Waiting

is not one of my strengths.

I received word this week that two recent swaps are winging their way back to me. Can't wait to spend some time in my rocker soaking up all the beauty from this swap and then time in my creative corner creating with tidbits from this one.

I also can't wait for this swap to come in. I love bling and perhaps wearing this while I do the dishes will make the task more pleasant?

I did manage to get a set of ATCs completed for my local stamp club. Our theme this month was "Domestic Animal". There was quite a bit of debate last month on what was meant by the theme - domestic, domesticated, domestic to where (or should that be who? whom?)

I found this sweet old childrens book at an estate sale awhile back and even though the covers were missing and it had pencil lines on almost every page, I snagged it because I knew that my little man would get lots of giggles out of the story of a puppy named Wiggletail.

And I was right.

I scanned in one of the pages, resized him and cut him out. Applied color to my watercolor paper base in a variety of ways - just playing around - to get the look of sky. Then added some vintage book paper colored with ink to simulate the grass and the sun.

It's very one-dimensional and I wish I could've thought of what else to add. Days later I think of a collar of course. My little man awoke from naptime about the time I was thinking of sentiments. I asked him once what he thought the little puppy was saying and for the next 15 minutes he had me in stitches. Of course, they got more elaborate so I just stuck with a simple please.

I hope you've had a chance to giggle this week too!

Swapping

 

I thought I'd share what I sent Jessica for her Very Vintage Spring Ephemera Swap. I had it in my head it was due mid-month but I think I might have mixed that date up with the Birdsong Tag swap.

A few weeks ago I found a really large sized dictionary at an estate sale along with some sheet music.

I ended up putting my items together in a page protector. I also added some grocery stamps and a booklet, an old canceled check* and a playing card (I bought them for the case and was happy when Jessica announced this swap as I knew they would be my submission).

We were supposed to include a ___ with our information on it. I scanned the ATC I made last month for my local stamp club and printed off my info on the back.

* Please tell me that you think an old canceled check is cool. My DH thinks I'm loco and that nobody would want some old check.

Parle de Fleur - A Tiny Book Swap

I thought I would share what I sent off for Michelle's Tiny Book Swap. 

By folding and cutting, you get the above to form a little book. I sent off all my little books so can't really show you what it looks like all folded up.

I hemmed and hawed over what theme to choose before finally settling on using these vintage flower images.

I also wanted to use image transfers. It's a technique that I have done many times in the past. But apparently I've lost my edge. I can't even tell you how many mess-ups I had. The above photo is the front and back cover. Same flower image - although the one on the front was a 'mess-up' that I decided wasn't too bad.

I'm not sure how accurate my French is but I do like it. I don't feel too terribly bad as I'm fairly certain that if my college French professor saw it she would just shake her head and laugh. My Texas drawl used to crack everyone up. However, my sister is pretty affluent in French and I'd bet the farm (if I had one) that she is cringing right now.

I had to finally settle on printing my images on transparencies and using them that way as I was flat out of time to mess with pulling off transfers any longer. Lots of ink and layers on all the pages.

I tried to keep everything cohesive by using the same two colors, two laces and two papers (text and music) on each page.

I really love how the pages took shape and came together. Folding them was a challenge and I'm still trying to figure out why my last page is off. But that's for another day.

Petite Inspiration Box Spring Swap

Heather @ Speckled Egg hosted another Petite Inspiration Box swap with a Spring theme and I was blessed to be paired with two sweet girls. First I'll share the items I swapped with Jessica @ Kids Napping? I'm Scrapping

The theme was Spring and I grabbed some moss in a sheet and planned to do flowers and birds for the outside of my boxes. But then --- I ended up going in a completely different direction! I was wandering through a Wal-Mart and spied some strawberry labels with the canning supplies. I knew that Jessica liked strawberries because she told me so and I also knew that she has a serious obsession* for labels.
* her word, not mine.

And since I love the arrival of Spring Strawberries in the Supermarket I figured that would work as a theme!  I found a bag of trims at the local thrift store. I bought the whole bag just for some pink ball trim for this swap. Both my partners received some but you'll have to spy a glimpse in Lisa's photos tomorrow. Also in the bag was the big aqua bow. Totally cool. I wanted to keep it for myself. And then I found that enameled pink and tied it all on with some pink tulle so that Jessica could salvage then and use them on other projects if she wanted.

Jessica is a Button Floozy and so I was digging around in my button box and found that weird looking thing on the left. But I wondered what would happen if I painted it? Would it look like a strawberry?

A little? Right? And some more buttons and such that I included for her. See that one in the middle. I saw a strawberry button on etsy but couldn't make myself pay that much for a button. So imagine my glee when I saw that one in my button box one day. It was a little present from God and I got totally giddy. I left the patina on it as Jessica is a Button Floozy and would know (1) if it should stay or go and (2) how to make it go if she wanted far better than I. See that sparkly one in the lower right? What a saga to get that little bit. I found them on ebay and there were several in there and the price was a steal. So I nabbed them so that I could put one in Jessica's box and one in Lorraine's Things with Wings box (later post). Then I noticed they were coming from Hong Kong. They took soooo long to get here. I held off Lorraine's box waiting for them -- and then finally sent it without it. They finally arrived just as I was ready to send this box off. Talk about bad timing!

You can see the labels that started this box in the center. I also included some vintage papers in both boxes, rolled up with some vintage pink ribbon. I made sure that Jessica got dictionary pages for "berry" in her pack.

I also was paired with Lisa from Happily Scrappin' Today. Oh I had such a fun, FUN time putting her box together too! I went reading through her blog and found pictures of her scrap space. She told me she liked pink and dress forms --- and her space really showed that!

Why does Blogger do that? I used some vintage flowers and a miniature dress form to decorate Lisa's box. I thought that would fit in the box --- but it was a little tall. I also decided to paint and shabby chic the dress form up too. I layered lots of paint on it and finally achieved a look I was happy with! I sure hope Lisa loved it too!



I used a vintage hankie to wrap up the goodies in each box.

I knew that Lisa liked milk glass and angels. I couldn't pass up that little milk glass sugar bowl. Again, I thought it would fit in the matchbox and again, I was a little off on estimating my sizes. I found the pom-pom trim at the thrift store in a bag of trims. There was the pink stuff, some very cool brown embroidered ribbon, odds and ends and a really weird yellow yarn octopus. The little aqua envelope is a "zipper helper". It is marked Blackburns on the back which is a department store that we used to have here years and years ago. Often times I'll see hat boxes and such with Blackburns on it at estate sales in the area.

I can't wait for you to see what I received from Jessica and Lisa. They are both vintage and awesome and completely me!