Liisa's stamping corner

What "stamping corner"?

2012-01-27T18:16:00.005+01:00

I'll admit it. I'm turning into a knitter. Help!

Now I've gone and done this:

Well, my arms were freezing!

My stamps are quiet, they don't call me to go play with them. No Sandra, you can't have them, from time to time little beeps come out of the stamping room, so I'm not giving up hope. I shall stamp again!

Wait a second... did I say "little beeps"? Where's my phone...?

Left-over yarn and what one does with it.

2012-01-20T14:16:00.001+01:00

-I just love my cardigan! You know what would be really cool? Matching mittens! If I had my cardigan with mittens to match, oh boy would people be jealous!
-Well, I do have some yarn left over...
-Make sure there's yellow on them, I love the yellow especially, it's so pretty!

-I'm so in love with love my cardigan, and with the mittens it's just wonderful! Do you think it would be difficult to make beanie to go with them? The colors are just so beautiful, it would be great to walk around with a colorful beanie! The one I have now is black, it's just no fun.
-Well, I've never done a beanie but...
-Oh come on, you're very talented, how hard can it be? You do still have some yellow left, don't you?

-Oooo, lookit my cardigan and lookit my mittens and lookit my beanie! Too bad my feet are freezing...
-What, you want me to knit you moonboots now?
-No, just for indoors, you know, there's a draft, and... yellow?

-These are so warm!
-Come on, they're ugly. They're like the ugliest thing in the hemisphere.
-I don't care! They're just great! Besides I'll wear my sandals over them anyway.
-(You'll what?!)
-In fact all I need now is a scarf.
-With yellow?

The cardigan

2012-01-06T11:47:00.001+01:00

The cardigan got – miraculously! – ready for Christmas!

I finished all the pieces (the back + front in one tube piece, and the two sleeves, also in tube) in time, ahead of schedule, even.

and then gathered all my courage… and prepared myself mentally to cut. This is the Norwegian way to do it, and admittedly things do go a lot faster when you are always working on the right side of the work, especially when working with several colors at one time. You simply knit extra stitches for cutting holes for the arms and in this case the front of the cardigan (that's the red line, 5 stitches wide), sew next to the future cut lines in order to block the stiches…

and then you take your scissors , and cut through all those years of knitting.

The cutting itself was no problem, it went well and was surprisingly easy, the trouble was the sewing. sure, it could have been done by hand, but that would have meant a LOT of slow work, and so I decided to resort to my faithful sewing machine.

Sadly, though, my faithful sewing machine (the original! From the 80’s!) had apparently not appreciated my previous sewing project involving inch-thick stacks of fencing uniform fabric, and after a few stiches of the cardigan, it went on strike. Actually... it broke, and the reparations cost almost as much as a new machine but I’m still having it done… Oh well.

What a drag! I went to see my stamping buddy Sandra for our last stamping Monday of 2011, and took my knit with me, in order to make some advance on the sewing (now done by hand).

And guess what – it turns out Sandra is not only a stamper, but a proud owner of a sewing machine as well, and with her machine she saved me, the cardigan, and Christmas!!

Sew, cut, knit the collar + the front, choose the buttons, have the button holes sewn in by a tailor (yes they still exist!)… and on the evening of the 24^th Santa could deliver the cardigan to its happy new owner!

(A picture will be added as soon as I get one taken)

2011-12-23T11:44:00.000+01:00

Happy holidays! (Oops hadn't noticed the bent flower in the scan... and they're all gone out in the mail, of course!)

More birthdays

2011-12-15T11:41:00.000+01:00

Go Meerimage stamps, I like you more and more :)

Stamp credits: Lady Godiva - Meerimage, Background - Stampfrancisco, Text - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Wings sold separately

2011-12-04T13:14:00.004+01:00

This card traveled to Alaska for Kersten's birthday, and since it's arrived I can post it :)

Oh, I know, the wings are on crooked. But if you knew the number of attemps I did before this relatively successful one, you'd say they're the most perfectly placed pair of wings you ever saw!

Stamp credits: Woman - Meerimage; Wings - Cherry Pie; Party hat - err... must look this up; Pan - Beeswax; Pine tree -Wildlife Enterprises; Moon - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Welcome, Gabriel!

2011-11-25T15:36:00.002+01:00

My pianist has a baby! It's a boy, born on November 17th, and his name is Gabriel. Remember the little jacket I was working on this summer? Well, here it is, all ready and actually already delivered. I'm afraid it's much too big for poor little Gabriel: he's still in his 50's, speaking of centimeters of course ;) and the jacket's for 70cm. However, should it be a cold winter, he can wear all the rest of his wardrobe underneath. Ha! Layering is the mot du jour!

An old technique revisited

2011-11-11T20:25:00.000+01:00

Sandra, my stamping buddy, posted on her crazy blog a tutorial about an age-old technique: the grid. Oh boy! I remember always wanting to learn to use that technique in a refined fashion, and after a few lousy-looking cards I just gave up. Didn't see the point of going through the trouble (and the extra-inky fingers, guaranteed to last for three days) for such... well, as the French would say, minable cards.

But then along comes Sandra, whips together a marvel, and reminds me of the ultimate reason to use the grid: you get to use all your favorite stamps without thinking too much about how they should interact! Oh yes! And so I, Miss Unable-To-Do-Collage, dug out my darling cars and crowns and a few other dearly missed treasures I just can't seem to combine with anything, and combined them with each other.

A thank you card for Sandra, in grid.

Stamp credits: Cars - Stempelmine, Pointing finger - Heindesign, Dots - Florilegesdesign, Lady - Endless Creations, Crown - Tim Holtz, Flowers - Hero Arts, Hearts - Aladine

4x4 Friday challenge: Chakras

2011-11-07T01:12:00.004+01:00

Here's my response to the 4x4 Friday challenge. I'm quite inspired to make a whole series of these, but the chakra of creation (among other things...), insisted upon being created first.

That's chakra #2, Svadisthana.

Stamp credits: Zettiology

That'll be 60 cents.

2011-11-05T00:04:00.006+01:00

I love mail art.
I love sending pretty mail.
I love stamps.

But I dont love... no, I hate!... the Mariannes. That's the basic "head" stamp of the French post, equivalent with Queen Elizabeth, King Albert II and their colleagues around the world. Sorry but the Mariannes are just b-o-r-i-n-g! This country has such beautiful stamps hidden under the counter, and they keep selling the population the Mariannes! (The only thing sadder than a Marianne on an envelope is a sticker. You know those machines? And they have the nerve to vall that "a stamp"!)

There used to be the perfect post office just around the corner from where I live. I'd befriended the post lady, Chantal, and she always had the greatest stamps for me (of course for the others too, but this is my blog, not theirs). She's a mail lover, too, so we understood each other very well. She'd happily help me send the funniest mail art projects, and life was good. One day though, the post office was closed - definitely! - and my postal friend Chantal was confined in a bureau without windows, and without contact to actual mail sending folk.

For me, that was the end of mail art. I had no one who'd cancel that stuff for me anymore. Things were actually refused at the counter!

And now, they're removing pretty stamps from the post offices everywhere, you can only get the dumb Mariannes! Apparently, if you want nice stamps, you have to buy them on the internet!

This makes me so sad! Mail art is on its way to Chantal, to tell her about the situation, in case she doesn't know.

Yes they're 60, I don't cheat.

Of course, when I went to send this, I got the best service in ages, and the safe containing all the lovely stamps was actually opened for me! Hooray! I may have found a new place to mail mail art from...

That famous Mekka yoga stamp

2011-10-31T00:19:00.000+01:00

It was at Stempel-Mekka in .... 2009 (?) that I got this yogi stamp, my one and only. "What did you get that for?" asked my two travel companions (I was traveling with Sandra and Sandra, my two stamping sandr... buddies) "That's just plain ugly". Well, maybe she's not a beauty, but you have to understand, yoga is not about being beautiful. And it's not about being in a hurry, either. So it's perfectly normal for a yoga stamp to wait a couple of years before it sees the daylight again.

OK I'll admit it was tough to place. The task was a lot easier once I'd cut off the flourishes around the yogi...

Now that I look at the results on the scan, I realise I should have elaborated the layering more. I may come back to this card yet - or then not. :D

Stamp credits: Yogi- American Art Stamps, Lion - Third Coast Rubber Stamps, Lotus - unknown; Pink flowers, lilies (disguised as leaves) - Stone House Stamps

Believe - in me!

2011-10-25T20:31:00.003+02:00

I did this one last spring, and just found it again in my stamping room. It made me smile, somehow I find it a very soothing card. Must see in whose house it will end up eventually.

Stamp credits: All - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Back on the track

2011-10-23T13:05:00.003+02:00

The rush at work has subsided, and I am enjoying a weekend of rubber stamping, coloring, browsing the internet for ideas (and new stamps... no! must stop!), and pouring out on paper all the ideas that have been stocked in my brain for the longest time. Oh yes, I'm back!

I have installed a Stamping arena in the living room instead of my usual tiny stamping room (couldn't find the desk, to be honest), and I'm happy to announce I am CLAIMING the flat for my stamping soul.

The first little one, born sometime last night, to celebrate some stuff happening in other zones in my life at this moment, marking a new beginning with new dimensions:

Coincidentally, a friend of mine had a baby last night... more than one new lives started last night!

Stamp credits: Bird and branch - de Stempelwinkel ; Text - Zettiology

No comment

2011-08-18T20:27:00.002+02:00

... this lovely elephant need none, imho. I love the stamp. I must introduce this pachiderm to Frida ;)

Stamp credits: All - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

A rubberstamper on the knit

2011-08-13T17:12:00.002+02:00

I’m now working on another knitting project, a cardigan I’d promised to deliver at Christmas… 2008. Oh well, better late than never, right? I’m doing this Norwegian style, which means that instead of doing the back and gfront pieces separately, they are combined. In the end, I’ll sew along the edges of the red stripe in the middle, and then cut straigth through the piece, creating the front opening. The same will be done for the openings for the sleeves, the holes will simply be cut in the big piece instead of creating them while knitting.

The advantage of this technique is that you can knit always right, and anyone who’s ever done a pattern like this with 2+ colors knows how much quicker and smoother that goes.

The disadvantage of this otherwise wonderful technique is that in order to pick up the courage to cut through what has taken me years to knit, I shall have to be seriously drunk, so much so that there is a considerable risk cutting crooked.

I was recently ill for 8 days, stuck indoors, which enabled me to make good headway with my knitting (and with my 4400 marathon) , and I’m now done with the big piece, the famous back&front combined. Here’s the happy future owner of the cardigan, unable to get her arms out of the thing until I (get sufficiently drunk and) cut the way open for the arms.

By the way, she's trying to talk me out of cutting, saying she loves the red stripe, but in fact she's just scared I'll cut wrong and it all goes to waste. Frankly, so am I. But I'm still cutting.

Oh, and she also claims I promised the cardigan for Christmas 2006, but that can't be, right? I mean... right?

Thank you HaKa

2011-08-01T16:58:00.001+02:00

Here’s a card I stamped a long time ago, colored (water colors) this summer, and sent to HaKa to thank her for sending me yarn for the baby knit I was working on about a month ago. The knit is finished and it has travelled to Paris to wait for the November birth (of course I forgot to take a picture of the finished project, will have to blog that later…).

Stamp credits, those that I can remember:

Pan, eagle - Beeswax; Alice – Stampfrancisco ; Weird little man with a snail on his back (yes, I did mean weird!) – Enchanted Ink ; Brick fence – Stempelmine ; Big leaves behind the fence – Third Coast Rubber stamps ; Big flowers - StoneHouseStamps

Summer stamping

2011-07-02T17:53:00.002+02:00

Don't forget your sun screen! ;)

Stamp credits: Mr. Lobster – Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers ; Sunbathing lady – Cherry Pie ; Ocean, rocks on the ground - Third Coast Rubber Stamps ; Cliffs – 100 Proof ; Boat - unknown ; Pillow – handdrawn (couldn’t tell, huh? Hrhm…)

Sonja is getting better

2011-06-25T16:21:00.001+02:00

Closed doors, drowsy air, now and then heartbreaking coughs – my landlady Sonja has a cold. So a card was in order. She is already feeling better, not sure if it was the card that did the trick (or the visit of her grandson, or maybe… time?)

The knitting is coming along nicely too, half an hour every evening. Better than nothing. The back is ready. Don’t you just love knitting for babies, they’re the perfect size!

Stamp credits: all Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Gone knittin'

2011-06-22T12:00:00.002+02:00

Due to a mad situation at work the stamping corner has been (only temporarily!) transformed into “the knitting lady half asleep in front of the television”. A friend of mine is having a baby in November, and this prompted me to dig out my favourite knitting pattern, and to knit a jacket for the new-comer. I love this pattern. It's like 15 years old, I got it free from a shop once and the original leaflet has already gone to shreds – thank the heavens for Xerox machines! Haka the frantic knitter found left-over yarn in her closet and sent it to me, yahoo! Thank you Haka! So last night, during two episodes of Battlestar Galactica on my trusted DVD-player, I got started.

What an intelligent friend, to be having her baby in winter! Had it been a summer baby, she would have had to content with a silly book.

Getting ready to go

2011-06-15T22:08:00.005+02:00

As I'm trying to get my act (as well as a suitcase that would cover my life's needs for the next 10 weeks) together, here's an attempt to escape from reality: I choose this terrible hectic moment to blog. Hah!

I'm proud to present a new blog in the blogosphere: my Friday stamping buddy has started hers, brace yourself for some very interesting stuff! My other stamping buddy - or rather, scrapbooking buddy? - has had hers for a while already, but let me introduce her too!

What else is new? Some creations from the weeks past.

I bought these ladies ages ago but I've never used them in a scene before. Funny how some stamps remain unused for the longest time, but then when you get around to them they tickle your imagination and you can immediately think of several ways to introduce them into a scene!

"You've done this scene a million times" said Sandra the Stamping Buddy, but I don't care. I still love it. This combination just calms my spirits :)

Oooh.. the classic blunder: you're stamping, all is going well, and then... aaargh! The smudge! You put an enormous ink smudge right in the middle of your scene! Instead of starting over (look, I'd already stamped the frog and the mice, I refused to start over!) you decide to save the situation. "Cache-misère", as the French say. You convince yourself that you are a talented drawing artist, and draw a butterfly over the smudge. Except that your butterfly is somehow crooked and not (butter)flying at all. So you decide your butterfly wanted to be sitting on a fence, anyway. And you draw a fence. And you draw a bush (since you can't find your bush stamp which is hiding in a pile of junk). Then you decide it's a stamping and not a drawing project for pete's sakes and you fill the scene with branches and grass and... and in the end you are very happy and have forgotten all about the smudge!

Stamp credits:
The dancing ladies card - all - Third Coast Rubber Stamps
The swan prince, hills - Third Coast Rubber Stamps ; the texts - ?
The frog card - The grasses are Third Coast, the frog I believe from De Stempelwinkel, the mice and the branches... you got me!

Ah, my Copics!

2011-05-01T21:24:00.005+02:00

I'm working on a Christmas present... that is to say, I already gave this present to a friend of mine last Christmas, but in a slightly unfinished state. It's a monthly table calendar, and for each month I've promised to make a little scene. In December, only January was ready and February was half-colored, but since then I've made head-way (well, luckily!) and I'm even a bit ahead schedule at the moment.

The scenes being small - postcard size - I'm coloring them with Copics. The desk the calendar lives on is a fairly messy one, too, so the bright colors enable the calendar to be easily located in case need be... but the real reason for the use of Copics is of course that I still love them, and the happy result they give :)

In honor of the month of May, here are some of my favorites so far!

Stamp credits:
-The Geisha: Geisha riding a Kai - Viva Las Vegas Stamps (waves drawn by hand)
-Desert scene: all - Beeswax
-Triple duck scene: Duck in a bathtub - unknown, duck in a picture - Heindesign, Rug - Stampfrancisco, Window - Inkastamps, Flowers behind the window - Third Coast Rubber Stamps, Wallpaper - Kaleidoskop
-Sheep, grass and flowers - 100 Proof Press, House in the hills - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Japan collage

2011-04-19T18:48:00.006+02:00

OK, I'm lousy at collages, but quite like the result here. It's a cover for my stationery pad, and one of my favorite themes, Japan. I did this a while ago but with my sluggish blogging lately... you know ;)

Stamp credits: Red flowers on the top, Lanterns - Inkadinkadoo; Geisha looking back, Standing man, Dancing man in green, Dancing man in orange - Inkastamps; Geisha riding a kai - Viva Las Vegas; Geisha drinking tea - Ichiyo Art Center; Geisha reading a letter - Stone House Stamps;
Man and woman under parasol, Small collage with a kai, Small collage with lake,-?

The Row House Swap part II

2011-04-17T18:14:00.005+02:00

I know, I know.... please just imagine I hibernated for a few months. Here we go again, though.

The Gypsies are having another row house swap! We had an ATC-size one a couple of years ago, and this time we're going for postcard size. I so enjoy having all my stamping friends' houses lined up on my wall, so I'm really looking forward to building a second block with a new set of houses.

Here are mine. I used some of my treasures, Alice-images I'd got from Cathy, as well as some of the backround paper I made years ago at an art class. They've been waiting for the project to be used in.

The idea was to start with a stardard post card size background or support, cut it up to the shape of a house, and then fill it with you, your life, your thoughts. As a house in a dream represents our inner thoughts and our life & soul, so do there houses.

Stamp credits for the mermaid house: Mermaid - Meerimage, Barnacles and Seaweed - Third Coast Rubber Stamps, Fish - unknown

Catching up with the past

2010-11-17T12:15:00.005+01:00

Gone all summer with no scanner, then making stuff only to send (and not wanting to ruin the surprise I decide to blog later but completely forget about it), the Stamping Muse taking an unexpected and long holiday... here's an update of some of the very little stamping I'm done in the past six months. Sorry for the silence!

And an ATC to finish off (yes I've got Meerimagestamps now :) ):

Stamp credits:
Lady in a tree, tall grass on the ground - Third Coast Rubberstamps; lighthouse - Viva Las Vegas, short grass with rocks - 100 Proof Press
Caravan, palm trees - Cherry Pie Art Stamps; Mountains - Beeswax, bedouin - B-line
Geisha, Japanese lantern, boat, plant with big leaves - Inkastamps; hills with clouds - Third Coast Rubberstamps, grass,
Checkered backgroud (the help -card) - Hero Arts
Bathing ladies - Meerimage, background hills with clouds - Third Coast Rubberstamps, palm trees- Cherry Pie Art Stamps

Frida in trouble

2010-05-25T21:01:00.003+02:00

:D

Stamp credits:
Frida, window, door - Viva Las Vegas Stamps, Tiger - Cherry Pie, oval panel - Purple Onions Design

Fish to Belgium

2010-05-14T11:47:00.006+02:00

I'd always wanted to send an object through the mail without wrapping it in a box. Just to see if it arrives. So on Monday I sent this:

And it arrived today, after only a few days of travel! Go, French & Belgian posts, go! Apparently when I send strange stuff it arrives without fault, but where is that regular envelope inside which is a college shirt and a DVD, huh? Too "normal" for them?

Anyway, the report from this morning is: it's early in morning, we're talking pre-breakfast-barely-brushed-your-teeth-time. The interphone rings, it's the mailwoman. "I have here a... a... packet? for you." So Maija runs down the stairs to receive whatever it is. Somehow the mailwoman has made it through the front door into the staircase and they meet half-way. The mailwoman is holding in her hand the bottle which makes a clonkety sound (because of the fish inside), so Maija thinks this must be someone who's collecting money for a cause. But the the woman thrusts the bottle to Maija saying, "this... this.. errr.. is apparently for you." And she accompanies the delivery with a "this has got to stop!" -look.

Inside the bottle are fish, a bunch of them (most of them like being in the bottle so much they didn't want to come out for the photo). Please notice, these are fish created by REAL artists, not just me. We're talking opera singers, during the entr'acte of a performance of Verdi's Don Carlo at the French national opera Bastille. The fish can't swim but they won't be damaged by water (they're made of fimo), so the bottle can be used for its original purpose.

But seeing the response from the Belgian mailwoman, I guess this is it for mailart to Belgium, at least for a while. Besides my little post office has just closed this week (a catastrophy!), and I have no idea where to send from anymore. Mailart-friendly post offices are hard to find.

I really loved my post office, never got such good and friendly service anywhere else, and instead of "don't even bother sending this, it will never arrive" it was always a "haha, this is funny, let's see if it makes it". See what I mean?

Publish Post

Mail art to Belgium

2010-05-13T00:58:00.002+02:00

This little (about 30 cm / 12 inches tall) yogi traveled safe and almost sound from France to Belgium in only a few days. I hear a one of the legs was broken but still attached. Shall we call that a fractured limb instead of a broken one?

"Voi hyvin" means "be well".

All acrylic paints, painted on a sunny morning. I'd had the yogi itself (plywood) for months already, just hadn't had an inspiration to finish.

A blast from the past

2010-05-10T18:46:00.005+02:00

Palma asked to see the altered playing card swap we did over at the Gypsy forum ages ago and I promised to post the series on my blog. I wondered why I hadn't done so before, but then I saw the date at the back of the ATCs.. 2006! I had no scanner. Heck, I didn't even have alcohol inks back then! I remember struggling to stamp on the playing cards as I had no ink that would stick, and then I accidentally discovered acrylic paints - I could stamp on them! That's when the making ogf the series really took off. Fun to see how my style has developed since (or not...)

Stamp credits? You're joking!

Collage painting for darling sis

2010-05-08T21:55:00.003+02:00

I don't seem to have posted this, unbelievable! My masterpiece from last year: a painting for my sis, welcoming her back to Europe. It's a collage I did at the art class I attended last year, magazine clippings and acrylic paint. We were given the challenge to make a town using certain color combinations.

The size is ca. 20 x 30 cm (8 x 14 in)

Rehearsing might save your life

2010-05-05T12:30:00.003+02:00

No comments.

Stamp credits:
all - Stempelmine

Frida's going gets tough

2010-05-02T22:11:00.006+02:00

Remember Frida? Well, because I've been such a lousy blogger, you haven't seen much of her here, but Frida is definitely one of my favorite rubber stamp characters. She's still friends, or rather, stuck with Alice, and se still finds herself more or less perfect.

Here are some of the cards I started during my volcano-week i.e. during the replacement holiday. I was glad I'd brought my faithful Frida with me, but stupid me I hadn't thought about bringing Alice! So, Frida had to get through the week on her own, with no one to blame but herself. Well, almost...

