snow far, snow good

we had the first significant snowfall of 2016 here in central new jersey last night, though thankfully today it has warmed up enough to turn to rain and melt most of our accumulation. i'll tell you somewhere that i always LOVE to see snow, though, is on a papercrafting project, like these giftbags:

i stenciled the flakes with modeling paste on dark blue store-bought gift bags; then added sparkly ribbon and some stacked snowflake diecuts i made using a few more "surplus" color burst panels i made over the course of the last few months. for one reason or another, these guys weren't quite right at the time, but i never chuck them out, because i know that i will find a use for them!!! 

another place that snow is popular just now is the simon says stamp monday challenge blog, where they say, "let there be snow", so i'm linking up with them. 

in other news this week, the outside lights are on our house...

...we visited the annual gingerbread contest at peddler's village in lahaska, pa...

...had a most scrumptious christmas tea at teaberrys in flemington, nj; and made a few more eyelet outlet washi quilt cards, in order to call my 2016 xmas card production FINISHED and get the last few cards in the mail!

(can i get a, "WOOHOO"?!)

how has your week been, darlings? i hope you've found time for a treat or two! ♥♥♥

speaking of art friends...

...on saturday i finally got to meet up with my fellow cardmaker and jersey girl lorraine, of paper vernissage! together we drove up to paper anthology in kenvil, nj, to take elisabeth's utterly awesome ranger techniques class. here are my cards:

is that distress ink bokeh-effect card gorgeous or what?! and howsabout that sweet dina wakley bird on his background of blended distress paints? not to mention the fabulous alcohol inks we combined to make a granite effect and then embossed on top of. want to learn how to make all of these? elisabeth will teach this one last time on april 21st and there are still places available.

meanwhile, i'll be teaching my scraptastic rainbow cards twice more: this coming wednesday, april 8th; and sunday, april 19th... i'd love to see you there! ♥ see full details for all the great offerings in the class section of the paper anthology website.

from norway (& nj!) with love

recently i had the very great pleasure of having my lovely friend linda brun come to stay for 10 entire days of art-making, treat-eating, shopping, cooking, journaling, crocheting... in other words, pretty much the best STAYCATION ever! :)

cool chicks onna train
(photo by linda brun)

during that time we made several excursions into new york city: we had dim sum at golden unicorn, took in the feast for the eye that is the rubin museum, and even cruised a couple of favorite thriftshops on 17th street... (angel street and housingworks chelsea) ...tho alas, we have no amazing finds to report from the latter.

sesame balls... my favorite!

on a different day we met up with massachussetts' sweetest and most talented freestyle crafter sandi taloumis, and together we all rode the subway a few short stops out of manhattan to visit the brooklyn art library, home of the massively inspirational sketchbook project*! obviously we had to do a bit of art shopping, as well, at blick and the ink pad. in the face of such overwhelming fun, i somehow managed to take NO PHOTOS AT ALL, so i'm posting (with permission) this one linda took of the three of us (plus 2 extraneous passers-by, lol!) that i really love:

in front of the ink pad
(this pic and lots more awesome ones by linda brun; go check out her instagram account!!!)

the main purpose and event of linda's visit, though, was what we came to call "art camp". we set up a big long folding table in the living room, loaded it with supplies-- paint, stencils, stamps, pens, pigments, vintage paper, magazines, modelling paste, and pretty much anything else that struck our fancy-- and spent the majority of our free time playing and experimenting in our journals. you can see linda's work on her blog-- my favorites are the series of "found faces" that she made over the course of several days; i posted some of my things on instagram at the time, but here are a couple more pages, both finished...

craft paint squirted right out of the bottle, tinted modeling paste thru circles stencil, lots of outlining, plus hand drawn and shadowed bricks. the latter were linda's idea, she thought the word looked like graffiti--this is why it's great to make art in the same room with other people, i would not have thought of bricks! :)

...and unfinished:

modeling paste through a fern stencil, shadowed with stabilo pencil on top of random ink spotches; i'm not in love with this one, but i wasn't really going for a finished product, just playin' with my stuff! 

finally, to cap the whole visit off in style, linda made fabulous new multi-media journals for herself, sandi and i:

we are going to all three work in each of them in turns, via the mail, so that at the end we will each have a book with work by all of us in it. i'm thinking we'll all need to meet up again next year to review the end result! well, ladies? who's in?

