My Other Creations: Pet Post-It Note Holders

This week's theme at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog is "lions and lambs," in honor of Spring.  Anything tied in to an animal vibe will fill the bill.  I reached straight for my Waffle Flower "On My Mark" dog and cat dies to create these fun little Post-It note holders, even though I have a traumatic history with cats (read on if you want the grim details):

I started by cutting several cats and dogs out of white cardstock using the On My Mark dies.  Don't you love the elongated limo-type look that these animals have?  From there, I stamped on my cut-out's with black ink, then smudged color on with sponges and Distress Ink.

For the one that includes the "crime fighting cat," I drew my own cape and used a black rectangle of paper to form the "mask," which I glued googly eyes to.

For the party pup, I made him a pointy hat out of a triangle and tried to pick a sentiment that went along with the weekend feel (free as a bird).

I learned that the Tim Holtz matchbook die set has a die that perfectly houses a 3x3 stack of Post-It notes.  The only modification I made was to score a different line on the top flap so that it folded shut at the same thickness as the bottom flap did.  I decorated the matchbooks with ephemera bits and stamping.  Here it is as it unfolds:

And opened up completely to reveal the Post-It note stack inside:

These make great gifts and I had fun putting them together.  And kudos to me for including a cat.  As stated at the beginning of the post, I don't have a great track record with cats.  There are many stories of cats plaguing my youth, but here is just one.  When I was little, my brother and I took piano lessons from a pretty hard core piano teacher lady.  She had to be about 95 and she was serious business!  She was an amazing musician, but there was nothing warm-fuzzy-grandma about her at all.  It was summer, so while I was waiting for my brother to finish his lesson, I sat on the front porch of my piano teacher's house and started playing with a stray cat.  See?  I tried to show some love to cats at an early age!  But alas.  My attempt to bond with a cat had disastrous results.  By the time it was my turn to step up to the piano, my face had swollen to the size of a watermelon and my fingers were seriously five times their normal size.  I couldn't bend them to play a note and even if I could've used my fingers, I couldn't see because my eyes had become two swollen-shut slits.  Apparently I had allergies to cats.  But instead of extending empathy to the human ball of dough, which is what I felt like, my piano teacher yelled at me for the rest of the paid lesson time (guess she wanted my parents' to get their money's worth).  NOTHING stood in the way of piano-playing!  Not even cat-induced disabilities!  So while my allergies became almost non-existent as I grew older, the emotional scars from many a negative cat incident remain.  Even so, I was able to look past that for this project and make a heroic cartoon cat.  I hope my feline-fond friends appreciate that extra effort.

To make your own pet Post-It note holders, pick up these supplies from Simon Says Stamp:

Waffle Flower On My Mark Die Set	Sizzix Big Shot Machine	Lifestyle Crafts Genius Ultimate Platform System	Tim Holtz Sizzix MATCHBOOK SET Dies	Webster′s Pages Hall Pass 12 x 12 Paper	Martha Stewart Scoring Board	My Favorite Things, Whimsical Wishes Stamp Set
Simon Says Clear Stamps SCRIBBLE FLOWERS	Hero Arts Basic Alphabet Stamps	Darkroom Door Dots Texture Stamp	Fiskars Acrylic Blocks	Doodlebug Take Note 6x6 Paper	Fancy Pants True Friend Ticket Roll	My Mind′s Eye Wonder Sticky Notes Wild Berry Jubilee
Prima Coffee Break Cling Stamp Set	Darice 4mm Paste-On Eyes	Simon Vintage Dictionary Paper	Pink Paislee Daily Junque Mini Notes and Labels	Ranger Archival Jet Black Ink Pad	Squeezed Lemonade - Distress Ink	Ripe Persimmon - Distress Ink
Mustard Seed - Distress Ink	Barn Door - Distress ink	Festive Berries - Distress Ink	Peacock Feathers - Distress Ink	Distress Ink Tumbled Glass	Colorbox Rain Forest Ink

So what do you think of with our "lions and lambs" theme?  Upload your creations to the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog for your chance to win a $50 voucher to the Simon Says Stamp store.

My Other Creations: Blackout Poem Tribute

This week's theme at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog is, "B is for...."  When I started thinking about B things, the possibilities were endless!  You don't even know how close I came to trying to art-i-fy a piece of bread!  But in the end, I went with a project I'd been excited about for quite a while: my own version of a Blackout Poem.

What, you may ask, is a Blackout Poem?  We have the highly clever Austin Kleon to thank for that.  He's a writer/artist who had the inspired idea to go through a stack of newspapers with a black Sharpie and scribble out most of the words leaving only a few behind that formed a "poem."  As a lit nerd myself, I found this idea intriguing.  We crafty folks often add words to collages, but relying on the words that are already there and creating art around it?  I wanted to give it a whirl.  

I started by ripping out a page from a discarded book (and don't think my librarian side didn't cringe doing it).  I took a good look at the words.  We're used to reading words in the order in which they're intended, so it was a different sort of phenomenon to look at all the words independently and try to figure out a new way to connect them.  I eventually came up with, "You can generate geek magic."  I penciled around the words that I chosen, then got out the Gesso and painted out everything but those five words.

When it dried, I masked off the words using Post-it notes and reached for my acrylic paint.

I painted some streaks and smears down the page, covering everything in blue, green and yellow.

Next I did some stenciling and stamping and threw on a circular frame that I cut from some vintage dictionary paper. 

I added more stamping, some yarn and some fabric scraps, too.  And the best part of this project?  That moment when you pull off the Post-it note masks and see your poem showing through!

I thoroughly enjoyed this project and will never look at words on a page the same way again.  The only hard part was the pressure!  Usually if you mess up on an art project, you can scrap it and start from scratch.  But I had ONE unique book page with ONE unique set of words.  I know we say, "embrace mistakes," but let's face it: where else would I find another set of words that spelled, "You can generate geek magic"?  I couldn't mess up my one shot, so I'm glad this project had a happy ending. 

Thanks again to Austin Kleon, whose idea I absolutely love and absolutely stole.  But he also wrote one of my favorite creative books called, Steal Like an Artist, so I think he'll be okay with my respectfully-intended thievery.

I made this project with these fabulous supplies, which you can get at Simon Says Stamp.

Prima White Heavy Gesso	Dina Wakley LEMON Heavy Body Acrylic Paints	Dina Wakley LIME Heavy Body Acrylic Paints	Dina Wakley TURQUOISE Heavy Body Acrylic Paints	Donna Downey Dandelion Pods Stencil	Dina Wakely Mixed Media Stamps - Textures	Prima Honeycomb Stencil
Darkroom Door Dots Texture Stamp	Indigo Blu Script Stamp	Heidi Swapp Make Pretty Stuff Word Clear Stamps	Simon Vintage Dictionary Paper	Tim Holtz Idea-ology Ruler Ribbon	Fiskars Acrylic Blocks	Mixed Media Sponges Bars
Ranger Archival Jet Black Ink Pad	Colorbox Rain Forest Ink	Festive Berries Distress Ink	Ripe Persimmon - Distress Ink	Barn Door - Distress ink	Salty Ocean - Distress Ink	Peacock Feathers - Distress Ink
Distress Ink Pad - Tumbled Glass

 
And what will B your inspiration for our letter B challenge? (see what I did there?)  Upload your masterpieces to the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog so we can be inspired together and so that you'll be entered in the drawing for the $50 Simon Says Stamp store voucher.  That would B a sweet prize!