more goodies from camp

(woo-hoo!!! some pics are clickable again!!!)

Onto some more pics from camp...

We had a fantastic time painting our aprons with the "totally sick" Jane...who informed us we weren't real fabric paint artists until we got the paint on our undies!!! Okay, so I think none of us made the grade as far as that was concerned, but more than a couple of us got it on our clothes! Of course, I was wearing my new Michael de Menge apron so there was NO WAY I was going to get paint on it (and I didn't!!!).

The very lovely Sulea wowed us all with her beautiful creations, both made before camp and given as gifts, and what she made while she was there. I was the lucky recipient of these two gorgeous pieces....first is a Collections arch kit that is just so textural you have to feel it to believe it.

This is the front of it, closed up, yes..... that is a stick with some little nuts still attached at the left side acting as the hinge!

Next pic below is the little book open and then below that one is the back of it, it has so much texture and the colours are just wonderful! Sulea always has such wonderful words on her pieces...very thoughtful and reflective.

I was also lucky enough to have Sulea as my Mystery Muse partner. It was relatively easy to guess who it was as there's not that many of the girls who do soldering and Sulea had soldered the edges of 3 atc's that were enclosed in an alcohol ink decorated little metal suitcase. It also had a fantastic necklace with "k" on it...also soldered and with alcohol inks on it too. Too beautiful for words these pieces, just love them Sulea, thankyou.

Here's the suitcase which was painted with gesso, alcohol inked, then dimensional magic on top.

here it is open...

Inside it contained this necklace...and these three beautiful atc's....

Also......how about this absolutely stunning bracelet that has 3 little houses soldered around the edges and joined by jump rings that was also with my mystery gift. I asked Sulea if they were her drawings...yep, they were....amazing!!!

Another of the uber-talented girls, Dot, hand-stitched this little fabric atc for me while at camp, her attention to detail is remarkable and having come from a fabric and beading background myself, I know what sort of work goes into her fabric pieces! I also got to choose one her atc's as well (to the right of the fabric one)...love the man's face and the colours in this.

On Saturday night at camp we had a pyjama party....okay, so not all of us got into this...some of the girls said "we don't wear pyjamas and we don't want to frighten anyone, so we choose to stay in our clothes!". Some of us made a special effort to buy new pj's for the event....me included.....saw these ones and just LOVED the colours but it was the pattern that really grabbed me! Perfect for me!!!!! Here's a close-up of the print...

(Note for Michelle W.....bought these at Target!!!!)

Speaking of PJ....I also received another awesome atc from a girl called PJ at camp ;-) She saw the quote and thought of me....how kind.....I think???? lol

Have I worn your eyes out yet???? I only have one more pic to go.....I had some badges made up at Cafepress before camp as a little commemorative token for all the girls who attended. I used a picture of an atc of mine as a background and then carrying on the oft-quoted comment from last year's camp taken from the movie "American Pie",........"this one time....at stamp camp", (though it was band camp in the movie - we thought it was relevant!). I hope that when all the girls look at this on their fridge, they'll be reminded of what a great time we all had and what wonderful new friendships were formed, and also old ones were strengthened.

One more comment.......some girls complained to me that I hadn't supplied the bloke from the atc as well!!!! Well girls.....we have to leave SOMETHING special for next year's camp!!!!! :-)

This one time.......at stamp camp......

And a fabulous time was had by all!!!! I've just returned from 3 days at the INKrediblyRT stamp camp down at Busselton (3 hrs drive south of Perth). Loads of fantastic arty stuff was created...we did a wonderful painted apron with the very talented - but VERY sick - Jane Pisan.....I mean "sick" as in ill with a cold....not "sick" in a modern sort of really "fantastic" way....though you could say Jane is totally SICK but she was also just sick....understand???? Here's a group pic of all the girls wearing their aprons.



Another project we did was to make an atc box with Kylie Mell giving us her guidance. This is one I don't have a picture of yet as it's not quite finished....will save that for a later update. I spent some time making atc's as trades, some of the girls were organised enough to do this BEFORE camp. I did at least remember to take pics of them though.

Last year's wild antics at camp were toned down this year for our resident karaoke-er (Carmel) was slightly off her game with the same bug that had afflicted poor Jane. Nic thought she had found the bargain of the century when she stumbled across bottles of Black Sambucca on special at a liquor store for only $8 (down from $10).....really, the price should've given it away....I told her the main ingredient was probably petrol as it gave her pretty bad headaches each morning....consequently, it wasn't all drunk! Sometimes cheap isn't best! lol Though Nic certainly took out the top award for "NEATEST DESK", probably because not much stuff was unpacked but at least she did produce some things ;-)

Michelle takes the award for most novel way of coffee-dyeing....take a mouthful of coffee....have a coughing fit....spray said coffee all over everything on your desk, the person's desk next to you, and the desk across from you! I wondered what the little brown spots were on my embossing tray, and I'm sure Nic LOVED the effect of the coffee spray on her stack of papers...hahahaha .....awwwww, come back Michelle.....all is forgiven....lol

I think Sulea takes the "ooooohhhhh.....aaaaahhhhh" award for her gorgeous work that she produced this weekend, as well as the beautiful gifts she gave out to several people (me included!!!). This will be another post though later as I have to photograph these wonderful pieces...wait 'til you see what I got!

Let's see, what else happened, Kylie learnt how to use a cigarette lighter for the first time...no, not smoking, lighting a candle for the soot technique (an oldie but a goodie!). I taught transparent atc's using the Collections big window frames, acetate, alcohol ink & a Xyron 250. Quick description....

Use alcohol ink to colour acetate the size of an atc. Cut out two window frames that are just like borders - atc sized - leaving about a 1cm border on all 4 edges. Colour these two window frames, paint, ink, emboss or whatever you want to do with them. Then stamp on a piece of plain atc sized acetate or attach a picture to it. Run the alchol inked piece of acetate through the 250 Xyron and attach to the other stamped (or picture added piece) atc sized bit of plain acetate. Then sandwich these between the 2 frames using double-stick tape. You can add words to the atc or embellish the frames further with brads etc. I generally use my clear word stickers as you can see the words but it doesn't detract from the clear aspect of this atc. Here's my samples that I made at camp...

Finally, a project with the super-talent - Dawn the Prawn. Using an idea from Sally Jean's book where you write down all these different things ~ draw, paint, stamp, scratch, colour, image, text...etc.etc, put them into a container and draw one out at a time, have a time limit set (ours was 10 minutes) where you had to do that particular technique on your chosen work surface. We worked on canvas boards 5" x 7" in size as they were small enough to get your ideas down but stable enough to take paints, stamping etc very easily. I had a theme in mind for mine before I started....I'm doing a dare on Aussie Dares and the theme is "It's all about the title", where you have to choose a book title, a movie title or a song title for your piece. I chose a song from my favourite band - HIM - the song is Gone with the Sin....like it Michelle????? (not "M" Michelle...the other Michelle ;-}....)