more exciting (and late!) news!!

angie and durin had their baby!! (angie did most of the work of course!)

this was so very exciting to all of us mods at craftster, since she was the first of the pregnant mods to pop (one more is due in november, and then another in february - there's something in the water all right!)

warren came into the world the morning of august 4th, and hopefully he won't be toooo much of a leo!

at the moment, he's going to be the most spoiled baby in the world when it comes to handmade goods, i'm sure! (that'll change once the rest of the mod babies are born, he'll have to share then!)

i busted my butt and managed to get the majority of my planned projects done and sent before he was born - i have one more that i was specifically waiting for his name before i made it, now i just need to start it!

first, i finished up the sublime stitching julie west embroidery that i posted a long time ago by sewing them into bibs.


they were all backed with drool-resistant nylon



i LOVE how bright the sky is in this picture!!








again with the sky!










bright blue sky! i should note that i'm not JUST posting these pics because i adore the sky and the rose, but also because the actual colour of the fabric is somewhere in between the pics with a flash and the pics without. i DO have a purpose! it's actually the same fabric as one of the preggo tops that i made angie in the spring.









and i made them two sets of washable wipes, which were 2 squares of 7"x7" flannelette serged together. the brown really wasn't for poop! i didn't even think of that! i fell in love with the cowboy print, because i knew angie would like it, and then i looked for a solid that went with it. i also wanted a colour that would look good in the nursery, because i feel like so much baby stuff is so damn UGLY (packaging, etc), so i wanted to make wipes that could be kept in a basket without contributing to that!


and i made angie a shirt, which sadly did not turn out nearly as well as i'd hoped....

i scanned orange paisley scrapbooking paper, printed it onto an avery iron on transfer, cut out the letters and heart, and then ironed onto old navy maternity tank. sadly, i forgot to take into consideration the depth of the colour of the tank top, and it made the iron on much darker than i'd anticipated. you can barely see the design in the lettering, and the small baby in fetal position in the heart is pretty much invisible. plus, the iron ons acted wierd, almost like the burnt, and they stuck to the shirt. it was very weird. i love me my avery iron ons, and i've never had that happen before. i ended up washing the shirt to try to get some stubborn backing paper off.

i was sad about it, because i was SO EXCITED about my idea of having the baby in the heart, but i didn't have time to order a new tank top (and that felt wasteful too). it was a huge pain in the butt finding this one, none of the local stores had tanks left at the end of june (stupid!), so i had to order it online, old navy took FOREVER to ship it, then i had to pick it up from my US address (old navy won't ship to canada because they're stupid). i was actually hoping to get this done in time for the baby shower, but the shirt didn't arrive in time. i still think it turned out cute, just not AS CUTE as i'd hoped!

i also made an art piece, mostly as a thank you for angie and durin's hospitality when i stayed with them for the baby shower, but also because i wanted to send a "non-baby" present as well! i used a ttv photo of angie that i took while i was down there.

it's painted on a canvas, the bottom layer is kroma acrylic paints in raw umber, permanent green, titanium white, carbon black and acrylide yellow. i drew the the stems and leaves before the paint dried. the image was colour copied and transfered using kroma gesso. after it was all dry i used a bunch of different stazOn inks - timber brown, saddle brown, olive green, stone gray and dove grey. the green and brown twill tapes were dyed for earlier projects, but i used timber brown and olive green stazOn inks to make the colours more vibrant. i used saddle brown on the twill tape with writing. the little A chipboard piece has purple flocking on it, but it was too bright for the piece, so i used stone gray stazOn to tone it down a bit. the word smile was a charm, but i cut off the circle, and used ranger adironback inks in ginger and caramel to colour it. the dragonflies were brads, but i cut off the backs. the metal pieces and the chipboard piece were all attached using silicone. i think it turned out very "angie"!


before adding the extra layers. i tried the gesso transfer technique (i didn't want pure white, so i tinted it with a teensy bit of raw umber) and it wasn't as fabulous as i'd hoped it would be. the spots where it rubbed off made me sad, and the one corner rubbed off so much that i ended up rubbing more off on purpose so that it would look okay!

the most AMAZING wedding invitation and my rsvp!

i guess this shows how behind i am, since the wedding was almost a month ago, but i really really wanted to show this off!!

one of my dearest (and craftiest) friends j got married at the end of july, and it was the most lovely wedding. perfectly suited to her and her partner, just so THEM. it was a very brief ceremony that took place at an art showing that j is super involved with, and has been for several years. (i wish i'd taken photos of the pieces she had exhibited, they were incredibly wonderful little quilts.) after the wedding there was the premiere performance of anna camilleri's "still breathing fire", which was, of course, absolutely amazing. the wedding reception was held the next morning, due to the performance, and it was a very lovely "champagne brunch". all in all it was a fabulous couple of days, and it was so wonderful to see two people so happily suited to each other!

and the wedding invitation was AMAZING! my god! they made them all by hand, and planned a lot of the wedding details while making them, so there was so much love included in them.