♥♥♥♥♥

*the sketchbook project-- both as an idea and an exhibition--is AWESOME; however one thing you might not realize until you get there (at least, we didn't!) is that you won't be allowed to just randomly pull books off the shelves and flick through them, each item must be requested electronically and will be brought to you by one of the librarians. for maximum enjoyment, it's a great idea beforehand to cruise the digital library, create a free account, and make yourself a little queue of examples you'd like to see in person! meanwhile, the brooklyn art library is a short, safe walk from the L train at bedford ave, through a neighborhood with plenty of shops, restaurants and other fun places to visit! well worth the trip! ♥

merry christmas!

whether or not you are celebrating today, i hope you are having a wonderful, calm, happy day... and maybe even have a few treats to look forward to! in case your preferences run to eye candy, here are a few photos from our trip to longwood gardens on sunday:

longwood gardens, in kennett square, pennsylvania, close to the delaware state line, is glorious in EVERY season, but secretly, christmas time might be my favorite, as you can see, they go ALL OUT in terms of decor!

most of these pics were taken with my iphone; jeff shot using our "real" digital camera, and we made a little flickr album of those to share with members of the family who couldn't come with us that day.

if you go to longwood, it's a really good idea to pre-book tickets online because they get quite a few bus tours in addition to individuals and families, so it's possible a drop-in visitor could be turned away if they are full. (this has never happened to anyone we know, but especially at xmas we do tend to book ahead.)

in addition to bringing your camera and some comfy shoes, you'll want to save a bit of time and a few extra calories to have a cup of longwood's justifiably famous, uber-rich, creamy mushroom soup in the cafe. there is also a more formal restaurant on site, but we like the quickness of the cafeteria-style one, and the menus (including availability of beer and wine for the over-21 crowd) are similar in both places.

all of the indoor and outdoor facilities at longwood-- including the enormous 20-room conservatory which houses most of the christmas display during the holiday season-- are wheelchair-friendly and very accessible. there are wheelchairs and motorized scooters available to rent on a first-come, first-served basis. we've gotten a scooter for my mother-in-law several times, and it makes it possible for her to enjoy the very same experience as the rest of the family.

we've been to longwood... gosh, i'm not even sure how many times! it's quite near jeff's parents' house, so it's a semi-regular stop for our family. but no matter how many times we visit, the experience is always different, and always wonderful! ♥

random thoughts on november 6th

thinking:
it's NOVEMBER 6th already!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! how the heck did that happen??!

making (and taking!)
the awesome projects at paper anthology's gala third anniversary bash last weekend, which was SO! MUCH! FUN! plus i got to meet my lovely blogging friend and fellow jingle belle, jess of jess crafts, who is even nicer irl! :)

speaking...
...of paper anthology, i'm BEYOND excited to announce that i'll be teaching my very first card-making classes there on sunday, november 16th; wednesday, december 2nd; and saturday, december 13th, you can read more about it in the newsletter or the class section of the website. if you're in or around central new jersey, i heartily invite you to come along and make some christmas cards with me!!!

thanking:
the sisterhood of snarky stampers who've crowned me the queen of snark for my pink halloween card! ta v. much, darlings, i shall try to live up to this great honor!!! i get to be a guest designer for their next outing, so i'm really looking forward to that. (meanwhile, nobody tell them that making that card to celebrate their awesome "hopeful halloween" challenge was already a pretty cool reward all its own, kthx.)

eating:
too much halloween candy, i blame the youth of today; wouldja believe we only had *TWO* trick or treaters! TWO!!! in retrospect, last year's total of five seems positively massive, doesn't it?

