I'll be there for you

Step Outside Your Box has a toughie this week: Fabric of our lives.
Well then, I had to step outside my safe zone, but I know it's a good thing and one of the reasons I try to manage every challenge.


T-shirt jersey, paper flowers and a a placket made with white polyshrink, stamped and chalked. I can't believe I have 6 sheets of that stuff and no sensible use for it. I bought it to try make some nice jewelry with it, but the stuff is just mean! I dislike how it feels when it is cured. Makes my teeth hurt. Ugh.

The placket is attached with silk embroidery floss, as are some of the flowers. Yes, it's real silk, a terrific find at the flea market in Vienna.
This ATC is for a dear friend, who makes cards and now wants to explore the world of ATC's.

Warm Colors

Theme Thursday is asking for warm colors. A nice change from my usual greens and darks. Here is orange.

Alphonse will be looked after
pic clicks for bigger. Thanks for looking!

TMTA / Insects

Insects are the theme this week at the TMTA challenge.

Here are my pretties:
Single chap, eh?
click for bigger!

The bodies are from an old engraved book on insects. I made liberal use of pearlescent, silver and gold paints on their bodies. The guy is actually lavender.
Background is a mixture of cream acrylic, green glitter glue and sage stencil paint. I usually put them in a heap and start blending on the card. Any overflow goes on the paper that covers my desk. Whenever that starts to look interesting I cut it up for new backgrounds.
I also made a gel transfer of some b&w line drawings of insects, but those got kind of buried under.

Hypnotic

Saturday Surprise has an interesting theme this week, hypnotic. It took me awhile to get my juices flowing. I spent many hours agonizing, staring at my blank paper, toying with pictures, backgrounds, ideas... I felt like at first grade. Luckily everything fell to it's place - here is the result: Look into my eyes

clicks for bigger!

Dancing in Paris

Kollaasimania's this week's challenge is Dance / Moulin Rouge. A ribbon or twine has to be incorporated. Now, I think Moulin Rouge is associated with the recent film where there was a lot of couple dancing, rather than with the famous revue hall sporting scantily clad women kicking their legs up in unison (like Radio City Music Hall, just with more skin).

So, I found this couple from 1910's. There is a look of real pleasure on the woman's face (though not really visible here). It doesn't feel - like so many photographs in any era - like she was posing. Imagine how it must have been: the lights are bright, the decorations fancy, you feel the music, the heat, the noise, other dancers bumping into you, you twirl and move and dance the night away.

Cheek to cheek in Paris
click for bigger!

Wednesday Valentine

Just tried to be clever there... It's Thursday, of course, but the challenge was by Wednesday Stampers, calling for Valentines.
My card doesn't have the usual sugary coloring.

"Because you're hot" came from a magazine, and seemed to go well with the picture of this lady. She's the sweetheart of a gustav, adolf, angus or some such. The pink heart brad screams love, as do the row of hugs and kisses top of the card.

pic clicks for bigger! Traded.

Faces

Inspire Me Thursday prompts to explore faces. Well, I did, and this is what came out:

Her left eye has this bad nervous condition.
Background is a magazine photo treated with some diluted acrylics. Also glued some white and lavender tissue paper at odd spots, and softly added some stamping.

traded

Think outside the Box

There is a great challenge on Think outside the Box. No glue!
Oh, I love my trusty stick of glue as much as the next guy, but I decided to give this challenge a try, anyway.
Not happy. Not happy. I could have gone wild and uninhibited, I know, but this is as far as my faint heart allowed me to go: clips and cross stitching with bronze thread.
No Other Colors
The fish are held with silvery clips, their tails are stitched with a cross stitch, and the straight stitch in the middle holds the text.

Pic clicks for bigger. Thanks for looking!

Childhood in a frame

Kollaasimania (sorry folks, in Finnish only) has childhood for a theme this week. In addition, one has to use a frame in the collage, too.
EDIT: And a day later, TMTA has the theme child with bird.
Here is my entry:
Kasva lapsi (Grow up, child)
Picture clicks for bigger!

Saturday Surprise: Men

Here is my entry for Saturday Surprise. The theme is Men. I wish I could have found the words: Time is love, time is money. Kind of sums the bulk of them up... Harsh generalization, of course!

traded

Asia

Wednesday Stampers calls for Asia-themed entries. Well then, here is mine.
I glued on the brown skeleton leaf as an afterthought - the upper right looked a tad empty. Too bad it hid some of the flourishes.

TT/ Spring

Spring (Sprang. Sprung.)

Theme Thursday this week: Spring. To me me, nothing says spring like the first butterfly. Which won't be for another couple of months... oh well. But these vibrant colors make me happy. Can't wait!

Clare

Please send Clare in, then.

I used gesso, acrylics, transfer and pencil. I like the spare look, makes Clare (and what she did) look even more menacing. And will you just look at her, cool as a cucumber!

pic clicks for bigger, as always.

I now have a flickr-account! Please visit to see all available cards for trade - and some private ones as well.

TMTA / Cats

TMTA challenges to use a cat in our art work. Here is my take:

Dreaming Big
click pic for big!

MMM/ swirls and flourishes

Mixed Media Monday has the best challenge to ease me in: swirls and flourishes. Yes!

The background has been stamped with a swirly pattern, even though it's not apparent at first sight. I used a really coarse foam stamp and dabbed it thickly with cream acrylic paint. The background paper is old sewing pattern paper - love that stuff! You can achieve such nice gradation with it. Plus it's got quirky words. Like this one: 3UP. No idea what it means, but I incorporated it in the composition.


Pieni (Small)
clicks for big!

Love, etc.

I made some ATC cards today. Feeling a bit rusty, though. The break has been a very long one, but I'm back now!

Started thinking about love, how it takes funny forms sometimes. These ATC's are a bit tongue-in-cheek, and everyone is free to interpret them their way.

Placement Line (#1435, 1455 and 1451).

Thank you, Judy dear.
Both are available for trade.