Score! Birthday! Ebay! Etsy! Junking! Swaps!

September went out like a lamb, which was merciful, considering a certain number birthday--or perhaps other of life's diversions--has caused my blood pressure to rise into the danger zone. A little week-long break from blogging, Flickr, Hotmail, Etsy, Ebay, swaps, groups, and virtually everything else didn't necessarily help the BP but it did show me I really missed blogging.

I like my virtual record of art I've made, received, stuff I've done, read, etc., and although I don't post to my Blythe blog or my writing blog as often as this one, I do like to upload my photos to Flickr as soon as I take them, and organize them accordingly.

The books above, an old Alice in Wonderland, barely hanging together, and a fashion compendium with 1,000 pictures, were both found in antiques shops in North Webster, IN for $3.00 each. They're going to come in handy for altered art.

And thanks to some help from Maggie on Etsy, my Avon Small World re-collection of the eight 1970s figures is essentially complete, sans a few boxes.

The blue charm bracelet is the finished version of the charm bracelet I blogged about starting here. It traveled around the world, literally, to California, Pennsylvania, Norway and more, before making its way back to me in the Marie Antoinette Mail Art round robin charm bracelet swap.

And last but not least, the crazy assortment of goodies photo includes an Alice doll, some doll heads, a pink beaded jewelry box from Pier 1, some old Bailey's Irish Cream cups, a pretty pink rose necklace, a little lavender crescent-shaped dish, a reproduction apothecary bottle, an old tin robot and the finished version of my Zettiology skinny book, from a swap on Flickr, blogged about here. These treasures arrived via various means and reasons but all helped to make my birthday week and month special. More on the finished Zetti book soon. It's an explosion of art and color.

Meanwhile, many of the vintage books and treasures, bottles and doll heads came from one of the most wonderful places on earth: Green Oak Antiques in Rochester, IN. These three buildings are 10,000 ft2 (that's right, ten thousand) of furniture, junk, garden wire, salvage, cottage, victorian, primitive, jewelry and more.

Owner Ann Burton Wootten Furnivall and I had some great chats in person and via email about altered art, steampunk jewelry, favorite sites and more. She has some great sites: her blog Magpie Cottage, Gypsy Market on Etsy and the shop site, Green Oak Antiques.

I highly recommend a drive to Rochester from wherever you are. Out-of-state visitors are very common. You'll need several hours and probably a truck. They are open 10-5 every day but Thursday.

Heirloom tomatoes and fresh cut flowers= farmers market and fall festival

It's a different kind of art-mother nature's to be exact-that makes up my 400th blog post today. The fresh-cut flowers and produce took my breath away today, a sunny Saturday in Syracuse, where I was summoned impromptu to a festival by my daughter. You would have thought it was the first time she had ever seen altered art, snatching up a huge wooden Notre Dame sign and another "Welcome to the Lake" sign, both made of paper mache letters on old doors or shutters.

The heirloom tomatoes taste like candy and are almost as sweet as the whoopie pies we both bought- she got chocolate and I got oatmeal. My little 26-year-old even bought a bag of Amish noodles, although she insists she doesn't know how to prepare them. She must have missed my lesson on boiling water.

There was a lot of great jewelry, photography, beads, ceramic tiles and other art, which I managed to avoid, but Wawasee Antiques drew me in and sent me out later with two tiny Kewpie dolls, a couple of old medical tins and two old chandelier prisms.

Besides finishing up the round robin charm bracelet swap in the Marie Antoinette Mail Art group, I have fat book pages coming due in my new Alice in Wonderland Mad Tea Party Mail Art group, and a Halloween-time Marie-theme treat bag/supply swap due next month in the Marie group. I have one coming to me from Amanda and I send one to Rebecca.

Marie Antoinette Mail Art Book and ATCs

The results of lots of hard work by a lot of artists have paid off and come to fruition with the latest fat book by the Marie Antoinette Mail Art group, a private, juried group of 75 artists, of which I am proud to be one.

Rhonda Thomas hosted this lovely 4" x 4" book of all original art by 17 artists, who each made 17 pages, so that everyone would have a finished book. I am treasuring mine. You can see some of the pages above. Mine is the Marie with removeable masquerade mask. More about my hand-painted pages here.