listening: 
to the first book in the st. mary's institute time travel series by jodi taylor, "just one damned thing after another" and i'm totally hooked. most reviewers compare her to connie willis, especially "to say nothing of the dog" and i definitely see why; but it reminds me more of jasper fforde's thursday next series. really, though, once you get past the similarities of theme, it's very much its own thing and utterly engrossing.

drawing and painting:
all sorts of fun stuff, like mandalas, autumn leaves, cupcakes... whatever jumps into my head at 10:30pm after i've finished my official evening project and i'm starting to wind down towards bedtime.

watching:
peter capaldi as doctor who, and enjoying it even more than expected. i was ready for his slightly-less-cuddly version of the doctor... (going back to a style more like early doctors william hartnell and patrick troughton, as opposed to more recent veterans matt smith and david tennant) ...but i didn't expect him-- or the scripts-- to be as charming or as much *FUN* as they are. kind of bummed that saturday is the finale of this series, especially since i suspect we'll be left with more questions than answers!

treasuring:
nephew matthew's gift of two of his awesome minion peeps-- especially since it was his very own idea. thanks for sharing those with me, buddy, i loOOOOoOoove minions!!!

best wednesday ever?

yeah, i'm pretty sure it was. yesterday, i mean. thanks to a couple of lovely crafty friends who let me hang out with them in new york city! the ladies in question are linda brun (who's from norway, here on vacation) and sandi taloumis (who, like me, came in on the train, just for the day). between the three of us we put a sizable dent in the city's stock of art supplies and thrift shop merchandise! here we are at the ink pad, with many thanks to anna for taking A LOT of photos before we managed one without me looking like i was having some sort of weird facial seizure:

 

don't believe me? here's a picture of the three of us on 14th street: sandi has a lovely smile... linda has a lovely smile... lauren looks like she just swallowed a bug. yeah. that's usually what i look like in pictures, lol!

but back to the fun stuff! here's linda outside the ink pad, which has a really cool board that miss hayden (who works there) made:

we also went to ♥SEVEN♥ thrift shops, which might be a personal best for me. in case you're planning a trip to new york and have only a limited amount of time, i will share one of my favorite thrifting secrets with you: on east 23rd street there are SIX charity shops within about three blocks of each other; not to mention a cool art shop*, the subway** and a post office (just in case you buy something HEAVY, lol!) walking east on twenty third street, from lexington avenue, they are:

housing works 

157 east 23rd street 

(betw lexington and 3rd ave)

salvation army 

208 east 23rd street 

 (betw 3rd and 2nd ave)

cauz for pawz 

212 east 23rd street  

 (same block)

goodwill 

220 east 23rd street  

 (same block)

city opera 

222 east 23rd street  

 (same block)

vintage thrift (east) 

286 third avenue

(around the corner from the others... betw 23rd and 22nd streets)

we went to all of the above, except vintage; but on the way there from the ink pad we hit another branch of housing works and angel street thrift shop, both on 17th street, near the rubin museum.*** we found some cool stuff at various venues, though no one made a "big score"; however, i think we could all have come away completely empty-handed and still have enjoyed the "thrill of the hunt" so to speak, each other's company, and some really good exercise!

eventually, we dropped sandi off at grand central. linda met up with her lovely hubby at penn station. and i got on a train back to new jersey. well, a girl's gotta crochet somewhere, right?! :)

i was sad for the day to end, but somewhat assuaged by the fact that linda and i are taking this awesome class with nathalie kalbach on sunday; whilst sandi and i have signed up for two classes with dina wakley in september!

good bye for now, darlings! see you soon!

