Jewellery and Journals

I'm making jewellery and journals tonight. I decorated a piece of heavy weight paper with paints, a page from an old dictionary and my home made stamps. I stuck very thick card board circles and rectangular shaped metal pieces onto the paper with gel medium, when this was thoroughly dry, I cut out the shapes. I have to do the same for the other side, I'm not sure if I'm going to draw faces on the circles or just decorate them.
The journal page started out as one of my drawn faces scanned into my computer, I then took it into Photo shop and created the background. The stamped images in the background are from my hand made stamps which I turned into brushes in PS.
The final page has the same face altered with hue and saturation to change the colour. I've printed them out and glued and sewn the images to the page.

Australia Day

We've just arrived home from a weekend away at our friends' house down the beach. The photo shows the view fom their property. We celebrated Australia Day with a Happy hour at their place which was great fun. I love the sea and it inspires me to create, I never leave home without a project on board and the collage is what I created as a page for my journal workshop.

Decorated papers

I'm working on decorating paper for a journal workshop I'll be teaching soon. I've painted the background and while it was still wet I've put bubble wrap on top and used a brayer to press it into the paper, then I've decorated them with my stamps made from erasers, when they dried.

Four more cards

I'm still painting cards. I have about 10 more to go I think, maybe a few more. The two ladies cards are all hand painted with notes added. The Magic one is a hand painted background with a piece of a serviette stuck onto it and a hand written stamp, then an image and text from an old magazine. the last one is hand painted patchwork squares with hand draw graphics and scraps of my decorated paper, the map of Australia started the whole concept. More to come soon.

Three more cards

I've completed three more trading cards. The top one has my hand painted paper as a background, then I added a painted tag, with corrugated cardboard, handmade paper and a small piece of some fabric I'd painted sometime ago and topped it off with some electrical resistors.
The second one was a terrific image I found of US mail boxes in a very old National Geographic, one of the doors was open so I added an Aussie stamp with a possum on it, then added text and a tag.
The third one is made up of the inside of envelopes made into a patchwork with postage stamps added. The heart and other stamps were carved from erasers.

My first trading cards

This is all new to me, I've never made any ATC's before. I'm attending a retreat in WA in March to do a jewellery class with Nina Bagley. We've all been given a deck of cards to decorate and trade. I'm thoroughly enjoying this new challenge, but I'm having difficulty trying to make some with subtle colours. The brightly coloured ones come far more easily, but I am trying.

Caught in action

Whenever we go out I always take an art project with me, as my husband always takes his camera and he can spend quite some time taking photos of things around us. This time it happened to be me, I was totally unaware as I was so absorbed in trying to get the charms finished for the charm swap I'm in. I received an email from Dawn and my charms have arrived which was a relief, being so far away. I can't wait to get mine now, I've been to Dawn's charm site and seen some of the others, they are great.

Jewellery on mass (or mess)

I couldn't resist taking a photo of all my necklaces on mass before they went to the gallery in a much more orderly fashion.

Photo hint

My husband and I visited the Melbourne Botanical Gardens on Saturday and saw these lovely sunflowers in the children's garden. My husband's a keen photographer and suggested I try taking a photo using normal day light and then using the flash. I was amazed at the difference the flash made. None of the images above have been touched in Photoshop they are straight from the camera. Maybe some of you know this trick but I thought I'd pass it on to those who don't. We didn't see the overladen bee in the picture until we downloaded them at home, what a nice touch.

More Found Objects Jewellery

I forgot to add these photos of my latest necklaces and earrings that went off to a new gallery on Friday. I will be uploading these onto my web site this week along with others I haven't shown yet. I've been totally absorbed in jewellery making these past two weeks so my studio is a complete mess. I now have to put together a journal made with my hand decorated papers to have on display at Hann Made where I teach altered books and decorated papers. I'm looking forward to doing something other than jewellery and of course I have to fit in going to work, if only art provided a more regular income, then I could retire and be busier than ever.

Finished Charms

My charms are finished now all I have to do is post them tomorrow and hope and pray they get to USA before Jan 31st.
They took so long but I've enjoyed every minute. I can't wait to receive my return ones. I just hope mine get there on time.

Charms

I'm participating in a charm swap at art-e-zine cafe. The back of the charms are my hand painted and stamped paper and on the fronts I've hand painted faces. I still have to add eyelets and seal them. I also have to wire them and add rings. I wasn't going to use any found objects originally but I'm sure I'll find something to add along the way. I'll post some finished ones ASAP.

I was thrilled last night to receive an email from Gillian Allen from Art-e-zine, she has very kindly created a page for me, re my found objects jewellery, on her site under newstuff for 2007. She has a fantastic site full of information and inspiration, I visit there often, it's a must visit. Gillian is so generous with her time putting together all this fabulous information and she does fantastic work herself. Well worth a visit over and over again.

Found objects necklaces

We are still in a smoke haze, this photo was taken from our back deck this evening. The sun is like a ball of fire as it's slowly setting. The fires have been burning since before Christmas and with temperatures of 36C and 38C predicted for tomorrow and Thursday things are looking grim on the fire front.
I'm still busy making jewellery, these two necklaces go off to the gallery on the Peninsula at the weekend along with four more and ear rings and pins. I'm also in a charm swap with art-e-zine, I'm really looking forward to that, my charms are almost finished. Back now to my beading.

Found objects pins

I'm still on holiday so I'm busy assembling new jewellery, the pins above along with some necklaces and earrings are off to a new gallery, I'll have details on my contacts page on my web site after I've delivered them.
Wow it's been a warm day today the temperature's in the mid to high 30'sC and no chance of it letting up for a few days, my poor garden is suffering as we are on strict water restrictions due to the lack of rain. We're not as bad off as some parts of the State in the north, they haven't had rain for months, we really are a sunburnt country.

Found objects jewellery

We're back after a lovely New Year's Eve celebration in the country with family and friends, a great time was had by all. I'm now busy assembling jewellery for a new order, I'll have these on my web site shortly with the details of the gallery they are going to.

The photos are of pieces I've made from 'found objects' the top one was a rusty piece of metal I discovered in a car park. I've cleaned, decorated and polished it and added old African beads and wire details.
The second piece was again an old rusty bottle cap which I've cleaned and decorated, the beads I made to imitate amber and old African beads, from polymer clay, I also created the wire bead. Now, back to the assembly line.