Fabric Book of Roses

I love making fabric books I like to see how I can make each page different. This one has embroidery stamping printed images and fabric collage and its a good way to use up all the supplies I have stashed away. In between the pages I have placed compressed wadding but I wont be using it again I found it quite hard to machine on. When the pages were machined together I hand sewed them into a cover. I shall soon be able to open a library of handmade books I feel one about Autumn colours coming on.

Mixed Media the Next Page

This page is a collage its as near as I'm likely to get to a photo taken at Scalea Southern Italy of old houses going up a hill. The roof tops are made from corrugated card and the tree from other papers.
I have been making my daughter a scrapbook of most of her baby pictures up until she left home. She is now 40 so it took me sometime
three weeks in fact. I felt I had been doing it day and night. Some days I started at nine and went on till four in the afternoon. Oldish photos are not the easiest to deal with I think the camera used at the time was a Kodak and some of the colour is not very good I didn't have the time or the skill to update them in photoshop.

Another Altered Book Page

The title for this book is Beautiful Creatures.
I thought the ballet is very lovely and chose Swan Lake for the beautiful swan. The pages are collaged with paint papers and finished with the pictures and oil pastels. I like collage messing with paint and papers the only thing is its time consuming getting all your stuff out sorting and then getting more out putting it all away and then clearing up the mess.
This spread has turned out very well it all hangs together.

Altered Book Page

Altered book for Becky the theme was along the lines of sending a letter from yourself when young and then from older self. I thought this was a bit scary when I first saw the theme but it was quite a fun one to do. My thoughts went back to when I was 16 I left school at 15. Remember my grandmother telling me she left school at 14 and thinking she was still a child. My granddaughter has just finished college to start teaching and she is almost 23.I collaged about what was big in my life then I headed the page Return to Sender Address Unknown that let me out of writing a letter much to busy having fun at that age.If you look there is a picture of me at 16 on the little book we even looked innocent in those days. The second half you can see is not so busy but life is good and the heading is One More Step Along the World I Go with a book of quotes that have helped me through difficult times.

Altered Book

I have been quiet on my blog lately I have joined an altered book swap with mixedmediauk- see links. I have never made one before I always thought it was a mystical operation I wouldn't be able to do. Becky on the group explained all to the new ones and yes I have done it. There are eight of us in the swap and we post the book off to a new person every month so it wont be back to me

until next year. We all chose our own themes mine is The Lady and the Garden I like anything to do with flowers and gardens. Some of the themes are a bit more difficult than mine I will tell you about them as they come to me. I hope you will be able to follow my instruction for making the book and please leave me a comment I would love to know what you think.

This is the last spread I did. Its painted stamped collaged with paper napkin poppys and worked into with paintstik and other crayons. The lady was put into photo editing and turned into an oil painting this sounds as though Im good at photos but Im not I just played around with this its just a matter of clicking and using a slider. I havent yet worked out how to do layering its probably quite simple if someone shows you how to do it

I use a free programme called paint.net just enter this into search and its a free download. I have

now posted my book onto the next person.

Fabric Birds atc

Atc cards were made for a swap at mixed media uk yahoo group. I havent made any for sometime and found it very confining to work in this small space again. They are birds of bling the middle one looks as though he is about to take off.

Christmas Banner

I made this banner for my church about two years ago its one of three of mine that are put up every Christmas. This picture shows the main part of the banner and has been chosen for the church Christmas card this year. Although it doesn't show there is quite a bit of glitter that I

enjoyed using kings must shine. I had to stretch this around a board to illiminate any wrinkles in the fabric for the photo but the banner was edged in fringing and hung from a small pole.

Paper Fabric Wall Hanging

I like this one and it didn't take long to make. Tissue book pages and music were glued with pva onto cotton when dry were painted and stamped. The birds were made in the same way and hand sewn onto the backing. The leaves were machine embroidered and beaded, then it was backed with batting and more cotton which were machined together. I added my own handmade paper to the bottom and added machine wrapped cords with papier mache beads. I wanted to use the words at the bottom of the hanging about the best birds,I find this very inspiring if I think my talents are not good enough to take part in any project.

Paper Fabric Quilt

The size of this quilt is 12"x12". The backing is cotton collaged with pictures and tissue, the flower and pot was made from more paper fabric and machined on and wadding put on the back. As I made it over a year ago I cant remember exactly how I made it. The idea came from the magazine Cloth Paper Scissors. I have only made this one so far.

Mixed Media Wall hanging

A wall hanging made from Beryl Taylor's book Mixed Media Explorations. The feathers are machine embroidered onto paper,hand embroidered or done on water-soluble material. I must go back to this book as I would like to make a medieval type book sometime.