Geometric Faroese Shawl Knit-Along

This is another shawl knit-along I am working on with a Yahoo group which is moderated by Agnes Argan. It is her design for the Geometric Faroese Shawl and she posts another part of the pattern at somewhat regular intervals. I am quite far behind right now as 5 clues have been posted and I have just gotten started on clue 2, but I am progressing at a steady pace. I am using a dark green fingering weight yarn with 3.25 mm. needles. I think the pattern is quite lovely so far and I am enjoying knitting this shawl. This style of shawl is one of my favourites as it is so easy to wear.

Holiday Mystery Shawl Knit-Along

Holiday Mystery Shawl Knit-Along
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

I am participating in a shawl knit- along on Holiday Mystery Gifts Knit Along Yahoo group. Instead of a shawl I decided to to a tablecloth in bedspread cotton no. 10 in ecru on 3.00mm needles. This is clues one and 2 finished. The designer posts several pattern choices with each clue and I chose to start with Birds Eye, then knit Inverted Aran Wheatears and finished up clue 2 with Fircone. I have started clue three knitting Candlelight pattern. This will take me a few days and I will have another photo then.

Created Byhand Challenge Jan 13

Created Byhand Challenge Jan 13
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

The theme for this weeks challenge is to use the word love somewhere in a project. I created a piece with gel paints then cut it into three quarter inch squares to make the L. I placed these on a black cardstock rubber stamped with a woven background stamp in white pigment ink. The letters "o, v, e" are alphabet stamps embossed with detail copper embossing powder. This is a 4X4.5 fat book page format. You can see more entries here at the Created Byhand Challenge
I think it's about time for some blog candy, so I will draw from names of anyone who leaves a comment on this post and also says they collect fat book pages and would like this one. The draw will take place on Jan. 31, 2009 so check back then.

Edit: I will do the draw sometime on Sunday, so anyone who wants to get a last minute entry in the draw has until Sun. morning.

Bee Tag Set 2

Bee Tag Set 2
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

Here is some more of the tags for my "Tell The Bees" tag book. I made two versions of the Garden Buddies and I'm not sure which one I'll use, but I' m leaning towards the funky flower background.

Felt Wrap

Felt Wrap
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

I've uploaded all the pages from my book for the 12 Days of Christmas swap to my Flickr account. Here is a link for the slide show

or just click on the photo to go to this set of photos.

Bee Tag Set 1

Bee Tag Set 1
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

I've been working on some tags to make my own version of a "Tell The Bees" tag book. These are what I've done so far. Most of the images are collage images from PC Crafter. I've used a distressing tool, chalks and Vintage Photo" distress ink. I also painted Making Memories Asphalt paint on sequin waist and pressed in on to a tag painted with Making Memories Shopping Bag paint.

The Last Group of Journal Gifts

These are more of the felt knit journals for the 12 Days of Christmas swap. Judy, Louise and mine are fastened to the o-wires of the Zutter journal with half hitch cords with shell buttons on the spine. Judy's has a garter clip fastener, Louise's is tied with ribbon ties, Wendy's is a crochet cord held in place with a button and wrapped around the journal and mine is also a crochet cord with a button that the cord is wrapped around to hold it closed. For fastening Wendy's felt cover to the journal, I let my rebellious muse out again and did free-form crochet chain loops. This is the first time I have done felt knitting and it was a fun adventure. The first part of the journal has some of my artwork and favourite quotes and the last half is blank or background pages for the recipients to add in some of their own favourites. I will show some of the pages in my next post and maybe some of the covers under the felt which are all done with handmade papers.

More of the Journals

This is the next group of the journals I made for the 12 Days of Christmas Gift swap and this time I had four finished at one time and was able to photograph the stack. Usually the gifts were mailed at different times in order to get to the most distant destinations on time. The journals for Linda T., Jane, Nicolette and Carolyn are more felt knit covers with half hitch cords or lace ribbon to hold the felt covers to the Zutter bound books. most have shell buttons on the spine, two have ribbon ties, 1 has a garter clip and one has a sleeve clip for a closure. I didn't keep track of which one was sent to each of them, so I hope these ladies will leave a comment to let me know. The last group will be posted in a while.

My Gifts For The 12 Days of Christmas Swap

Now that my day 9 gifts have been opened I can show you the 13 books I made. The ones for Melanie, Beth, Linda C. and Kristy are knit with various wool yarns then felted in the washing machine with hot water wash and cold water rinse. I used ties, lace ribbon or half hitch knots to fasten the felted covers to the Zutter Bind-it-all books. To fasten the covers closed I used garters or sleeve clips. The cover for our hostess, Mary-Beth was the only one made differently. For hers I used a piece of felt I made a long time ago and recently found in my stash. This piece was made by laying wool roving in the brown and white pattern, basting it between fine netting and felting in the washing machine with hot water wash and cold rinse. I cut the felt to size and let my rebellious muse out to couch yarn leftover from one of the other knit covers in a random design. Although i usually like things finished neatly, I left the ends hanging out of the edges, and used a garter clip for the closure. I'll continue with the rest of the books in a new posts in a little while.

Silk Ribbon Embroidery Christmas Stocking

Silk Ribbon Embroidery Christmas Stocking
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

Whatever way you celebrate, I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday. In keeping with the season I just dug another project out of my PNE and IPE entries bin. This is crazy quilt with silk ribbon embroidery, charms and buttons. My entry won Best in Class for Christmas Stocking at the PNE in 1997 and first place for silk ribbon embroidery at the IPE in 1998.

