My final gift from my husband

At first I wanted him to buy me a new label maker that used cheaper cartridges, but I soon found out that wasn't going to work because they didn't have all the symbols that my label maker has just decided to stick with the one I have for now:-)

Since Paper Imagery Designs was having a birthday sale to celebrate Lori Roberts Birthday - I decided what better way to spend my money then at a birthday sale:-) lol I bought two sheets of stamps and two collage sheets if you really want to see what they are you can click on the links to see them.

Artistic Collages

Paris 1900

Digi Fashion Women 196

Fashion Women

The Sale is going on until the July 31st if you want to take advantage of the 15% off sale -

Tim Holtz NEW Stamps $16.96 after discount

Stampington Stamps from $12.00 to $15.00 after discount

Maya Road Products from $1.70 to $6.00 after discount

and most of their VERY Popular Collage Sheets as low as $1.70 each WOW!!!!

I will be enjoying my new stamps by the end of the week I can't wait:-)

HELP!

My friend Dot found this and thought it best described our lives -- Sad but true:-) lol

More on my birthday

Today I am officially 39:-) thought I'd share more of my goodies from friends and family.

My local Scrapbook Store 'Memories in Bloom' celebrates their anniversary at the same time as my birthday so I decided to take one of my birthday gifts, yep thats right it was a check - this from my dad and I thought I'd spread the wealth with MIB:-) lol below is the pictures of all my goodies -- HUGE SALE LOTS OF GOODIES

Memories in Bloom was having door prizes and thank you gifts in the bag so some of this I didn't know I had until I got home which made it an even more of a fun surprise - my daughter went with me so I ended up with two door prizes -- the purple monochromatic was my door prize which tickled me because as most of you know purple is my favorite color:-)
My girlfriends Boo and Dot took me out to dinner at O'Charley's for dinner and then we came back to the house and had a play date:-) we are always buying things for each other through the year so our birthdays we have a tendency to buy or give foolish things to each other -- the rubiks cube was from my friend Dot's workplace (she works at an insurance office) She seen it and thought of us and knew we would want to alter it -- The coffee was something I had been after my friend Boo to let me have for about a year and while packing up her shop she found it again, so it was a birhtday gift along with the Readers Digests and heart shaped book.
This is a gift from my son Joey - he bought this with his own money - he knew I wanted a Japanese Screw Punch -- well I would not spend $40 or $50 on one since I won't use it a lot so when I seen this at Wal-Mart I thought it would be great for my needs - Joey was with me when I found it - so he decided that was he would his gift to me:-)
I wanted an MP3 player so that I could listen to my audio book in the car so this was my gift from my mom -- Yep I made out like bandit:-) lol

My Birthday

Well on Monday Juley 28 I turn 39 - WOW I feel so old:-) lol

I wanted to share with you 2 gifts I got from a friend she made me a beautiful handmade rope bracelet of blue and green beads and a 4x4 canvas with a handmade beaded butterfly - I feel so special to have recevied such a beautiful gift - yes I know I keep saying gift I know I received 2 but I'm biased I LOVE MY BRACELET THE BEST:-) I will wear it as often as I can.

These are my two gifts from Halle.

My canvas will hang on the wall in my art room so that I can see it everday - in hopes that on those days that my muse is missing it will inspire me:-) lol

A while back my dad came to visit me he lives in Wichita which is where my friend Elizabeth lives and she had some things she wanted to send to me so my dad being the most wonderful dad (yes I know I am biased there to but it is true no one could have asked for a better one) he stopped by E's house on the way here to pick up the things she wanted to send my way along with everything she sent me an early birthday gift gotta take advantage of free shipping no matter in what guise:-) lol She made me a collage canvas of blue's it is the color of my living room I showed it off before but I didn't want her to feel slighted when I started sharing my gifts so please click here to go see my birthday gift from E and how I displayed it -- I had it on my wall in my living room before my dad even had his truck unloaded that evening:-)

Stay tuned for more of my birthday saga to unfold:-) lol

Hugs and Kisses 4x4

A one on one swap with another friend the theme is hugs and kisses

(front)

(back)

Woman ATC Swap

Here is my ATC for the woman swap on my ABC - Altered Book Club group -- I learned how to do the earring from craft tv weekly - I ran the wire through my paper crimper looped it and then clasped the ends in a bead and glued it to the woamn

4x4 map swap

Here is my 4x4 for the map swap on my ABC Altered Book Club

4x4 Napkin Swap

My ABC Altered Book Club yahoo group is having a napkin swap, but were not swapping napkins were doing 4x4 were the napkin is either the background or the focal point of the 4x4.

"A SNOWFLAKE IS WINTER'S BUTTERFLY"

Patriotic and quote stick-ins

A friend has a patriotic and quotes altered book - I made her a few pages her books.

The first one is for her patriotic, the background is The Pledge of Allegiance. Uncle Sam can be used in either her patriotic or quotes.

Betsy Ross for patriotic
These two are for her quotes book -- the Disney quote is "I DREAM I TEST MY DREAMS AGAINST MY BELIEFS, I DARE TO TAKE RISKS, AND I EXECUTE MY VISION TO MAKE THOSE DREAMS COME TRUE." ~Walt Disney~

The Music background quote is "DANCING IS LIKE DREAMING WITH YOUR FEET" unknown

Chocolate 4x4's

I'm working on a chocolate 4x4 fat book as a gift for someone wanted to share some of the pages I've made for it.

