Flea Market Finds & 2012 Journal

Happy New Years! Yesterday, I went to the Alameda Pt. Flea Market with my sister, Pat. It was a gorgeous day on Sunday, perfect for hunting and picking. Here are my finds of the day:

I found lots of vintage books this time. My favorite is the one below...

A scrapbook for kids from 1910. It's kind of like a modern day sticker book. Here's the inside.

Here are my other vintage books I found (notice that picture frame, I got 3 of them - love them!)...

Also some rhinestone pieces and a cute little velvet purse...

Old children's cooking toys (thanks to Lisa for letting me buy a couple pieces she decided she didn't want)...

Some beautiful wall paper scraps...

It was a good trip and I love running into so many familiar faces: Maryl, Lisa, Tricia, Deb & Shawna.

I also wanted to share my 2012 journal. My sister Lana gave me this great journal made by "A Song In My Heart." This is how it came:

They've made these journal calendars for several years now, they're very cool looking, but I decided to embellish further. Here's how my cover looks now:

And here's how I embellished the inside pages:

Below are what the weekly pages look like. That "star" girl was a New Years card that my sister, Diana, sent me - too cute!

I think I'll have fun embellishing these pages. I'll try to show pages from my journal periodically.

2012 Calendar Collaborative Project

A couple months ago I was asked to participate in a 2012 Calendar Collaborative project. This was my first organized collaborative/swap project. Chris Capista is the organizer and the theme was Catherine Moore's Character Construction stamps (http://www.characterconstructions.com/).

The way it worked was Chris first picked the calendar theme. Next, Catherine selected 12 people to participate. We're each assigned one of the months and we had to create a 8.5" x 11" portrait calendar page using Catherine's stamps. We then had to make 11 copies of your finished calendar page and send them to the other 11 participants.
My month is April and the picture above is my calendar page. As you may know, one of my latest obsessions are Santos dolls, so I knew that was going to be my focus. Here's the envelope I sent my calendar in, all ready and lined up to go!

Last year, Chris created a calendar using images from Paper Whimsy. She has a wonderful article about it in the recent issue of Somerset Studio Gallery (Winter 2012).

Chris's calendar page for 2012 was the first one I received. It was so exciting to open the envelope. I just love her page and all the little details she added.

I look forward to the mail arriving every day now, in anticipation for the next calendar page! We have participants from Canada and France too. I'll make sure to post them as they come in. What a great way to celebrate the new year!

Holiday Handmade

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas, I know we did. It's great to see family & friends ,enjoy yummy food, play games, open gifts and also get some crafting in. I wanted to share some holiday handmade projects.

Made by: Connie, Frances & Pat

My sister, Frances hosted a wonderful Christmas gathering. At the end of a great dinner I brought out the paper, glue & scissors. The craft project of the evening was to make calendar dolls. I had bought these mini calendars from the flea market for just ten cents each.

 We spread out the supplies over the table and we were all cutting and gluing.

We first made paper dolls and then attached the mini calendar to the doll.

Made by: Barbara & Lana

As you may have noticed, we primarily used Catherine Moore stamps - she has such a great variety of doll images to use.

Made by: Maryl

I brought Christmas paper, in case we were going to make Christmas dolls, but it turned out to be a hybrid project...so the Christmas dolls turned into Christmas calendars.

Made by: Star

Made by: Kacia

I also wanted to share some beautiful hand made cards/projects I received this season...

Made by: Lois

Made by: Tiffany

Made by: Ruby

Made by: Pat

Made by: Laura

Don't you love these? They're all wonderful and creative! Last, is my Christmas card for this year, "Peace on Earth".

Next week, I'll start sharing with you a project my sister Lana and I are involved with, a Catherine Moore calendar swap. Stay tuned.

Happy Holidays!

Paper Xmas Village

This weekend, I made 12 paper Christmas theme houses. 

It all started when my sister, Lana, gave me these adorable stamps from Michelle Ward - Twelve Days of Christmas.

I first stamped them on kraft paper and cut them in different house shapes.

The next step was to add some odd shape roofs using a variety of xmas paper.

Then I embellished them with chimney, doors and windows.

I added an "L" shaped piece of cardboard on the back so they can stand up on their own, but then I decided to put mine in a garland.

Here's some close up shots...

Christmas Paper Dolls & More...

I've been buying some of the recent Christmas paper pads & embellishments at Michael's knowing that I was going to make some Christmas paper dolls.

Well, tonight was the night. This is what my table looked like during the process...but it wasn't all me, my sister Pat and Lana were over too.

For my paper dolls, I used a variety of  stamps from Catherine Moore (http://www.characterconstructions.com) and stamped her girls on a bunch of different Christmas papers. I mixed and matched doll parts with embellishments and came up with these...

She reminds me of the Green Hulk's wife

Opps, left off her shoes

Now that's a funky dress

My poinsettia girl

Bringing holiday goodies to you

Like her stocking?

This afternoon, my sisters Pat and Lana came over for an artful playdate. Pat was showing me how to make the watch face ornament below. It's hard to see, but there's a glass dome over the ornament.

I found a box of  watch faces at East Bay Depot for Creative Reuse long ago...so it was perfect for this project. This one measures about 4" tall.