My First Mail Art

This is the first set of Mail Art that I've ever done. I am participating in a mail art Birthday swap on the Collage UnLeashed group. Basically, you send a decorated envelope with some goodies inside to each participant during the month of their birthday. My B-Day is Dec. 27th, right around the corner, so I am looking forward to getting some pretties of my own in the mail.

These pictures show the fronts (with the flower and leaf stamps) and the backs (Wish) on the back. I used acrylic paint throughout. It was fun, but a little challenging to keep the envies from getting stuck, and keeping the adhesive strip on the back dry. Its tempting to decorate all of my outgoing envelopes now!

Spring is in the Air!

Catching up on some posts here. Fletcher is 5 weeks old now--where has the time gone? He is doing great--loves to eat--and is growing nicely. My 7 year old dd loves loves loves him, and my 4 year old son is pretty enchanted with him, though he won't admit it!--and will tell you that he is allergic to babies! But he is a pretty proud big bro.

I am anxious to get back into some art making. Harder to do these days, but I am trying to fit small bits in here and there. I just get cranky when I don't have time to be creative, so it is an important part of my life that I need to make time for.

Anyway, here are a couple of swaps that I did in April, right before I had the baby, but didn't have time to post yet. The charms were for a Springtime Charm swap on Oh So Charming, and the papers were for a Springtime paper swap on Collage UnLeashed. The papers were painted and stamped, and the charms were made with shrink plasic, and the other set with polymer clay.

Art Cloth

I have been doing more surface design on my fabric lately. Taking hand dyed fabrics a step further, and adding more dimension and visual texture to them with paint--stamping, squirting, stenciling, etc. I am currently hosting a painted fabric swap on Collage UnLeashed--where we are swapping 8.5 x 11 inch pieces of fabric using one or more of Traci Bautista's techniques that she lists in her book. Plus, I am working through Rayna Gilman's book, Make Your Own Hand Painted Cloth on A.R.T., so the stars are in line with fabric painting these days!

Here are two pieces of fabric that I have recently done. I used a combination of stamps, stencils and found objects.