♥♥♥

 *da vinci artist supply, 23rd st and lexington ave
**the 4 or 6 train at 23rd st and park ave; the n or r is a block further west at broadway
***which is utterly amazing if you like asian art at all. which i do! we didn't stop there this time, however. :)

all i did was buy some pumpkins!

to decorate for halloween, i mean. seeing as it's our first holiday in the new house, i bought a few real pumpkins, as well as some of those little plastic candy-pail ones, that i'm going to light up with flameless candles this evening to direct our trick-or-treaters to the side door from which we plan to dispense our candy. i was feeling pretty excited about this, until the other day, when i happened to have a little extra time between appointments in lambertville, new jersey, and my friend and hairdresser phyllis suggested i stroll down union street to see some of the decorations.

lambertville has always gone all-out for halloween. in addition to the typical trick-or-treat festivities, there's a big parade the weekend before, and on halloween night most of union street is closed to cars, so the houses there go all out in decor!

and wow, is it ever impressive! the creativity of ideas really blew me away, and i just could not stop snapping away... as you can see, lol.

this particular stretch of union street is mostly residential, and there are a lot of grand victorian homes, which particularly lend themselves to this sort of thing.

a few businesses get in on it too, though.

by far my favorite is the dragan house, which is pretty famous, locally. mrs. dragan was the art teacher at the town's elementary school, and it's not uncommon to hear local teens and twenty-somethings speak with great excitement about a project they loved making, or a play for which they helped make scenery, or some special thing they did in second grade, which has not stopped feeling special ten or fifteen years down the road!

every single one of these figures... (of which i've captured only a pretty small fraction; maybe a tenth?) ...was hand made by mrs. dragan, from the ground up! she builds wire armatures and then covers them with the kind of plaster-n-bandage type of material from which casts for broken arms used to be made, in the olden days.

 
not only have i failed to capture the scale of this amazing display, i didn't even attempt to show the way the house's windows were painted to look as if there were dozens more characters inside.

even just that i was there during the day means you cannot tell that at night the whole thing is black-lit and luminous!

it's not surprising that this house was featured on a special episode of "four houses" but something that really does shock me is, apparently, it only took second place?! seriously??! i demand a recount!!! :) :) :)

new york, bound

last week i showed off my favorite photos from our recent new york trip; now would you like to see what i've done with them? (hint: i made a travel book! surprise, lol!)

i didn't think i was going to make a travel book this time. honestly! i mean, i do go to new york fairly often, and i keep the "treasures" i acquire in my ordinary journal AND my new york theme book; so it sort of seems like at some point these things would become a bit redundant. but being as stephanie was here, and we were actually going to spend most of the week in the city, within about 15 minutes of arriving, i had labelled this an official vacation... for which one obviously needs to make a souvenir book. (obviously!) the fact that i hadn't made journaling pages in advance suddenly became an advantage when i realized it meant that i could just collect up all the bits and bobs, then use my bind-it-all to make a "real" book out of everything when i got home. so i did. :)

it also meant i could do some fun, silly things, like make a custom "title page" out of my favorite picture, with lots of different fonts:

i emailed myself some quick notes each night, so i'd remember everything. when i got home i used my vintage typewriter (and stickers and a few photos) to record our itinerary from each day:

so what else is inside? a little bit of everything, really. menus from our favorite restaurants--with some teeny tiny pics attached because, bein' cheap, i like to fill THE WHOLE PAGE of photo paper!

there are postcards and handouts and more photos (these are from the high line):

maps (both commercial and the google kind), plus the fortune from my favorite little temple in chinatown:

tickets and leaflets and museum brochures and even more photos:

i love that the bind-it-all lets you incorporate material of all different sizes... i like that you can see little hints of what's coming up next around the smaller pieces:

i especially like having a mix of wide and narrow, long and short, single items and collages.

i made sure to attach a few fun photos "upside down" to the backs of pages, too; thus when you flip the page you can see both "planes" at the same time.

i deliberately attached some of my photos to transparency scraps so they would "float" in the book. but this see-through page is actually the trimmed down vellum bag in which my purchases from kinokuniya were packed:

yes, i saved the chopstick wrappers from the sushi place. but only because they were especially pretty chopstick wrappers, lol!

finally, another big photo for the back cover, with a little side view of all the pages in the book:

want to know my favorite thing about this project?! i get to KEEP IT! (yay!) ♥