Crafty Musings by Hagit

Hello Instagram!

We took the day off today, and went to the flea market.
It was beautiful and sunny outside, and I had a chance to play around with my (new for me, but rather old) iPhone.

 I love the square photos and effects you get with the Instagram app, but I really don't want it to take over all my photos!

So... just one more? :)

This last photo I absolutely love, because I discovered it as I opened the phone to capture a completely different picture, and there it was on the sidewalk, my husband's shadow, drinking his Diet coke :)

A New Art Journal

Front cover - image transfer on canvas, which I colored with copic and gel pens:

(It's right-to-left, the Hebrew way.)

I love it when all the strings hang like that, so I used different color spools for the bobbin: red, yellow and white.
I love the rough look of this journal, with the transfer, the uneven way the canvas is cut, the strings. I think this image makes this point even better, as you can see the spine as well, and all the textures:

Inside, two signatures from papers in varying sizes, to which I added bits and scraps. This way i don't have to deal with blank pages! 

On the back cover, several image transfers, with gesso and paint. I reecntly noticed that I have a great collection of chair images. I guess that's part of my visual vocabulary. I wonder what it means!

And as I completed the journal itself, I just had to sit down and start working in it!
These are the two pages that I made:

This first one is just too green. I may have to continue working on it.

This next page I'm very happy with. It totally expresses how I felt as I was working on it!

I made this journal as part of a blog hop between Hebrew sewing blogs. If you read Hebrew, you can read all about it here.

The funny thing about inspiration and learning and process-oriented work is that when I sat down to make this journal, I had "sewn-fabric-journal" in my head. I had Teesha Moore's journals in my mind, and I watched all her fantastic videos of making fabric journals. I was 100% sure that i was going to make a Teesha Moore journal, and then this is what happened. Know what I mean?

Scrapbooking as therapy

Who knew scrapbooking could be this therapeutic?

I started this mini with Basic Grey Stella Ruby papers, because I've been hoarding them for so long, and I love them. It was time to use them. I decided to just start cutting and pasting, 

And then sewing came naturally, since these papers are made based on sewing patterns.

As I sat there, looking at my stitched papers, thinking what content to put on them, I remembered my (deceased) grandparents' pictures, and knew this album was made for them.

A place to hold stories, memories,

Birthday cards and letters and even CDs of family movies:

This small album holds so many pictures, stories and memories, and I'm happy to have them all saved in my personal way,

But what was even more special to me was the process. I started off just choosing pretty paper, and from there on I was swept by thoughts, reminiscing, sifting through old (dusty!) documents and letters and birthday cards (I had received from my grandparents), some from over 30 years ago.

DIY Postcard Swap WIP

I received my first postcard from the  iHanna's postcard swap yesterday, and it was a BEAUTIFUL postcard from Janet Briggs. You can see it here, it's the one that was sent to Israel. :-) Thanks, Janet!

I worked on my postcards last night, and enjoyed it so much! Actually, I enjoyed it so much that I stayed up till after 2:00 in the morning. Not a regular thing for an early sleeper like me.

I collaged cardstock backing with scraps

And then added on lots of gesso, paint, rub ons, ephemera, ink and stamps, and mainly had lots of fun and got my hands dirty with paint and glue!

I'm not done yet, but here's a peek.
This is one of the postcards right after collaging:

And this is what it looks like now, after more paint, an image transfer, some washi tape, ink, and ephemera:

I like it, but I'm not sure whether it's done yet. I think I'll let it "rest" and then come back and decide whether I want to continue working on it.

Here's another one:

I may add text on this one.
Back to work, then. :-) 

Babushka

She's a babushka, although I used the Gingercake winter caroller tutorial to make her :-)

I pieced together lots and lots of fabric scraps using free motion sewing, just like the ROD journals, but instead of making a journal, I put together a doll! This is how it all began:

I'm really happy with the outcome, and I absolutely love the process, too. I just love that I've used so many scraps (including selvedges), and I love sewing carelessly, just "driving" around with the machine, until I have a beautiful canvas I can work with.

Isn't she a beauty? :-)

Some scrapbooking

It's been a long time since I got out some paint and actually scrapbooked, so these two were lots of fun to make, just for me! Lots of paint, free hand cut elements, some felt, free writing, as I said - lots of fun!!

In this first one, the picture was taken last year, in Amsterdam, on a very windy day. We were desperately trying to take a picture of ourselves with a windmill in the background (because of the wind, there was no one around to ask to take the picture!), and kept getting very funny close-ups of ourselves, without any background:

 

And this is just a practice LO I made, where I used a picture I clipped from the newspaper. That also explains why there are journaling lines, but no journaling. :)

 

Remains of the Day

So some time ago, I registered to take Mary Ann Moss' class, Remains of the Day.

The problem with online classes is that I never get around to actually "participate" when the class is on, and many times I never get around to doing anything at all. This time, however, I just knew I had to do it! Free-motion stitching seemed like something I had to try, and I love Mary Ann's gorgeous journals, so even though it took some time, I did it!

The first thing I made was actually not a journal at all, but a pie carrier. I had seen something similar to this in a magazine some time ago, and really liked the idea, and as I joined a kitchen swap, I thought of combining Mary Ann's techniques into the carrier.

So here's the result:

 

A closer look:

And then I finally got around to making the journal itself:

I really enjoyed working with all those bits and pieces, and I loved all the free stitching.

For the inside, I made a different journal than that taught in the workshop. I printed out lined pages with some interesting quotes, and made three signatures:

 

Then sewed them into the journal spine:

And as you can see, I played around with some more free stitching inside, trying to actually draw something.

And...done!

Ceramic Tilda Dolls

My friend, Yael, fell in love with Tilda dolls, and instead of sewing them from a pattern, sculpted them from clay!

I think they're beautiful, and I love that she didn't stick to the original idea, and decided to create them her way:

For more pictures, visit Yael's blog.

It's a feature, not a bug!

Something funny happened in one of my recent altered domino workshops.
One of the participants stamped an image on her domino, and was very disappointed to learn that the ink was dry, and the image turned out somewhat blurry and light. She told everyone to watch out for that ink pad - can you imagine how embarassed the instructor (that's me!) was? :-)

But several seconds later, we all took a look at the "ruined" domino, and realized that the "dry ink" effect was beautiful! It sort of made an interesting light background. Here it is:

And then can you guess what happened? everyone was on the lookout for the dry ink! it was so funny. People started asking "who has the dry ink?" "I need the dry ink, where is it?" as if it were a desired new product, and not something to be trashed. These are a few of the dominos people made with "dry ink":

Can you see how the stamped image is light, uneven and imperfect? and doesn't it make a much interesting background than an even clear image?

This reminded me of how Celine Navarro stamps - without fear! Know what I mean? look at this, for example:

Now honestly, how many of you would have freaked out at such an imperfection? :-)
I think it's just perfect! It makes a much interesting texture, and gives her albums more character, doesn't it? Have a look at this beautiful mini here and you'll see some more "imperfect" stamping. I love it!

And this is when it becomes even more of a feature. See the shadowed alpha stamps here:

Celine explains how she does that: "To make this shadow behing each letter, you just have to stamp EACH LETTER twice without re-inking your stamp.I Use black Versafine ink, stamp one letter and then, without cleaning your stamp, stamp again but a little bit on the side, to make the shadow" - well, isn't that the "dry ink" technique again? :)

And I have several other examples, where the "imperfection" led to something very perfect.
A year ago, I sewed a diaper bag for my nephew's bed:

Because I'm only a beginner and my sewing skills really need to get better, as I turned the fabric to its right side, I realized there was a very crooked stitch, and not only that, but I had also left it open. So I sewed the lace on top, and I like the result even better! See, I wouldn't have thought of adding the lace without making that mistake.

And here's an example from my friend, Keshet, who made this frame in a recent workshop we both went to. She got too much glue on her frame, and it showed, and made her very unhappy. She then moved to cover it up with the aqua felt, and lo and behold! It looks so pretty, and much nicer than the original red-only frame! (that's her beautiful daughter in the pic :):

And this picture is from a recent altered photos workshop I gave. The same Keshet thought she had "ruined" her photo because her son, portrayed in the picture, got a smudge on his cheek. But then she looked again, and decided it makes him look like an indian, so she added feather to his hair:

Isn't it beautiful? She wouldn't have thought of adding the feather without that "mistake".

So what do you think? is imperfect the new perfect? :-)
I think those little imperfections are wonderful, and definitely interesting.
Have some examples of your own? Please tell me all about them/link in the comments section!

The Guest Book

My friend, Gali, celebrated her birthday several months ago, and I made a guest book where we all wished her our birthday greetings. I wrote about this in my Hebrew blog a long time ago, but this post reminded me that I had made something similar, and I wanted to share it here too.

I had returned from Japan a few weeks before the birthday party, where I bought a Fuji Instax camera, and I really wanted to use it in a way that would not only be for taking pictures, but taking instant pictures where you actually do need them on the spot. So I came up with the guest book.

I used an old book cover, inserted a binder mechanism, and put in some scrapbooking paper. I embellished the pages lightly with some stickers and ribbon, and created lines to write on with washi tape (another something I brought from Japan! :)):

 

See the library card on the right? I love it! It's a very old book, and that card even has columns for you to write whether or not you enjoyed the book!

This another one of the pages I prepared:

And these are the final pages, with our instant pictures and birthday greetings (view larger here):

 

And the book, closed:

I really liked the outcome, I think it was a great surprise for the birthday girl, and a great keepsake from her party, with pictures and birthday wishes.

If you have other original ideas for guest/birthday wish books or original ways of using my instax, I'd love to know! share them here, I'm going to need some more!:-)

(All pictures in this post were taken by Gali)