A cheap find

I've been wanting some of those fancy pastels to add color to some flourishing but can't afford any right now.   So, I look out for possible alternatives.   I saw this product in Ohio at a store similar to a Hobby Lobby or Old Time Pottery and it was cheap.   It is some sort of cream pastel with a clip and little fuzzy balls for applicators.   I think it's pretty neat and will experiment with it more. 

Back from Ohio!

Had a great time.  It's a really pretty state and the weather was gorgeous except for the last day--which really wasn't too bad for early spring there.   Did a lot of sightseeing and of course had my lesson with Mr. Bill Lilly.   I hope I didn't come off too much like a groupie but when you meet a legend it's a bit hard to control yourself.   I was able to have one lesson and of course would have loved to have had more but time didn't permit and you are grateful for what you can get.   Here's my first envie post-lesson.   I know I need to practice more and there are ways I've been doing things that I must learn a new way now.  That's going to be tough but hopefully I'll be able to sit down this week with ink and concentrate on some of the tips he showed me.  

I had to quickly do this envie in order to get it in the mail today so I tried to concentrate but get it done.  (it's for MILs b-day on Friday which explains the rush).   I am happier with my 'D', 'r', and 's', on this.  What happened to that 'B'?????  I think my lowercase l's will now improve because I understand I must flatten the back more.   Sooo....off to catch up on laundry (the worst part of returning from a trip) and will post more on a new find or two later this week.  Cheers!

The second Cosmetic-to-calligraphy case

I don't know about you all but flying isn't fun for me anymore.   The stress of packing, worrying about something being left in a side pocket or under something which will get confiscated is just nerve-wracking.    I've had this question bouncing around about my pointed pen tools.   They're metal and, well, pointed.   Would they make it through security?   What about my tiny needle nose pliers used to adjust the flange?  What about my battery tools for setting hot fix crystals?   Anyone who's ever taken a self defense class learns that most anything can be a weapon.   And given TSA agents have enormous lattitude at the gate and can use their judgement despite what the official TSA website says is just another fly in the ointment so to speak.  

Did I mention I hate checking bags too?   Looks like the only workaround though so yesterday I started working on the second old cosmetic case, turning it in to a calligraphy tool transporter.   Remember the first one I did here opened length wise and wouldn't be good should I need to transport liquids.   A case made for women's toiletries and makeup has a deep body and shallow lid.   Some even come with straps to hold jars or bottles.   Perfect!  

I'm going with a lime green for this one, should make it easy to spot.  Decoupage as the first with all sorts of stamps and arty things culled from letters sent by friends. I should finish by Sunday and be ready to load it up with all those things I would be hesitant to take as a carry on.    The strappy thing inside isn't very good but at some point, I'll figure out a way to secure ink bottles and such.   Happy travels!

One for us

While I was working on the last project I alluded to making a few attempts prior to the one I settled on.  One of the watercolors wasn't bad so I decided to finish it off for us.  I found a cheap shadow box at Michaels on sale and mounted it yesterday.

One more thing..

An idea came to me while I was working in my 'craft' room (yes, I can get back in there to actually work) on Friday.  There's a saying I really like for some reason and I got the idea to once again combine watercolor, Pebeo, and quilling.   Took me three times to get the right shade of blue.  A word of caution, if you are using Pebeo and pointed pen, go much darker than you normally would so the writing shows up.  If you use really light washes of color and remove the resist, you can barely see what you've written.

First wash over the writing, wasn't happy with the green forest foreground so I went back over with a smaller round brush and added some depth.  
Last steps were installing the quilled pieces, and some tiny birds in the upper right...ta daaaaaaaaaaa!

So after taking these pics and working on this post, I decided the sun pic needed something else.   More green and a gold crystal on the sun.  That will fix it!    This, I like. 

A final note.  The difference in colors is due to the different settings on my camera.  I've been playing with some of the features to see which gives the clearest and truest to life colors.  So far it's between the museum and food setting.  One I can understand, the other...go figure. 

Finished!

