Category Archives: Craft

Meanwhile…..

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…..back in the real world I have bought myself a new camera. It is very fancy and has lots of bells and whistles; I have no clue how to use it. For photos on my blog I use my iPad because it’s very good at taking sharp pictures of small details, i.e. it’s very good for calligraphy and collage, but not so wonderful at distant views – poor zoom capability.

Anyhow, I am trying to learn Camera. I am calling it Camera because it’s on a par with learning a foreign language. It is fine if I leave it in Auto mode [as seen in my previous post – competent pics of a misty morning, and nice pic of Sid], but if I stray out of Auto mode the results aren’t so pretty….

Therefore during the month of October I will be mostly learning Camera; writing Christmas card addresses in my finest calligraphy; and trying to write a novel. I know crazy talk! Writing a novel has been an ambition of mine since I was a child, but I’ve never really taken it seriously – I have a habit of giving up once the going gets tough, or when I realise I’ve written 16,000 words of utter tosh. It doesn’t matter if it is tosh – it’s the journey that matters, and actually FINISHING SOMETHING PROPERLY. I get so cross with myself. I will have regrets if I don’t try. [All this talk of apocalypse focuses the mind]. I will also have regrets if I leave Christmas card addressing until mid-December [unless there is an apocalypse and then it won’t matter].

Last week I heard this tune on the radio – I thought it was something from the 1980’s – apparently not.

Though appropriate for the difficult times we are living through.

Next Week: Ms Scarlet falls asleep; her ink goes dry, and her keyboard remains silent.

Exciting News!!! Shop now open!!!

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Iam now available to buy on Etsy!!! Not me personally [that would be illegal], but my collages. It has taken me forever to make enough collages, photograph them all, and then tackle the steep learning curve that is Etsy, and although my shop isn’t the slickest in town, it is open, and it’s enough for now. I have added a link on my sidebar.

collage-with-gilded-letter-r-and-drawing-of-rook
Shop now open!!

Other news: I have been scrubbing. My house is now a dust free zone, and I have very shiny taps. I had let things slide a little since March and I suddenly snapped – my inner domestic goddess came alive and found there was fun to be had with a flexible hose and a long-nosed crevice attachment. She even moved the furniture.

So that’s what I’ve been doing. Apologies for the blog neglect. I am back now.

X for….?

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Ihave little to report this week. It is raining, blah, blah, blah. The mud and the weeds are doing well. A spider jumped out of my bath towel yesterday when I was drying myself; a scream followed. Other than this nothing much has happened.

I have though, been working on my collage alphabet. I have nearly finished it! I was fed up by the time I’d completed ‘m’ and wasn’t sure if I had the will to go on, but I powered through. I’ve realised that I’m not good at creating collections.

I was a little inventive when it came to the letter ‘u’…..

u-for-unicorn-collage-with-calligraphy-and-gilded-letter-uk

I had to adapt, and recreate a drawing from the book I’ve been using to illustrate my alphabet. Whilst I was doing this I began to fret about the letter ‘x’. What was I going to do? Should I try to draw a xylophone? I pondered making an x-ray image of one of my tiny bears, but dismissed this idea because it wouldn’t fit with the rest of the alphabet [I have put this idea on hold and is something I will do when I have finished the alphabet]. I fretted some more for ten minutes and then thought what the hell….

x-for-xmas

…..after all, who hasn’t heard of the Xmas Duck????? I like ducks. They look especially fetching when wearing hats. I could have done an Xmas Unicorn, which would have been interesting.

Shall we have a tune?

Dropping Off

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Panic!! My bloomers have dropped off and I know not what to do! My orchid has been flowering since it came to live with me in March, but now the flowers are falling onto my mantelpiece. I knew they wouldn’t last forever, but what am I supposed to do with the two stalks I am left with? My first thoughts were to ask Jon and Dinah as they are knowledgeable about all things exotic, but being an impatient soul I couldn’t wait for replies to this post, so I have also consulted the internet.

Dropping off
Notes on an orchid

I am now calm. My orchid is being normal and is doing normal orchid things.