During the past year two big things have happened in Frida's life, first, she turned 1 in March,

and she now has a little brother Louis. Louis loves animals.

Publish Post

Stamp credits..
Frida, the owl - Viva Las Vegas Stamps; Louis, the ladders - Stempelmine; the lion - Third Coast Rubberstamps; the frame - Purple Onion Designs. For some reason I can't find the maid in my calatogue - any ideas?

Mrs. Walter's apple pie

2010-04-28T11:17:00.004+02:00

I've been on a wonderful vacation, and one of the things that made it so wonderful was that I had time to do some stamping :)

Most of the projects I started still have to be finished, as I didn't bring any card stock with me to the trip (the eternal dilemma of having to be able to lift your suitcase...), but I did finish a page in my calendar. I have a Paperblanks calendar, one side of the double-page is for the dates and the other side for notes. I like to do stamping & painting & scrapbooking on those empty pages, that way my calendar is full of colorful memories.

Mrs. Walter is an elderly lady who lives near to where I went for my holidays, at the foot of the Alps, with a view on Mt. Blanc, the highest mountain in Europe - yes! She is an amazing woman, full of energy and warmth, always there to help others out in whatever way needed. Her two passions are gardening and cooking, and we got a taste of that cooking in the form of an apple pie. Delicious! So of course, we had to have the recipe. Here it is in a "functional" form. Should anyone like a translation I'll do it, but for the time being let's just let it be a visual memory of a wonderful day.

The background is acrylic paints, and the bowls are colored with Copic markers.

A tea... thing!

2010-03-16T15:52:00.005+01:00

Inspired by Kris and her wonderful tutorial I made a little birthday present for a friend who travels a lot and likes to take a few tea-bags with her wherever she goes - "just in case". It did occur to me halfway through the project that this "little" teabagholder will take a LOT more room in her bag that just putting the teabags in a plastic bag... but then, if she doesn't like it, she'll just leave it at home. I enjoyed the process a lot!

I used a tea box as a basis for the folder, although you really can't see it anymore :D

The front:

The insides:

And the back!

This was fun :) A thousand thanks to Kris for her tutorial!

Thank you & more mail art

2010-03-15T10:53:00.004+01:00

A card I made with the traveling copics for Barb, to thank her for this great gift she made us all:

Another piece of mail art was born during the off-moments at work. It's for yet another colleague, with bits of text from various theatre programs found in my handbag + cut-outs from old magazines. That handbag is a miracle, apparently you can do practically anything with it! I should see if it can fly, that would make traveling across town easier.

One of the mail art cards I sent out earlier (the one with the cat & facial cream) has not arrived. I'm still hoping it will, maybe it's just -literally- stuck somewhere? The other card sent the same day (the candy wrapper one) has arrived safe and sound.

Stamp credits: Geisha riding a kai - VivaLasVegasStamps, text - Stampattack

Good mail

2010-03-11T13:05:00.003+01:00

Kersten gave me this book for my birthday. It is SO good. I highly recommend it! It has of course stuff about the history of mail art, but also it gives tips and ideas for projects. I particularly liked the idea of taking a stroll, picking up stuff along the way, then sitting down in a café to glue it all together on a card, and on the way home, just sticking the card into a mailbox. Great!

So, this is what I've been doing. It's amazing the stuff you run into during the day, and even more amazing is, how it all comes together on the card, even though in the beginning you thought the bits and pieces have nothing in common. For example, here's one I did for a colleague, Anne, during a break at work the other evening:

The receipt is hers, from the cafeteria, and since the talk of the evening was beauty-salons and their outrageous prices.. well. Unfortunately the receipt didn't agree with glue, but then who cares (just call it my personal Uhu touch!). The beauty salon brochure came from the handbag of another colleague. Also, at some point on practically every work night, we all have a Snickers or a Twix bar, so plenty of wrappers were at hand.

So, the next time someone says you should empty your handbag more often, just snort and think of all the lovely mail art you'll be creating with your trash treasures!

Another colleague, Olivera, is always reading cook books. So, naturally...

I also ran into a beauty cream sample in one of the mags I was reaging that evening, so I sent it to her for future use on her holidays under the sun.

Now that I look at the finished card, I realize I should have made a background for the cat. Well, next time, Gadget!

These two cards should have arrived by now, if they arrive at all: when I sent them, I learned from my post office (she's still there!) that staples are not allowed on mail in France because they get stuck in the machines. So I covered all the staples with Scotch tape. Looks stupid, but I'm hoping it did the trick and that the cards traveled safely.

Challenge - swirls

2010-03-10T12:24:00.002+01:00

I did it! Fot the first time I've really answered a challenge from a challenge blog - hooray! I've been peeking into them for ever and ever, just never took up one. Now I did, and here's my reply to the Crazy Amigos Challenge today: swirls!

While I was at it, I made another card using the Japanese dancer. I've rarely used that stamp, and I'm quite sure it still has a lot to offer :)

Stamp credits: Japanese dancer, lantern, fish kite - Inkastamps ; text and flying flower on the swirl-card - Studio G ; grass - 100 Proof Press ; text on the kite card - Stanislaus Imports (stickers)

Traveling copic markers

2010-03-07T10:13:00.004+01:00

Old stuff, again, but I wanted to post these on my blog so I won't lose them :)

Just before Christmas there was talk about the Copic markers on the Gypsy forum. Had anyone tried them, what were their impressions, etc. Unfortunately the markers are a bit on the expensive side, and they are of no use alone - you need several to get the profit they can offer. So what we did was each participant bought one or two markers, sent them to one of us, and then those markers traveled the world as a package, so that everyone could get a good try at them. And guess what? I loved them. I love the colors, they're vibrant like regular markers but with more shades and more possibilities than regular markers.

Here's an example comparing regular & Copic markers:

In our traveling markers there was no light green "frog green", but you get the idea. We had no yellow, either, so the light coming from the lamp is not blended out.

And some more coloring I did during my turn.

I find the Copics a perfect solutions some of the stamps I love but didn't know how to put "en valeur", as they say in French. The regular markers were not varied enough in color, and water colors not vibrant enough. These stamps have been sitting in my storage, waiting for a miracle. And look:

While the pens were still making their rounds, one of the participants, Barb, announced she had decided that in the end, she doesn't like the Copics and doesn't want her pens back. "Just keep them". Now, Barb had put in a lot of pens, and this incredibly generous offer was accepted with great joy!! So, once the pens had visited everyone, they were divided into smaller groups and sent to their new homes. Which means I now have a small collection of 9 pens! Hooray! I plan to grow it in a couple of weeks time, when I visit Finland. I liked the brush nibs on the Sketch pens (the traveling pens were mostly Sketch), but in France I can only get the hard nibbed Copics. I'm going for the cheaper Ciaos available in Finland, they have the brush nib :)

Stamp credits: Frog stuck on a lamp post - VivaLasVegasStamps; Japanese boys - Creavil; Rooster poster - Stampfrancisco

Back? I hope.

2010-03-06T10:58:00.004+01:00

Long time no stamps. Or very little. Mostly mail art, and envelopes as usual, but with little stamping involved. I'm getting more and more into mail art, will post a brand new "production line" soon, as soon as I find time to scan stuff.

My lack of time / energy / willingness to stamp has been odd, especially since I do miss working at my desk. Things are looking up, though, I'll start by updating my blog a bit.

I did have a massive re-organizing attack, and thought my whole stamp storing system over. ow it's better, more accessible and makes more sense. I ran into some old friends, for example the hill with hearts, which combined to the Lanvin fashion stamps made some lovely envies:

Also, a little cut-and-glue mail art to a friend who was questioning her life, universe and everything:

... I seem to have mailed a lot of stuff without scanning first. Silly me! Could it be I too was questioning my universe a bit?

Well I'm better now anyway :) I've even looked into some challenge blogs but haven't got to realising anything yet. Patience!

Indoor scenes

2009-11-10T23:01:00.003+01:00

Because of work work work (and loving it!) I have - again - had very little time to create anything, let alone post what I've done. What a shame..

Here's a novelty, however, thanks to Stamping Buddy Sandra's Amazing Rubberstamp Collection I was able to create my first serious indoor scene. I don't have any of the credits to give, sorry!

The scene takes place at the Dietomaniacs in June 2010
-Here they come, the biodynamic vegetables of the day!
-Oh great, I'll make us a soup right a way!

I know, I need to work on my horizons & co. but oh boy was this one fun to make :D

Mekka coups-de-coeur

2009-09-19T18:36:00.003+02:00

At Mekka, I always see stuff I've never seen before. Like this year Stampbord. Don't get me wrong, I'd seen some in mags and I'd seen the lovely results, but I'd never touched it or seen anyone working on it. It was love at first sight! Here's my first go at it, an inchie:

This year I also bought some stamps that are not exactly my usual style. What can I say! I just had a coup-de-coeur! A sceptic Stampingbuddy might say I'll never be able to do anything with them, but see, Sandra, I've already started! The bird on the inchie was a new style to me, too, I very very much like it.

After Mekka, back at the hotel, we of course immediately spread all our new treasures on the bed, attacked our grab bags, did the exchanges we wanted and busily started mounting all our new stamps on EZ-mount so that we could start stamping the minute we land back at home. The mounting went on in the train, and although I was the only one ready before we arriver at Gare du Nord, my Stampingbuddies were not far behind.When in Mekka, don't waste a second!

Even between Stampingbuddies, however, tastes differ, and among the stamps the others had bought, we each saw some impossible ones. "What were you thinking?! What do you want to do with that ugly thing?!" So we gave each other a challenge: we will each make a 12" scrap page, which must include:
-at least 1 photo made during the trip
-the two stamps the other Buddies found impossible
-two stamps the others found great

I have some scrapping to do!

Stamp credits: Bird - De Stempelwinkel; Writer, Flower woman - American Art Stamps; Around the Flowerwoman - Florilèges

Mailart to Belgium

2009-09-18T14:32:00.004+02:00

This little piece of mailart (created on a piece of he huge cardboard box which lives behind the bookshelf in my stamping room) is on its way to Belgium. It should arrive any day now :) The address was written in white around the fairy image.

I'm a bit bummed because my post office lady, who understood all about mail art and nice stamps, went away on her vacation in May and I haven't seen her since. Instead, I'm stuck with someone who will only give you boring Marinne head stamps (the "official" ones), and in case you're not sending to France, you're entitled to a printed-out blue sticker, huge and impersonal. I mean, there's one cent missing from the price, and instead of digging out the stamps and giving you a small yellow Marianne, this man will print for you a blue sticker. He will also glue for you a long line of Air-mail tape on your envelope, of course all over your stamped decoration. Once he almost refused to sell me anything, saying only "there's no point in sending this, it will never arrive". Needless to say, the mailart arrived at its destination the next day.

I'm desperately seeking a replacement, and I may have found something at the Cité Universitaire. It's an hour away, but I go there occasionally so it's OK. Mail art must be respected.

Long time no post

2009-09-13T20:26:00.006+02:00

This weekend, at the Mekka stamping convention in Germany (see links) , I was told by my dear traveling & stamping friends I should update my blog. Soon. Like, as soon as I get back home from Mekka.So here I am.

I am terribly sorry, I had not realized it had been so long since my last update. I have not stamped very much in the past months, I simply have not been in the mood for it. The little stuff I did this summer was mailart, and just guess if I ever thought about taking a picture before sending the things off!!!

Here are, however, a few pieces of mailart from late spring / early summer.

