Altered By Me

You may have read a previous post where I talk about wanting to start an art journal. Well I had the journal with a few pages gessoed and ready to go for over a month. Every time I picked it up to try and do something in it I thought to myself. "why did you buy such a big book?" The pages are HUGE...........8 x 11. I of course had a case of big blank page syndrome when I realized something. I like working on big backgrounds! Alot of my work is done on 5 x 7 canvas board. Art that I make just to make art. You know what I mean...Most of the online challenges and swaps are for atc, 4 x 4, 2 x 2, 1 x 1 and now 3 x 3's but when I reach for a background to work on I almost always grab one of my 5 x 7 canvas boards that I keep already gessoed. Or I cut a piece of watercolor paper to that size. Now that is still smaller then the blank pages I have been facing but that little light bulb that went off. and once it did it freed me up and allowed me to get over the stage fright of s

Are you like me? I have so many things I want to blog about that I just don't know where to begin. And do I want to write a huge post covering everything? Or do I break it up and post a couple of post in one day? And then you know what happens? I just don't post anything to my blog. So I have just finished up one of the biggest swaps ever. On my arttechniques yahoo group I participated in a 4 x 4 fatbook technique swap. Technique swaps are great because you get to see and feel so many different techniques that you may have not done before. And even if you have done it before when someone else has done it they can get a very different look then you did when you did the same technique. When I signed up for this swap I was prepared to do 20 or 30 or even 50 pages in this swap just to get my hands on all those techniques. Well we ended up with over 100 people signing up for the swap. It just kept getting bigger and bigger. Finally Sherre and Susan who are hosting the swap put a cap

Over the years I have made a variety of hand bound books. Every once in awhile I would bind up some of the handmade paper I make into a simple book. I have never written in one of those books mind you. But recently I decided to try my hand at Coptic binding. It could be that I am fascinated by the Art Journal craze and decided that I could make my own. I did recently buy myself a sketchbook that I plan to use as an Art Journal. The size is a little intimidating tho. I've only managed to decorate the front and gesso a few of the pages but hopefully I will begin to work in it soon. So... a couple of days ago I recycled some papers from a scrapbook I bought and used the covers from a vintage book I had on hand. There are four signatures with a total of 64 pages. I guess you could say over 80% of the book is recycled. I only bought new the hemp thread and ribbon I used as decoration on the front. I think it is important to do as much as you can for the environment. I love my new litt

Technorati Tags: ATC , Paper Imagery Designs , Bird Sanctuary Stamp Set , Vintage Image Sheets , Cemetery Angel Cemetery Angels Aren't they beautiful? I made this new atc using the image of a beautiful cemetery angel from sheet # 272 from Paper Imagery Designs . I've been having a great time playing around with my new stamp set. I've used three stamps from the Bird Sanctuary set on this atc the set is available here . Thanks for stopping by! Arlene

Well I have been having a hard time with blogger this week. Finally......... I am able to make a post. Woo Hoo! Have you checked out the Paper Imagery Designs website lately. There are so many new goodies. Melissa just added a slew of new image sheets. Some of which are halloween images. We are having a great time on the PID yahoo group ; mingles, swaps, techniques, and challenges galore. I've never seen such a fun and friendly group of ladies as we have in the yahoo group. I also can't forget that Lori + Mel like to throw a few contests in there every once in awhile. Ya never know when they are going to be giving away goodie bags and free image sheets. Oh and Lori is having an anniversary give away. Her Altered Art Expressions blog turns 1 and she is giving away some great goodies on the PID Blog here is the link for the information Altered Arts Expression Give Away This week was the first installment of Technique Thursday. Every other Thursday I will be posting a new tec