Postage Stamp 4x4's

I'm in a 4x4 postage stamp fat book swap - mine will be a Christmas gift - I will also be adding junk mail 4x4's in the book as well -- Haven't quite figured out what to title the book, but I suppose it will come to me:-)

The background for the Curious George 4x4's is a paint splatter, the Patriotic 4x4's are a napkin, the Statue of Liberty is the postage stamp blow up to the to be used on the 4x4, The Austrailan stamps background is a tissue box. Can't go to the store and just buy any box of tissues these days - it takes longer to choose a box of tissues now then it does to buy a new shirt:-) lol

Spoons

I made some spoons today for a swap - this was a new endevor for me - I got the idea from my friend Kathy Turnquist She got them from one of the altered arts magazine. These will actually be come a spoon book - you can go see Kathy's Blog to see what a spoon book is.

And The Winners Are???

Stepahnie Loomis and Carolyn Miller

I'll have your prizes in the mail on Monday

Congratulations Ladies

The Answer Was - 'Short Circuit' - With Steve Guttenberg and Alley Sheedy (1986)

5th Anniversary Circle Swap and CONTEST

My ABC Altered Book Club is celebrating its 5th anniversary - this year we decided to make CD books. I'm going to host a contest, everyone has been doing them so I thought I would to:-) lol

My first CD has the phrase "#5 Is Alive" -- Who can tell me what that phrase is from - I will give you a hint giving me this answer will date you:-) lol -- I will draw two names from both my groups (ABC and PAP - PLEASE when you leave your comment tell me which group your from allthough I know most I sometimes forget who is from which group) Everyone who leaves me their answer by leaving a comment will have their name in the drawing - I'll be making my comments private so everyone has a fair chance. Contest will close May 9th at Midnight

Have Fun

More Altered Puzzles

I did these two awhile back, but wanted to share them - I used kleenex boxes as my backgrounds, it is a sad day when we can't even go to the grocery store and simply buy a box of kleenex, with out standing in the aisle and debating what we can do with the designs on the box:-) lol

BLACK & WHITE

And with these two 4x4's I am done with all my colors

YELLOW

Color Swap

I'm hosting a Color 4x4 Fat Book Swap and thought I'd share what I've gotten done so far. Red, Green, Pink, Brown, Orange, Blue and Purple.

A Gift From A Friend

My dad came to visit me at the beginning of April and as a favor to me he stopped by my friend Elizabeth's house to pick up some things that E wanted to send this way so she could save on postage. Elizabeth decided that she wasnted to send me an early birthday gift. She made me a wall hanging using leftover scraps all in different shades of blue which is the color of my living room, I loved it so much that I had my husband hang it my livingroom not 5 minutes after my father brought it into the house -- My husband said "I hate it" - and his reason for hating it... "IT'S NOT LONG ENOUGH" --rofl, as you can see by the large window where we hung it - he thought it would have looked even better had it been about 5 feet longer then it was. We had to remind him that it wouldn't have fit in my dads truck, Oh well short or long it looks wonderful in m living room and I LOVE IT!!!!

Altered Altoid Tin

I made this tin for a Spring swap awhile back - though not the first altoid tin I've altered it is the first tin I covered with polymer clay - I learned how to do this from my friend Debbie Sprake, who creates some of the most beautiful polymer clay art that I've seen. Debbie showed me how to use alcohol inks to color the polymer clay and then to stamp into the clay using ink pads instead of mica powder as a release agent.

Fashion - Altered Book

I got bored and started working on a book that will be a Round Robin in the future. This was a childs board book I stripped the pages (I have found that if you are careful you can actully peel the pages up instead of sanding or gessoing them) I covered the outside of the books as well as all the inside pages with dressmaking pattern I tore the patterns into strips and used gel medium to cover the pages. The binding of the book is aluminum I distress and then used brads to attatch it to the book (I got this idea from another artists book in a current Round Robin).

Scrabble Charm Bracelet

I really got hooked on making charms from Scrabble tiles, a long time back I bought 3 complete scrabble games so I have all these tiles that were just sitting there taunting me:-) lol I got the idea to use the tiles this way from a link on the internet I wish I could remember where so I could give credit to who gave me the idea but I can't so just know that this isn't my original idea.

Charms

I've been working on charms for a few different swaps I'm in and thought I'd share them with everyone. I really like how they turned out the 3 below with pictures on them are made using Scrabble tiles, I used my dremmel (my favoirte tool) to add the holes in the tiles printed the pictures from my computer and sprayed them with workable fixative after they dried I add Dimmensional Magic and the dangle beads - the puzzle pieces are real I painted them and covered them with Gel Medium for strength as well as the Dimensional Magic and then added the P these were made for a swap on my Puzzle Art Plus group - the holes are strengthened with eyelets. The dragonfly is a store bought charm with beads added to glitz it up a bit, the blue and red one is a handmade bead using polymer clay, it was used with leftover clay that gets caught in my past machine this way nothing is ever wasted:-)

Tye Dyed Paper Towel Backgrounds

I got the idea to do this from Belinda's Art Techniques - I will send you to that site for the how to's she explains it better the I can:-) Look for March Challenge - dyeing paper towels.

Elizabeth also did this technique if you'd like to see hers you can also see hers by going to her blog Altered Book Lover -- Thursday, March 06, 2008

Backgrounds made from Color Mists, Viva paper towels, and mica powders

Belinda and E both used color mists I used watered down acrylic paints, as I don't own in color mists yet, maybe one of these days:-) lol

Here are a few images of my favorite backgrounds out of the ones I did - I made 36 and still want to make more as I forgot to break out my mica powders (compliments of E) and would really like to add some umph to my backgrounds:-) lol

This first image is of all of them.

I like how mine turned out but think they would have looked better with some mica powder added - so will have to try again:-) lol