Adventures of the Moth Fairy :)

Recently, at Art Connection, I taught a Moth Fairy class! It was so much fun. These pics are of the Moth Fairy that I did during the class. Everyone was having a ball and I loved each and every one that was created. Everyone started with a pre-sewn moth fairy body which I sewed myself (all 18 of them) and this is a major accomplishment for me with the sewing machine :)

I know some are a bit skiddish of the Moth Fairy project. I decided to let everyone choose an image of a sweet young girl for their faces. I thought this would soften any doubts about anything creepy or scary :) I do feel this worked as everyone became quite attached to their moth fairies and some even named theirs :)

I, personally, really love working on moth fairies; they are for people who sew or don't sew. I use fabric glue, a lot, to attach embellishments; even fabric pieces. We even stamped muslin using fabric inks, and I shared a technique using Shiva Oil Paint Sticks along with rubber stamps and fabric.

I would like to thank my sweet friend, Patti Gramza, for introducing me to this wonderful art form! I find it fun, relaxing and these can also be made as gifts. One of the students, in my class,made one especially for her mom for Mother's Day!

Speaking of Mother's Day..........a very Happy Mother's Day to all of you who are moms to kids, pets or even Moth Fairies :) Love - Marilyn xxoo

A Little Humor....................

This is a picture of a birthday card for a friend of mine. I decided to go with a little humor, on this one, as my friend uses embellishments in her art - like I've never seen before! She is the Queen of Embellishments and I always love the creative ways she comes up with choosing just the right touches for her art.

I'm wishing everyone a good start to the new week. So far, the sun is shining, it's going to warm up, birds are singing, flowers are poppin'; life is good!

Love, Marilyn

The Worry Box

A friend of mine is celebrating a very significant birthday soon. I wanted to make her something special and meaningful for her celebration. She is going through a bit of a challenge, in her life, right now and I decided to make her a "worry box". I made one for myself awhile ago and it really seems to help. I am a worrier (which I even worry about) and this little box has helped me kind of prioritize my worries :) When I'm really at my "best" with worry, I make little notes on tiny pieces of paper of what my biggest worry is for the day. If it's something that I cannot control, I put the note in my "worry box" and let the box take care of it. I know this sounds silly, but it's a little exercise that seems to help me. After about a week, I open the box, take the notes out and the problem I was really sweating over, seemed to take care of itself. My hope is, this little box will help my friend.

The box is made out of an Altoid tin that I threw on the barbecue grill, last week, along with the chicken and burgers!! It really makes the tin come out funky and distressed; I love the markings when it's "done" :) I painted a black and white transparency with acrylic paints for the cover and used an image of two "sisters" or friends. I decided to use the word "true" with metal words that I dabbed with alcohol inks. Of course, I had to crown the two friends. :)

The inside of the tin is collaged and I used one of my favorite quotes - Hope is..... again, I used a metal word and I chose the words Don't Worry. I dabbed this with alcohol inks, too. The little box with the image of the pretty little girl is a matchbox that holds some significant little embellishments that should mean a lot to my friend.

So................."Don't Worry................Be Happy"!! Love, Marilyn

The "Feathered" Box................

Birds, nests, and eggs really call to me any time of the year. I love watching them and their habits especially in Spring.

This is a picture of a box that I "feathered". Recently, I came across the true definition of the word feathered. This is what I found:

v. feath.ered, feath.er.ing, feath.ers v. tr.1. to cover, dress, or decorate with or as if with feathers

This lead me to think about what we do with our art, particularly with altered art; we "feather" our subjects. :) I like to think of it in this way now.

I began "feathering" this box with Gesso (of course)-hahahaha, a gel transfer and used my stamp sheet from Green Pepper Press for stamping. This is Michelle Ward's unmounted sheet Painted Ladies. I love it and am using it a lot. I added some beeswax and then decided to create a realistic approach to the nest using some things from the outdoors. Happy Feathering my friends! Love, Marilyn

#4 Coaster

This is a picture of #4 Coaster I made for my DIL as part of the series that I've been posting the last few days.

This image really called to me; I love her expression and I think that's why I just love images of faces; children, women, men, boys, animals; it's all in the face ya know?

I decided to use the word CHANCE with this piece as what are the chances of seeing the sun here in the Northeast????? hahahahaha

Seriously, though, I really enjoyed working on these for Kate. I so hope she'll like them; they certainly were created with love :)

Bottle Art

A friend's birthday is coming up soon so I thought I'd work on a little art gift for her. I collect antique apothecary bottles for my home as well as my art. This picture is of an altered bottle. I dripped alcohol inks inside, had to use a skewer with some felt pieces to get good coverage, added a transparency inside. That was tricky but I found if I rolled it up tightly then pushed through the bottle, the transparency actually burst open inside the bottle. I didn't have to do much manuevering of it either :)

I then dripped some beeswax over the bottle, added wire, beads, fringed beads, charms and fibers. I cut up a cork and etched some design elements on a piece of metal tape, wrapped that around the cork, dabbed on some alcohol inks and added some rhinestone embellishments.

This isn't the clearest picture but it's so darned hard to take a picture of glass. Oh well; I hope this gives you an idea anyway. It was fun working on it :)

Nature is so entertaining :)

Hello Friends! I just wanted to share this with you. It's not the clearest picture but I had to take the pic through a screen in our back room. Perhaps if you click on the picture, you'll get a better look.
Ted and I were taking a break, this morning, from cleaning up outside, and we noticed this woodpecker working away at making a nest. Ted knows his birds :) and said this is the Hairy species of woodpecker and the difference between a Hairy woodpecker and a Downie Woodpecker, is the Hairies build nests in live trees as opposed to Downie's who build nests in dead trees. A little science corner from the Rocks :)

Anyway, we were observing this woodpecker and he actually got stuck in the hole. Apparently, he was testing it out to see if he could fit and he got stuck. I took a picture of him as he was in this position for the longest time and eventually got himself loose! We could actually see him bucking back and forth trying so hard to free himself. While it was funny, at same time, we were worried he'd really get stuck in there and how would be get him out? But; nature provides and he's free, now, and keeps coming back to work on the nest. Cool, huh?