Audrey, Molly and Messenger [IF]

Christmas Greetings from myself, Audrey the cat and Molly the dog.

The Illustration Friday challenge is 'messenger'.

The background cityscape - pen drawing, the doodle house - pens, brush pens, envelope - vintage image, owl - digital drawing 

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree

A variety of Christmas trees. 

Below is an altered version of the original pen drawing above, I've also included an image of children from The Graphics Fairy

and a Christmas cactus

more trees

Angel {TM}

Three Muses challenge - Angel

The angel girl was from the Graphics Fairy, the statue angel is a photo I took in Rome, the song is Abba's, the stamp has been altered with an image of little angels from my stash.

Sepia [TAW], Christmas Cactus Lights

Take a Word challenge - Sepia

The vintage photo is of a great aunt, the background is altered handmade paper, the other parts ?. I did [most] of the digital collage some time ago but altered it for this challenge.

Christmas cactus - there were buds on the plant when I took the photo a few days ago, which are now flowers. I love the lights which are like little flowers, they are just battery operated from a £1 shop. 

Handmade Buttons and Book

Continuing from yesterday - handmade gifts. I made buttons for two friends and a sketchbook for the other. I made three different kinds of buttons. The clear ones were hand drawn on shrink plastic, a great idea I first saw on this blog . I bought the wrong plastic and the wrong size punch so they are quite small buttons. Also some were not exactly round - but it adds to their uniqueness, or so I tell myself. 

These are made up of French Knots sewn on a non fray fabric [fliselina/vilene] then glued to 'Dress it up' 'make-a-button' button shanks.

These I made with the 'prym easy cover button shells', lace on silk.

These are also on the easy cover shells, French knots and two kinds of fabrics inspired by Karen Ruane's lovely work

For the button cards I started with labels from The Graphics Fairy which I altered, printed and distressed. They looked like this to start with.

For the book I made, I used unused printed patterns {passap knitting patterns} and the insides of used envelopes - have you ever looked at these, there are lots of different kinds of patterns, great for collage and backgrounds.

All the pages shown below, click on the images for a better look.

Handmade Christmas Presents

I went out with some of my 'creative' friends last night and we exchanged gifts - handmade gifts of course. These are the goodies I got.

A knitted mug warmer with mug and decoration including hand made heart and embroidered button.  Also a chick and tag and cookie.

A handmade book with pockets for keeping bits and bobs.

A felted, layered Christmas tree

and a cute bone china brooch with a reindeer stamped on it

Lucky girl eh?

I'll show you what I gave tomorrow.

Sink [IF] and Rolling Stamps 76,77

I have two offerings for the Illustration Friday challenge - sink.

Above - I think cup boats would sink

Below - Be careful, he may sink those teeth into you

Two more rolling stamps, both of them are textured wallpaper

Gel Printing Plate

Remember last month I said I'd won a prize on the Sketchbook Challenge, well it came a couple of days ago. It is a 'Gelli Arts' gel printing plate - basically you put paint onto the jellylike surface and then create patterns by pressing objects into the paint or drawing on it with a stick or something. You then put the paper on the top, gently rub and pull the paper off. I thought I would have a quick play with it but ended up doing 35 pages, just with items I'd found to hand such as bubble wrap. The green paper was made with a hand whisk which is one of my favourites I use in batik. I like the plate and will find it a very useful tool and it will be excellent for making background papers or papers for collage. Since doing the above I wondered whether it would also be useful for fabric - I've had a quick try and I'm impressed with my first efforts. I've not taken photos of those yet but will soon.

Odd Bod [TM]

Odd Bod in the Land of Odd

for the Three Muses challenge - click here to see more entries

One of my drawings on one of my photos [altered of course]

Tis the Season [TM] and C&G Books/Quilts

Take your pick - I did two for The Three Muses challenge - Tis the season

Below is some old City & Guilds work. The top two images are books, for the top one I painted on fabric and covered a big file, the lower one is a handmade book.

The two images at the bottom are little quilts made with hand painted fabrics. All four items were inspired by tigers.