply swap, the other a stocking swap.
I received my supply swap on December 11th, I was overjoyed it came so early.
In our packages we were to include:
1. 20 6" x 6" sheets of patterned paper
2. 5 charms or metal embellishments
3. an alphabet
4. 10 diecuts or punched shapes
5. 10 stamped images in black ink on white cardstock
6. a bling
7. 10 fibers/trims/ribbons
8. 5 small (1" or smaller) or 3 medium (1'" - 2") or a large (over 2") flower(s)
9. 3 journaling spots
10. a pocket or small envelope
11. A surprise.
I thought it was a great swap to join, it always seems other people's stuff is better than your own.
So, here's what I got from my partner:
You can see the pile or metal charms, and the flowers (way more than 5), there's a distress ink pad there, and a cupcake stamp, also 4 journaling spots, a rub-on alphabet, and the bling (self-adhesive crystals in the shape of a bird in a tree.

Here's a close-up of the metal embellishments (way more than 5), there's a key, some metal charms with words, the black things are roses, a butterfly, some photo corners, wings, a heart, a crown, and a blingy thing.

Here's a close-up of the flowers.

In this picture you can see some bottlecaps, the envelope (or more than one), some manila tags, the fibers, the diecuts, some chipboard (in, I believe, ATC size). I'm extremely giddy about using the chipboard, awhile ago, I ordered ATC sized chipboard through Etsy and decided it's great to use as a backing for my ATCs.

Here you can see a bunch of lunch bags, a chipboard book in the shape of a crown, a set of patterned paper (way more than 20), and the stamped images.

Here is some more chipboard, the card she gave me and a Christmas tag she made (also one of the requirements.

We were supposed to make a Christmas tag with a rubon on it, I love her tag, especially the jingle bell at the top, and whatever set of rub-on's she used.

And the last thing in my package was a set of white things. Each of these groups were in their own little container.

Also, if you noticed there's pink tissue paper as the background in each of these photos, that was included as well, and I'm also very tickled about it.

My other swap, the stocking swap, we were supposed to read each other's blogs and spend $10-$15 before shipping with a stocking on stuff our partner would like. These were supposed to be mailed by December 11th. I haven't seen mine yet. I waited a week before contacting the hostess about it. I tried emailing my partner during the swap with a question and never got an email back. I'm starting to believe I'm never getting a package back.

That annoys me and makes me wonder if I should bother getting in to swaps where we send directly to our partner. I'm also out the money I spent on her, her gifts and the over $10.00 in shipping. I'm not naming names, but I did just read one of her blogs that she posted yesterday, so she's still somewhere in the world.

On a positive note today, I got a mini Stampin' Up catalog in my mail, sent to me by Alicia, who is a Stampin' Up demonstrator in CA. I follow her blog and I'm sure I'm now in her Stampin' Up website database, but that meant a ton to me. Thank you Alicia.

Hope everyone's having a good holiday and Merry Christmas

Christmas swaps

I know it's been awhile, but here are a few things I made for some swaps I joined. The first was a card to go with a stocking swap. We were supposed to fill a stocking up with $15-$20 in gifts and send it out to our partner. Here's the card I made for my partner:
It's a red cardstock background. I layered a green patterned paper on top of it, and then added some glitzy buttons. The reindeer were from a pair of earrings I bought at a garage sale this summer. The snowflake stickers are from a set I bought at a garage sale as well. The "Happy", "Holidays" and snowflake buttons were purchased at Hobby Lobby.
This next one is a card I included with a supply swap.

Once again, it's a red cardstock background with a piece of green patterned paper layered on it. The snowglobe is actually a bubble and came in a sticker set with the "Let it Snow" sticker on top, I bought them at a garage sale this summer. The snowflake buttons I bought at Hobby Lobby.
This tag was one of the requirements in the supply swap. We were supposed to make a Christmas tag with a rub-on.

I started with a white cardstock background and then rubbed green and red inkpads over it. I took an old book page and rubbed red and green inkpads on that as well. The tree and "Merry Christmas" stamps are from a set of clear stamps that I bought at Jo Ann Fabrics, the jewels came with them. The red bow was in my stash.

I have also signed up to do a snowman swap that's due on Decemeber 19th.

I'm trying to not get too messy with my creations lately as I sliced my finger open washing a glass on Tuesday and had to get 7 stitches. If you want to see a picture (it's just the stitches, nothing gory), and read a little more about it head on over to my other blog here.

Happy WOYWW

Hello all,
I'm back participating in WOYWW this week. I finally finished my cards for my Halloween swap for my CollageATCs yahoo group, exteremely late, I know. But, I was the hostess and as we weren't doing anything for December, and everyone's busy with other things, nobody seemed too bothered. And here they are:
Starting in the upper left hand corner: I used the orange vellum and the 'Trick or Treat' bag. I had the Lisa Frank jack-o-lantern sticker, and the sunglasses used to be a pin.
I used the orange vellum and the jack-o-lantern punch. I thought it would be neat/creepy to have a set of eyes peering out from a leaf pile. All the leaves are diecuts I bought at a garage sale this summer.
I used everything but the background. The black bat and moon are buttons, the smaller buttons are from a plastic bag, and the house is a punch. I used gold spray webbing on the background.
I used the tiny 'Boo' piece, it's from a plastic bag. I thought the old couple looked kinda creepy.
In this set, starting in the upper left hand corner: I used the orange vellum ghost and the foam witch's hat. The ghost is glued onto a piece of lined cardboard and then onto an old book page. The trim on the top and bottom is some green leather.
I used the candy corn paper, and the candy corn stickers. The background is another piece of old book page. The lady is a stamped image given to me by a friend.
I used the black tissue paper covering the spider. I started out with this flourescent yellow plastic spider, I tried to color it black with a sharpie marker, but that didn't work. Then I remembered this technique I read about on a blog of covering something with tissue paper, so I did that with some Mod Podge, and then added the gold pearl powder to it, I covered it with more Mod Podge, so it wouldn't rub off. This is my favorite of the group. I still have to paint the hourglass red, but I love it the way it is now.
The last one, I used the web and the spider.

