is it that time of year again???

I woke up this morning to the news, via Facebook, that today is International Yarn Bombing Day.

Blimey, that's come around quick!  It seems like only yesterday that we gave some local statues nose jobs.

I had hoped to do something big and exciting this year, but given I'd entirely forgotten it was today, I clearly hadn't done any prep - so I had to do something quick again.

And the only thing I can do quickly with wool is make pom poms - so it's pom poms again this year - maybe that can become my "thing" :)

So I made 9 big shaggy pom poms from my fancy yarn, and took them to the local park to hang them in a tree by the pond:

They aren't immediately obvious up there - for example there are three in this photo with me, but they don't leap out at you:

But I hope a few people will notice them as they stroll through the park, and that they will make them smile

I added a tag to the lowest hanging pom pom, just in case anyone was wondering why....

And here's a nice arty shot that Jay took to finish off :)

Maybe I'll be more prepared next year.....or maybe it will be pom poms again :)

an Index Card a day keeps the doctor away

About this time last year, I began to see people all over blogland taking part in a daily art project called ICAD - index card a day:

It does exactly what it says on the can - the challenge is to do SOMETHING on a plain old office-supplies index card every day - write / draw / paint / collage - SOMETHING.  There are optional prompts to use if you want to, other days you can just do something of your own devising.  The challenge lasts two months and I think the plan is to ease people into daily creativity.

So, like I said, last year I watched other people playing, but I didn't join in as I thought 'every day' sounded a tad scary.

But this year I must be braver because I am playing along :)  And so is Connor which is super cool, it's great sitting down with him every evening to do something creative.

We're now at the end of week one, so without further ado, here are my first 7 cards:

prompt: doodle your name

prompt: fish, collage

prompts: grid, testing new pens

prompts: dictionary, draw your camera(s)

prompts: yellow, dragonfly

Connor and I are making a display of all our cards on the "tatty wall" in the front room.  So called because that's the wall where our (sadly no longer with us) pet rats ate the wallpaper!

It's already looking pretty cool - and there are still another 7 weeks to go:

Tatty wall - week 1

Anyone else out there ICAD-ing?

Going postal!

I've been getting back into Mail Art recently so I thought it would be fun to make some "Flo Post" artistamps to use on my  postcards....

These are fun to make, here's a little step by step if you fancy making a batch of your own:

Draw up an even grid on a plain sheet of printer paper

Use a sewing machine with no thread in the needle to sew along the lines you have drawn to perforate them

The sewn sheet will look like this

Draw up the same grid as before on a second sheet of paper, and then draw a line a short distance to the left and right / top and bottom of each line in the grid

Use a craft knife to cut out all the small interior squares

This sheet becomes your mask

Align the mask over your sewn sheet precisely.

Sponge ink through the mask

Stamp or draw a focal image

Cut masks for the stamped images from post it notes and cover them up

Spray or stamp a background design 

Continue to stamp or otherwise embellish until you are happy with the design

Peeling the masks off for the big reveal is the most fun part:

Look out for these on my mail art over the next couple of months :)

A couple of new pages in my pair journal....

The first two pages are fairly finished (although my pair journal partner, Shirley, may well choose to add to them):

And these two are works in progress, am passing the ball to Shirley on these ones:

Can't wait to see how they end up :)

Rocking Your World Friday week 21

This is shocking, I’m on time two weeks in a row!

It’s only because work is a little calmer than usual at the moment and so I have actually been able to take lunch breaks – so that’s definitely the first thing for me to be grateful for this week :) Much as I do occasionally enjoy the adrenaline buzz of rushing around trying to meet impossible deadlines, it is also nice from time to time to take the foot off the gas a bit and take things at a more healthy pace.

On Saturday I spent the morning being Swindon’s answer to Banksy – ha ha!  Well, as it was stickers I was putting up, probably closer to Swindon’s answer to a young Shepard Fairey....but anyway – you can read all about it here – and don’t worry, they are only temporary, officer :)

 And then in the afternoon, we may well have got into the Guinness Book of Records!  We won’t find out for another three months if the adjudicators are going to let our new record into the book – but even if not, we did have a lot of fun taking part in a world record attempt for the world’s biggest lightsaber battle:

It all kicked off at the local railway museum, which is currently hosting a Sci Fi exhibition (without a train in sight).  There were tons of Star Wars characters in attendance (mainly just peeps in costume, but there were also two minor actors from the original movies there), and also, rather randomly, a Sylvester McCoy era  Dr Who lookalike, and Judge Dredd and Spiderman, all of whom looked rather out of place with lightsabers :)

We all got a cool certificate and badge for taking part, plus the boys got their photos taken with the whole cast for an extra fiver to charideeee.

It was ace!

....with our certificates

On Sunday, we had a nice lazy morning. Then in the afternoon we went geocaching along the Thames Path near Lechlade.  We started at the spot where Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Wiltshire meet, which was cool.  You kind of need three legs so you can stand with a foot in all three counties :)

giant ducks?  or little houses?