The first one is for my parents who had just moved into a new home by a lakeshore.

The second one is a double: it's a response to a challenge at my Friday night art class: make a piece of mailart including
-red
-straight lines
-a reaction to two words drawn in a hat full of suggestions. I drew "metallic" and "chaos"
The problem was this: to me "chaos" does not always have to carry the connotation of panic, boodshed and fear, as it seemed to mean to the other members of the group. To me, chaos simply means an unorganised and unruly state of things. I bent under general pression put upon me by the group and created a violent piece (the teddy bears getting killed by a UFO), a piece very unlike me. I admit, I learned something while making this one. It was very difficult. I don't like making this kind of stuff, especially since it was not a result of something I had to say. I had the feeling words were put into my mouth, and that always upsets me. The text says: "Connotations - but not my connotations"

But I also made "my" version of the challenge: chaos in the sense where you simply do NOT mix Mickey and Donald in the same story, it's a rule and if you break it it's a chaos - small scale but a chaos nevertheless. Child I mean, who decided that chaos = destruction?

I love making mailart.

Meet Frida

2009-03-22T09:26:00.005+01:00

Frida landed in my stamp collection on Friday. This fiesty young lady was born in Las Vegas, and somehow I get the feeling Paris is not her favorite place on Earth...

Frida complains about the food (too lean), the messy state of the stamping room, the choice of background music, the size of the other rubber stamps (especially the male ones), even the weather: too mild, she says, apparently "real weather" is either burning hot or freezing, springs and falls are just plain boring.

One of the first of Frida's complaints was the lack of friends to play with. So I dug out Alice, who is the perfect size and age to play with Frida, and I expected the two to get along well. But no. As a welcome gift, Alice brought Frida... a pig. Unfortunately Frida's reaction was not what Alice had hoped for.

Time will show, whether these two will become friends.. or not.

Stamp credits: Frida, grinnning sun - Viva Las Vegas Stamps ; Tree - Stempelmine ; Alice - Stampfrancisco ; Flowers - Hero Arts

Workshops and techniques

2009-03-15T10:14:00.006+01:00

Oh my, has it been almost a month? So sorry for no updates!

I've been busy with my birthday (a Somerset Studio subscription was among the presents, hooray), and then with Serious Workshops these past two weekends!

Last weekend I took part in a scrap rally, as Sami calls it. It was two days of scrapping without pause, I went with my two stamping buddies, the two Sandas, and we had an excellent time. We did an altered box using photos as part of tehe decoration, and a mini album on a wintery theme. Unfortunately the box is a present so it must be blogged later, and the mini album isn't finished, but you'll see pictures shortly!

Yesterday we three stampeteers took part in an amazing adventure at a convention dedicated to stamping techniques and discovery in the world of what's new in the field (well, new in this part of the world...). We did workshops with the likes of Suze Weinberg, Tim Holtz and Manuela Jamet... oh boy! Yes, photos will be shared, but like the box from last week, some of the things I made are presents and I feel they should arrive at their destinations before being published here.

Instead, two scrap pages. One with me and the Sandras (the photo taken the day we got together for the first time, in the background our usual Friday playfield), and one the page I made last night at the convention with a given choice of papers and embellishments. Eglantine is my clownname. I'll say for the clown page, this would definitely not have been my choice of colors and papers, had a scrapped at home alone! but it was a challenge, and the results are OK, I find.

Done with "building"

2009-02-21T23:39:00.005+01:00

My row houses are ready, the swap is done, and all the envelopes are going out on Monday. I made a card to go with the swap:

And the rest of the houses are here:

This was a particularly fun swap. I organized it, and so got to see all 10 houses of the other participants. I really feel I know them a bit better now, after all the theme for the swap was "me"! Some participants described their houses, and some told things about themselves, their wishes and dreams and their way of life.

ATC swapping at its best. :)

Stamp credits: Painter - Enchanted ink, houses - Heindesign , tree - Stempelmine, Alphabet for "home sweet home" - Art By Moonlight (Stampfrancisco), All stamps on the orange house - Inkadinkado, Text behind the lute player - Stampington.
Other credits: All white texts on black background on the rowhouses - Lisa Vollrath

Tule sellaisena kuin olet = Come as you are

More rowhouses

2009-02-11T20:14:00.004+01:00

Here are some more houses (ATC size) I've made for the Altered Gypsy swap. I took quite a diferent appreach to these ones compared to the first ones I made (published a couple of weeks ago). Few stamps, moslty clop art.

Stamp credits: woman with flying hair - Cherry Pie Art Stamps

He's made it home

2009-02-10T08:19:00.005+01:00

The little polar bear (mail art) has made it to his new home to Alaska! So it's also time to post him here.

The card is made on cardboard (a shipping box, might even be a pizzabox again... I just love that material). Painted with acrylic paints, then stamped with snowflakes in gold. The image is from a magazine, and the letters cut out of paper I made at Azoline's a long time ago, see entry of December 11th 2008.

Stamp credits: The snow flake- oops I forget (it's not mine)

Get well soon

2009-02-07T10:30:00.004+01:00

Here's a get well -card that went out to a stamping / scrapping friend this week. I hearshe's doing a bit better and is our of bed - keep fighting, Samy!

The fish is saying.. "Get well soon" :D I don'tknow what it's saying for real, "Our company prepares the best socks in town" perhaps... I wish I knew what my Japanese (and Chinese) texts say. Apparently they're often commercial slogans! :D

Stamp credits: Japanese lady, small bamboo around the pond - Stone House Stamps; Gold fish - Limited Edition ; Bamboo in the background, flowering branch- Inkadinkadoo.

Rackett

2009-02-04T23:38:00.003+01:00

Rackett the cat left us this morning at the age of 19. She was a happy cat with a good long life. Scratch her stomach and you got a purr, guaranteed. See you, Rackett.

The bulletin board

2009-01-29T01:21:00.004+01:00

Attention attention! Friday is approaching... and this Friday will be a Stamping Friday again!

The mail delivery is slow, and thanks to the General Strike which will paralyze France tomorrow, my card to the stamping party hostess will not make it to her mailbox in time for the message to be delivered... so, just this once, my blog will serve as a bulletin board. Luckily, the message was stamped, so it doesn't break any rules (if ever there were any). The card is rated at least PG-13, because.. well, if people would just stop giving me stamps with violence and drinking and phone harrassment and spam on them, I would be able to keep stamping those sweet non-violent pastoral scenes!!

-Hello? Sandra? Sweetie-darling?
-Tell her Friday's OK!
-And that I'm bringing something to eat.
-But that the first person arriving too late will be shot.

(Don't worry, the person arriving late will be me myself, apparently I'm "late" even when I skip breakfast and show up in my pyjamas!)

Stamp credits: All - Viva Las Vegas Stamps

Houses where I live

2009-01-25T21:29:00.007+01:00

I'm hosting a swap for the Gypsies. We are making little houses (starting with size ATC and then shaping the cards as a house) representing ourselves. The idea is that at the end we will all have on our stamping room wall a row house, where our stamping friends live.

So far I've finished three houses, seven more are waiting in my draft book.

I wish I had more time these days to stamp and to create, I feel like my head is bursting with ideas but I have no time to realise them. Luckily I have my draft book, a present from Kersten a long time ago. The book now has pages and pages of ideas for cards, complete with drawings and designs... it's not so much an artistic journal as a sketch book. But I love it :)

Stamp credits: Alices - Stamp Francisco, cat - StampAttack

Be with those who help your being

2009-01-12T12:04:00.004+01:00

Happy New Year everyone!

My New Year has started of absolutely magically: I'm doing a masterclass in clownery (what a wonderful art form!) until the end of February, and that is working wonders on how I see the world. I want to stamp and paint and create all the time!

This weekend my Parisian stamping buddies (2xSandra) came over, and we had a great day trying out new products and stamping little scenes for fun.

I did a folder for a friend to put her choir music in:

The folder is a bit bigger than what my scanner can handle, a bit is missing from each side of the image.

Stamp credits: Weeping willow - De Stempelwinkel, text - Hampton Art Stamps, others - Stone House Stamps
Music: a Tim Holtz mask

The last bunch is out!

2008-12-14T10:36:00.003+01:00

Some lucky people are not only getting a mail art Christmas card from me, but their mailart Christmas card is made on a piece of a pizza box! I'm using serious glue, otherwise I may wake up to 2009 with 10 less friends than what I had in 2008 :D "I mean, who does she think she is? She cuts out a piece of a Pizza Hut box, paints it yellow, and tries to make it pass as a Christmas card? What is this? Well I'm sending her an empty box or Oreos, then we'll see! And what kind of a Christmas color is yellow, anyway?"

The lucky winners of the Pizza Hut draw will know they've been selected in.. I'd say a week :D Here's an example of what the winners will receive:

OK, so it's not been all pizza boxes lately, one should try to eat healthy (if only occasionally). So in lack of mailart material, I've also made a Very Traditional Card.

And since they do celebrate Christmas in Brazil, too, here's a special one I made for Sandra the Stamping Buddy (who dislikes cooking, doesn't drink alcohol, and whom I certainly cannot imagine on a golf course).

(The toucans:
-It's Christmas! Even in Brazil! I feel like giving a present to Sandra, but what could it be?
- I know! A lovely enamel saucepan!
-No! Some tico-tico-tico-tequilaaaaah!
-I vote for a beautiful yellow golf ball.
Alice:
- Don't worry you guys, I've got it covered. Look, I've already made for her a gorgeous crown out of old Coke cans!

Inside: In the end, the crown is too cool. I'm keeping it. And you're getting bits of red rubber.)

It may not be do visible on the cards, but I've actually gone crazy with glitter. There's glitter on all of these cards. Lots of it. I'm five years old again, and that feels good :)

This may be my last post before Christmas, so here's wishing to all of you
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!

Stamp credits: Christmas elf- Gaïa; Toucan - Stamp Allate (? can't read the name); Leaves and grass - Third Coast Rubber Stamps; Alice - Stampfrancisco

Fun with acrylic paints

2008-12-11T23:58:00.004+01:00

For two weeks now, at my art class on Friday nights we've been working with crylic paints. The exercise was to first paint a huge pape full of colors and shapes (no planning, just paint), which gave me this (a small part of a huuuuge paper):

We then cut rectangular shapes out of the paper, wherever we saw an interesting pattern or an image form all by itself. I still have loads paper surface to put to use, so far I've got an ATC (as the ever practical girl I of course went against the teacher's specific orders and made my cut-outs ATC-size...).. I love this one, I'm calling it "Yonder". "Yonder" being Alaska.

I also made a couple of Christmas cards out of the cut-outs. I'm not sure they're finished yet, but then I don't really know what to add. The bottom one may get a stamp or two on it before it goes out. We'll see. I like the feel of the surface of the painted paper and of the cardboars, I don't want to lose that. And I try to keep in mind that simple is beautiful.

More Christmas cards

2008-12-03T00:23:00.002+01:00

Unbelievable, but this is the first year I seem to be making my Christmas cards at the ast minute, to be sent out practically the minute they're born... I'm working on a huge scrapbooking project (pictures maybe later), and that's eating up all my free time. Which explains the delay on the cards. Anyway here are two new ones:

The flower was painted on a separate paper with acrylics and cut out

Stamp credits:
Dear Santa: cat - 100 Proof Press, hat and text- don't know
Noel: Noel - Stamp affale, Snow flake -Judi Kin's, swirl - Autumn Leaves clear stamps

Christmas card #1

2008-11-25T12:55:00.004+01:00

'Tis the season to get started!