In other news:- I am still making my collage alphabet for my shop – I know, I am taking ages to fill it, and there has been only one item available since May? I will stock it properly when the alphabet is complete, the good news is that I am up to the letter ‘p’. Here is some evidence of activity….

collage-collection
Breeding…

I am not sure when the alphabet will be complete as I keep being distracted by other things to do, such as practicing italic…

scroll-nib-italic-calligraphy
A bit scruffy…

This is the first italic calligraphy I’ve done in over a year. I used the scroll nib because I thought it would be more forgiving. Ha! I am certainly inconsistent!

Next Friday: The FGES. Where are they now? Are they clean? And when will the film be made?

To Rip, or not to Rip…

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Sigh. Mutter. Squirm. I am in a quandary. For my collages I have been thoughtfully curating illustrations from a vintage book. I bought the aforementioned book at a flea-market in 1991 for £3.00, and for the last eighteen years the book has been kept in a variety of cardboard boxes; occasionally I would flick through it and admire the pictures. There is text in the book and I did mean to read it, honest, but I never did. Anyhow, today I thought about getting another copy and I checked it out online – replacing my trashed book might cost £25+

I feel guilty about trashing the book. I grew up respecting books. BUT, if I hadn’t trashed the book then it would still be sitting in a box, unopened, unread, unappreciated. I would’ve never gotten around to selling it on Amazon or Ebay – I wanted to keep it because I like the pictures so much, and with the collages it is getting a new lease of life, and if I frame and display the collages then I can always look at the pictures…

the-letter-j-collage-using-vintage-book-paper-and-gilding

And the reason I wanted another copy? So that I could trash it, of course. Sigh. Mutter. Squirm. At ease, I can’t afford to do that right now.

To add to this quandary is a further quandary relating to a vintage newspaper – the very first edition of The Sunday Telegraph – which originally belonged to my dad. I was going to take my scissors to the print, but I checked online, and it might be worth £100 – £200. Sigh. Mutter. I am not squirming yet because I haven’t cut it up. It is so gorgeous. Even a full page framed would look good. Damn it. I would love to cut it up and use it. Anyhow, it is now in a box with nobody looking at it. Excuse the colloquialism, but this quandary has done my head in. Of course I would take £200 if offered, but what is my price? How much lower would I go? Or in other words: How much money does someone have to offer me so that I don’t cut it up? Would I give it up for £40? No. But nor would I spend £40 on a vintage book or newspaper to cut up. Do you see my issue? I’ve not really spent any significant money on the items I’ve cut up. Yet.

I am sighing, muttering, stomping my feet, and huffing all over the place. I love making the collages, and when I put them together every component has to be just so. Making copies of the pictures from the book would not have worked for me – I did try, but I could see that the originals looked so much better. There is something special about aged book paper, it’s just so infused with existence [whatever that means].

Perhaps I should remind myself that generally art materials are expensive, and that these vintage bits and pieces are, for the time being, my materials.

So, should I cut up the vintage newspaper? Or try to sell it?

Next Week: More Map News!!! Are we there yet?

Friday Stuff

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You see what I did there? Okay, so I am no longer the hostess with the mostess trolley on a Sunday, but instead I will be here on a Friday bringing you….GLORIOUS….stuff! All sorts of stuff, the stuff that you’d rather shove in a kitchen drawer and ignore, but you never know, one day it might come in handy.

There will be this sort of stuff:-

collages-featuring-the-alphabet-and-calligraphy
Lots of stuff!

There will be calligraphy….

Old Stuff

There will be vague witterings taken from my autobiography, of which I seldom speak, and of course there will be music!!!

I heard this the other day, I was watching Just Go With It because I needed something to send me to sleep. It worked a treat, but when I woke up towards the end of the film, this was playing:

And I thought, yay, that’ll be great for Sunday Music, forgetting that I no longer do the Sunday Music thing…
So, anyhow, whatever, expect STUFF from me on a Friday. There may even be a vague reference to a map next week.

This post was brought to you in a rush by Scarlet Blue.