Our most recent swap at Art for the Creative Mind was to make an altered altoids tin with the theme of Spread Your Wings.

My pictures turned out blurry no matter how hard I tried to hold the camera steady. Sorry about that.

In any case, I decided to go with a picture of a pegasus, inside and out. I painted the tin with blue acrylic paint first, then glued the picture of the pegasus in place.

For the lid, I used a second layer of imagine to give the pegasus wings that flew.

I used gold Outlines stickers to give the gold border around the edge.

Inside, I put text that read,”Because she was a princess, she had a pegasus”.

The lavender on the inside of the lid is scrapbook paper, to which I have stamped the image of a princess and some musical notes.

Its not shown here, but I added a small lavender flower made of paper to the inside cover.

My swap partner will receive the altoids that I removed from the tin before doing the altering.

Yet another altered art project for this mixed media swap group.

This altered cigar box has the theme Moulin Rouge. I made it for a swap at Art for the Creative Mind, and the theme from the swap was Fragments from the Past.

I choose Moulin Rouge as my personal theme for a few reasons. One, in my stash, I found some very nice Graphics 45 scrapbook paper with the Moulin Rouge theme.

Secondly, I have visited the Moulin Rouge back in the eighties and have fond memories.

Thirdly, the Moulin Rouge was established in 1889, so it it easy to fit with the theme of Fragments from the Past.

I had no items that were old enough, so I devised my own by aging and distressing some new things.

The white garter is a wedding garter from the Dollar Store. I soaked it in a mixture of tea and walnut ink to give it a brown, aged look.

Similarly, I soaked the sequin covered satin in the dye mixture and also some strips of lace.

The silver spoon is taken from my collection. It will tarnish in time, although I did clean it before putting it in the box.

Otherwise, I found a pearl ended hat pin, a brooch that reads Paris and some paper flowers.

On the outside, I strung some beige colored beads. I’m not sure the beads were a good addition but the color did match well and the red gives a bit of needed color.

I also used some red marble beads from my stash to trim the sides and to make an “opener” on the top of the lid.

Underneath, I attached “feet” that I made out of jigsaw pieces that were glued in stacks of four pieces each, and painted black.

A couple of black feathers completed the project.

As for the cigar box itself, I bought it at a local tobacco store for a few dollars. eBay is another good source. This link goes to the cigar boxes and related items currently available on eBay: :

My swap group is doing a monthly swap of altered rolodex cards. We use a different color each month. This month we are using the color aubergine.

Aubergine is a purple-brown color, similar to an eggplant.

We make six cards for the swap, and received six back. I always make seven, because I save one of my own for my personal collection.  The picture here shows four that I made.

I had aubergine colored scrapbook paper, so I used that. The white handwriting is done with a rubber stamp and white pigment ink.

The sparkly shapes are cut from strips of “burnished velvet” glitter. I made it using lace masking and used two colors of glitter — pink and  black.

The images are clip art that is included with Sommerset Studio magazine. I attached them with pop dots and covered them with a clear, dimensional glaze.

The lines and printed words are done with a white gel pen.

For the past couple of years, Art for the Creative Mind has been swapping altered rolodex cards.

We began by swapping cards with a geographical theme. Now we are using various colors as our theme. The most recent color is aubergine. I will show a picture of my aubergine cards tomorrow.

I wanted to display my cards appropriately, so I went in search of a rolodex machine. I found one on Craigs List for $5. You can also buy them new at Amazon at this link: Rolodex Machines.

I think this project is wonderful. The rolodex, which is not nearly filled yet, is a great piece of altered  art. It is fun to show visitors when they want to know the type of projects we work on.

This 4 inch circular mandala is made for a swap at Art for the Creative Mind.

Our instructions were to make a mandala that was four inches in diameter. I made one for myself as well, and placed it in my fat book or chunky book that I use for items that are four inches square.

Although I think many of the group opted to  doodle or use Zentangles, I decided to use a combination of stamped images.

The large flower shape and the cat shape are both from Outlines.

I used a lot of masking to create the design, and also used heat embossing.

I colored the flowers with Copic markers. The cat has some Copic coloring as well, but for the most part, it is decorated with green rhinestones.

You can get a good selection of Copics at Amazon: Copic Markers

The four small flowers are stamped images also, using black pigment ink and with a rhinestone on each.

I blocked the white circle on green card stock, leaving a narrow band showing around the circumference of the circle.

My very talented friend Joan surprised me with a gift of these fabric brooches.

All are made from a felt fabric and trimmed around the edges with embroidery in the form of hand done blanket stitching.

The top one has a cat pin attached, as well as some miscellaneous beads.

The red heart contains a gold metallic heart shape and various pins and charms.

The green square is decorated with intricate hand made tatting.

Joan thought I might use these to decorate art projects, but I plan on wearing them instead.

This is the second artist trading card (ATC) that I made for the swap with the theme Morning in Tuscany.

My inspiration was a picture I found online, showing a field of sunflowers in Tuscany, with a background of trees and a blue sky overhead.

I used the torn paper method to create the background. That is, I wrinkled and tore card stock in yellow, green and blue, and then glued it to a backing.

The red flowers in the foreground are cut from a greeting card and attached with pop dots.

I envisioned this as being a type of impressionist art.  Yes, there were Italian impressionists. They preceded the French impressionists and were known as Macchiaioli .

I haven’t posted for awhile. I’ve been fighting with a nasty flu bug. However, I did manage to get this artist trading card done for a swap at Art for the Creative Mind. The theme is “morning in Tuscany.”

I used  clip art from Microsoft Office to create the expresso cup.

The scene in the cup is also clip art. I used Adobe Photoshop Elements to paste the scene into the coffee cup.

I then printed and cut the newly created clip art, and glued this to a a backing of corrugated card stock.

The word Buongiorno means Good Morning in the Italian language — at least according to Google Translate. The letters are alphabet stickers.

A few days back, I posted a picture of a Diamond Fold card that I made using Washi Paper Quilting. The picture of the Diamond Fold Card is at this link.

I decided the card was too small to send on its own, so I made a cover for the card.

The quilted heart is made from one of the Washi Kits put out by Hanko Designs.

The quilting is not done with a thread. The kits contain a very light foam that is glued to a light card stock. The paper is glued in place over the foam. It’s easy to do and very lovely.

This little mini book is made by folding one sheet of paper to form four “pages” with pockets for tags.

The top picture shows the outside of the book. The bottom picture shows the inside.

The project uses one 8″ by 11 1/2″ piece of good quality printer paper.  This is the type of printer paper that comes in packages of 100, and is a heavier weight than standard printer paper. The paper I used is called Ivory Granite Letterhead by Gartner Studios.

I learned how to do the fold from this DVD: Ranger Tim Holtz DVD, An Altered Journey

I stamped the paper prior to folding, using a variety of stamps and a couple of colors of Ranger Distress Inks.

The fold creates four pockets, which I filled with tags made from a light colored card stock, and also stamped.

I decorated the tags with printed text, a cancelled postage stamp and a punched butterfly shape.

At the top of the tag, I used embroidery cotton and attached a hand made paper bead. The beads were a gift from a fell artist.

It is a cute little project and highly versatile.