Here's one kind of Christmas card, that will be leaving my house to wish happy holidays. I'm trying to keep it simple this year...

Stamp credits: Santa - Stampfrancisco, swirl - Cherry Pie Art Stamps

Snow!

2008-11-22T21:10:00.002+01:00

They are announcing snow for Paris tomorrow! Can't wait! :)

To celebrate that, here are two scrapbooking pages I did a while back at a Stampin Up meet.

Stampcredits: All - Stampin Up!

Mail Art

2008-11-08T00:34:00.004+01:00

They've made it! These mailart have arrived, one in Alaska, the other in Japan. Long live the postal system! Long live mail art!

The images were painted with bright water colors on white paper and "uncolored" with bleach. They were decorated further with gel pens (mostly white and gold) and cut out. The little doormouse was originally part of a big flower, as was the butterfly, but at one point in the cutting process I started "seeing things" and ended up cutting most of my big drawings into smaller images. No regrets!

Thanks to Azoline for the technique! (That's where I go play Friday nights ;))

Alice ATCs

2008-10-05T10:16:00.006+02:00

This ATC swap went to Cathy, and since it's arrived, I can finally publish it. Yay!

The theme was Alice, and my four ATCs are a series on one of my favorite sayings, one that helps me through when I feel I'm missing out on something or things are not going the way I planned / wanted.. so in case you get one of those uncomfortable feelings, relax. And remember:

YOU ARE ALWAYS AT THE RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME!!

Stamp credits: Cheshire cat; White Rabbit - StampAttack, Clock - TimeToStamp; road sign - Stampers Anonymous ;the rest - Stampfrancisco

P.S. I'm doing an art class every Friday night now. It's fun! And it's things I never would have tried out at home on my own. A couple of mail art pieces were born tonight, they will be posted later, once they've arrived at their destinations. (Yes, this is one big delay blog..)

PPS I don't know why blogspot dates this blog entry as of Oct 5th. Today is October 17th - or rather 18th already

A tooth for Anna

2008-10-03T18:13:00.006+02:00

My Goddaughter Anna in Hungary is getting her teeth! Apparently she's having trouble with it (and as a result, the whole family is a bit short of sleep at the moment), only one tooth has come out so far! So I sent over a giant tooth, so that she can see what she's supposed to working on.
;)

The nursery rhyme says: "Tooth, tooth, come out! Your house is on fire! You'll get milk and butter, an dyou can stay till tomorrow". (It used to be a snail in the rhyme, but hey, in this case a tooth is nicer ;))

Stamp credits: Well, I did the stamping at Sandra's again.. but I promise: as of today I'm writing down what I'm stamping with when I'm not stamping at home. Sorry!

Shadows

2008-09-28T21:03:00.004+02:00

This has been a week with alcohol inks. I prepared some backgrounds, stamped seriously over at Sandra's last Friday, and have been mounting the results bit by bit these past few days. I tried a promising ink for stamping on the backgrounds: Tsukineko's Memento. This little miracle is dye and waterproof at the same time, and it stamps beautifully even the finest images! But an unpleasant surprise was ahead for the alcohol ink backgrounds: right after stamping, the image was beautiful and black, but a few hours later it had faded to gray! Go figure. So my shadows took on a different atmosphere that that I had intended. Not always bad, though, as you can see.

This forest card has little transparent stars glued on it, unfortunately they are not visible on the scan.

Does anyone have an idea what ink would do the trick on alcohol inks? I'm looking for a black result, crisp and intense. Contrasts! Am I stuck on Stazon? The big tree card is stamped with Versafine, but it was so thick the image looks three dimensional - no problem with the tree, but with some other images that is less good ;)

The sale is approaching...

2008-09-25T19:21:00.006+02:00

I've been invited to join an art sale in a couple of weeks, and I'm getting ready by preparing cards like mad. Yay! It'll be fun! There will be other people with their creations: jewelry and things made out of fabric. If this goes well and my cards find buyers, I'll go and do Christmas sales aswell. We'll see! Here are some of the simpler cards that are ready at this point:

Stamp credits: Lighthouse: Sirius Stamps; Swirl - MakingMemories; Others - Stone House Stamps

Sputnik (Happy birthday Sandra!)

2008-09-15T11:41:00.004+02:00

Here's the card (30x30 cm, 12x12 in) I made for Stamping Buddy Sandra. It was delivered during Mekka.

The space ship is cut out of a scrap paper, the rest are stamps (listed in the credits below). The slide system is as seen on Susan Soyka's "Sliding into fall" -card in the RSM of Sept/Oct 2008 (p.28). What a great idea! I used two 50 kopeck coins, so I suppose that makes the space ship a Sputnik?
It was a bit of a "don't try this at home" -project, but here's what I did:
The scene is stamped a piece of regular moving box cardboard (with the waves and all, which made it a bit complicated to stamp well..). The route for the space is simply cut with a cutter. I used black Stazon ink to stamp, and colored the images with markers. I then painted the blue background and the clowds with acrylic paint (this was the aaaaaaargh -part). I contoured each image once more with a black pen and stamped in the pixies. Oh, and I seem to have forgotten to stamp in the music notes which I wanted to have around Pan and the bird! Oh well... At last the space ship was mounted on it's slider: underneath the sliding route there's a 50 kopeck coin. On the piece, I put two little 3-D pads, and another coin was attached on top. The spaceship is glued on to the top coin.

Mekka... I forgot to take any pictures during Mekka, how did that happen??? Had loads of fun, though, and now have new toys to play with ;) In lack of pictures you'll just have to take my wor for it I guess: next year September 12-13, be there!

Stamp credits, as seen during the Sputnik's descent:
Smiling moon - 100 Proof Press; Flying pig - Stampfrancisco; Flying Superhero Woman - Zettiology; Running Pixie - Cherry Pie; Flying Man - Stempelmine;
Sun - Third Coast Rubberstamps; Winged Woman With Funny Hat and Woman holding banner - Zettiology; Banner - Third Coast Rubber Stamps; Kid Riding A Fish and Fairy Riding Fish - Cherry Pie; Bird Bird on a twig - 100 Proof Press;
Pan playing flute - Beeswax; Boy with bugle - Stempelmine; Fairies - Cherry Pie; Mushrooms and Mice Having Picnic - 100 Proof Press; Frog Playing Accordeon - Stempelmine, Gnomes (2 separate) and Gnome Riding A Donkey, Twigs and Grass - Third Coast Rubberstamps. Texts: handwritten.

Off to Stempel-Mekka!

2008-09-12T10:07:00.003+02:00

The train for Mekka leaves in an hour and a half, my backpack and my shopping list are ready, and I'm all psyched up to go! :D

A tiny little ATC swap is a must, here are my Mekka 2008 ATC's. I've never done folding ATCs before but that was fun! I'll definitely explore this form more closely...

Here's the one going to Marie (who's German), this is the open form. The closed form had nothing special, it's a fun scrapping paper that's all. The form is the traditional gate form, the gate flaps/doors opening in the middle. The fortune cokie text says: if you never walk into a forest, you will never find any blueberries.

And here's the one for Sandra (in French, of course). The form is an accordeon. And the fortune: you are about to embark on a delightful journey.

Stamp credits: Alphabet - ArtByMoonlight (Stampfrancisco), swirls in the background - Autumn leaves

Pay It Forward (PIF)

2008-09-09T16:59:00.003+02:00

Pay It Forward!

I got this from Kati, although I was slow to post it.. Anyway, here it goes!

****

The Pay It Forward - rules are as follows:

1. All who have a blog or a Flicker album can play this.

2. The first three to sign up (in the comments of this post) will receive a hand-made present from me.

3. The presents will be sent within a year.

4. Those who will receive the presents, must put the PIF-heart and the rules on their blog/Flicker, and get ready for the next sign-ups! They will then in turn send out three presents.

****

If the rules are not clear, tell me and I clarify, they went over a few language barriers to finally end up in English! :D

On the stamping front, I'm preparing cards for a small sale next month. My first! I can't wait :D I'm also making a couple of ATCs for Mekka. The train starts on Friday! It'll be my fouth Mekka, and I'll be accompanied by two first-timers, Sandra and Marie. Oh boy do I feel important, haha! :D

Envelopes of all sorts (summer madness)

2008-08-31T16:45:00.003+02:00

Here's a bunch of envelopes realised this summer! Most have already been mailed off, but some are still waiting...

Stamp credits:
-Envelope with arches: all stamps NonSequitur
-The Lady and the fountain: all stamps NonSequitur
-Alice does the rounds: Crowned Alice (top, 4th from left), Alice With Her Hands Behind Her Back (next to Crowned Alice), Alice With Arms Crossed (bottom, middle) - StampAttack
-Alice and the bear: Alive - Stampfrancisco, bear on bicycle - Stempelmine; others - Stampfrancisco

Think it, prepare it, then surprise share it

2008-08-21T13:14:00.006+02:00

Sometimes I'm not in the mood to do anything big and artsy, but just something to share: Immediately. Sometimes it's bits of cut-outs whose colors call to me, sometimes it's a stamp I want to try out.

I like mail art, and I like the idea of sending just a card, with no obligation (it has to be someone's birthday, or my card must respond to some specific team). That's why, on the gypsy forum, I launched the challenge "Think it, prepare it, then surprise share it". I.E., just do it. People love to get mail from their friends, even when it's nonsense.

So far as a result to my own challenge, two cards have made it to their destinations:

Sandra received a complete-nonsense "no this doesn't mean anything" collage:

And poor Cathy received a try-out on how to use collage sheet images, resulting in a "I definitely can't do collage, and this is dreadful":

The third piece is still on it's way, it's a complaint on how I can't do collage. Ironically, I sort of like the result!

(Yes, I'm working on the collage technique, it bugs me how I can't make them look like I planned)

Stamp credits: Alice - Stampfrancisco, Italian text - StoneHouseStamps, birch - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

New home?

2008-08-07T00:20:00.002+02:00

You can either 100% stamp it..

..or use a photo of the new neighborhood!

Stamp credits: Alice with curtain: Stampfrancisco, House: 100 Proof Press

A faire-part for Gabrielle, and a how-to

2008-08-02T09:16:00.006+02:00

Since I for once took pictures during the creation process, I've decided to write my first ever how-to :D

This is a "faire-part". In France when something important happens, when a baby is born or people get married, a faire-part is sent out to friends and family, to let them know that there's been a change in the life situation. Friends of mine got a baby in May, and they asked me to do the faire-parts. Since this meant making 50 cards, the design had to be simple. Here's how it went:

On photo paper, I dropped alcohol inks to make little balloons. This was HP photo paper, not the quick-drying kind. (Unfortunately they've gone fancy and quick-drying now, and the little balloons just don't have the time to form because the ink dries too quickly!) On the photo the balloon is big, I just wanted to show one from up-close, I like them so much :D

Then, and this was the new parents' idea, letters forming Gabrielle's name were stamped around the the center of the card.

In the center came a baby pram, and the photo paper was glued on yellow card stock.

Inside the card I made a little pocket out of vellum, decorated again with alcohol ink drops. Long live UHU-stick glue which is practically invisible when dry! When Gabrielle was born, the parents printed out the name, date of birth and a little picture of Gabrielle, cut it to fit in the pocket, and the cards were ready to go out! In the original plan there were paper flowers attached to the information card, but with the picture of the baby that was a bit too much.

