Out With the Old: Some Unshared Projects From 2014

Hello!  I was organizing some photos the other day, as I was tucking 2014 into bed, and realized I had some projects that I hadn't shared here!  Would you like to have a look-see at some of my favorites?

Mini Albums

I love this mini album I made to record memories of a trip to visit my dear friend Christine in Denver. I adore the rustic piano hinge binding that I made using twigs that I gathered from the birch tree in my front yard.

Another dear mini album is the one I made for my dad for his 70th birthday.  Yeah, the cover doesn't really match the style of the interior pages, but I'm ok with that.  The focus of this project was to express the love I have for my dad, and I think that I conveyed that pretty well.

While presenting in front of a whole lot of family, I didn't want to provide explanation for this "Do Not Poke the Bear" card from Cocoa Daisy.  But, growing up my dad always referred to my mom as "The Bear", and during those smarmy teenage years he would often coach me not to provoke her with my attitude.  :)

Art Journal

I worked quite a bit in my art journal this year, and most everything in it was black and white work. I practiced sketching and shading, and I doodled and journaled.  

Scrapbook Layouts

Here are a handful of layouts to peruse.  I think all the seasons of the past year are represented, though chronological scrapping is not my thing.  My guides are emotion, nostalgia, and pretty paper.

I love that these kids truly love each other.
I hear them say it to each other all the time.

Love this bouquet of dried sage flowers picked up on a local walk.

Blaze loves the beach! It's nice to finally have a kid that enjoys it as much as I do.

Documented Bliss*
*Mine, not hers.

Jillian's costume from Halloween 2013 finally scrapped

Dorking out, just because it keeps me entertained.

Aw, sweet little ol' me.

Off-the-Page Projects

We started 2014 off with a fun commissioned project for our new local scrapbook store.  Anna, one of the other design team members, Mike and I worked together to build a huge magnetic chalkboard for the store's grand opening.  It was so fun to work on this project with Mike.  I must say, as difficult as they were, I truly miss those years where we worked side by side creating and running his bike company.  :)

Photo by Tonya Wade

 Here is a cute little gifty inviting a friend to Tea for Two.  I love that I had a couple of teabags from Trader Joe's whose tags perfectly matched the paper I used.  It's Ginger Pear White Tea, if you are interested.  Pretty good with a vanilla and white chocolate biscotti.

This was a failed attempt to do some free-motion sewing, challenged by the One Little Word blog to create something inspired by the word "aspire".  I didn't continue the piece, annoyed by puckering, impatience, and lack of stabilizer.  But I enjoyed the practice, and will keep at it.

In the meantime I finished these pillows for our sofa, which I hand-emboidered with the artsy look of free-motion sewing.  Mike drew the dogs for me and I traced them onto the fabric along with the words "sit" and "stay".  I crocheted a scalloped trim, and hope they send a welcoming invitation to our guests.

 Aw, here is Blaze modeling how to use one properly.  :)

This is another commissioned piece made for a teacher's retirement.  The kids later added their thumbprints as foliage to the tree.  

I love these little Halloween trees!  My favorite part are the tree stumps made from wine corks.  I painted the corks black and scribbled on them with gold glitter glue--totally looks like bark!!

Also, for the love of all things pumpkin, I crafted these wire pumpkins and tacked them to canvases.  One canvas I painted orange, and the other I left primed white.  I rather like both of them!

Here is another wine cork craft.  I made these cute place cards as a design team project for Craft Envy.  Just a simple circle folded into a rectangle and slipped into a slit cut into the cork.  

And finally, a gingerbread luminaria, which has been on my bucket list for a dozen or more years.  I had seen them in a Sunset magazine long ago, tried, failed, and have long lost the magazine.  I was able to come up with a great "construction" gingerbread recipe online that made for much more predictable and sturdy pieces.

So, there you have it, assuming someone actually made it to the end of tis monstrous post!  It is my intention to share more regularly in 2015.  I will be sure to put out more manageable sized chunks of content.  No one should have to take a potty break in the middle of a blog post!!

Thanks for stopping by!

Today's Post Brought to You By…

...The Letter "R"

I've always been a HUGE fan of Sesame Street, hence the title of today's post.  Why the letter "R"?  Well, when I came up with this idea for an off-the-page project for Remember When, I decided "R for Remember When" was a good candidate.

R is a lovely balanced letter from a monogramming  standpoint:  It's as heavy on top as on bottom, has vertical, round, and slanted lines, and has complete as well as broken horizontal elements to carry a design across, both directly and suggestively.  

Paper: My Mind's Eye Collectable "Remarkable"

To construct the letter, I printed out a bold "R" in Arial Black font at size 800.  I traced it onto a piece of 12x12 chipboard, which was actually the backing of a stack of scrapbook paper.  From a thinner, flexible piece of cardboard (the back of an old spiral notebook) I cut 1-1/4" strips and glued them perpendicularly around the edge of the R, creating a 3D block letter.  

While a coat of blue paint dried on the finished R, I punched a bunch of 1-1/4" circles from the papers and curled one side of each around a pencil.   I glued the flat edges in a scale pattern on the front. 

I think this would look cute on the mantel of some R-named family, or on a bookshelf in an R-named kid's room.  I wonder if Jeremy would mind if we changed his name to Rob, Randy, Rick or Rafael….   

Thanks for visiting! :)

Beautiful Girl of Mine

My daughter, Jillian, is an amazing artist.  She is constantly sketching and drawing, creating with polymer clay or origami-ish paper sculptures.  It has ben a pleasure to  see her explore different media in her art class elective in this first year of high school.  Not many of the projects make there way home as the class collection fills every bit of wall space in the school studio, so I was so giddy when she shared a little tidbit with me recently.

The challenge was to create a face as a contour line drawing, meaning drawn from one continuous line, trying not to trace back over any parts.  My immediate reaction was, "Oh!  This is beautiful!" I followed the line in awe; I studied the brilliance of the abstract suggestion of hair, the use of negative space.  I pulled back my gaze to take in the piece as a whole again, and was struck with the realization, "Oh!  This is YOU!"

"Yeah," she said with a soft chuckle.  Then she explained that the drawing was just Part 1 of the project.  Once the students created a contour line drawing of their visage, they were given a length of copper wire to bend and curve following the lines they'd drawn.

This is part of the collection now hanging in the front lobby of the school.  I loved looking at all the different faces, seeing where each person decided to start and end their sculpture.   Here's a closer look at my beautiful girl!

Thank you for visiting!