First day of a new month!

#113

#114

Mail Art by Miss Z

Arms and Art

Arms and Lips

PINK

The grand girl, Miss Z, was sitting at the studio table with me while I was making Mail Art. She wanted to make some, also, and used what she found at hand. She's really good at using a glue stick and a burnisher (she's only 3!!) and know what she wants regarding composition. She, also, has a sense of humor!
    The Arms are a part of my eMail Art series. I'm having fun with it and when I don't have Global postage handy, I can send one of these.
   Pink is an old card of mine from 2004. I'd printed up some of my collages into cards and I just found this one this morning. I altered with a pink postage stamp and am sending it to the Pink Mail Art call by Tofu.  Find more information HERE.

Mail Art, of course, and More, of course.

#107

#108 front

This pink mail art was in response to a call from Tofu, out in California.

There are a few days left to the dealine if you want to participate.
HERE








I used the cover of an old, very distressed book, to make this piece of mail art. It was fun to just change it up a bit and, also, it felt good not to just toss the book in recycling.

 

 

#108 reverse

#109

Mail Art installed in window

Interior display

The above piece of Mail Art is a reference to the fabulous paper dolls of Stephanie Blake. Her's are amazing. Search her name to see more, if you have a moment.

Well, the Mail Art is installed and it looks excellent.

The solution that Lauren, at Rostov's Coffee and Tea shop, came up with is excellent.

The window display and the one inside are both so appealing. You can see the more photos of the exhibit and all of the cards entered at the bicycle blog.
HERE


Viewers are encouraged to pick up and interact with the Mail Art pieces on display inside. The entries are all on display. I hope that this exhibit will encourage others to take up making and sending out Mail Art.

Have you made any lately?

A new year!

#1

 Happy New Year!

The holiday season has come and gone and my wrists no longer ache from production knitting, and a new year has begun.

I decided to grab some pieces out of the tin of colored paper. My grand and I have been making circles so I have a lot of paper with holes punched out of them. Layering them makes for a lively piece of Mail Art, I think. 

#2

 Working with this old colored paper is fun but frustrating in that I have to keep it really clean as it marks easily and if glue gets on it, it doesn't clean up nicely. Oh, am I a bit too precise here. It's ONLY Mail Art! And I noticed, when we saw the Matisse Cut Out show that he wasn't precise or neat. And his work is so amazing!

 Our trip to New York City was really good. We saw that Matisse Cut Out show at MoMA, and M took us to the Noguchi Museum in L.I.C. after we went to PS1 in Queens. Really liked both of those museums. My first time for the Noguchi.

The weather was okay, not very cold, though rainy the first couple of days. But who cares when shoes are bright!

This is a view out a bathroom window in PS1. I was on a quest for boring photos for the Boring group that I'm part of. It turned out to be not so boring to me.  Since I've been looking for things to photograph that are boring, I've had a very interesting time. Go figure.

And FYI, summary of my Mail Art 2014 - I made and sent 256 numbered cards. I send a few un-numbered but can't remember how many so maybe I'll round up to 260. I'm pleased with that considering I'm NOT doing a 365 project.

Now, on to my resolution - getting rid of stuff daily, even it only one item. I was proud of myself, I threw away my old date stamp that didn't go beyond 2014 when I got my new one that started with 2015. I did think momentarily of the possibility of the old one being a sought after vintage item in the future. But tossed it anyway. YAY, me! Good start to 2015.

Did you make a resolution? or two?

Toile-la-la purse for change

I had some of that cute toile print fabric left from the purse I made so I made a purse for change. I just posted it and a couple other new ones in Fritzi, my Etsy shop. I just love toile!! What is it about this type of print and me? Check out my shop and see what's new. I had a private sale yesterday when my friend J came by to do some shopping for gifts. It was fun to show her all of my totes and purses and get her reaction, which I must say was, POSITIVE! yay! An afternoon of sharing, drinking tea, eating banana bread, how perfect.

Toile-la-la

There are a lot of features in this bag I created for a charity auction, which I don't do on my Fritzi shop bags, in order to keep the costs down. For this bag, I made an adjustable strap, have an inside pocket with a hook and loop closure, and the bag is reversible. The Toile is the outside BUT it can be reversed for the floral exterior. I included a matching Purse for Change. Also, this is new fabric. I wanted to have some pink for reference to cancer, and created it in honor of our cousin, who just finished her chemo. The name of the bag: Toile-la-la!