And the envelopes must match, of course. The ink dots are made with a round sponge.

Stamp credits: Alphabets & pram - Aladine, I believe, must check once I get home.

Happy summer (I know!)

2008-07-29T22:49:00.005+02:00

Sorry, my darlings, it's been hectic...

I'm not at home this summer, but working in Germany, singing at an opera festival. It's a 10-week job, so you can imagine I'm carrying a lot of other stuff but just stamps... Which obviously doesn't mean I came emply-handed!

Unfortunately all the pics during the summer will be taken with a camera (I decided not to bring the scanner, ha ha), so the images are not the best possible, but here goes:

just before leaving home I ordered some new stamps from The Third Coast Rubber Stamps (see the link on my side panel), and they arrived right after I got here. Hooray! I've tried some out, but still need to get to know my lovely new foxes and tree branches etc.. Here's a first try, however:

I've also decided I need to learn to make shorelines, and tried that out too, but I realize my stamsp are too big (or rather paper too small?) to do what I had in mind..

The envelope looks more like it, I find:

Now that the busiest part of the festival is over with (no more rehearsals), I might actually find some time to stamp. I'm looking forward to it!

Stamp credits:
Merry day to you -card: all stamps Third Coast Rubber Stamps
Leaping frog -card: Frog -Stempelmine, Butterfly - StoneHouseStamps; Text - Third Coast Rubber Stamps, Reeds, waterlily - 100 Proof Press
Pan Envelope: Pan - Beeswax, Reeds - 100 Proof Press; Sun, Brach above Pan - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Happy Easter!

2008-03-23T21:40:00.003+01:00

Happy stamping with Haka!

Haka and I spent a great afternoon yesterday stamping on Easter eggs. Fazer makes Easter eggs is real eggs, filled with chololate (they're called Mignon).

We first painted the eggs with acrylic paints, then stamped (pigment inks work well) by either adjusting the UM stamp to the surface of the egg, or by rolling the egg over a stamp lying on the table. As you can see, the results were far from perfect and the birds are missing their eyes or the frog half of his accordeon.. still, it was such a fun experience I decided to blog the eggs ;)

Stamp credits:
Main stamps: rabbit - Enchanted Ink (?), birds - 100 proof press, frog playing accordeon -Stempelmine, alpaca - Rubberhedgehog
Flowers and leaves - Rubber Stamp Tapestry

Light ahead :)

2008-03-16T20:23:00.002+01:00

Dear all, I'm back - little by little!

My new computer should arrive next week, and I've a new scanner, so..

In the meantime, here's something I should've (could've) posted a while ago already, but I had completely forgotten I had scanned it before the Big Collapse! This is my card published in the RubberStampMadness March/April issue!

The card is called "Merlin solves the musicians' housing problem", because musicians have such a hard time finding a place to live and practice their art...

I submitted it for the challenge theme. My challenges were double:

1) using stamps I've had for aged i.e. which don't necessarily go with my current style (those would be the magician and the houses)

2) using my brand new self-made stamp positioner, which I used to get Merlin stand on that huge mushroom.

Ah, it feels good to be posting again! Thank you for having been so patient :)

Stamp credits:

Merlin the magician: Stempel-Galerie, Big mushrooms - Sirius Hobby, Musicians - Die Stempelmine, houses - Heindesign, others - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Yeah, "happy" new year :D

2008-02-06T14:34:00.000+01:00

I'm so sorry. I'm experiencing serious technical problems. My computer broke down definitely, which means that at this moment I have no possibility to scan, nor do I have a photo editing program to edit any photos I might take of my creations. Therefore I've decided simply not to post anything, before I can show some decent pictures again.

I should get my new computer in a couple of weeks' time, so I will be updating with new pictures toward Feb 20, I hope. I hope I hope I hope!

Return of the rubberstamper!

2008-01-25T20:27:00.000+01:00

Wow it's been long again.. sorry for the long wait, and thanks for keeping coming back!!

This time I have note been soooooo lazy, just lazy to blog ;) I did have a stamping block (they to exist!) over new year, but it's over now I'm glad to say. Just had to get out of the house a little, and to recover from flu-flu-and-then-another-flu. Now I feel I'm on the roll again!

So this time it's several projects that you get to see. Mostly stuff to send, envelopes, for example. I'm mad about envelopes, it seems :D

Here's a theme:

..and two variations of it. The yellow patches are for the address, they make it stand out a bit.

This little deer went off to Alaska (the smudge was the address, not the ghost of deer dear dead mom). I'm not quite happy with the colors, although they were more alive in real life than scanned. Gotta work on using colors in my stamping, I tend to stamp with black and then color - the easy way out ;)

And this light house envelope (created around the gorgeous stamps) is on its way to Finland.

I've also been very very stupid and have counted my ink pads. "Now, that was a stupid thing to do", said Stampingbuddy Sandra immediately... she is right. I won't tell you how many pads I have, I'm trying to actively forget that figure (the truth hurts)! Anyway I organized a little guessing competition for some postcrossing friends, and the prize was of course a card. The prizes are here for everyone to see.

The first one says simply "happiness in the coming year", and the little roll attached to the flower is a Chinese fortune cookie text, stating an exciting journey awaits.

Another happy new year -card:

"... she woke up with a red wine moustache and slight problems in the eye-sight, but once a princess, always a princess"
The fortune cookie text on this one says something like "the secret to staying young is to sleep well and to lie about your age" - can't believe I forgot to write that down before sending the card...

A bookmark was born somewhere along the way, too:

And last: I love the little Nicolas, but at my age, can I run around admitting my love overtly? Therefore,

was:

is:

Stamp credits:
Envelopes "theme and variations": all stamps - Stone House Stamps
Deer envelope: all stamps - Third Coast Rubber Stamps
Light House envelope: Light house - Sirius Stamps
Trumpetist card: Trumpetist - Third Coast Rubberstamps, Text -Finnstamper, Background - Anna Griffin
Dancers' New Year: Dancers, grass - Cherry Pie Art Stamps; Pan -Beeswax; Background willow, bushes - Third Coast Rubberstamps
Princess: Princess, background bushes - Third Coast Rubberstamps; Mice, Goose - 100 Proof Press; Grass - Cherry Pie Art Stamps
Bookmark: Musician, audience -Stempelmine; curtain - 2nd Nature Art Stamps
Calendar: Alice - Stampattack, Lady with a hat - Non Sequitur, All others - Third Coast Rubberstamps

Stamping on the road

2008-01-02T22:30:00.000+01:00

Sorry -such a long time and no post.. I had some serious computer/internet problems, but now I'm back!! ;)

At the end of November I went away for a week, and stubbornly took _a_lot_ of stamps with me,so that I could stamp evenings in my hotel room. There are so many stamps in my collection that I feel are still pretty much unknown to me, and I though that by limiting the selection I could do some exploring - true! It was fun creating little scenes with what I had on me, and I ended up making little notecards, that I could fold in two, write inside of, and then close with scotch tape and send off like little letters. Thank you to the recipients for letting me scan the cards later!

Card # 1:
Card # 2:

Card # 3:

During my stay -and actually, still today -I was suffering from voice loss, as you can see by the first card. And on card # 3 you can see what it was like - the food was too good.. ;) I've scanned the sides of the cards separately, but in real life they are joined at the top.

The first card/letter I had hand stamped at the post office, but then the post office closed down for who knows what reason (some obscure local holiday?) and the two other ones started their travel the normal way, I just dropped them in a mail box. I was glad t see they traveled just as quickly and safely as the first one, and even got a very nice post mark on them :)

Stamp credits:

Card #1 - Alice - StampAttack, woman playing the lute, long grass, willow (behind the wall) - Third Coast Rubber Stamps; cat, wall - Stempelmine; Flower - StoneHouseStamps
Card #2 - grass - Third Coast Rubber Stamps, Moon/sun - Cherry Pie Art Stamps, all others - Beeswax
Card #3 - mushrooms (2 stamps), mice - 100 Proof Press; Alice - StampAttack, Suns - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

On with the challenge

2007-11-25T07:11:00.000+01:00

A bit late with blogging these (had a hectic-attack in real life!), but here's the latest on the November new staps challenge.

This Photo stamps was a present from Maissi, and it was quite a challenge, really! I love the stamp but I seem to have dicfficulties in using photo stamps - I can't think of what to do with them. But aren't challenges just for this kind of situations? I quite like the results myself, could have done some tuning here and there but never mind the details, life is beautiful :D

First, and ATC which I made after there's been an update about the Maddie kidnapping in the news. I just felt so terrible about all the missing children in the world, and about child labor and all that. I'm rethinking and re-doing my own shopping habits now.

For this (a bit too orange-y) tag, I stamped the image on an alcohol-inks background. Not bad, the results, just the choice of color was a bit weird :D Oh, and the tag also finishes up the challenge for the twig.

And the "typical" things, the card with its envelope:

All colorings were done with chalks.

Update on the challenge:

Twig - completed
Photo stamps - completed
Fairy girls - 1 done, 3 to do
Fourth stamp not chosen yet!

Stamp credits: Girl in photo stamp - Tuscan Rose

New Stamps -challenge

2007-11-14T23:05:00.000+01:00

Err.. I seem to have gone and challenged myself among others on the Altered Gypsy-forum :D So far Cathy has taken on, the others I hope will follow suit. Of course, you are all welcome to join in! If you have a blog, leave me a link and I'll visit you ;)

The challenge is this:

Choose four stamps from your latest acquisitions/presents, something you haven't had time to explore too much.
Use these four stamps in four different ways / styles, on in four different types of work (ATC, card etc.)

So far I've chosen two of my four:

I'm waiting to see if I receive stamps in the Gypsy secret sister Christmas swap, and I may use a stamp I got from my Secret Crafting Friend Maissi as a thank you present (it's a photo stamp and will surely be a challenge! Must mount it first, though :D)

I started working on the challenge immediately, and actually it wasn't as hard as I thought. I'd bought both these stamps myself so I knew they'd integrate into my work pretty easily, but still I was surprised. I expect to have more difficulties with the photo stamp, but no panic ;)

Here are the cards I made today.

#1 for the little flower stamp, an envelope

#2 for the little twig, a thank you card:

#3 for the twig and #1 for the sleeping butterfly girl:

Stamp credits: both challenge stamps - 100 Proof Press, shadow cat - Sirius Stamps, brick wall and kitten- Stempelmine, Alice - StampAttack, grass - Third Coast Rubber Stamps

Happy Fathers' Day!

2007-11-11T17:48:00.000+01:00

It's Fathers' Day in Finland today, and although I did talk to my dad today, here's a card for him :) He'll get it a bit late, because his silly emigrated daughter has more and more trouble keeping up with the events in her native country. Sorry dad! And happy Fathers' day!

The text says: Real men know how to party - even a bit late.

And take this envelope as a warning example about what happens if you don't stay concentrated while stamping an address! (Answer: you have a silent revolution and end up creating a new country. Like Fizland.)

Stamp credits: whoa... no idea. Must check up with Sandra again. (Does she ever use her own stamps, growls the audience)

Six weeks till Christmas

2007-11-11T17:34:00.000+01:00

Very busy day yesterday, I made tags for Christmas presents. Every Christmas I wanted to do this but never got to it, so you can imagine I'm glad now! I made a whole bunch, on different papers.

