I wouldn’t typically do this but desperate times call for desperate measures. Feel free to leave and come back another day when I will post more art. I completely understand.
I have a dear friend who is struggling. A few of us got together and with her permission started a Go Fund Me campaign to help get them get back on their feet after one thing after another has seemingly worked again them.
Thank you for your consideration and I promise next time I post it will be about art!!
Hello and welcome to a snowy and cold edition of T stands for Tuesday. We were lucky enough to have a two hour late start for school Monday morning. It still remains to be seen what will happen later this week as the Polar Vortex invades Minnesota. We might end up with a “cold day” instead of a “snow day”….it’s happened before. If it does I’ll have plenty of time to continue making my mini collages. I can’t STOP!!!!
I honestly can’t stop…I have a quart baggie filled with them already.
It seems like the more frayed and full of strings the more I love them.
These ones will work quite nicely for a Christmas theme.
These are a bit more subdued in color scheme. So fun!!
Last week after a small binge of creating a stash mini collage pieces for journals and cards I decided to make some tags as well. I was inspired after watching a YouTube video by The Mushroom Market. She created lovely tags to go in her journals with just leftover strips of paper layered up in a seemingly random fashion. It looked like great fun!
Since I’m not big on following rules or doing things exactly as I’ve been shown, I began to layer up papers from my scrap bucket. Different sizes and shapes…all glued down on a piece of glossy printer paper that had yellowed around the edge. Obviously not the greatest quality paper but I’m not complaining since it came in a gigantic lot of craft supplies I acquired several years back.
As with so many things I don’t have a true “before” photo of the uncut sheet. I get so caught up in what I’m doing that I completely forget to document the process.
But you get the idea of what the sheet looked like before I cut them apart, cut the corners and stitched the edges.
I think they are kind of fun. At any rate they used up some scraps and will be put to use as journal tags, gift tags or embellishments someday.
Over the weekend I finally checked something off my perpetual to-do list that has been on it for far too long….a closet purge. I decided to through my closet with a realistic mind. I had so many articles of clothing that hadn’t been worn in ages. They fell into several categories; out of style, doesn’t fit, not my style, and why do I even own this?
I have a tall kitchen bag full of shirts and skirts but several pieces had potential to be reused or re-purposed.
I decided to cut or tear out the usable crafting pieces. I love adding bits of fabric to my journals, collage cards and mixed media pieces.
There was a good mix of colors and textures.
I’m really excited to start piecing these together. The pink plaid is kind of bugging me in this photo if I’m honest. But the rest of it gives a real tropical 1980s feel. Bright, bold colors…totally 80s. Like, totally! (in your best Valleygirl impression)
That roll of lace is calling my name….I cut it from the bottom edge of a shirt that I think I only wore once. It just never fit right. I hate that! I should know better than to buy something just because I really like the look of it and ignore the fact it doesn’t really work. But at least I have some pretty lace now.
But seriously…so many fun bits of this and that.
Anyone notice my glass of water in keeping with the T stands for Tuesday rules? She’s there on the corner of the table. Have to keep hydrated in the winter.
There was a sweater in my original pile but I haven’t decided how I want to use it yet so it remains uncut. I was thinking about Christmas ornaments and decor. Also maybe boot cuffs or mittens. I also thought about trying to refashion it in some way. Since I am totally undecided it will go in with my sewing fabrics until a later date.
Ok I think I’m a little obsessed again. I’ve been creating tons of mini collage pieces.
While making embellishments for my December Daily I rediscovered my love of fabric and paper collage at my sewing machine.
I haven’t made any of these in a very long time. Likely since I made them for the article I wrote for Sew Somerset. Of course my style has changed since then a bit but that’s to be expected. We shouldn’t stagnate in our creativity in my opinion. 
These blue ones make me want to created a winter theme journal or set of greeting cards.
Although these I think are my favorite. I love the pop of orange along with the teal and blue.
Trust me you haven’t seen the last of these pieces…
Today I went on a ski trip with the 7th graders. I’m not a skier but I was there to support and encourage the kiddos. I tried skiing over 20 years ago and was pretty sure I was going to get hurt if I kept at it and I needed to drive the bus home so figured I better quit. This time I wasn’t needed to drive the bus but there was no way I was putting on skis.
I may not have skied but I became very proficient at helping with boots, bindings and picking kids up off the ground. It was so fun seeing the kids go from hardly able to stand to going down the slope.
I stood outside at the bottom of one hill or another for about 5 hours today. So happy it was hovering around the freezing point instead of way below like is typical this time of year.
A day filled with exercise and fresh air needs a hearty breakfast…
like this one. Wish this would have been from this morning. This breakfast was during winter break while planning some of the flurry of blog posts that made it to the site. It was really great to be so prolific in posting.
I’ve been working on getting caught up with my journals…not the art kind. I’m planning to do a flip through video eventually. I’ve also been thinking about doing flip through videos of some of my completed journals and altered books if there is enough interest. What do you think?
Welcome to the first edition of Second on the 2nd of 2019. It’s fun to look back and re-share posts from the past. Since my focus lately has been journals I thought I’d re-post a tutorial I wrote about one of the ways I prep a vintage book for altering. The altering after this point is completely up to you.
2/8/2015
Since I was starting a new journal I thought I’d share with you my process for prepping the book. First find yourself an old book that appeals to you. For me it was the size of this book. Not too small or too big… Just call me Goldilocks.
Look inside to see what kind of binding you have.
This inside cover gave me a really good indication that I had a sewn binding but I had to make sure.
Yep…sewn binding. Perfect! Now we’re ready for the thinning of pages without leaving chunks of torn pages along the inner spine. Removing pages reduces bulk since the altering of a book whether journal style or a themed altered book adds lots of bulk!
I find the center of each signature (as seen in the above photo) and remove the page from each side.
Like this. I go back and carefully pick out all of the torn fragments. It will appear as if nothing has changed until you look at the page numbers. You’ll have a definite gap which would make reading the story a real challenge at this point.
I remove at least one page from each signature, sometimes more. You can always go back and remove more. 
Here you can see the gaps along the spine and how the book is more narrow going toward the outer edge. This is exactly what you want. 
You have a nice stack of pages for your altering pleasure when you are done.
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So here’s an after photo of the completed Gypsy journal.
Thanks for stopping by for Second on the 2nd.
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