Monthly ATC Swaps for December

The theme for this months ATC swap at the Grind is hands, and I have not managed to create for the theme before, but I did this time. It's great that I came across a bag full of fun foam hands and feet so I figured I could do something this time. I cut watercolour paper to ATC size and glued the foam hands on. These were painted with gesso and when dry they were painted with aqua or pink craft acrilyc paint mixed with white sparkle gel. After the paint was dry I stamped with an alphabet background stamp. The letters are computer generated "die cuts" printed and cut then glued on the cards.

Monthly ATC Swaps for December

On Sat and Sun I completed 27 ATCs, now I will select some to send to Yogi for her Byhand Artists monthly swap and take the rest to the monthly swap at the Grind in Vancouvernext Sunday. The last 2 groups "Starry Night" series are white or burgandy organza on blue or pink cardstock. All the images are from the Ten Two Studio Christmas Countdown. I used various charms, fibres and peel-offs to embellish.
The first group "Winter Wishes: series started with a background painted on watercolour paper. I coated the paper with matt medium and painted Vancouver Grey, African Violet and Paper Bag acrylic paint on while the gel medium was still wet, blending some of the colours and wiping some of the colour off in areas. When dry I stamped with a flower and flourish foam stamps with Spotlight acrylic paint. This was scanned and reduced in size for the background of the ATC, printed on acrylic paper. I also stamped and embossed snowflakes and then embellished.

12 Days of Christmas Gift Swap

I am part of the byhandartists Yahoo group 12 days of Christmas gift swap and the plan is to make 12 gifts and send one to each of the other 12 members of the group. Each gift is labeled with the day number it is to be opened, with day 13 being opened on your own day. My day is Day 9, so on day 9 when all the others are opening my gift I will be opening day 13 gift. This must be ooh and awed over without revealing what it is. The rest of the gifts can be talked about to our hearts content on the day they are opened. All the gifts have been sent and received and so now we wait until Dec. 13 to start opening Day 1 gift, hey that's tomorrow, oh goodie. In the meantime I have been collecting the gifts in this basket and admiring the lovely packages every time I walk by. Don't forget to check my previous post or the sidebar for a Blog Giveaway and a great sale at Artella.

New Artella Affiliate Program

Affiliate Program. I hope to explore more creativity I have been busy with a number of projects for the last while and one was to join the Artella with this program, share some giveaways with you and perhaps earn a little money with your help so I can buy more art supplies. I downloaded the first ebook freebie and tried out a project inspired by one in the book. I did not have all the supplies listed so I just created my version with what I had on hand. I made these 3 ATCs based an a card project and hope to try more soon. For these 3 I used a yellow-gold cardstock for the background and stamped with a crackle image from a cube stamp and embossed with Pirate's Gold embossing powder. I cut a 2 inch square from dark red cardstock. The small squares are green, brown and yellow-gold cardstock stamped with another image from the cube stamp and embossed with a mixture of Dragon Red, gold and silver embossing powders. These were cut to three quarter inch squares, glued to the 2 inch red square and this was glued to the ATC background. The final touch is the ribbon glued to the top. If you would like to download your own copy of this ebook please use this link or check out the link in my sidebar. If you would like to check out the Annual Gala Sale here Save 55% with the Artella Holiday Gift Gala Super Sale!

or perhaps you'd like to explore other parts of the Artella store here Find thousands of creative products in The Artella Store!

Christmas Countdown

The Ten Two Studio Christmas countdown has started today, so go to the link for some great collage images.

08 Nov ATC Happiness

08 Nov ATC Happiness
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

A scan of Happiness magnet I found in the front door threshold when we moved in. I cut out the image and mounted it on purple cardstock. This was mounted with foam mounting tape on gift bag paper which I misted with water, crumpled then smoothed out and mounted on purple cardstock.

08 Nov ATC Passionate Purple

08 Nov ATC Passionate Purple
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

More of the ATCs taken to the Monthly Grind swap. Gift bag paper mounted on purple cardstock with Cutlebug die cut flowers and one with a silk flower.

08 Nov ATC A Little Fish Music

08 Nov ATC A Little Fish Music
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

Some of the ATCs I took to the Grind swap last Sun. For these I started with torn music paper background glued to watercolour paper with matt medium. I scanned the background added my fish image and and printed on watercolour paper. The fish outline was highlighted with black Crayola sketch markers and then coloured with Portfolio Pastels. This was then scanned again and re- sized to ATCs The border of each ATC was then coloured with Portfolio Pastels and blended with a wet paint brush.

Last Sunday was the monthly ATC swap at the Grind in Vancouver, but before the swap began those of us who participated in the "Tell The Bees" tag book received the finished books. Here is my whopping 60 tag pages book. Thanks to our Queen Bee (host) Penelope Harris we have a beautiful book to treasure. Can you smell the beeswax. The covers Penelope created look wonderful and are candy foe the eyes and nose. Our ambitious Queen scanned all the tags, cut and punched them, designed the backs, collected secret messages and bee lore, as well as the wonderful little bead and wire bee on the name tag. All the art is wonderful and a big thanks to the other 14 worker bees. You can catch a glimpse of my tags in the book and check them out in my previous post.

ATC Oct 2008 Flower Garden

ATC Oct 2008 Flower Garden
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

Some paper napkin applique ATCs and one yoyo ATC I made for the Sept ATC swap at the Grind. I added small wooden picket fence embellishments to some and small pieces cut from silk flower bushes to others. The bottom right hand corner ATC is paper cut from a gift bag and embellished with a fabric yoyo and button. I made yoyos many years ago, but this is the first one I've made in a long time and the first time I used the new Clover template. It makes the process quicker and easier to do.