Also, I'm proud to announce that the scanner that's been sitting on my desk since.. well, before I got to this desk! is now installed and functional. The scanner's a tad old and suggests I install Windows 2000 (or WInmw or WIndows95) for its better functioning, but we'll see.. I'm hoping the scanner won't get too crabby about my computer :D

Stamp credits: Christmas tag: TinCanMail

Happy (belated) birthday, Sami!

2007-11-09T17:54:00.000+01:00

The whole story is this:

A couple of week ago, Sandra, Sandra (I'll call her Sami) and I had an all-day stamping session, during which Sami accidentally let us others know, it would soon be her birthday. She had to leave earlier than we, so as soon as she was out the door, we hit the stamps to make her a birthday card. No need to look very far for the image to use, as we'd already managed to forget what the exact date was.. So here's the (accordeon) card we made together, and which by now has arrived and can thus be blogged:

1) -My butcher's cousin's neighbor's cat is losing its hair! You know what that means...
- Noooo, what?
- It means it'll soon be Sandra's birthday!

2) But I've completely forgotten if it's on the 5th or on the 7th...

3) Come on! Think, this is important! Seriously, you've no brain!
4) This can't be.. the 5th or the 7th?

5) Oh! I know! I'll send it on the 6th, she'll never know!

6) Happy birthday, Sandra!

Stamp credits: all photostamps - Stampsmith
The lacey border - *forgot to wrote it down! Will check with Sandra and update here*

Christmas ornament

2007-11-08T13:23:00.000+01:00

Ha! I did it! I made a Christmas ornament :D Don't know why it was so hard, but in the end I figured out what I wanted (and could) do and all was fine. This was really a challenge. I'm participating in a Christmas swap and we are to send an ornament (among other stuff) to our secret sister - that was for me the hardest bit in the swap!

Also a bit of news: a card of mine will be published in the Rubber Stamp Madness! What an honor! Will wait until the magazine is out to post the card here, since I don't know what their policy is on blogs vs. mag.

Scrapbooking, for a change

2007-11-04T19:22:00.000+01:00

I'm catching up on my scrapbooking! Yay! I'm already in August, as you can see.. scrapbooking is a definitely a project where you can't expect to be all caught-up, ever :D

This summer I met up with some fellow postcrossers in Tampere in Finland. Some of us visited the city museum, this picture was taken on the way there. What a fun and sunny day that was!

The stamps are from postcards and letters I've received through postcrossing (a few are just images on tha background paper, but mostly these are real stamps)

Learn Finnish!

2007-11-02T10:09:00.000+01:00

A friend of mine has started learning Finnish. :D I say wow, and made her a special notebook for the classes. (The word "psychanalyse" was on the original notebook, so this little book was perfect for altering. Who needs a shrink - challenge yourself with the Finnish language instead! :D)

Stamp credits:
Man flying, man sitting, frog with accordeon, clown with trumpet, dancing children, boy with bugle, violinist - Stempelmine
Pan - Beeswax
Eiffel tower - B-line
Rocks, grasse & co. (i.e. anything on the ground except what goes with Pan) - Third Coast Rubber Stamps
Alphabet - Heindesign
Dragonfly - Cherry Pie Art tSamps

Bingo! :D

2007-10-31T18:16:00.000+01:00

I knew it! I knew it! My Secret Friend is the queen of timing :D On the last day of the game, the last parcel arrives - and last but not least", definitely! THANK YOU, BRITT, it was a great pleasure being pampered by you for three whole months :D

Arvasin! Arvasin! SAY:ni on ajoituksen kuningatar: SAY-ringin viimeisenä päivänä saapui viimeinen paketti - eikä se suinkaan ole paketeista vähäisin, vaikka pahnanpohjimmainen onkin :D Samalla paljastui SAY:ni henkilöllisyys: KIITOS, BRITT, on ollut todella ihanaa olla hemmoteltavanasi näiden kolmen kuukauden ajan :D

This time Britt had merged two beautiful themes - the Pre-Rafaelites and Fairies...

Tällä kertaa Britt oli yhdistänyt pakettiin kaksi teemaa: pre-rafaeliitit ja keijukaiset..

First of all, these gorgeous card with envelopes, beautiful pictures! Just the kind I like :)

Ensinnäkin, paketissa oli upeita kortteja kuorineen! Juuri sellaisia, joista pidän :)

As usual, there were wonderful papers (here in the background) and collage pictures enclosed, I see card making times ahead! :D

Ja jälleen kerran mukana seurasi kauniita papereita (tässä taustana) sekä pikkukuvia. Taitaa olla korttienteon aika! :D

And for the fairies, there was even a book! With poems about fairies, and little stories, and of course breathtakingly beautiful pictures... Charming creatures, fairies, and so sweet... Collage pictures accompanied the book, so I'm all set to make fairy cards, too :D

Keijuista Britt oli liittänyt mukaan kokonaisen kirjan! Kirjassa on runoja ja pikku tarinoita, sekä tietysti henkeäsalpaavan ihania kuvia. Kijut ovat niin ihania... Pikkukuvia keijuista oli myös mukana, niin ettei keijukorttienkaan syntyä enää voi estää! :D

Britt had made three cards on the Pre-Rafaelites (on the picture underneath, on top, and a third card showing partially at the bottom (with Mona Lisa). The little squares are stickers, made by Britt herself. Perfect for adding the last touch on a card or an ATC!

Britt oli tehnyt pakettiin kolme pre-rafaeliitti-korttia (alapuolella olevasssa kuvassa: kaksi yläreunassa, kolmannesta näkyy alareunassa Mona Lisa). Pienet kiiltävät neliöt ovat Brittin itse tekemiä tarroja, täydellisiä kortin tai ATC:n viimeistelyyn!

I also go a letter, where Britt introduced herself. Nice to get to know the real you! Once again, thank you for all these beautiful moments, I had a great experience in the Secret Friends project :)

Sain myös kirjeen jossa Britt esitteli itsensä - hauska tutustua! Vielä kerran, kiitos näistä kauniista hetkistä, SAY oli minulle ihana kokemus! :)

P.S. The Lady of Shalott is sitting in her boat in the last picture (a red ribbon runs through her sky). The poem The Lady Of Shalott by Alfred Lord Tennyson is one of my favorite poems. It is pure beauty. If you don't know this poem I recommend you take the time to print out these pages and read it, savor it... it is guaranteed to make you dream!

P.S. The Lady of Shalott istuu veneessään alimmassa kuvassa (punainen nauha kulkee kuvan taivaan halki). Alfred Lord Tennysonin runo The Lady of Shalott on suosikkirunojani. Olen muistavinani että Jylhä olisi suomentanut sen, mutta en ole varma. Joka tapauksessa, jos suinkin kielitaito riittää, suosittelen lukemaan runon. JOka sanaa ei tarvitse ymmärtää, tunnelma kyllä välittyy. Tämä runo kirvoittaa unelmia... Tuolla linkkisivulla on helppokielinen tiivistelmä enne varsinaista runoa - englanniksi tosin sekin.

Behind the scenes - samaan aikaan kulissien tuolla puolen

2007-10-30T12:53:00.000+01:00

Greetings, everyone!

I haven't disappeared, I've just been working on stuff lately that doesn't go on the blog (scrap pages, series of Christmas cards etc.)

The Secret Friend thing is coming to an end. I'm still waiting to find out who my secret friend is. There was nothing in the mail today. Tomorrow is the last day of the game, and I wouldn't be surprised if my Secret Friend had managed to time her packet to arrive on the last day exactly! I know something is on its way, I was "pre-warned" my e-mail... :)

I was the Secret Friend to Maissi, that was really fun! Our styles are a little different, and visiting her blog regularly has really opened my eyes! I ike her style, and I'm hoping to integrate some aspects of it in my own cards and scrap. I dare say scrapping has become easier for what I've learned just by looking at the stuff she makes!

Because I knew Maissi would be browsing the blogs, trying to find out who her Secret Friend is, I never could blog cards that I made for her, and I even tried to make them a bit different from my usual stuff (more or less successfully). So, here are the cards from the three months past, for Maissi (in no particular order):

Salainen Askarteluystävä 3 -projekti loppuu huomenna. Vielä en tiedä, kuka SAY:ni on, sillä tänäänkään ei paketti tullut (tiedän sen olevan matkalla, sillä SAY:ni vihjaisi sähköpostilla, että lähetetty on..). Tosin SAY:ni tyyliin sopisi, että paketti saapuu paraatipäivänä, eli viimeisenä päivänä ja kruunaa kaiken! Itse olin Ystävänä Maissille. Tyylimme ovet hieman erilaiset, joten oli mielenkiintoista vierailla Maissin blogissa katselemassa, miten ja mitä oli syntynyt. Pidän kovasti Maissin tyylistä, ja yritän tuoda omaan askarteluuni ideoita ja yksityiskohtia Maissilta. Erittäinmielenkiintoinen tuttavuus! Koska tiesin Maissin nuuskivan blogeja saadakseen selville henkilöllisyyteni, en näiden kolmen kuukauden aikana ole uskaltanut kauheasti blogata luomuksiani, ja yritin tehdä Maissille hieman tavallisesta tavastani poikkeavia kortteja. Tässä postauksessa ylempänä ovat Maissille lähteneet kortit elo-lokakuulta, satunnaisessa järjestyksessä.

And finally - Happy Halloween! Ja lopuksi: hauskaa halloweenia kaikille!

Stamp credits: all stamps on the Halloween card: Cherry Pie Art Stamps, except the text: Stone House Stamps

My Secret Crafts Friend has gone Asian! A(a)siaa, SAY!!

2007-10-10T20:31:00.000+02:00

My Secret Crafts Friend has sent me a wonderful big packet full of Asia-inspired papers and pictures.. wow! :) Some of these papers are really fine, like silk paper, some are handmade, all of them are -again!- too wonderful to use! :D I love the Asia-theme (especially Japan), so I really appreciate this packet! I find the Japanese are the champions in making paper, they find incredible textures and designs, truly they are my favorite. Whenever I go to Japan I stock up. This time it's my Secret Crafts Friend who had ordered papers from Japan, and she's included some in my packet. Ah!

And my Friend had once again wrapped everything beautifully, too... have you noticed what a difference that makes? :) Thank you, Secret Crafts Friend!!! Once again you've hit the nail on the head...
SAY:ltä tuli mahtava iso paketti täynnä Aasia-teemaan sopivia papereita ja kuvia... iih! :D Osa papereista on ohuen-ohuita, osa paksumpia käsintehtyjä (?), ja kaikki - taas kerran!- liian ihania, että niitä raaskisi käyttää! Rakastan aasia-juttuja, erityisesti Japania, joten tämä paketti lämmittää sydäntä aivan erityisesti :) Japanilaiset ovat minulle paperinteon mestareita, heillä on ihania .. hui, nyt unohtui suomen kieli!... öh.. no, siis paperi tuntuu ihanalta käteen ja kuvat ovat kauniita, Japani on suosikkini! SAY oli tilannut Japanista papereita, ja laittoi pakettiini muutaman arkin. Aah!

Ja taas kerran, pakkaussilmää SAYllä riittää - rakastan kauniita paketteja! Kiitos, SAY, osuit naulan kantaan taas kerran!!!

Christmas is a-coming

2007-10-07T18:37:00.000+02:00

Two new designs! "Design" being pushing it a bit, but anyway. I'm particuarly glad for the angel card. I got the stamp a couple of years ago from Kersten, and it's really taken me a while to figure out what colors I could use with it. This time I'm quite happy with the results. Again, these are to be "quick cards", I have so many cards to make I need to find designs that don't take too long to prepare. (I hate having to think about that, but I must. Last year was near death.)

