365! I did it. Done!

#364

#365

 To me: Congratulations!











My kitties in the landscape will not end with this project. I have many more vintage postcards and several more kitties to go.








Voila! My last card of this 365 Mail Art project. I thought a lot about what I'd end with and since I discovered that I had a two or three more Tiny Town blanks, this felt like the perfect way to end the project.
On the reverse: Mme Brunau brought Simone to Tiny town on the last day of the year, to quietly wish the residents a bonne année. The residents responded, "merci." 

And again, here are the words of my offspring - the motto of their business, The Alternative Speakers Bureau.
Say this to yourselves and believe it.
Do something, make something, and share with me.

I'll be continuing to make Mail Art, and other stuff! See you in the new year.

Only 2 days to go, oh my!

 Just out of the oven - the delicious sweet potato pound cake! I was mindful to lower the oven temp and to shorten the cooking time a bit, and voila, perfection! The recipe is on my recipe blog HERE.

#361

#362

#363

More Kitties in the environment cards. I'm having fun. I'm adding a sentence about what's happening, on the reverse. I"ll leave it to your imagination.










I have only 2 more cards to make to complete my third, and LAST, 365 Mail Art project. Whew. I've got my last one planned out in my mind. A good ending. However, that said - I'll still be making Mail Art, just not daily, and not posting them, unless I feel like it.

Ta Da!

Another post, so soon after the last! Oh My.

 I've been making more finger-less gloves/mitts/wrist warmers, whatever you call them, and noticing my palette. Very orange! I'm not even a big orange fan! The pair on the left is made from English organic cotton and organic merino wool Very nice feeling. The pair on the left is from a blend of silk and cotton, not so silky but nice, and good for someone who can't wear wool. My next pair - a different color for sure. By the way, I'm selling mitts at NEST.

#360

I am so close to the end. Notice the number on this mail art! I put a little English girl on a postcard of an English painting. She so HUGE. I think I wrote on the back something about her "playing loudly and enthusiastically hoping to distract the hunters and hounds, thereby saving the fox. "

Ta Da! Her's our girl, doing some fancy footwork with a knitted boa. She's 9 months old and walking! Yikes!

Have any of you taken the dialect quiz? I've been placed in Richmond and Arlington, VA & Washington D.C. based on two words, but the dark red areas show were my speech is most like other speakers in those areas. My natal city isn't so dark, and what about that spot in the west that so deep red, in Colorado? And is that little dark patch by the gulf Alabama or Mississippi? Take the quiz and let me know how you fare.

Another week gone by - happy Wednesday

 Here's the Mail Art catch up since last week. Mail Art and only Mail Art in this post.

Is it too much to bear?

 Cards #352 through #355 use stamps themes.  Some with random letters some with text.

 Cards #356 through #359 are altered cards using vintage Kitties (printed in Germany from a flea market) to create narratives.

I wish I could have grouped these cards differently, like in a grid, but Blogger doesn't allow much control or else I haven't figured out how to do it in all these years.

Hope these weren't too much at once. I seem to be blogging less frequently. Hmmm.

It's Wednesday! Midweek hooray!

 Hats for sale! Hats for sale! My sister makes lots of hats for little ones and hasn't any outlet for them. She sent a dozen to our grandgirl, who looks so cute in them. Now she's sent me a bunch which I'll put into my Etsy shop at some point. However, if you need a last minute gift for a baby, let me know, I've got hats galore.

Here are a pair of my mitts keeping Bad Girl Art's Keithley's hands warm. They're made from cotton and linen blend yarn. Oh, look, they kind of match her puppy!

 Chilly weather here, so tea time is anytime during the day. N gave me a lovely gift of a Tardis tea "ball." How cool. It's big enough to fill with tea for a pot but also works in a big mug with a smaller measure of tea. I love it! And that's my nice breakfast blend tea from Carytown Teas.

#349

I'm coming into the final stretch of my 365 project - can't believe it. A relief in so many ways, but hopefully my practice is well established and I'll carry on daily in my studio.

#350

In this series, I'm using old postage stamps to create scenes. Above, a landscape of a city with a bridge, airplanes overhead, and a bus headed for the bridge. In the one on the right, a family takes a walk in a city, visiting the sites.

#351

I'm totally not religious but what does one do with sooo many Madonna and Child stamps! Look, a Mary Cassatt painting in the center. I like this theme, it works so well. What do you think?

Brrrrr, so chilly here!

