One World One Heart Giveaway Blog Event

This international event has been organised by Lisa Swifka from her blog …A Whimsical Bohemian… and she said ‘the original idea behind this giveaway event was to bring bloggers together from around the world … to discover new and wonderful people, and in the process possibly win a prize or many prizes along the way”

This is the first time I’ve joined in with this annual event or offered any giveaways from my own blog so I hope I’m doing it right - there are four prizes in total - read on.

….. So here goes, Roll Up, Roll Up, welcome to my blog, it’s great to see you here whether you are a regular visitor, an occasional browser or you’re here for the first time - you are all very welcome and I hope you’ll come back some other time too.

To be in with a chance to win one of my giveaways all you need to do is leave me one comment. Please make sure I will be able to link back to you or leave an email address so I can contact you if you are a winner. The draw will be made on 15th February 2010 so if you want to enter, please ensure to leave your comment by midnight 14th February. I will post the names of the winners on my blog on the 15th February and will post out the prizes during that week.


So, what are the four prizes?

1.  A jointed paper doll called Leilah. She is a cousin (twice removed) of Aladdin and will soon embark on her exciting journey on the Magic Carpet and maybe will arrive at your house? Her body is cut from card and painted with acrylics. Her clothes are fabric and her hair is a boot lace. Her face has been moulded from air dry clay and painted with acrylics. Her legs and arms are moveable. I’ve put a couple more pictures of her on my Flickr photostream (link is in the sidebar). 

2.  A book of 30 sheets of silk screen printed Vellum
A border pack of heavy uncoated paper stock (50 sheets 2x12”)

An altered domino magnet (details of how I made it may be found here)

3.  A book of 50 sheets of heavy uncoated paper stock (8” x 8”)in ‘Antique Creams’ colours.
A border pack of heavy uncoated paper stock (50 sheets 2x12”)
An altered domino magnet

4.  A paper punch - mini tag shape

A border pack of heavy uncoated paper stock (50 sheets 2x12”)
An altered domino magnet

So there you have it! Don't forget, leave just one comment to be in with a chance of winning and come back on 15th February to see if you've been lucky.

If you want to continue riding the Magic Carpet and be in with a chance to win more goodies go to Lisa's blog and check out the list of other participants.

All that remains for me to say is Good Luck, Bonne Chance, Viel Glueck, Goed Geluk, Buena suerte.

Valentine Heart

I made this heart for the Flickr group 'Hugz from the Heart'.  The group is run by Viv (aka bowling belle) who provided a template for us to use.  She said 'You may make your heart out of anything you wish and decorate however you wish'.

I started off with a card base and machine stitched to it a thin layer of wadding, the main background fabric and the lace.  As I did it freehand and quickly the lace puckered up and the finished shape was rather wonky!  The little heart in the centre is stuffed and hand stitched onto the main fabric - again this also puckered up a little making it a funny shape.  The hanger is narrow ribbon stitched on with two tiny heart shaped buttons.

For obvious reasons then, I'll call this 'My Funny Heart' or maybe it should be 'Pucker Up'!  It's not perfect, but I think it has a quirky look about it. Hope whoever gets it will like it anyway.

Another Garden Goddess

This one is called 'Rose' and she was made much the same as 'Fern' (in previous post below) except she isn't completely covered in Decopatch paper - her neck and arms are painted in a flesh tone and she is wearing a lace shawl and some sparkly jewellery.

I love the voluptuous shape of this template - and must say it pretty much mirrors my own body shape ................ except I have a few layers of fat on top!

Garden Goddess Art Doll

The current challenge on the Flickr Art 'n' Soul group is to make a 'Garden Goddess' using the template by The Enchanted Gallery and to use some embossing on it (either powder or metal).

Here is 'Fern' the Autumn Goddess.
I cut the shape from mountboard, covered it with some Decopatch paper and free hand scribbled some lines to emboss - I didn't want to cover too much of the paper up as it has lovely autumn leaves and ferns on. I glued on a few buttons near the bottom (after removing their shanks) to make the cute little plant pot and flowers.
 

