Lots of December Projects......

I can't believe it's already December 7th! I've been terrible about blogging lately but have been busy with lots of Christmas projects. I am making felt ornaments for sale, baking cookies for sale, and trying to get my apartment decorated for Christmas. I will try to post some more pictures soon but here is a picture of a snowman ATC I did earlier this month. We've been getting lots of snow lately - it doesn't accumulate to much but it seems like it is always snowing.

Crazy Owl ATCs

The theme for this swap was "Crazy Owls" - owls that crazy patterns or colors, anything but what you would find in nature.

Dia De Los Muertos ATCs

What do you think? I love Mexican Day of the Dead art. It's so colorful with lots of cool patterns.

Skull ATCs

Halloween ATCs

More ATCs!

The theme for this swap was "Movable Parts". So, I did this mushroom pop-up above and the record player one below.

Flower ATC

I thought I would try something a little different. Papercutting and silhouettes are all the rage on some of the blogs I've been reading so this is my take on that trend.

Robots - not the scary kind

What's going down? Making ATCs, mostly.....

Off to See the Wizard!

Here are some photos of my latest Artist Trading Card. The theme was The Wizard of Oz so I decided to do a fold out of all the characters.

Owls

I've been thinking a lot about owls lately - and drawing them, too. What makes the difference between a serious owl and an angry owl? One v-shaped line? Are big eyes what make a cute owl? I doodled owls for a week in preparation for creating these two owl-themed ATCs.

Below is a funky, retro owl that I did in Microsoft Paint the other night. Working in Paint is probably a good exercise for me in doing drawings that are more graphic and simple.

Artist Trading Cards & Swap-bot

I've started a new hobby! I'm going to start swapping Artist Trading Cards (ATCs to those in the know). ATCs are little works of art that are traded, not sold. When I say little, I mean pretty little - 2.5 x 3.5 inches, or the size of a playing card. Here is a link with lots of good info on ATCs:

http://www.cedarseed.com/air/atc.html

I signed up for a swap on a cool website called Swap-bot (http://www.swap-bot.com/) You can sign up for all different types of swaps, not just ATCs. People swap books, postcards, letters, stickers, scrapbooking materials, fabric, vintage items and a million other things!

I sent off my first ATCs to my two swap partners - one in Washington state and one in England. The theme was insects. The one pictured at the top of this post is one that didn't make the cut and get sent out, but I was still pretty happy with it.