Elflog - this morning

This morning, my little cousin and I put a pink ribbon on the shelf for his mom. We were really excited to see the new things. "Peace" in wire writing and a yellow flower on a stick. The little beads and things on the shelf itself had been rearranged. What a treat to see this shelf!

Think Pink? or Think Again!

As you've read in previous posts, I'm very concerned about the safety of skin care products and cosmetics. My daughter alerted me to a way that we can make our voices heard by sending letters to cosmetics companies via a web site called Think Before you Pink
Clik on their "take action" button. Also, see
mica's blog on the subject. We can make a difference in the market place. Don't buy products that contain known or suspected carcinogens, don't do it. Check out your products on the Safety Date base, Skin Deep.
You're worth it, spend the time, spend the money, do it as if you life depended on it, because it may. Can I make this any stronger? Don't give your money to companies that don't care about your health. Take action!

This just in...more about Cancer awareness.

My cousin just sent this e-mail. She had a bi-lateral mastectomy last month so is, naturally, very concerned. She has made herself very knowledgeable about products and here's what she found out. I have to admit, I'm the one who bought this bottle for her at a sporting goods store, thinking that it'd be SAFE! Fortunately, she did the research.

Hi all,

I need to spread the word that several stores across the U.S. are selling this pink water bottle (pic attached), called the "Breast Cancer Awareness Bottle," and that it would be in your best interest to NOT PURCHASE IT! It contains chemicals linked to Cancer, specifically BISPHENOL-A (BPA). This is an ingredient used to make polycarbonate. Canada has BANNED these bottles and other products made with this chemical, but our own Food and Drug Administration says that the link to cancer "cannot be proven," so these products are still on the shelves!

This BPA bottle is technically not refillable because once the bottle warms up/heats up and reaches a certain temperature, the toxins from the plastic bottle can transfer to the liquid you are drinking inside it. Repeated cooling and then thawing/warming of bottles made with this chemical is not recommended.

The next time you drink from ANY plastic water bottle be sure to turn it over and look for the number inside the little recyclable logo. If it has a number 7, make sure you throw the bottle away after drinking its contents. PLEASE DO NOT REFILL, CHILL AND REUSE BOTTLES UNLESS THEY ARE BPA-FREE!! Fortunately, there are BPA-free brands available to us, just do a Google search.

I cannot believe the irony in this situation. A product is being sold to bring awareness to Breast Cancer and it's not safe and may actually cause Cancer?!

KNOWLEDGE IS POWER, PEOPLE! SPREAD THE WORD!

x.o

In the neighborhood, pole news

An amazing item appeared on the pole where the shelf used to be. It's an assemblage on cardboard. Pretty wonderful. Also, some flowers and gift ribbon adorn the pole. I'm so intrigued by the continuation of community art making/shrine keeping. Neat!! I wanted to share with you some of the flowers from my neighbor's yard. She does wonderful rose bushes and these two were such sweet looking blooms, kind of old fashioned looking. Her hydrangea bush is quite large and bull of blossoms. It's in full sun, while mine are in the shade and haven't bloomed yet.

Pink

This post is for Dawn. Yesterday, our cousin Dawn had a bi-lateral mastectomy. Today, at my hair cutting place, they were making a cancer survivor chain in preparation for their annual Lance Armstrong cancer awareness day. I added a link in the chain with Dawn's name on it. I'm wearing a pink tee shirt in her honor. (I rarely wear anything but black) She is a survivor. I'll be going to spend time with her in a few days.

Spring in Richmond

My dog and I enjoyed seeing all the flowers on our walk the other day. Huge purple irises planted by an apartment building, a single yellow tulip in my neighbors' yard, big pink blooms on the...oops, forgot the name of the flower, on the bush at the end of the alley, my deep fuschia azalea bush in the back yard, which I trimmed back a lot last fall and now has bigger blossoms, though I'm not sure I did the pruning correctly. It's raining really hard today, with thunder and lightening earlier, I think the blossoms will either be very bruised or even better looking next time I'm out on a walk.