The book that Jenny (Crossley) made…

Beachhouse Boulevard hosted their annual retreat / stamp camp / scrapbooking weekend in early June 2010.  This year’s guest artist was Jenny Crossley, of A Mark in Time fame, known for her industrial jewellery and wonderful art book making.

Jenny Crossley (left) & Michelle

Our project for the weekend was a beautiful art book, filled with vintage images, found objects and antiqued papers, bound in four signatures with ribbon or string.  There was a frenzy of antiquing, gluing, sanding and edging; and that was just to prepare the pages. Then the decorating began.  After many hours work, we had all finished our books.

As usual, the pictures do not do this work of art justice. It is so much better when you can pick it up and touch it and see how the light reflects off the mica and embellishments.

Many thanks must go to Monika and Mick, who host a fantastic retreat, each year. And also to Jenny for sharing her brilliant artwork and for her enthusiasm.

Also a huge thank you to all of the class participants: this book was such a lot of work and everyone helped one another out at different stages, regardless of experience level. And the encouragement between everyone was heartwarming.

Mixed Media Monday – Something New

Hmmmm… Something new… something new… Could I possible have something around here I haven’t used before? Well, there are those nice background papers and border punches that my sister gave me for Christmas. And maybe those Darkroom Door Stamps that I bought at the Beachhouse Boulevard stamp camp…. Was it really back in July and I haven’t even mounted them yet, let alone use them? Surely not! Well, maybe… yes.

Mixed Media Monday has challenged us to do or use Something New this week. This is what I managed to scrape together:

After getting those stamps cut and mounted, I made a few simple cards:

Using these stamps were pure pleasure. It was such a delight; the Brilliance Pearlesent Lavender ink just glided onto the ivory semi-gloss card, leaving an incredibly crisp image (right hand side). The image in the left was stamped with Chalk ink. Both colours matched the background papers perfectly.

It was great spending the day making a few simple cards and remembering the joy of papercrafting, and why I had started in the first place.

Hope your day was just as joyful,

Michelle