The six artist trading cards are from the same group, a swap in which each person used rubber stamps to create Marie-related images. Other ATC swaps in the MAMA group have included "Marie cuties" and "Big Hair Maries." Still waiting for the spoils of that one to arrive.

I am presently in a charm bracelet round robin with that group: sending bracelets along to eight other people, adding charms as they arrive in my mail. Can't wait to get my finished bracelet back!

And I am also making a Marie torso for Terri Gordon as part of the Marie Halloween swaps going on. I already received my torso from Tristan Robin Blakeman. More about that here. One of my torsos is above as well as my charm bracelet.

Look at all this good STUFF!

So much mail, so little time! Let me try to describe the who, what, when, where, why and how of all this fabulousness, from the top down.

The torso extraordinaire is from Tristan Robin Blakeman in the Marie Antoinette Mail Art group Dress Form Swap. The artist trading cards are from the same group, the Little Marie Cuties swap. I blogged about my submissions here.

The Fasteeth is a treasure from Etsy which I am saving, along with the sprinkler head, Jello mold, insulator, flower frog, knobs and more, for something special. I'll know it when I make it.

The doilies, the miscellaneous below the doilies and the tins all came from my IRL art friend Constanza who is paring down her altered art supplies on Etsy also, having moved into a smaller place. Check out her wonderful offerings of supplies and also finished artwork, like the "Under the Elm Tree" piece in the bottom photo.

In the next to last photo are some treasures I found at Green Oak Antiques, in Rochester, IN. Less than an hour from my home and 31 years in existence, and I had never been there. What's wrong with this scenario?

Marie Mail Art Project...off in the mail

My Marie Antoinette starter charm bracelet heads off to California tomorrow, complete with a sign-in book for the guest artists to take and leave a Moo card in the envelope pocket pages. There will be eight artists in our Marie Antoinette Mail Art group's charm bracelet sub-group besides myself who will add charms to my bracelet in this round robin swap. Eventually the finished bracelet will make its way back to my wrist, fuller for the experience. Can hardly wait to see it!

Big Hair is Always Good

Just some crazy big-haired Marie Antoinette artist trading cards I made Sunday for a swap in the Marie Antoinette Mail Art group. Marie was well-known for trend-setting and elaborate hats and poufs were at the top of her list. She is said to have worn a replica of a ship on her head and live nature settings; I wonder if she ever had a fish, a bee skep, bird's nest, fruit salad or sea shells on her head?

Weekend Busy-ness: Due vs Do, Deux Jours, Not Enough, Mon Dieu!

Here are a few of the artist trading cards (ATCs) or some call them ACEOs: Art Cards, Editions and Originals that I made for two swaps in the Marie Antoinette Mail Art group. I am just loving this new group I was recently lucky enough to be juried into. I made a dozen all original, all handmade (no digital skills for me) cards Saturday. These are off in the mail Monday, and then I need to get to work painting 17 4" square book pages for the group's fat book page swap. I sketched some ideas last night. Not sure if I want to go with hand-drawn, hand-painted pages or my usual collage with embellishment.

I really feel like I've been busy all weekend, yet I've accomplished little else except to make a list of all the art and writing projects I have due or want to do.

I saw the absolute most darling paper mache ever here on Pam Garrison's blog, so I've been dying to try to make something like these. I also have the doll heads and fat canvasses, so I want to make a dolly canvas like Lisa Kaus here or Beth Quinn here. I have a great sprinkler head just waiting for me to make a robot like this. And I have a new blank watercolor journal so I can journal like Pam does here. I also want to draw girls like Suzi Blu so I joined her Ning group to take a class.

I packed up some Earthenwood beads like these for a trade with Lorelei for this bracelet from her Etsy. She is so talented! I have several things from her shop. I also upended my own Etsy shop. Take a peek. And I am drooling over my recent Etsy purchases of this darling birdie from Michigan, swimmer-person from the U.K. and Steampunk canvas from the oh-so-talented DeBriNa in Cali.

Today I squeezed in a little time to properly dress and coif my new, unnamed Blythe, which I blogged about here. One of my Blythe dolls is going to Aunt Maggie for a face-up.

And over the weekend I tried to work a bit on the first five pages of a manuscript that is due by July 3 for a writing workshop, where I can not only have it evaluated by an author or editor, but I can pitch it to an agent, and I can enter it in a contest. That would be the Midwest Writers Workshop; can't wait! If only weekends were made of five days, and work, deux.