Here’s a couple more projects I made with my new Silhouette die cutting machine. I wanted to see just how small I could get the machine to cut so I chose a simple image, the deer silhouette, and was able to cut it 1″ x 1/2″ ! I adhered it to vintage French book paper and put it inside a pre made frame. Isn’t it cute?? I want to try some more like this but soldered them.

Next I had a wonderful wooden cigar box I wanted to make into a specimen box so I layered some patterned paper and card stock inside the box and cut out a few butterflies and a label from the same papers using the Silhouette and mounted everything inside. I love how “old world” it turned out.

Over at my blogging job as stamp editor at Craft Gossip I got the opportunity to review (and keep!!:)) a Silhouette die cutting machine. I am in love with this machine, it’s amazing! The generous people at Silhouette not only gave one to me but are also giving one away over at Craft Gossip. I wanted to give my readers a heads up, so follow this link and read my review and then leave a comment (at Craft Gossip not here) to be entered.

Here is my first project made with my new Silhouette, no surprise it’s an Alice and Wonderland theme! I made an accordion card and cut out all the fun Wonderland characters with card stock and patterned paper with the Silhouette.

When I was little and asked my parents what something meant they always told me to “go look it up”, i.e in the dictionary, encyclopedia, etc. It’s not that they didn’t want to help me, they wanted me to learn to use the books and find the answers for myself. Maybe that’s why I now love old dictionaries? I remember mine was red, with little cut out half circles on the pages where the letters where, funny how things like that stick with you.

Here’s a few soldered pendants made with illustrations from a wonderful vintage dictionary from the early 20’s. I added black patina to all the soldering and the backs of the pieces are their definitions.

a really cool raven:

a fat little toad ( I just love him!):

and a lovely bird in flight:

I’m so excited and honored to be in the latest issue of Altered Hearts digital zine! One of the contributors Edeena Cross contacted me recently asking to include some of my art work in their July issue, after I said “yes, of course”, she decided to feature alot of my work and also asked me questions about my background, working process, inspirations, etc and now there is two whole pages devoted to little ol’ me in their zine, how cool is that!?

The online magazine can be found at Scrap Artists. Click here for a direct link to the July issue, it’s only $3 and totally worth the few bucks, it’s chocked full of great interviews and art work from some really terrific collage artists.

Here’s the magazine cover, you’ll have to buy it to see my article and the rest;)

Steampunk is a really popular style currently. I love the idea of combining Victorian looks with scifi and technology. If you’re not familiar think W. G. Wells, Jules Vern, lots of gears, dirigibles, googles, steam power, etc. Here’s a wiki definition too.

I wanted to try my hand at some steam punk so I made some tiny mixed media collages for soldered pendants. I used a great top hat stamp, vintage photo copies, some metal gears and vintage watch parts that I combined with pages from a vintage shop mathematic book to make my jewelry. I think they turned out pretty cool.

Steampunk Gal front:

back:

Steampunk Guy front:

back:

Here’s a couple of new charm necklaces I’ve made recently. I’m enjoying mixing altered and soldered game pieces and charms together.

The first one is sort of a pun, it’s a skeleton key necklace. A large metal key with a skull charm and a soldered domino charm with dancing skeletons.

This one is all Alice, a tiny glass bottle filled with blue beads and three soldered game charms, a domino with Alice on a blue background, an “A” scrabble tile with vintage “Alice” text and a vintage bingo tile with vintage “drink me” text.

These are both currently available in my Etsy shop, click here to visit.

It’s been awhile since I’ve made any collages on canvas so I got out a few canvas boards last week and made a couple.

Awhile ago I made an all white washed collage with a bird cage theme and was really happy how it turned out so I got out the gesso again to do some more white washing. I used a sponge brush and a light coating of gesso over some vintage music sheet and vintage book papers, then covered my 5 x 7 canvas board with music sheet using gel medium to adhere it. Then a traced a chipboard butterfly onto the back of the book paper, cut it out and adhered that. I had a lovely copy of a Victorian photo I bought from a dealer in the UK that I scanned and printed onto watercolor paper and I matted it with black cardstock that I cut with deckle edge scissors giving it that edge you see on alot of old photos. I then adhered the photo, popped up the butterfly with lots of foam tape and added layers of buttons on the butterfly and the corner of the photo along with a crocheted flower. Lastly I cut the words “spread your wings” from a vintage book and adhered that to the bottom of the collage.

I love the black and white contrast of this one alot.

Oh my gosh, has it really been that long since my last post?! Spring time is just so busy, I’ve been doing so much yard work, planting, weeding, mowing, etc. it’s taken up alot of my free time. I’ll try to do better

I haven’t posted any cards or stamping lately so I wanted to share a fun card I made for a class recently. They loved it, especially the flower and I wanted to share how I made it.

First off you need a large brad and some ribbon that has stitching through it, it comes in lots of colors and can be found at most craft stores. Cut a 5″ piece of ribbon and begin pulling the threads from the *same* long side on both ends. Keep pulling and gathering the ribbon as you go, when it forms a circle tie the ends of the ribbon threads together, then trim off the ends of the threads, careful not to cut through the knot. Then insert a large brad through the ribbon flowers open center and open up the brad, this will hold it in place and you can use a large glue dot to hold the flower to your project. Easy and cute, huh?

The skunk and sentiment stamp comes from a set from The Paper Company and he’s been embossed in black, the bottom of the card has been cut with a scalloped pair of decorative scissors.

Ok, I also can’t seem to stop making things with Alice in Wonderland either I’ve been making Alice jewelry and collages for years now and am happy to see a big jump in popularity because of the new Burton movie. Somerset Studio even did another issue with lots of  wonderful Alice art, the first Alice issue some years back is still one of my favorites and I still have my dog-eared copy.

Here’s a picture of all of the Wonderland character soldered domino charms I posted about recently:

 and here’s a domino ring I made with Alice:

and here’s my favorite, a charm bracelet. It has charms made with shrink plastic, soldered wooden game pieces, a tiny glass bottle, soldered dominoes, vintage King and Queen puzzle pieces, vintage text and silver charms.

All these items are currently for sale in my Etsy shop, click here.

I just can’t seem to stop making things with birds Here are a couple of new mixed media necklaces I made last week.

I enjoyed making my Alice in Wonderland Domino charms so much I used a larger domino, inked it blue and stamped a really cool flying bird on it and then soldered around the edges, adding two sets of jump rings to the top to hang from the ball chain. I also adhered a glass rhinestone to the front for a little added bling:

I also made this necklace with a pretty silver bird charm and a tiny soldered word charm that says “fly away” on vintage music paper, also on a ball chain: