enchanted garden

simply said, enchanted garden is an album i created for a class at my scrapbook ideas. 

i must say, msi had provided a very generous kit of k & company susan winget botanical collection, prima flowers, hambly screen, tim holtz embellishments, ranger's crackle paint and canvas, other necessary supplies in creating this album.

k & company was my first love in scrapbooking and now i do remember why...the vast elements in every collection.

the idea of this project was of course to create an enchanted garden within an album.  so i use layers and layers of papers and embellishments...should be more than 100 of them.

we used tim holtz' knob and leather to lock  and ranger canvas to bind the album and i adored this flower flap on the opening.

now, let me entice you through my garden of joy....

perhaps one couldn't really tell, but we layered around 20 pieces of flowers, butterflies and dragonflies here.

using flower stem wire, i hand-shaped the writing in the manner of my script.  the opening title was rather tough because of the wire thickness, but the rest was easy.

i'm changing the photos on this page. 

hello max....xox

i already had a couple of similar album from my memory lane ensemble, but as soon as i finished this enchanted garden i wanted another one.  this is a type of album that will not have the same look when you recreate it with a different set of stash. in fact several ladies who already finished it said the same thing.  today, lia showed me the almost finished 4th album she had in this binding.  together we had created many projects and she thought this was the best album ever.  hahaa...  until our next?  :p

there are layers of flowers and dragonflies on the shabby wooden wall.  after the class, i added a few trinkets from prima and tim holtz on this fence.

i forgot to take a top view of this album where i also built the shabby wooden wall on the inside spine and fully embellished it because we can actually see it when the album is opened.

more scenes

the class was a full-house and in all the photos everyone was transfixed in doing the project from start to finish, which could only meant good that they were so into creating their own enchanted garden, no? :)

i hope these ladies adore their albums as i do.

anita and mieke couldn't make the class so i happily worked with them today with the kit they got.  they managed to finished theirs identically to mine besides the pictures.  alas as usual we forgot to take pictures!  i believe they will be uploading  theirs soon.

mieke even showed me the pristine way to wrap paper corners over chipboard.  

i'm very happy with how this project turned out and i'm thanking ina and grace of msi for making it happened and of course all the ladies who came.

it's always interesting to see the cloning of a class project.  now, to anyone who finished her album and leave her link on this post, i will send each one a gift.

friends ep. 81 ~ sharon's tv class

i checked out laine's classes because i was going to singapore last month.  saw this lovely tv class by sharon.  so i went with my friend christine.  we forgot to take photos together though.

i'm developing the photos tomorrow.  they're humorous photos of me and 2 of my old friends, chili and nala visit to jogja.  the 3 of used to work together and a couple of years ago we reconnected after losing touch for many years.  just like that we decided there and then to visit their old friend kentu, who happened to be my new friend then, suwage.  it was also the grand opening of roommate—a curator house, so there were also some other friends in the trip. but the 3 of us flew and stuck together.  it was such a fun and memorable trip.

 the kit

oo...now that i see it, i forgot to stick my text sticker. also, i forgot to take pictures of the sides which are pretty impressive and well thought.

sharon said she would add more trinkets, so i put in a few of tim's and prima.  i also added the stands.  there will be more little cut out photos in each compartments.

this is my favorite compartment, look at the bobbin and bulb.  now i want to do the plasma version.  :)

updated on  may 9, 2011

i managed to put in the pictures....

 added photos on a film strip,

 and had to use tweezers in setting up the pictures.

 fooling around with suwage's mac.  chili looked like edvard munch's " the scream".

it was a cloudy day and i took these pictures inside my workshop, turned out that we can't really see the embossed letter effect which i thought was brilliant.  check out sharon's reality tv.

memory lane ensemble

i've been working on a few projects simultaneously.  one in particular since last year, is an ensemble of my childhood days. it's an album which housed several other albums within.

when the fly a kite collection came out, i was ready to build the album.  just then i saw the sneak of modern homemaker.  i knew i had to wait.  then the campfire.  don't i love october afternoon!

let me walk you though my halfway done childhood story....

