From Russia with Love

Wooden dollies!
Originally uploaded by Mixing-Katie

Haven't posted in quite a while! The summer was kind of a blur -- trip to Russia, a new job, and moving back to the East Coast. Now that things have calmed down (comparatively), it's fall already! Hoping to get back into the swing of uploading pics and posting. I've been busy making things, so plenty of art to post about.

Here's a set of nesting dolls I found while in Russia this summer. I was on the lookout for blank dolls the whole trip, but didn't spot these till a few days before we left. The vendor only had one set or I would have bought more. When I was in Russia in 2004 I saw blank sets all over the place and never thought to buy one -- regretting that now! I'm still thinking on how to paint these.

Matrioshka: Create
Originally uploaded by Mixing-Katie

And I've got dollies on the brain lately. I'm hosting a doll swap on ATCsforAll and made lots of matrioshka ATCs. I've also started working on a 12"x12" painting with dolls.

I just can't get enough of these sweet dolls. I love how they open up - it's so much fun to play with them! I've purchased many sets while in Russia, but most

Crafting 365, Day 72
Originally uploaded by Mixing-Katie

ended up as gifts. I've got one set with fairy tale paintings on the tummies. It's a lovely set, five dolls together. Since I'm not sure when I'll be back in Russia to get more dollies, painting some is the next best thing!

Art For All 2009

IMG_7417
Originally uploaded by vintagepix

Last weekend I went to Indianapolis to meet up with people from ATCsforAll. It was so much fun! There was a lot of trading, a lot of creating, and a lot of laughing going on. This is a photo that Vintagepix took during a watercolor workshop. I'm on the right in purple. It was fantastic to meet people that I've only known online and wonderful to try out new techniques with friends. I have a lot of unpacking to do and need to catch up on a lot of sleep!

Free-Motion Flowers

ATCsforAll.com is having a get together in Indianapolis in June. I am super excited about it because members are coming from all over the US and even from Canada and Australia. There will be art workshops and lots of trading! I have finally started getting ready by making up some fabric ATCs. I figured flowers is a theme that a lot of people collect, and I've been wanting to try out this technique again ever since I realized that my machine has the option to drop feed dogs and do free motion.



It took a while for me to figure out exactly how to get my machine to do free motion (I think I need to find a new foot) but even so it went a lot faster than the last time I tried these with just a straight stitch and lots of starting and stopping and rotating the fabric. I'm really happy with how these are turning out. I'm adding lots of beads, which I never do for cards that get sent in the mail.

Photo Journal

I'm in a circle journal group on ATCsforAll where we make two page spreads -- one page has a photo and the other page is our interpretation of the photo. This time the theme I worked on was 'trees.' I took a picture of a pretty maple tree near my apartment building. I've been admiring it as the color of its leaves change. (Since I took this photo it has lost nearly all of its leaves)



I haven't done very much photography, but I do like taking pictures. I signed up for this journal group thinking it would inspire me to carry my camera around with me more often. I have taken more pictures than I normally do, but I still feel a little weird taking pictures on campus when people are walking around.

Make it Mondays: Houses

I made these ATCs for a swap, and they fit with the theme of the Make it Mondays challenge too! Neato :) I had fun making these. I used my copic markers, then put some colored pencil on top. A few gel pen accents.

Crafting 365

I saw this fun-looking group on Flickr and decided to join. Members post a photo a day showing their creative endeavors. I noticed it because some of my contacts had photos in the group's photo pool. So far I've done 8 days - it's fun!

This week I've been working on house-shaped chunky pages for a swap on ATCsforAll - lots of fun! I started with cardboard pages, then gessoed and smeared on acrylic paint. then I stenciled with ink pads through punchinello and glued on paper accents. I used some of my favorite paper: brightly colored memos from work that I paint, draw, and stamp on while I'm working on other projects. I love how it kind of preserves some history about me, and I really like the crazy color combinations that end up on this paper. I made a door and window on each house. I colored a phonebook page green and cut out leaves. I glued those on, then used my sewing machine to put on some stems and grass. Then I used markers and gel pens to put quotes about home on the pages. I did eight pages -- seven to swap and one to keep. Here's the page I'm keeping. The words say, "Home is where the dirty dishes are." That sure is true for me!!

Inchies : )

I'm hosting an inchie swap on ATCsforAll.com, and finally got around to making my own inchies for it. I cut out images from an American history textbook, put them on some inchie blanks that I had made when cutting out something else, and then stuck on inked up words and did the edges with a silver marker.

While I was doing them, I spread out the finished ones and noticed that some of the words kinda made interesting phrases. Maybe that will turn into an idea for another swap -- sentence inchies :)