Tag painting workshop

 The five of us had a fun day decorating tags using a variety of mediums, mostly molding paste, stencils, paint and a little ephemera.

 Pinky had purchased a big box of fairly large red tags and shared them with us all and that was what we decorated.

 Our main object was to experiment with the media and see how different applications affected each other.  For instance, what happens when you apply gesso to the tag as a first layer and then paint over it with acrylic paints as opposed to applying paint directly to the paper tag.  Or how molding paste works over or under paint, or mixing paint in with the molding paste to color it before using the paste on the tag.

 We were writing our "formulas" on the back side of the tag.  Or at least we started at first but soon got into the fun of creating tags and just played.

 I think everyone made at least half a dozen tags that they were happy with.  They were pretty fun to make and everyone learned a bit and had a good time.

 We did the workshop at Karen's house.  Above shows Pinky, Karen and April.

April and Gwen, hard at play.

Back In The Saddle Again...

On Friday, we had our annual Christmas party (a little late) at April's.  It had been several weeks since we have all been together and we were anxious to meet.  A bonus was that Amber, April's daughter, was down from Alaska on Christmas vacation.  We were able to enjoy her company for the whole day.  It was fun catching up with her and her AK adventures.

April had a real spread for our lunch and goodies for each of us.  We have to confess that we didn't do a speck of creating, but just enjoyed each other's company.

We did trade the calendar pages that we made for each other.  They were really amazing.  I think everyone agreed that they loved the pages that each of us made for each other...WOW!

 Above...Amber is sharing stories of Alaska with us.

 Jan is showing us her new pages to her calendar.  She made a really beautiful cover for her notebook and has each calendar page in it's own folder inside.  That way, she can journal and see the calendar page at the same time...great idea!

 Sorry this picture isn't a little more clear.  April and Amber on the last day in Birkenfeld.

 Mary is showing two pages...top one from Lyla and bottom one from Pinky.

 OK...so this picture is upside down!  Can't be perfect all the time, right?  Amber brought each of us little bottles filled with Alaska sand and beach glass and even some tiny shells.  She brought one for each of us.

Pinky is showing us two pages that were made for her calendar.  She is wearing her scrapper's necklace that daughter, Carrie, gave her.

 I'm hoping I'm getting this right...Jan made this page for Karen.  We were sad to hear that little Joe is no longer with Karen.  His health went downhill in the last month.  We all will miss him.

 April is pretty tickled with the page she is holding.  Each one is a piece of art and we all loved the ones we received.

 I'm really not sure what Jan is looking at in this photo.  I think it is her Christmas gift from Pinky...a blank journal.

 April is pretty happy with all the goodies she received from Lyla.  She is holding 4 postcards that Lyla made just for her.  She also received lots of cut outs, stickers, and other scrapbooking items.

Pinky loves "Hello Kitty" and April gave her a pair of  HK pj bottoms for Christmas.  She also got two boxes of rubber stamps.  She was pretty excited about that.

Not sure what day we will meet this next week.  We are waiting to see what April's work schedule  has in store.  We will be back to work in the creating department.  See you then!

Meeting At April's Today...

This was our first meeting with April arriving at noon. We kind of took over her house until she got home today. Three of us...Jan, Pinky, and Mary were working on future rag rugs. Pinky is working on a round one. Jan & Mary are working on an oblong ones.

When April arrived, she was getting ready for her Saturday Crafts Day at her church. They are going to do cutting art on rhodie leaves. She was busy making a sample for Saturday's class. I am sorry I didn't take a picture of it. I meant to and just yacked too much.

We missed Karen today. There is always a void when she isn't with us, so hope to see her next week and that she is feeling much better.

Pinky brought us the neatest copper colored ties to go on tags and shared with us all. There is one for you, too, Karen...see the top left pic.

Oh, by the way...the 2nd row left pic is of our little buddy...sock monkey...

Thanks, April for the books you let us go through and choose. That was a treat!

Thanks, too, for letting us see the art work your dad had done in the past.

We have one more week to work on the calendars for each other. We will exchange them next Tues. at April's house. Can't wait to see mine!!!

Have a great week...God bless you.

Jan's and Mary's...posted later...

The top photo is of Jan's distressed ink creations and the bottom one is Mary's. We all really enjoyed this project and LOVE our new inks! Double click on any picture to enlarge it... Scroll down to see April's, Pinky's, and Karen's.

April Has A Surprise For Us!

When we all got to April's on Tuesday, she had a great surprise for us all. We had talked about making some blending tools for our new inks that we all just received. April found some online very reasonable and made extra pads for them so we had a different pad for each color of our new Tim Holtz Distress Inks. For the rest of the day, we played with them and created. Jan had an interesting face stamp and we all took turns using it to make cards, tags, etc....very fun!

Pictured below are the finished products of our face stamping...double click on the pics to see the detail. Pinky brought us all some large tags to take home. As you can see...we all used them for a stamping project. Thanks Pink!

Thank you, April, for getting those for us. I know we all will get so much use out of them. The blending tool allows you to put ink on a card or project without streaking. It helps to blend the inks in to make a smooth appearance.

Pinky brought her "farm" stamps and gave us a challenge. We are all to use the stamps she brought to make something out of them...a card, a picture, a tag...whatever we choose. The two we have to use were the chicken wire and the hen stamps. She brought more...corn, fence, and I can't remember what the others were. We have two weeks to bring our projects in for everyone to see. Thanks, Pink, for the challenge. Sounds like fun!

Unless there is a change, everyone will be at Mary's next Tuesday...Can't wait...

PINK TUESDAY...

We all had such a wonderful time on Tuesday. It was so good to have April back with us, but we were missing Joan this week. Jan brought some little books as examples and we all worked on making one. We all had done this project before, but I think all of us were happier with the end result of this project...I sure was! Pinky wasn't able to make the little book when we did it before, so Jan gave us hints along the way and we all worked on them. The pics below show each of us and our project(s). As usual, it was a fun day and we sure made a huge mess on Pinky's table. The pics I am adding now are the finished or in my case almost finished books. From left to right on the top row are Karen's two, Jan's, bottom row Mary's, Aprils and Pinky's on the end. It was such a fun time!

April's Little Book Project...

April found the neatest coordinating papers to make her book out of. She always comes up with the most fascinating decoration and puts a lot of thought into it. She used brads, stamping, pens, making tags, assorted threads to decorate her book. I wasn't sure if she said she was keeping this one or giving it to a friend. All of us used hand dyed or painted binding that Jan had given us. It not only holds the book together, but is beautiful at the same time. Boy, did we make a big mess on Pinky's table!

Mary's Tuesday Doings...

This little book was so fun! I made inchies and little tags to fit inside each page. I still have to add some threads for a book mark and some charms and possibly something different to go on the front. The book on the right upper corner was made by Karen. She is so good at reusing to make something spectacular!