My Poor Pampas Grass....Burrrrr....

The faucet was dripping and as a result, my poor pampas Grass is half ice. Still a cold 35 degrees, but has warmed up from this a.m.'s 22.

Alice In Wonderland...

I found a cute little book that had the neatest little pics of Alice in Wonderland in it and decided that I wanted to make an ATC out of it. I worked on this while Pinky was working on cards after the girls left to go back to Birkenfeld. It was a fun ATC to make. I love the look on the cat's face.

The blue beaded heart is Jan's latest beading project. On the upper right side you can see where she used square beads and topped it off with a tiny seed bead. It is such an interesting look. Double click to see the detail. The other four pics are her pages that she did for Karen's calendar. We all really like the body building page :>))

On the pic closest to the top, Jan replaced the barrel racer's head with Karen's...pretty fun!

She also did a page of dogs of every kind with one even looking a lot like Rocky.

These three pages and one cover are the ones Mary did in Pinky's calendar. The Dance/Breathe one to on the bottom is the cover to her calendar. I used some paper clippings, old music from an old music book, stamps, and punched out pieces.

These are the pages that Karen did in April's book. They are original and wonderful. Karen uses many recycled clips for her work and turns out a fantastic new page.

These are pages that Pinky did for Jan's calendar. Sorry, Pink about the sideways deer! In the Flower pic, she used a heart punch and made it into a flower...sooo neat. In the page with the leaves, etc., she used some real leaves that Jan had given us all and some sticker leaves. I love the cat on the crackle background!

These pages are some that April did for Mary's calendar. The pic of the flowers are actual pictures she had taken of her own garden flowers...what a neat idea! She also did some scripture just for me...thank you, April.

Calendar Page Exchange....

Tuesday was so fun as we exchanged calendars once again. It is always so fun to see what everyone does with their pages and covers. Each of us has such a different style and are so unique in a good way :>))

Cigar Boxes Mosaic

Here is a photo collage of all of our cigar boxes, with good ol' boy Roy taking center stage as he does on the inside of Mary's box. From top left is Pinky's, April's, Jan's, Mary's, Mary's inside, Karen's, Karen's inside, Mary's close up, and side shot of April's. I left the collage large so you can click on it to see it larger.

Use Your Old Cards to Make New...Fun!!!

This was kind of fun...I just used parts of old Christmas cards to make new cards. I really enjoyed this project because I do like to recycle and reuse and this is another perfect way to do just that...

Some Add Ons...

Below are just a few of the pics that I thought I would add to Jan's from last Tues....what a fun day!!!

This pic is of Pinky's iris folding that she was doing on Tues. I think this is her favorite type of card to make. She has an excellent eye for color and matching. She even used some of the paper from her altered cigar box too.

Left to right...Pinky's hand :>)), Cathy, April, Karen, Jan...all checking out April's redo of her cigar box (see the larger pic that Jan took). The sharing is one of the best things about this group. The encouragement is AMAZING!

This is a new piece Jan is working on. She has done needle felting and beading and is now adding some embroidery. I apologize for not putting the pic on here correctly. It should be counter clockwise...OK...it's early :>)) It is a wetland scene and I can't wait to see the finished piece of work.

Jan, if you can turn this around, would you? Next week...tell me how you did it, OK? :>))

April has been working on a block that will be made into a quilt for a new bride. This is her progress so far. A couple of weeks ago we put the pic on of her design. She is now doing the actual embroidery.

Welcome!

I was going to try to do this on your site, but....Gabie, we enjoy your comments and those from Beadbabe and Anja also! We have so much fun together that we just want to share it! Just happy that you are coming along with us for the ride. Mary

Terrific Tuesday

Yes, it was another terrific Tuesday.  We met at April's and had as our guest Cathy again, she comes clear from Portland.  I took only one photo of her and it didn't turn out so I won't post it here.  I did send it to her so she could see how I made her look rather like a zombie.  Not for showing to the world;-)

Pinky brought her altered cigar box and we all agreed it turned out great!  I love the color.  She used paper and additionally added some gold pen markings on it.  The top element is a smashed bottle cap with a cute bird on it.  The whole box is so spare and elegant, just lovely.  Well done, Pinky!

