Altered Books

I finally got around to doing the collage work on my newest gratitude/positive thoughts journal since my other one is almost full.  I am so ticked about the bottom phrase...the contact paper stuck to the edge and pulled it over, covering the word 'start'.  I tried to fix it but the magazine paper was hopelessly adhered and was not coming off.  And of course I had to leave the number off the year that this will be finished.  

Inside front cover.  The pages have fortune cookie fortunes on them, or pics I've cut out from jewelry and other catalogs.

And the back of the journal.  My friend Angie made that pic for me as part of a set of scenics from Mt. Desert Island in Maine.  The others are hanging on some twine in my craft room.  

I bought this little book a few summers ago in Hyannis.  I'm such a sucker for Guatemalan textiles. The pages are handmade paper too.  I added that gold crescent to the cover.

I wanted to use those double sided frame/glass things, so I cut a hole in the pages and slipped the frame into the hole, gluing it in place the best I could then adding ribbon and rhinestones to hide the rough edges.  This project took quite a few days.

Not that I'm crazy about France or anything, but I did like that pic of Sacre Coeur from my ephemera book.  That was the only place in Paris that I truly thought was pretty when I visited in 1982. 

10 Years

It's hard to believe that my dad passed away 10 years ago tomorrow.  Today would be my parents' 66th wedding anniversary. I made this altered book in about 2005 or so, to help me work through my grief.

The lyrics at the bottom are from the Dave Matthews Band song, "The Dreaming Tree".  I love the song but it makes me cry every time I hear it.

Dad's on the left, mom on the right.  They thought they were invited to a costume party at their beach house, hosted by my cousins. So dad put on a wig and one of my mom's pant suits (how 70s), and they got some huge orange and pink sunglasses.  Not sure where mom got the shirt but she's wearing a captain's hat.  We arrived at the beach house and they were shocked to find out they misunderstood the invitation.  Hilarity ensued.

Dad used to perform in the annual Lions Club Minstrel Show.  He was a member of the main chorus and often sang a solo (as seen on the left, he was singing 'Baby Face').  He got great pleasure out of dressing in drag for the Flora Dora Girls.  I always laugh at the unfortunate flash bulb reflection on his balloon boobs.  

He always took me to see the Red Sox.

He marched in many town parades as part of the Lions Club.

At the airport when our 3 week trip to California commenced in August, 1988.

I got this note when I got a raise at Channel 56.

The last time I saw him in April, 2003.

Baby and Dad Projects!

Card I made for our niece who recently had a baby!  BTW, I went to see baby Abigail when she was 6 days old and she's adorable and so teensy!!!

This is the inside writing area.

And a cross stitch that I kicked butt on, because I started in mid-May for an early June birth!  I needed a frame and rather than get a generic one, I bought a plain wooden frame, painted it pink and then added the 2 flower stickers.  The stitched lettering gave me fits and I ripped it out a few times before I got it right.  I was pretty bummed that the lettering in the picture on the kit looked nothing like the lettering instructions given for the alphabet and numbers.  

I also did a Fathers Day altered book project for my honey.  I was so excited to do it and it only took about 2-3 hours and I was sad it was done so quickly.  I'm leaving the pics in a small size to make them as anonymous as possible, as I've not asked the kids if it's OK for me to post pictures of them here. I also haven't posted pictures of this project on Facebook because I don't want the kids to be embarrassed or uncomfortable with their baby pics being shown.  The first on the cover is him with them at Disney World from 2000 when they were still quite small.  (You can click on the pics to make them bigger though).

The photos on the left side of each page are of Russell with each child when they were babies or toddlers, plus a small professional picture of them and the right side of each page has a recent photo of him & each kid. I spent quite awhile looking at all his old photos and it's true what they say: First child is in 1000 pictures, second child in 200 by themselves and the rest with their older sibling, third child appears in most photos with his siblings!  lol  I had my pick of great photos of his eldest, but boy did I have to dig for ones of the youngest!!