"does not wash" more like :)

We found two multi caches (the type where you have to decipher a number of clues around the area before you can find the actual cache – our favourite type) and one traditional (where you get given the cache co-ordinates straight away).  It was a really nice day for a walk along the river – not too hot not too cold, and not raining.  We all enjoyed it lots.

Old Father Thames

On Monday night I had a fun chat with my bessie mate Alison, mainly about how hunky (using that word totally gives away my age, doesn’t it :) I doubt anyone under the age of 40 ever says it) two certain actors are, and how “my vampire is better looking than your vampire”.  She has been poorly and out of contact for a while and I always miss her loads when she goes onto radio silence.  She’s the only person I ever have silly girlie chats with and they are always a riot :D  Luvs ya, bww!

(paraphrasing the bessie mate: "a middle aged lech????  I might be a lech, but if anyone calls me middle aged I'm going to cut them!" hee hee)



So - a very important straw poll.... - ladies, or indeed gents with an opinion, which dude is hotter, the brunette or the blonde??

On Tuesday the weather really picked up - it was gloriously sunny and so I went for a nice walk in the sunshine in my lunchbreak.

This gorgeous park is about 10 minutes walk from my office - I should go here more often!

The weather has been stunning ever since, fingers crossed it lasts, it really cheers everyone up, doesn't it :)

In the afternoon poor old Connor had a nasty fall off his scooter while attempting a trick – ouch!  He got a big graze all down one side of his face and a few other lumps and bumps :(  That clearly didn’t rock my world, but the fact that he wasn’t seriously hurt, and is being a super brave little soldier, does.

On Wednesday morning, I got an email saying that my lovely Berlin apartment booking had been cancelled.  Grrrrr.  But never mind, I have found an equally nice place to book instead, and in fact it’s even more handy for where we are planning to go while we are there.  So I guess they did me a favour really :) Only 40 days to go – sooooo excited!!!!  I’ve been busy this week planning our itinerary and it’s going to be a frantic couple of days – we will return home utterly exhausted I reckon :)

In the afternoon the Olympics came to Cirencester!

Well the torch did anyway, and the atmosphere in the town was fantastic.  Our boss was really nice to us and shut the office for an hour so we could all go outside to watch.

Our torch bearer was a very fit and healthy 73 year old, who was coping really well with running along in the heat.  In fact I think he was handling the sunshine better than me, and I was just standing there :)

On Thursday morning I woke to a funny photo on my Facebook wall that really made me smile.....I had sent some jubilee and olympics goodies over to Canada for my Anglophile pal Carol, and it looks like she had got her hubby to model some of it ...... Mike is a good sport :)

And that's a wrap for this week

I'm over now to Virginia's blog to link up with the other Rockettes - why don't you join us?

Have a great week everyone :)

The Mystery Project.....let's go public!

So, you probably have gathered by now that I'm a big fan of the Art House Co-op (they of the Sketchbook Project and various other art adventures)....and here is the latest one I have signed up for.....the Mystery Project.

In a nutshell, each of the 2,000 participants worldwide were sent a marker pen courtesy of Prismacolor, and a theme, and were to take inspiration from these to make some public art installation of some sort - it could be anything, a painting, a sculpture, a zine maybe.  As long as it was left in a public space.

I was really looking forward to this one ....until I got my theme.  "If tomorrow came yesterday".....whaaat?  That stumped me completely for a week or two.....

But then I was chatting via email to a fellow blogger - Karen from I am Rushmore who is also taking part in the Mystery Project (her theme is fabulous - "Help! Robots are taking over the local elementary school!" - I was sooooo jealous :) ), and I was explaining my thoughts about my theme....about how if tomorrow happened yesterday you would have already seen a bit of the future....forewarned is forearmed and all that.....   and that sent me off into thinking I could do something with a man with four arms....

It kind of makes some sense to me anyway..... kind of :)

So here's how my submission for the project came to life:

I took four A4 sized white stickers, and randomly sprayed them with yellow and olive green paints to start with, the olive green was chosen because it was close to the colour of the marker pen they sent me

Next I added another green, and tiny spots in bright pink...

...and chevrons in orange....

I cut out the silhouette of a man with four arms and used it as a mask, over spraying with white paint.  And then I also airbrushed around the mask a little with dark purple ink.

The word "forewarned" was but out freehand with a craft knife and sprayed on with blue paint

....and then I used the free marker to write a few words around the image - "if tomorrow came yesterday, the mystery project...."








Here are the finished stickers ready to go:

Only three of them because I kept the fourth, which now lives on my bookcase:














And here are the three of them out in the wild, in various spots around central Swindon (along with my street art accomplice, who thoroughly enjoyed the whole adventure :)  )

Please don't worry, any of you, about us having permanently defaced any public property.  The stickers didn't have much in the way of stick....they peel off incredibly easily, and I very much doubt they will survive the first rainfall....

But it'll be fun while they last....