If you don't know what WOYWW is, head over to Julia's and check it out.

Altered Tin Swap

Last time I posted on here (it was a awhile ago), I posted the tin I decorated for an Altered Tin Swap for one of my Yahoo! groups. This is the tin I got in return, today, November 2nd (I'll come back to that).
Here's a view of the front, and the opening is on the left, a tiny bit backward if you ask me.
Here's a view of the back:

And here's a view of the inside:

It's very pretty, but I guess I hoped for a little more, it's all paper and glitter. Don't get me wrong, I do like, it's just a little different, but then that's why I join swaps, to get a great variety of art.

Now back to the part of receiving it today, November 2nd. Originally, we were supposed to mail these to a hostess and then she would swap them out and send them back to us. She decided it would be easier for us to just mail them to our partner, I thought it was a good idea too. The original date to get to her was October 15th, since it was changed to mailing directly to our partners, I interpreted that to mean, our partner should have it by the 15th of October.

I get my emails through a list email, as we usually get a ton of emails from the group. I saw on the list that my partner posted she had mailed hers late, maybe around the 20th of October. Now, she didn't email me to tell me that, our partners were not secret, so that wouldn't be a problem.

I kept checking my mailbox hoping it would be there. Today, I looked and it was, and the mailed date was October 27th. She had to go to the post office to get it mailed to me, so I know the date is true.

Here's my question to you all, if you're going to be late sending something to someone, wouldn't you email them?

Also, would this be unacceptable for you in a swap? For the item to be mailed 12 after it was supposed to be in someone's hands?

If I was hosting the swap, and I was waiting on an item, they'd be booted out of the swap. The package would be returned to sender once I got it. I know it wasn't a swap where you send it to a hostess, but still.

I'm annoyed about the fact that it was sent so late and that she didn't inform me about the fact she was going to send it late.

Happy Woyww, check out Julia's Blog for more snooping.

I would love any and all comments.

What's On Your Workspace Wednesday

OK, I'm late, and this picture is not actually on my workspace this week, but I needed to take the pictures before the sun was completely gone on Monday, and I had to mail it yesterday.
So WOYWW? it's an altered Altoid tin I did for a swap.
Quite a few years ago, my mother and I went to a class on using UTEE on Altoid tins, our instructor had already burned off the paint on her stove. We've found the best way to burn off the paint (though it could be different now), was to hold it over a gas flame on a stove set to high. Unfortunately, neither of us has a gas stove anymore, so I thought I'd try a candle, same principle right? Well, either Altoids has changed the way they paint their boxes or candles just don't give off enough heat, or I was impatient, or everything together, it didn't actually burn the paint off, so I finally gave up, and just added the UTEE over the top.
This is the front of the tin, after building up my UTEE layer, I added black, gold, silver, and copper embossing powders. I then added this leftover sticker backing I had laying on my floor, some leaf punches and some melted tinsel to it:
And here is the inside:
I also did the UTEE layering and then added terra cotta, butterscotch and hunter green embossing powders. Then I added the plastic leaves, the twigs from my yard, the pumpkin, an acorn stamped image, and the copper leaf to it.

I also added some left over stamped bookpages from my last ATC project and a piece of orange vellum, on which I wrote happy Fall, to the inside of the lid. Of course I did that later Monday night, and didn't get a picture of it.

If you want to know what WOYWW is, go on over to Julia's to find out.

Also, don't forget to go here for my Halloween giveaway, it ends on the 20th.

What's On My Workspace Wednesday

For September in my CollageATCs Yahoo Group, our swap theme was Fall, here are my cards for the swap:
Starting in the bottom left hand corner and going clockwise:
The background paper is from when I did some distress spraying and masking, you can't see much of that paper, due to the yellow handmade paper I added to it. On top of that are 4 leaf images that I colored and a clear leaf sticker, all of those came in the packet.
Upper left: background paper is from distress spraying and masking, you can see a 3 leaf branch and a 4. I added leaf die cuts and a brown button with a yellow gem in the middle. The button and gem were in the packet.
Upper right: I stamped leaf images on an old book page and colored them in with markers. You can't tell from the picture, but the red maple leaf is dimensional, the stamped image was in the packet and I put some foam tape under it. There's also a little bug sticker on the large leaf, which was also included in the packet.
Bottom right: the background is a bunch of sequin leaves that were in the packet, and then there's a dog playing in leaves sticker that was also in the packet.
Here's my other set of cards, starting in the bottom left corner and going clockwise:
Bottom left: once again the background paper is when I did some distress spraying and masking. I added the punched grass and a stamped tree. The items from the packet are the leaf punches on the tree and the sunflower button in the corner.
Top left: Again, I stamped leaf images onto old book paper, items from the packet are the acorn and the smiling apple.
Top right: background is pre-cut wallpaper, I added the grass punch, and the items from the packet are all the leaves and pinecone, as well as the scarecrow sticker.
Bottom right: background is a red card. I included some colored tinsel in the packet and was curious to see what it would do if heated, the "hair" on the leaf man is the result. I added some eyes and the metal piece for the smile. Items from the packet are the tinsel hair, the silk leaf for the head, and the metal for the smile.
I hope you like my cards, next week I will have an altered tin for my other yahoo group.


If you don't know what WOYWW is hop on over to Julia's to find out.


I love getting comments, don't forget to go here for my Halloween giveaway.