His oldest son

His daughter.   She is the only one of the three who knew what I was doing because I had to get her over here to shoot her pic with him!  

Youngest son.  This pic of them, taken one Sat. when they went golfing together, was what gave me the idea for this project. 

The 2 youngest visited us one afternoon so I got a pic of them with him, and then I had to add a cut out of one of his oldest, because he lives in Ohio now.  They've told me in the past that it's next to impossible to get all 3 of them together in the same place, so this was my only option! 

The Creepin' Crud and an Altered Book

I've been sick for the past two weeks and it is getting really old.  My boss was sick in mid-November, going into the Thanksgiving weekend.  By the time Deb and I found out he was sick, we hadn't been taking precautions of swiping stuff down with Clorox wipes.  I admit since the swine flu scare went away, I've grown lax about using Purell, although I do wash my hands a lot. 

Deb came back to work from Thanksgiving, with it too.  By that Wednesday, I had lost my voice as well.  The clients and the other attorneys who called kept asking why we were even still there at all.  We were both coughing, sneezing, blowing our noses....croaking into the phones....getting overheated and sweaty from standing at the copier for too long.  Or just standing for too long.  He sent us home Thursday and I went to the doctor on Friday.  I was good and sick.  Fever.  Freezing cold.  Headache that would not quit.  Earache. Painful lymph nodes....They made me wear a mask at the doctor's office.  I got my antibiotics that morning and spent the rest of the weekend sleeping and shivering under a blanket on the couch.  I was so weak that I couldn't even sit up straight at my craft table.

The antibiotics started to work their magic fairly quickly, but now this creepin crud is just hanging on for dear life.  While I'm not full blown sick, I'm still not 100% either.  Do you have any idea how uncomfortable it is to sleep sitting up?  I have no choice b/c I start coughing if I don't.  It sucks.  My nose got so sore from blowing it that my septum was torn to shreds and scabbed.  But every time I blew my nose or sneezed, all the cuts would open up and gush blood.  Oh and let's not forget about the "other" side effects from taking antibiotics....I'll spare you the TMI images but you all know what I mean, esp. if you are a chick, which most of my readers seem to be.  I've had more energy and was able to do a variety of crafts over the weekend which was awesome.  But I'd really, really like to shake this bone weary exhaustion and coughing.  My right ear still feels full although it doesn't hurt.  And I cannot get enough to drink.  I just had my bloodwork done the day I went to the dr. and my glucose is normal so it's not diabetes. I'm just thirsty, cold and tired every day.

It concerns me to think that these illnesses are becoming more and more drug resistant.  Deb's still coughing pretty much nonstop.  She and I are both over 2 weeks into this and it's not going away.  I wish I could go into work late for a few days, so I could sleep, but as usual we are straight out with cases.  I'll be very glad when the holiday season is over.  I'm ready to put this year to rest.

Anywho, over Thanksgiving weekend I worked on an altered book project that I've wanted to try for awhile. I have some favourite papers, ephemera, and other trinkets and decided to finally put them together into one place. The book is a plain, white thin foam board craft book from the scrapbooking section of the local craft shop.  I covered each page with pretty papers and stuff.  

My idea was to cut windows into some of the pages, and then insert a frame with glass in the center, with designs on each side of the page.  Once it was all done I sanded all the edges of the pages so that they'd be even, then inked the edges with green aging ink.  Click on the pics for a closer look, as the papers are so pretty.

The left page shows another glass 'window' from the hole I cut in the cover page.  I do want to add a couple more watch pieces and faces onto the right page.

I used some quotes that I liked, about living your life on your terms.  There's another window on the right page with glass covering a quote.

I love keys.

This page has a removable little card.

Left page is the reverse glass frame of the long window page.

Another removable card on the left.

The butterfly and dragon fly are attached w/ foam mounting tape to give it a 3D effect.  The bottom border is stacked on 2 layers of the foam tape.  I was trying to go for a garden fence look. It looks better in real life.

This is the back cover and I covered the spine with a piece of ribbon.