April worked on hers some more, she wasn't satisfied with it last week.  She sanded it down, added more papers and shaped elements.  I love the tiny perfume bottle that she is using as a knob for the lid.  She still intends to do further work on it.  And artists work is never done!

 Karen was creating cards.  She makes great unusual cards.

Mary was creating Christmas cards.  Here is one example.  Wouldn't you love to receive one of these hand made cards?  Jan was working on a needle felted piece, doing some hand embroidery on it.

Cathy brought these scrumptious shortbread cookies.  Heavenly!  Thanks Cathy!  April had put out plenty of snacks too so we all left a pound or two heavier, but with light hearts. 

 

Johnny's Pretty Cute!

Thanks, Jan, so much for doing the blog this week. It looks terrific! I have to admit that for a current heart throb, Johhny is pretty cute!

Pinky's Birthday celebration and cigar boxes

(Jan posting)  We were celebrating Pinky's birthday today, she will be 60 something on the 5th.  Happy Birthday Pinky!  We sure are glad you joined our group, you bring lots of laughter to our meetings as well as your unique creativity.  

Joan had picked up a Red Velvet cake for our dessert, it looks like Pink is enjoying it.  Joan also laid out a delicious lunch for us all even though she was feeling extremely poorly.  Thanks Joan, sorry you were feeling so bad.

Everyone was enjoying it!

We also were revealing our altered cigar boxes. Mary gave us all cigar boxes a few weeks ago and challenged us to alter them.  Today was the big reveal.  Above you can see Karen's.  She collaged lots of different papers on hers including pictures of her grandkids, pieces of wood and a rusty piece of metal for the handle to open it with. She didn't have screws so she used cup hooks to attach the handle, then just cut the hook part off. Very cool.  Below you can see that she also decorated the insides of the box.  Karen has the most unique papers and art work!

Next you can see April's.  She wasn't thrilled with her results, the glue she used to collage tissue paper and leaves left a very rough texture which was not what she wanted.  I think she is going to continue to work on her box, maybe sanding it down and adding more to it.  I really like the grape leaves she used on it.

Below you see Mary's.  She loves cowboy/girl images and chose to use them for her box. I love how she decorated between the images too.

She had a nice metal closure for her box, shown below. You can also see how she has decorated the sides with border paper with additional coloring by hand.

On the inside is Mary's secret heart throb.  Her boy Roy.  Karen almost stole Mary's box when she saw who was inside.  Those two!  You'd think they had never seen Johnny Depp! 

Don't they know he's the man?

Oh yeah! (these hunky photos of Roy and Johnny ought to bring us some new followers! heheh!)

Maybe I should put Johnny inside of my box, which is shown next.  I made several painted polymer clay mosaic tiles to glue onto mine, after collaging tissue paper and painting.

I didn't have a cool clasp like Mary did so improvised a wire and glass bead handle to open it with.

Pinky somehow forgot to bring her box so we won't get to see it until next week.  It was a busy meeting.  We also did our first trade on our round robin calendars. Below you see Pinky showing off a page from her calendar that Karen created.

Then you see Karen with the cover of hers that I believe Mary created. She looks pretty pleased with how hers is shaping up.  Everyone did a great job on the calenders, now we traded and have a couple of weeks to work on them before we trade again.

Finally here is a picture of our mascot, Rocky. Joan has a little Manchester Terrier and Rocky tried to fit his big bu...I mean his tush into her bed.  Not quite, Rocky boy!

It was a great celebration, marred only by poor Joan not doing well.   I'm glad everyone was able to make it and that so much fun art was shared.  There was also a lot of present unwrapping going on by our Pinky.  Maybe Mary has more photos she will be able to share.  Pinky received some very cool gifts!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed sharing a bit of our celebration!