Fun at Mary's

April sure knows her way around her colorful pen work!  Wow!

Pinky is actually using pink in her most recent crochet rug project.

Mary is the queen of stamp carving!

Karen is really enjoying her journal work.

Jan is knitting a hat.

Some of Mary's cards where she used her newly carved stamps.  It was another fun day!  Make sure you find the post for our 5th give away and leave a comment on that one if you hope to win.  Congratulations to Maddy for winning the last one.

Mary's Birthday party!

We gathered at Pinky's for a party to celebrate Mary's birthday today.

She received bountiful usable gifts from everyone. Above is her haul from April.

From Karen she received the above which includes a couple of cool collage panels that Karen made.

Pinky gifted her sister with the above pieces including an interesting Roy Rogers wood cut out panel. Whoops! That Dale woman he hung around with got covered up somehow:-J

Jan gave Mary more Roy Rogers stuff, along with these other items.

After Mary finished opening her gifts we got back to working on our projects. Pinky finished her crocheted rug. Here we are, trying it out.

 Here is Louie, giving it the paw of approval.

April wasn't far behind and soon finished her second crocheted rug too.

Karen was working on these cute tags. Mary was doing some bead work and Jan tore her crocheted rug apart and began re-crocheting it because it was too wonky. Pinky fed us all some delicious sandwiches and had a little chocolate cake as a birthday cake. Yum! I was too busy eating and forgot to take pictures! It was another fun day for this fun group of women. Next week we meet at Karen's and hope her sister Lyla will be able to join us!

Happy Birthday Mary!!

Fourth Give Away!!

Look at all this loot Mary has donated!  Yowza!  One of her hand made cards, stickers, a scrabble tile saying, chip board letters, a huge bag of blue glass beads and sequins.

A pair of wire wrap earrings that Mary made with blue glass beads.

The scrabble letters are glued to the tile holder.

Beautiful hand made card.

If you would like to win this give away, leave a comment on this post.  If you are a follower you will get two chances to win.  We will draw a winner on March 22nd.

Don't forget to sign up for our 3rd give away, you have until March 13th but you need to leave a comment on that post.  Here is the link: http://foxontherunarts.blogspot.com/2011/03/third-give-away.html  
Don't be shy, we just want to share our bounty.  You only have to write a little comment.  Did you see the wonderful box April decorated?  It is full of goodies and you can use it to store your own goodies, or use it as a wonderful gift box for further gifting.  Share the love!

Good luck to everyone. 
P.S. I wrote this a couple of days ago, before the earthquake and tsunamis in Japan.  We are all praying for those poor people effected by these horrific events.

Question of the month: Mary's reply

(Mary, all dressed up, nowhere to go!  We were having a dye workshop.)

We decided to start a question of the month feature on our group blog and our first question is:
How did you get started making your art? What steps led you to where you are, what you are creating now?
Mary sent her reply first, so here are some photos of Mary, her art, and her words.

(Above is an early wall quilt Mary created using a leaf stamp and discharge paste)

When I was young (20s), I didn't have a whole lot of money to work with and began making Christmas presents. I enjoyed it so much that it branched out from sewing to beading to drawing to dough art to making Christmas wreaths and swags...

(Above is the Roy Rogers homage collage she recently created) 

I loved making and creating, but often did not have the space for it, so I worked on fairly small projects. The the area that I lived in (Mosier, Oregon) I met many people who had the same interests and eventually created the Mosier Country Christmas Art and Craft Fair. At that time, it was the largest fair in the Columbia Gorge. It is still going today as I passed it down to a friend when we moved from the area.
We moved to Elsie/Jewell area in Oregon and I met April Wood, and later, Jan Brattain. I was invited to join a group they were starting along with Gwen Jarvela. In the beginning we sewed, quilted, beaded, etc., but today we try almost anything that sounds like fun. I will have to check with Jan, but I think it was almost 10 years ago. That's how we started our blog. We were hoping we could share our fun and creating with others looking for the same.

(Above is postcard size piece she painted) 

Right now, I am getting the materials together to make a Native American button blanket. I almost have all of what I need. It will probably have a NA raven or whale on it and will be done in black and red with white buttons. I have wanted to try this since my first trip to AK. Our trip there in Aug. reminded me that I really want to try this. Also working on some mixed media cards, ATCs, and making some quilts for our church group (Helping Hands) to give to those who need warmth this winter.
God bless your creating day...

Mary's Birthday celebration!

Mary has a birthday this week. We gave her a celebration today at our gathering at April's house. April prepared us all a delicious lunch of chicken salad, along with fabulous strawberry shortcake. Mary got a candle on her dessert. I'm not sure what she is doing here, pulling the honor inward?














Here is our blushing Mary, she can't wipe that joyful smile off her face. And why should she? She was the object of our full attention as she opened the gifts she had received from the gang. And what a great lot of loot she received! First she opened April's gifts and it seemed that bag of presents was never ending! All wonderful, from the art related magazines and books to the absolutely stunning book that April made for her. It was full of painted, folded, embellished, stamped, printed LOVE! It is a book that I'm sure Mary will treasure forever.


















This is one of the gifts she received from me (Jan). I think she liked it. I enjoyed making it for her. Pinky, Karen and Joan also had plenty of wonderful gifts, some hand made, some purchased new and some from garage sales. All seemed to be very much appreciated by Mary. All the gifts showed the respect and love we all have for Mary.

















Here is a closer look at the book April made for Mary. It is very special.

Everyone enjoyed the day. We also traded some scrumptious squares (decorated 1 1/2 inch squares), opened the package of ATC's we received from an online group we traded with, and made plans for our challenge of the week. We are going to alter/decorate some small tins to exchange with each other. Watch this space for the results of that trade. I'm sure they will be exciting. It was a very busy and fun day, even though none of us did a lick of art.

Happy Birthday, Mary! We love you!!