The hair is part of a tassel and it's just the right colour I think. 
The heart shaped sign is actually a button which I've rubbed a little gold metallic cream onto to tone down.   The wording says 'How does your garden grow?'  Quite appropriate for this garden Goddess.
 
Autumn is my favourite season and I really like this doll and can just picture her in a pot plant - or hanging up in my dining room - maybe I'll forget to enter her into the challenge!!  As she was so quick and easy to do though I think I'll make another to keep for myself.

Meet 'Fritzi' the Festive Fairy

Whilst blog hopping recently I came across this intro  'Do you like a challenge? Do you like Art Dolls?  Well you have come to the right place.....'  Where is this place you ask, Artist Trading Dollz Challenge Blog created by Linda B - her own dolls are truly amazing and if you like art dolls do go have a look and a drool over some of hers. 

The first challenge was to create a 'Festive' doll she said 'think parties, celebrations, happy times, lots of colour and sparkle'.

My doll 'Fritzi' is from Germany and over Christmas went to a fancy dress ball as a 'Festive Fairy'!  Her crown and outer wings are made from some fabric leaves which are absolutely dripping with silver glitter.  The rest of her clothes are an assortment of fabrics.  She just couldn't get her hair right on the day so wore a glitzy, red sequined wig instead.

Lovely as the silver glitter is, it does unfortuntately get everywhere - much to my hubby's amusement!  Over the last few days he's gleefully informed me that I had a silver moustache and a silver neck!  I had to laugh though when after I gave him some sandwiches he asked what the glitter was actually made of - is it glass?  His sandwich was liberally covered in the stuff and he was actually contemplating eating it!!   What does this say about me?  No, don't answer please. LOL.  I didn't do it on purpose to get my own back - honest!!  I will say though that I did take the sandwiches off him and made some fresh, glitter free ones!  Incidentially, what is glitter made of? LOL

The festive fairy has a lot to answer for!

More Charms - Valentine

The current charm swap on Kim's PDA group is 'Valentine Heart Shape'.

I bought some chunky wooden hearts which measure an inch and a half across - inked them, stuck on some old book text, then distressed them quite heavily with an emery board. 

On the back of them there is just one line of text.  I attached some metal charms to finish them off. 

Now I just need to negotiate the snow on the ground and try to make it to the Post Office in one piece!

Snow Joke!

Well, they said it would snow and it has - and still is!

I took these photos a few minutes again, the first one is the view from my craft room window and the second is the view from one of the back bedrooms.

I wasn't brave enough to go outside, so the photos are taken through the window glass.

All together now .... 'the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful... and since we've no place to go, let it snow, let it snow, let it snow'

Stay safe and warm!

Altered Dominos & Stampotique Rubber Stamps

I got some lovely (if you can call them that!) rubber stamps for Christmas from Stampotique - strange and weird may be a better description, but I still think they're adorable.

I had the opportunity to try them out today when I altered some dominos into little magnets.

As the rubber stamps are quite large, only the head and shoulders are on the dominos.

The orangey coloured one is my favourite and that happens to be the first one I did.  I stuck some old book text onto the domino with gel medium (the text had been inked first with colour).  Then rubber stamped the images over the top.  I tried to lighten the colour of the faces with ProMarker pens, but I think the background colour was a little too strong.

 

I tried some white acrylic paint on a couple of them - the pink one is fine but I'm not sure about the purpley one!  Maybe she's having a beauty treatment - face pack or something similar!

For the final two, I used some scraps of paper kitchen roll which I'd previously coloured with Brusho paints.  They looked a little plain compared to the others, but once they had a spray of Krylon Crystal Clear over them, they really came to life (now that's a really scary thought!)

The next time I use these stamps, I'll try to use the whole of the images as they're too whacky not to!