My 12 Tags of Christmas - Tim Holtz style

Each day from 1st to 12th December Tim Holtz is posting a Christmas tag on his blog together with detailed instructions and photographs of how he's made them.  The only downside to this is it's made me realise how many more Ranger products I need!  It's day 5 already and his tags are just amazing (well, we wouldn't expect anything less would we!)

I've made my first four tags based on his although I didn't have all of the products mentioned so substituted where necessary.

If you leave a comment on each day's post Tim does a draw for some of his wonderful goodies so it's well worth a visit - although chances of being picked are slim in view of the large number of comments he gets.

Now, onto day 5 ..........

Girl With A Heart - Paper Doll

This one is a bit different from my usual dolls as I've made her clothes (the sleeves and the skirt) with old book text coloured, then rubber stamped with ink.  I thought the book text was applicable as she's gone to Cindy to wish her a happy birthday and Cindy does like her books methinks!  The wings are a sandwich of acetate and tissue paper made in the same way as I did some Christmas baubles - well actually I made them from the leftovers of the baubles - waste not, want not - and they sort of determined the whole colour scheme.

The heart she is holding is made from metal and is left over from some Christmas ATCs I made recently - oh no, I don't throw anything away!

Anyway, I know that Cindy now has the doll so here she is!

I'd just like to take the opportunity of thanking those of you who leave some lovely comments here (and on Flickr) on my little creations - it means so much!  Thank you!!

 

'Elfie' Paper Art Doll

'Elfie' is an old English girl's name meaning 'elf' or 'magical counsel' and I think it suits this paper doll perfectly.  She's a little woodland elf!

I made her dress from some fibres from a ball of wool (well, it's polyester really) and I didn't knit it, just stuck it on.  Other parts of her dress and her booties are made from some silky fabric in a co-ordinating colour.

I love her hair - probably because I had mine chopped off today - and mine's dark brown (with a nice grey parting!!!!)  The doll's hair is from a cone of something or other - it's very fine and silky.

Her overall costume looks a bit like she's in a Panto - girlfriend for Jack and the Beanstalk maybe?  Well, at least that's seasonal - lol.

Inchie Row Houses

...and now for something completely different....

Little houses measuring 1" wide and no higher than 4" made from mountboard and decorated to the theme of 'Who lives in this little house?' for a swap on Paper Digital Art and Images By Kim.

I made two sets of five houses.  The first set were mainly inked, rubber stamped, painted and collaged whereas the second set were much more textural - I used wax, tissue paper with Brusho, metal embossing and textural paint.

I prefer the first set but hope the recipients will like them anyway.  The last day for getting them mailed to Kim is not until 30 January 2010 so I am well ahead of the game.

Fabric ATCs - Vintage Ladies

This is the current theme on the Artful Ideas Flickr group and I used a couple of vintage lady images I had in my stash and applied them to some cotton fabric using Golden Gel Medium - Regular Gel (Matte). 

As my proper sewing machine has a broken needle at the moment I used a tiny little machine which just does a basic straight stitch and is so irritating as the cotton keeps breaking in it!  However, I got the two ATCs done (evenutally!) and just sewed an assortment of scraps of fabric and ribbon around the main 'image transferred' piece of fabric.

There are some lovely ATCs in the Artful Ideas photostream already which you see here.