Stamp credits: Santa - StampFrancisco, Angel - Rubbermoon

Cluny

2007-10-02T23:32:00.000+02:00

I'm catching up on my scrapbooking - it's May in my album already! :D

RAK from Cathy and cards

2007-10-02T14:21:00.000+02:00

My Gypsy-forum friend Cathy has sent a RAK! What perfect timing, since this morning was dedicated to card making :) There was a Halloween card and a (TimeToStamp?) stamp in the lot - and even some bat wing lotion! Haha, I wonder what that's for! :D Thank you Cathy!!!

Suddenly my table was full of wonderful papers, and I didn't know where to start, as I still had my Secret Friend's papers sitting there, too... So I did just a little card for use around Christmas, and a few for letter-writing.

Stamping with Sandras

2007-09-30T18:12:00.000+02:00

Hooray! My Friday stamping friend Sandra knows another Sandra who has now been sucessfully contaminated with stamping germs - the past two Fridays she's been stamping with us! I have to figure out a system though, since they're now two Sandras. I'm trying to learn to call New Sandra Sami. Not easy! :D

This Friday I kept it simple with my crafts, I only had a Halloween swap to finish. So three ATCs it was:

Not much creating. I know. But there are days like that :)

Stamp credits:
Witch flying - Cherry Pie Art Stamps
All other stamps - unknown

Mail from my Secret Crafts Friend! SAY:n paketti!

2007-09-26T20:20:00.000+02:00

I have received a package from my Secret Crafts Friend! As you can see, my Secret Friend understands about wrapping :) I love pretty presents, and everything my Secret Friend sends is beautifully wrapped, in ribbons, and even the envelope was beautiful! (It's an Edelfelt painting)

This time, the present is musical and sweet :) I received a CD and a booklet with famous opera ouvertures, background papers that will go beautifully with the images I received last month, and note- and letterpapers with matching envelopes, flowers flowers everywhere! :) Thank you my Secret Friend! I know what I'll be doing next weekend ;)

My Secret Friend tells me that a second package is on the way - wow! What else could a person possibly need?

Tänään tuli SAY-paketti! SAY:ni todella ymmärtää paketoimisen tärkeyden! Rakastan kauniisti paketoituja lahjoja, ne ilahduttavat ihan erityisellä tavalla. Tämä paketti patkasi Edelfelt-kuoressa - aah!

Tällä kertaa sain CD:n jolla on kuuluisia ooppera-alkusoittoja sekä siihen liittyvän kirjasen, ihania taustapapereita jotka tulevat sopimaan loistavasti viime kuussa saamieni kuvien kanssa, sekä kirjepapereita kirjekuorineen - oikeaa kukkaisloistoa! Kelpaa siinä musiikin soidessa askarrella uusia kortteja kaikesta tästä ihanasta.. Alkavatkin nuo viikonloppusuunnitelmani selvitä! KIITOS, SAY!!! Osaat totisesti ilahduttaa meikäläistä!

SAY vihjaili, että toinenkin paketti olisi tulossa, huh! Mitä tässä muka ihminen vielä kaipaa? ;)

Storing Stamps

2007-09-24T10:20:00.001+02:00

HaKa was asking about how people store their stamps, and I want to show her my system. I'm also hoping this might help someone else to think of a system for themselves.

I have very little room, so I'm very very happy for the unmounted system (I use EZ-mount), otherwise I'd already be in huge trouble. Truth be said, I'm beginning to think you can get into storage room trouble even with unmounteds only, but hey, live dangerously and so forth..

My mounted stamps live in little boxes and in two drawers of the actual desk - those I use more often are in the drawers.

The unmounteds are in CD cases, organized by company:

The CDs go in the drawers of a cardboard storage system (very bad, don't buy it: the drawers don't slide well and the whole system is difficult to use as the staps weight a lot. Every time I open a drawer I'm afraid it'll break. I don't ever close the drawers completely for fear I might not be able to re-open them). On the side of each CD Iive marked which company it belongs to. Here again, need for improvement: my stickers are coming off. Must find stronger gluing stickers and re-do he labels. (Can you tell the system is relatively new?)

I've chosen to store the stamps by company, because that's the clearest (and my head operates like that). If I stored them by theme, I'm not sure I'd remember if the little girl with the added wings gazing the flowers is in "people", "fairies" or "flowers". So by company it is.

And here's my crown jewel, an index card box (original vintage, it used to belong to the first woman professor in Sorbonne, and that is cool!) This box - and my stamps - is the only thing in my household that is always organized, up-to-date and as-it-should-be. Behold. Admire.

Inside, index cards, by company and by theme (people, flowers, horizons, textx/alphabets, Christmas/winter etc)

There. I'm really glad I've got this system an that I've started it before things got out of hand. I did the index cards over last Christmas holidays, and it was quite a job, as I had to go through ALL my stamps for that. But the index is excellent for checking out what stamps I have + their proportions in case I want to build a scene.

I also have a little black Moleskine book (3, actually) in which I stamp my stamps in order of "arrival". It's easier to take with me to conventions than the index card box ;)

Got well soon

2007-09-24T10:11:00.000+02:00

A friend of mine was feeling down, here's a card that did the trick even before it was delivered! Talk about effienciency..

It's another one of those gesso-distress backgrounds I'm so in love with these days... The paper is from an old book and has a poem about a toad on it - quite a find for the card. And I just a-dore the frog stamp! It says (approximately): "Healthy, healthy, frog's leg, if you don't get better today, you'll get better tomorrow".

Stamp credits: Sweet wonderful bouncy little frog (Sandra's frog, not mine.. sniff!)- Cherry Pie Art Stamps, Fairy: Cherry Pie Art Stamps, sunrise - don't know yet: must ask.

Stamping aaaaaall day!

2007-09-23T15:47:00.000+02:00

Three aaaaall days, actually, but altogether it must come together to just one whole day. And with the very little sleep in between sessions, that's what it feels like, anyway :D

Despite the hours and hours spent stamping, I seem to have very little to show for them... Mostly I did Christmas cards, a dozen of them, and also cards for birthdays and other surprises, so they'll only be shown later. It's been such a long break again in my blogging, that I can't let you go completely empty-handed, so here's a selection from my weekend!

An ATC for a swap Im preparing (Halloween, of course!)

Christmas card type 1 this year:

Card & envelope (wish I'd had camel stamps ;) ) :

Stamp credits: Halloween-ATC stamps unfortunately unknown, Snowy tree -Personal Impressions, Text - Finnstamper, Dunes/Hills - Beeswax, caravan - Cherry Pie Art Stamps

ATC-ABC Family - Maurice and Nicolas

2007-09-13T11:22:00.000+02:00

Here's Louise's husband and Nicolas's father, Maurice. He likes being around children, and he always wanted a big family. He is a teacher in the local school, and in his free time he takes care of his pigeons and falcons: he's like to go hunting more often, but since that would mean being away from his family, he doesn't mind. For him, family comes first. In the photo he seems like a strict person, but in real life he's soft...

Nicolas, here in his Sunday whites, is the son of Maurice and Louise. His favourite things in life include keys (although he's not often given the chance to hold any), flowers, and playing with his idol, Georges from next door. Everything Georges does is terribly fascinating in Nicolas's eyes. Georges likes Nicolas too, and will often play with him. Today they went digging for worms and found a bone hidden in the ground. Nicolas didn't really understand what it was, but as Georges was all excited about their discovery, so was he.

ATC-ABC Family - Karin and Louise

2007-09-09T19:43:00.001+02:00

Finally some additions to my ABC-family :) I seem to always make them two by two, but who cares ;)

Here's Karin:
Karin is originally from Germany. She came over to France as a nanny, and ended up marrying Pierre. She loves her husband and their child, and life in France has been good to her, but she misses her twin sister Edda terribly. She wishes she could go back home more often, or that they could live somewhere closer to her hometown, but so far she has not been able to convince Pierre. She is afraid she will never again be completely happy anywhere, but that she will always feel something is missing.

And here's Louise:

Louise loves flowers. Her husband Maurice is her greatest fan. Louise takes her son Nicolas into the garden with her as often as she can, and while she is working on the flower beds, he is taking his afternoon nap in the shade. Louise's garden is special: when Maurice's great uncle Henry still went to Africa, he would bring back plants from there and put them in his brother's garden. Louise has inherited a lot of exotic flowers from Constance, Maurice's grandmother.

Last August weekend challenge

2007-09-02T15:55:00.000+02:00

Kersten challenged some fellow forum members to do at least three peces of art this last week of August (I joined in so late that my "last week" is actually a weekend in September, but never mind). As one of my things was a re-make I did four ;)

The challenge and the discovery of this incredible site, lead me to try out a new technique last night - the gesso resist backgrounds. Love 'em!!!

Here are my answers to the challenge.

An ATC on a new-technique-backround:

Decorating a storage box for old letters:

I also re-did an envelope design I used this summer. I quite liked it ;)

Part of the challenge was to send out one of the things made to another stamper, here's what I'm sending:

I'll have to wait a couple of days to mail it, though, as because of the flower it'll have to be cancelled by hand.

Stamp credits: Trees - JudiKins, Checkered background, flower (on the box) - HeroArts, Souvenirs-text - Artemio, Shop front (on the box) - Queen's Dresser Drawers, Bird in a dress - Invoke Arts; Alice, Mad HAtter - Stampattack, Grass- Thord Coast Rubber Stamps, MonaLisa - Stampers Anonymous (Tim Holtz), Carpe Diem - Time To Stamp

A present from Leo

2007-09-02T15:51:00.001+02:00

Finally a photo made, so I can post this wonderful pile of pictures of old etiquettes and posters sent to me by Leo! Thank you, Leo, I already have a few ideas brewing for them ;)

Playing with SAY's present

2007-09-01T23:51:00.000+02:00

Greetings from the summer holidays, which are now officially over... It was good, and thanks to the couple of rainy days I even found time to play with the incredible treasures my SAY sent to me earlier in August. It always feel funny making cards with no stamping on them, it feels a bit like cheating ;) But then, it's just a different kind of challenge. Here are some results of my afternoons:

I couldn't keep my hands completely off the stamps either, of course!

Stamp credits: Liles in the front - StampHouseStamps, all others - Third Coast Rubberstamps

Storing the stamps

2007-08-19T13:41:00.000+02:00

I store my UMs in CD cases, and until now the CD cases were stored in shoeboxes. All was well as long as everything fitted in two boxes, that's how much room I had on my desk for storing. but then came a third box, and I started juggling, kept moving the boxes to and and fro and up and down to find the CD case I was looking for. And when my collection expanded to a fourth box, I was in trouble..

That's why I bought this:

It is a storage system made out of cardboard, with two big drawers which will hopefully take all my CD cases but no more room than the two original shoeboxes did. The drawers are a bit tight, but I'm hoping that with time.. oh well. If not, at least I got the exercise!

So far the decorations are at this point -i.e. nonexistent - I've only just painted the box (not sure of the choice of color either, may have been a mistake). I'll stamp on it later when I've decided what I want to stamp. It's a tough choice!

But now, dears, I'm off on a little holiday away from my desk. I'm taking with me the packet I got from my SAY. I think I'll have stuff to post when I return! :D

Take care and keep creating!