Altered Book for KSP

Well, now that April 1st has passed and my pal Kelly P has her birthday surprise, I can post these photos of the book I made her.
She likes horses.....and that's no April fool!

Tucked some Year of the Horse lucky envelopes into a little pocket

I gelli printed some pages and added as many horse postage stamps as I could find...

Yup, she is another Aries.....and that is pretty close to looking like a horse...I think.

Added a couple of pockets because...well...you always need pockets...

And, I found some cool old photos of people on horses at the Vintage Paper Fair..

A horseless carriage!

So, there you see it! These books are a lot of work but really fun to make, if you are so inclined.
They are easy too so don't be afraid to jump right in.

My pal Monica is ready to pummel me....I am holding up our origami posts on our two blogs. I have worked on my origami wallet post twice and was ready to publish it when I had my "tester" try to make a wallet from my instructions on the blog.....FAIL.
Even though he can put just about anything together, including stuff from Ikea, he couldn't make the wallet. He could ALMOST do it but he says the directions weren't clear enough.
Soooooo
I guess I will work on that darned post  some more.....but it is very tempting to just go ahead and post it -- you creative types just might figure it out...
In the meantime, the altered books are pretty and maybe you'll get inspired to try making one.
&
The PenPal/mail Art Exchange post was kind of a bust....I was surprised because I am always hearing from people who are looking to trade mail with. I honestly thought lots of folks would sign up for trades. Go figure.
I will leave it up as a Featured Post for a while in case anyone is interested.
And, that's all the news that's fit to print, folks.
See you next time!

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Mixed Various

Yesterday I went over to my pal Monica's studio and that is always fun. Trust me. If you ever get the chance to go to Monica's studio, you want to go.
There is always so much to look at and I always learn something new too.

Our plan was to do two different origami folds and photograph each other doing each step. We were going to post one fold on each of our blogs but technical differences have caused problems in our plan.....I'm not sure when they will get figured out but I will show you the origami wallet fold pretty soon....I promise....what we need is a techie expert on blogs/blogger etc to help Monica get her blog back in business -- any volunteers out there?

She let me play with her Big Shot die cutting machine.....whoa....I never knew how much fun it is to cut out little envelopes and things.....now I want one for my birthday.
Maybe you guys can take up a collection?
(just kidding!)
(well kidding about taking up a collection but I would like one for my birthday...)

I did return home with a pile of various sizes of envelopes to play with....

And, being the way we are, we had to go out for a terrific lunch of spicy minced pork in lettuce wraps and roti (bread) with curry dip......

Now, it is pouring rain and I am hanging out in my studio with this guy....

I've been altering old envelopes with watercolors, rubber stamps and foreign postage stamps...

And prepping new envelopes with rubber stamps...

I've been making LOTS of wallets in all sizes...very easy and very fun...it took me years to find out how to do it and now that I can there is no stopping me.

I've been working on a few altered book pages....

Sending some good mail out...

A friend gave me these cards and I just had to add some little stamp heads to them..
I just can't leave things alone.

Worked on a pocket letter....but gee...those things are A LOT of work. It is like making nice ATC's.

I was going outside to shoot some photos for the blog but the rain stopped me. It is so wonderful to hear it pounding on the rood right now. Poor dry California really needs it and I, for one, do like to take showers so keep it coming!
I guess I better post this and get back to work on the various projects I've got going.....a rainy day is a good day to make things.
But then, every day is a good day to make things, right?

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When Is a Laundry Room not a Laundry Room?

When it's an art room, of course.....I have a laundry room next to the back of my studio and it has turned out to be a perfect place for gelli printing....

It's been such a long time since I pulled out my gelli stuff I had to take take a quick peek at the book to refresh my memory...but, as it turns out, it comes back to you really quickly..

Today was a dark and delightfully rainy Friday and what better to do than hang out and play with paint?
I couldn't think of anything......I had pumpkin curry in the fridge for lunch and rain on the roof and paint and paper and good music.....

It was so easy to set up since I had the boxes of supplies right there in the cupboards of the laundry...er...art room....just pulled them out and in five minutes I was pulling prints.

Making pages for my altered book -- hey -- you guys told me I needed to make my own altered book after I showed you the one I made for Dori's birthday....

***And the pages at 5 x 7-1/2***
I'm just saying in case any of you ( I can punch the holes.and you know who you are) want to send me some pages you make to add to my book.

Stencils, fingers....it all works....I employ a variety of techniques.

I was smart enough to pack a box with everything I need -- papers, bubble wrap, tags, card stock,  mark making things-- so all I had to do was to get busy.
And WHY have I waiting so long to do this? It is so easy and fun and a perfect thing to be doing on a rainy day.
(You may have to get used to us here in San Francisco talking about rain all the time...we are trying to get over a drought and every time it rains we get over-excited)

I ended up with about twenty double-sided pages and some tags and postcards....and one little bag I gellied too...not bad for a few hours.

You can see three postcards here and a couple of test sheets....

So, that you have it -- a rainy Friday afternoon with me.

Next up, got to trim the pages to size and do some collaging on them and punch holes and add to my altered book.
What are you all doing? Is it raining where you are? Or, maybe snowing?
Grab some paper and paint and start playing.
It's the weekend.

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