I may do a bit more tweaking to my piece but for the  most part I'm done.  I have to admit this was a really fun project.  I learned an awful lot about layout, adding scrolls so the joins don't show, and even picked up some tiny pearls for accents on the flowers and scrolls.   I hope the recipents like it.   It must be something to have been married 50 years.   It would be nice if the man and I made it to that milestone. Closeups of corners:

Happy Easter!!!!!

Black-eyed Susans...

I found a couple of pieces of brown paper and thought I'd try some quilling that involves rounding the center of the flower.   It's a neat trick and gives the flower more dimension.   I had already fringed some yellow paper so it was a simple matter of trimming one end, glueing the brown to the yellow and curling.   After curling, instead of slathering glue on to the center, I took the rounded end of the quilling tool and gently pressed against the brown center from the underside.  Turning slightly and applying pressure to the underside makes the center bulge on the topside.   This isn't something that can be done hastily as it would probably be easy to pop the center out then you'd have a mess.   It's a cute idea and a technique I'd like to explore with other shapes and creations. 

In progress

I've spent the last couple of days working on corner motifs with the skinniest quilling paper I've ever seen.  I decided to go with a pearl paper as I thought the colors would be softer than regular quilling paper.  It is softer color-wise but difficult to work with if you aren't very dexterous.  Needless to say I've struggled a bit.   However, I like the way the basic pieces are coming out.   I'm treating this like I do pen flourishing.   Get the basic lines down, then add to those with gradually decreasing lines.   I'll begin assembling these tomorrow after I cut the paper and put my stamp on the back.   Better to begin the final stages when you're fresh as a daisy no?    And speaking of daisies...or black-eyed Susans as the case may be....stay tuned for the next post.  

Stationery (or is it -ary?) box

Finally made one of these.   Naturally the instructions are suggestions and it's easy to modify to suit your needs.  Like I didn't see the point of added tags and such.  It's still a work in progress.  I can't find my foam stickers for the butterflies but this is pretty much it.  
As an aside, if you don't want to do the tags or address book, it really doesn't take long to put this together.  
Some lovely handmade stationery, stamps, pen, and notepad would make this such a lovely gift for someone. 

Working on Easter cards, searching for quilling paper, etc

I finished some Easter cards yesterday and got them in the mail.  Won't post pics now but perhaps later this week.  I wish I had had more time to do more but things are just so crazy right now that I haven't had time to do what I wished to do.   That's life eh?
I finally figured out what I wanted to do with that other piece I'm working.   I ordered some tiny (1/16th) pearled quilling paper this am and will do two border motifs.  I then plan to add some tiny pearls to complete the look.   I do not want to leave the edges plain so am looking at border punches.   As I'm using watercolor paper a punch may be tricky.   I have a test piece that I can use to try these out.   At any rate, it would probably be best to get a simple punch and not one of those lacey ones--that would be too difficult to punch.   Been there...done that.  
Want to get inspired as to how well beautiful quilling and calligraphy go together?   Check out this website.

Oh boy...

It's a truism these days...envies that come with cards should be tossed.  Unfortunately, if you don't have an envie to fit the card you have to keep it.  And this is the result.   A really sucky address. 

The ink didn't feather as bad as some I've used but the nib kept dragging fibers from the paper as it moved across.   For whatever reason I couldn't get my favorite nib to work so had to try a couple of others until the ink started to at least flow.  Why is that???!!!!   This was an Esterbrook 453.  I don't have many of those and it was the third different nib I tried.  And have I mentioned how much I don't like sumi ink?   It stinks in more ways than one.
I'd have taken more time with this envie but with everything going on here the man and I completely forgot his aunt's b-day was today.  So we've got to get this in the mail first thing and a thousand pardons for being so forgetful.  
One good thing---I was able to use some of the gorgeous stamps a friend so kindly sent me.   She made a very valid point last week.   When you spend time addressing and envelope, stamps should be part of the equation.   I have thought of them as utilitarian and let's face it, the forever stamps aren't that attractive and if the PO has to put a sticker on your envie it's worse.   So buy some pretty stamps and really make a statement!!!
Tomorrow...Easter cards!