Chrissy's new baby

Hi all, I've started a new uplifting blog called Miracles Of The Everyday Kind. http://www.miraclesoftheeverydaykind.blogspot.com/

The aim of this blog is to bring together meaningful accounts of the way life touches us personally with many 'mini-miracles' on everyday basis ... and how appreciating the little things in life make them bigger. Check it out here

The Karin Mermaid I've added a few pages to my mermaid altered book so we can all sign in as mermaids. Here is my page. What I'm asking you to do is provide me with some small coloured copies of your faces so I can glue them onto the images. Here are the images on offer for sign in. I'm not fussed about the angles or such. It's all for fun anyway.

Cool paper folding doobies - by Chrissy

http://www.handcraftedgreetings.com/teabaginst.html Hi guys, I've found this website with cool paper folding project downloads - there's heaps to look at and choose from, off a site called Handcrafted Greetings. Pretty cool!

Learning progress - by Lena

Since January 1st I've been recording new things I learn every day. It's going better than I expected because I thought I'd have to search for things some days but what 's happening is that as I'm open to learning I keep getting new stuff coming my way. This means that I'm having to be selective about it. The daily blog is at http://lenasalteredstuff.blogspot.com/ and it's uptodate as of today. One of my favourite pages is the one on Tesla, a mad scientist. I used some rusted paper that I'd made at my first ever cook up day at Spinners.

The one I did about using an ink jet printer to print on canvas is also a favourite

I wanted to make some Happy New Year cards so I worked out a new popup way of doing them.

This projest is turning out to be very interesting....

Learn something new every day - by Lena

One of my common reactions to seeing or reading something new is to say "You learn something new every day" so I've decided to turn this re-action into a regular, conscious, documented action.

As it's close to the end of 2008 it seemed like a good idea to do it for every day of 2009 so I've made myself an altered book to record a new thing I learn every day for 365 days. I had an old Financial Accounting text book from my college days so after a bit of paint the cover now looks like this

and this is on the title page

The book has 640 pages which means that some days can have a two-page spread and my intention is to complete the page/pages on a daily basis and upload them to my own blog at lenasalteredstuff.blogspot.com. I may occasionally upload images to this blog as well if there's something I'm particularly keen to share and talk about.

I have a feeling that this is going to be full of unexpected consequences. Simply the fact that I'll be producing art on a daily basis, and thereby turning it into a habit, is likely to have positive effects. I've already put an entry on the calendar of my mobile to ask the question "What new thing did I learn today?"

An exciting journey to be sure!

Lena

SOPHIA by Karin This was my first egg tempera painting, done at an icon workshop. Well something didn't quite work in the mix, and the image has progressively peeled and aged over time in such an interesting way. At first I painted it all over again, only to have the same aging process happen, and then I found myself intrigued with where it would all go. Months later there was not much of an image left, so I gave up and glued an image from a magazine into the mix. I've yet to see where this version ends up.

Desert Dweller - by Chrissy

There's really nothing like a bit of collage to get my thoughts sorted. I like this one; for the process of self-understanding & symbolism that unfolded during the process (and which still continues now while I look at it), and also just because it was fun and I'm happy with the outcome!

The SECRET by Karin She kept the essence of her being as a secret even from herself. This was originally a picture of a nun which I painted with egg tempera, in the old icon style. One night I glanced up at it and realised that I didn't really like it all that much, so I grabbed scissors and a magazine and found a new face for her. Somehow the hand came along as well.

Keith's blog by Lena

The best ever workshop I've been to was with Keith LoBue in Rockhampton last year. He's an extraordinary assembler of found objects into beautiful art pieces and a generous spirit. He taught us anything and everything about tools and how to connect different materials together (and when to know not to bother to even try). Since then I've been using the things he taught almost every day and I'll never abuse my cordless drill again. He recently started a blog in which to share his creative process. I've put the link up in the favourite blogs list. Check it out. The beautiful area I set up for working in at home has been trashed. Sigh! In the first instance I had to shift things for the painter to do his thing, then I had a water leak that destroyed some of my paper and card stock and forced me to lift everything off the floor. I have just two months to get it back into working order so that I can finish some altered books for an Avid Divas meeting at my place in February. The painting was related to a renovation we've just finished and I'm now so busy restoring things to their proper place that I can't really do any serious art work. I'm feeling very unhappy about that but I guess the time will come when all will be in balance again.

THE OPINIONS OF OTHERS from Karin

The opinions of others pressed down on her mind, eroding the authority of her own voice. This was a piece of Japanese art I liberated from the opp shop. I liked the backing paper and the kimono, but wasn't impressed by the figure of the samurai. So I found a face I liked and went from there. The hair is bits of phrases torn out of an old altered book.

Must Sees - by Chrissy

A couple of amazing blogs to check out ...

http://badskirt.blogspot.com/ She makes heaps of cool stuff out of fabric and has a keen eye for vintage stuff.

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And Badskirt also posted these amazing tins of delight below. She's purchased them from 'Tinniegirl' at http://tinniegirl.blogspot.com//

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Trapunzel - by Chrissy

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Karin - Am loving my mermaid book all over again

How blessed I am to share time with such generous creative goddesses!! Thank you so much for the delicious pages you have done in my altered book. I took it home and cruised through the pages and fell in love with it all over again. In fact I was so inspired I have added heaps more pages and still have hundreds of ideas for it.

Food, glorious food! - by Chrissy

One of the things that keeps our Avid Divas get-togethers so more-ish is our food sharing. I've come across a few recipe related sites below that are fabulous (They're especially for you Marilena) http://browninterior.blogspot.com/ http://101cookbooks.com/ http://www.culinaryconcoctionsbypeabody.com/ Take care!

The power of words - by Lena

Hi All, I'm working on a piece that includes painting, stamping and collage and I was staring at it intently, trying to work out why it just wasn't working for me. The colours and shapes weren't talking to each other as I intended. What to do? I picked up a gold gel pen and thought "What the heck, I'll write some words on it". So I did, and guess what? It immediately looked happy and finished. Yay! I haven't used words in my work that often but I'll certainly consider doing it in the future after this little experience. The power of words, eh? It seems that they're powerful in many different contexts. Who'd have thought? Avidly creating with pen in hand, Lena