when i received the envelope, i was confused, i couldn't think of what i'd ordered (that's a sign that you do too much online shopping!!). i didn't even think to look at the return address, since no one i know in canada ever mails me stuff!

i opened the package and found a little gift all wrapped up in polkadot tissue paper tied with thread and a little note with a knot design that said "for beautiful amy".

inside was a matchbox, wrapped in black leather and black lace with a red leather cord.



and inside the matchbox there was a match, a little magnet of hands holding, heart sequins and a little accordion folded book.


and showing the book unfolded


the book has a photo of someone playing guitar at one end (her partner's a musician) and someone embroidering on the other (j's a fabric artist)

so gorgeous! it was such an amazing invitation.


and i figured since the invitation was so cool, i should make an rsvp that was at least partially as cool!

it was very simple, because i wanted to mail it out immediately, but i really love how it turned out.



i bought a set of lace stamps with a 50% coupon from the cheesy scrapbooking store (as opposed to the non-cheesy scrapbooking store where i usually go). embossed it with black onto wine paper and wrapped it around the matchbox. all the edges of the box were inked before i did that. the sides of the "drawer" were inked as well, because i didn't have time to wait for paint to dry! (i really wanted to get it mailed asap) the front and back ends of the "drawer" are embossed as well.


i inked the inside of the drawer with a makeup sponge, again, to save time instead of painting, then covered it in glue and flocked it.


inside there's a little note that says "i would be honoured" and a little shrinky dink heart charm made using this stamp from invokearts.com and stazOn ink.

mods, portland and ttv!

the last few weeks have been really crazy with family stuff, everyone's been away, and then back and then away again and back, now they're leaving today for another longer trip, and i've ended up running tons of errands for everyone else who's super busy! in addition to that, i've had several friends come to town that i rarely get to see, so i managed to squeeze in two really lovely meals, dinner with my childhood friend ariel and her boyfriend of several years (who i'd never met!), and her family, who i also adore, and a lunch/dinner thing with my friend liz, who travels the world and inspires me with her combination of creativity and action! they were both so fabulous to see, and it was definitely worth the lack of crafting this week! (the constant errands - not so much worth it!!) there's so much to catch up on, alphabet atcs and non paper atcs, a fabulous gift that came in the mail ages ago, the most amazing wedding invitation and my rsvp, books i've been reading, the ttv pics with the polka dot dress, techniques i've been trying....

but the most urgent thing to update on is my trip to portland and silverton last weekend (most urgent because i never got around to posting pics from my LAST trip to portland in march!)

i went down to attend angie and her hubbie's "BabyQ", aka a baby shower and BBQ all in one (such a cheesy name!!), and also got to spend some time with the amazing kittypam and her mark. it was a super quick trip - leaving very early saturday morning, and arriving back home late monday night, but i'm so glad i went.

the baby shower/BBQ was so much fun, and angie's place is BEAUTIFUL! she's out in the country, surrounded by fields, and the property has chickens, geese, ducks, turkeys and peacocks roaming around everywhere, and goats on an island in the middle of the lake. (did i mention there's a LAKE?) it's so gorgeous, and so peaceful, but still close to lots of stuff. i'm completely jealous.

about to pop!!





on sunday we went for breakfast in silverton, and then wandered around a bit. for a small town, there's a lot of craftiness! there's a bead store, with quite a lot of selection, a yarn store with some really amazing wools, and my favourite, a sewing lounge! it's called snippets, and just opened recently, but how fun! it's actually in the same building as the yarn store, they're open to each other, and there's a coffee shop upstairs. it's a gorgeous old building. i did a bit of shopping, despite my telling myself that this wasn't going to be a "shopping" trip! but really, how could i resist a yard of the most perfect woodgrain cotton at snippets?



angie took a few pictures of me doing the ttv photos, i'm going to post them on the thread on craftster so that people are less confused about what i'm doing!


there were american flags EVERYWHERE though!










after a bit of a lazy afternoon, and looking over angie's inherited serger for her, i headed into portland to see mark and pam. we had a mellow evening, and on monday morning we went for a brunch before pam went to work. angie was able to come at the last minute, and it was fabulous. i so wish i'd had more time to see everyone!

i adore these two. so much.

and angie's so incredible.


after everyone else went off to work and stuff, i started to leave town, but detoured to collage instead.... how could i resist, really? i knew i'd end up there!

i restrained myself, really! not much in the way of ephemera or paper, just supplies and some stamps. i totally scored on the fabric paints - they were all regular $10 and were marked down to $2! i bought a few things that i'd been actively looking for, a stylus for embossing and the tool for batiking, and stocked up on a few things (stazOn remover for $4 instead of the $8 i pay here), and then the stamps. a few were from the clearance, and then i bought three different heidi swapp stamps - i love her stamps, they're totally funky designs, and they're CHEAP! i got the chandelier, the heart and the clocks (because i can't resist clocks!). and i picked up the bam pop number set, to go with the alphabet set i caved and bought from story kits a few months ago.




though short, it was such a good visit! (and i didn't spend too much money!)