Saturday's Retreat

Last Saturday I attended a retreat for the Altered Arts group that I am a member of. We learned 3 new projects. We etched metal, made fairies and learned soldering. I took a soldering class a few years ago and really needed a refresher in this so I was quite happy to revisit this technique.We started out with soldering.

I have not mastered attaching jump rings yet. You need 1-2 more hands to get this set right. I did find a tool that actually will hold the piece, freeing your hands for other actions. Love it. I am looking forward to using it on the next soldering project.

Jump rings are not supposed to be laying flat.Isn't this just pitiful (LOL). I WILL master this. Soldering is really not hard but it takes a lot of practice to really master it.

This is a piece of glass that I bought at Michael's and I soldered tape onto it to make it look like a gift. It just needs a bow. I am working on that .

Hard at work on my soldering. You really need more than 2 hands.

Next we learned to make Fairies out of chenille, yarn, a bead, fabric strips and florist tape.

They need wings and then they will be true fairies. Aren't these cute?? I love these and they are so easy to make.

Last but not least we learned to etch metal. This works well with brass, tin, copper but does not work on aluminum. Muriatic acid, peroxide and baking soda for the rinse and after 15 minutes or so you have an etched piece.This is not hard to do but you really need to work in a ventilated area and wear eye protection and wear rubber gloves. Here is the end result:

The day was perfect and we had a great time learning 3 new projects.

My thanks to Angie, Carla, Beth and Sandi for their hard work in getting their classes together and for their time.

Well that is it for now, thanks for stopping by, see you soon,

Barbara

Altered Dolls

I love doing these altered dolls. Too cute and pretty easy. This doll is going to my friend "Lovely Linda" for her birthday, a little late, but you know the old saying, "better late that than never".(Shhhhhh don't tell her its coming.) There are so many things that you can add to the body,which is just a clunky block of wood. That makes these dolls so exciting and fun to make. This one is in the celestial theme.

Hope you like this and thanks for stopping by. See you next time.

Barbara

Altered States of Mind Retreat

Altered States of Mind is a club that meets at the store once a month for about 2 hours. A few months ago we all decided to have a retreat and hold it at the store and be together from 9:00 a.m. til 5:00 p.m.The date agreed upon was Saturday Oct. 17.  Carla offered to teach us a few things and we took her up on her offer. It was decided that we would make altered dolls, a water color transfer, and wire beads. So we all brought in the raft of things needed for each of our "classes" and so began our altered day of fun.

 Below are the photos of my dolls. I will post more later on the watercolor transfer and the wire beads.

ALTERED DOLLS

We all started out with wood blocks. I brought in about a dozen that were about 2.5"X3.5" and about 1.5" thick. Another size which was more square and larger was also made available to anyone. I made 2 dolls and used the size mentioned above. We then took porceline dolls purchased at the dollar store, and totally disassembled them and used the limbs and the heads.(To me this seemed so sacrilegious at first, as a child I would never do this to my dolls.) But the end result is so cool. After some paint, doll parts and ribbon and effemera, here are the end results of my creations.  

   

Its amazing how doll parts and various other items can really transform a block of wood. The altered doll on the left still needs a few more things before she is complete and the angel on the right still needs a halo, but this gives you an idea as to what I was up to on Saturday.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to see you again soon,

Barbara