 We've made some new friends, the owners of NEST, where my honey will have an exhibit in February and currently has 3 pieces on preview.

My mitts are now for sale there, too. I've got to get busy knitting more with all the new yarn from my favorite yarn shop, now closed as of today. waaaa (me crying)

 Every day, I find Bizoo being places that I didn't know about, like IN the fern in the shower. The fern was going into winter mode and Bizoo was taking advantage of a nice outdoor experience while watching water go down the drain.

My friend, whom I call Prima because we share the same family name (with one letter difference,) is now the owner of MerryMaker. This is a shop where our kids used to spend their allowance money on Mrs. Grossman stickers! Here she is holding, for all you Harry Potter fans, a quill pen set. It's a fabulous set and she only has a couple left. Run over there and buy one. Very cool!

  Everytime I visit I find something I need, like Washi tape, notecards in Spanish, cool paper to make into Mail Art cards, and lots of things to just look at.

Stop in and say Hello, if you're in the area.

#346

#347

#348

Here are the series of cards that I made relating to the chilly weather this week. Brrrrr, that's what these cards say.











I used pen and ink with water, and then some rubber stamping to complete the composition.












Can't you just feel the chill?

More catching up.

 I love being by the ocean. I love the sound of the waves, the smell of the sea, the lines in the sand and the BIG sky. It's so peaceful and so immense, all of it.

 Last Saturday, I participated in a craft sale. Keithley of Bad Girl Art, invited 9 of us to participate at her home. It was such fun and quite successful. I sold more than half of the mitts that I brought with me. The two tiny hats in the photos are by my sister, who makes them out of cotton for babies. I haven't put anything back in my Etsy shop yet, as sales are brisk in face to face.

#341

More old rubber stamps. Kittens watching the rain clouds go by.

#342

I'd forgotten all about this beautiful "peace" stamp. I think I'll make a bunch more of these to send out for the New Year.

#343

Does this one look like ocean waves with moon and stars in the sky?

#344

Here's a sampling of some of my old cancellation stamps all in a clump. The card was askew on the scanner but I didn't fix it. Sort of more active looking this way.

#345

The triangle stamp is one that I never used as it was just too triangular and solid. However, it made a nice mountain background for this card. Don't you think so?

Update on everything!

 For American thanksgiving day, we went to Avon, a hamlet on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. It was really peaceful. This is a view of a sand pile that was next to our car, it was vertical but the lines give the illusion that it's a flat plane going off into the distance, right? So interesting.

 This is the view of the sun setting on the sound from our balcony.

#337

#338

#339

#340

I'm nearing the end of my third year long daily project. This will be the last one that I do. I'm happy that this is coming to an end. I'll continue to make Mail Art, maybe even daily, but I won't have to scan and post daily which will be a good thing for me.







In this series of Mail Art pieces, I've dug around in the unused rubber stamp box. These are old friends and I'm happy to be using them again.









I'd forgotten what fun it is to make these little narratives with rubber stamps.











It's like visiting with old friends.

Mail Art Monday! and more.

 Beautiful lettuces were available at the farmers' market on Saturday. I loaded up on them. I put them into "green" bags so they'll stay fresh for our holiday fest.
This is the market I went to at St. Stephen's church. It's quite convenient and will become an indoor market in winter. Yay. Fresh, local, seasonal veggies, and eggs.

I have to share my Japanese Maple tree with you. It's so brilliant, I mean like for real ELECTRIC brilliant. Isn't it beautiful?














I'm getting back into my pens, cleaning them up - I've mentioned this earlier, and now I've indulged myself with 2 new pens. Quite inexpensive ones but they write nicely. The larger one is a Lamy Nexx and the smaller one is a Pilot Petit with green ink in it for the moment. I do like using fountain pens but they do require maintenance!

#325

 Using reproduction Victorian scraps on vintage postcards is quite fun. It's kind of like Tiny Town someone suggested. Perhaps these kids are on their way there. What do you think?

#326

I like the incongruity of the kittens playing with a bowl of gold fish amongst the cacti, and the girl and her kitten having a picnic on the lawn.

#327

#328

 Here I'm using a new postcard of an old painting paired with a REAL vintage Victorian scrap. An odd series of kittens dressed up, and in this instance, holding a toy bear. My honey got the in a flea market in Paris, I think.

#329

Here the kitten is wearing clogs and a fez. So odd, so odd. He's strolling across a vintage landscape postcard.
I have more of these, so you'll be seeing them again.