i call it memory lane using a travel scrabble tiles.  you know...memory lane as in stepping back in time and memory lane as in wisteria lane as a friend said.  now, need i be so literal.

i stuck a postcard for the old street address and stamp date.  i haven't done it obviously.  there will be family member pictures popping out the window and some details.  stuck with a spring, i love my wobbly mom; although i doubt she'd ever worn an apron for real.  :)  the woolies and fabric blooms are basic grey's hello luscious and the fences are embelliscrap.  i hand-cut the chipboard trees (well with the help of my help), covers them with wood rind and age them a little. also the clouds and kite, and covers them with felt and hand-sewn them.  you can only half imagine the work for this ensemble and i haven't even started.

the ensemble opens up to some of my fond memories.  the idea is of course not to build a literal life on this ensemble, but to keep the impression of my childhood memory.  late 70s early 80s...you know, the pre-computerized days.  when we play a lot of physical and role playing games indoor and outdoor.  actually everything was about playing then and so here.

the right panel will have little collage pictures, journaling and stuff using little frames from melissa frances and of course stickers from various october afternoon's collections.   that's my indoor wall.  i still need to gather the pictures.

can't remember where those wooden letters came from; they're in similar shape of the fly a kite's boy and girl.  i covered them with golf grass and my painter friend helped me paint them.  he wanted to and he's a better painter than me.  my other brother is still missing, but he's joining soon.  you see joe is holding a kite spool?  if you read the kite runner, then you have an idea how the boys played the kite then.

i should have taken more detailed pictures.  the grass flaps opens up to two side by side albums, perfectly rest to the side wall by the power of invisible magnets.  i'm pretty proud of that inkling because otherwise i would have to use velcro...yikes.  more stories and photos on the panel, but again they're not there yet so nothing much to see for now.

these are the two mini albums.  third try and i gave the previous 2 to the friends who were also doing this project with me.  they're identical to this, but very minor issue with which sides should be the cover side by side was a big deal for me.

lots of things going on here, each strand was a memory or will be by the time i'm done.  these are the spines which rest perfectly to the sidebar wall.

indoor album

the albums are pretty much done, just need photos and journalings.

outdoor album

actually i fashioned another album—enchanted garden for a class last weekend. 

the main frame has a few full 12 x 12 pages.  more stories will come here; camping on the yard, hide and seek, friends, hoping in and out the neighborhood.  those days after school, we played indoor, then outdoor since it's always summer.  some days are just longer...weekends and school breaks.

other page has of course a full 12 x 12 picture and a monopoly board (indoor games right) from report card collection.

even mini-er storybooks.

and of course my wooden barn!  the construction was like building a real one.  it was supposed to be a storage room.  since the first one looked like a cabinet instead, so a barn it is then.  i will storage some memorabilia.  i adore this barn and it plays the tune of the sound of music.  who didn't watch it at least 127 times then.  actually part of the reason why this project is never done, because every time i pass by it, i tend to just wind the music box instead of working on it. 

it's not so easy working with old photos so i will dedicate a couple days sometime next week and prep them so i can finish the whole thing soon.

enchanted garden mini album class

as guest artist at 'create well...create often'

i'm honored to be featured as a guest artist by a talented craft-media artist, jennifer evans on her inspirational blog create well...create often.

Guest Designer - Colette Wibisono

Ok... I am totally freaking out with this week's guest designer, Colette Wibisono! She is the perfect source of inspiration to start this year's guest designers for Create Well... Create Often. She will blow your mind with her amazing mixed media talent! I wish I could just sit with her while she works so I can learn how she does her layering and techniques...

Is “I do whatever my heart desires without worrying too much of the label attached to it” considered a style? Hahaha… I’m not sure if I have or want a specific style in terms of techniques and design. But I have a genre— philosophical comedy. In a word, I’d say: conceptual. I’m not into decorative scrapbooking per say. Every piece I do is a soliloquy from a fragment of thought, feeling or emotion; let it be in my writing or craft. Each has a longer and personal story which I could easily replay when I look at it. They’re either inkling of a deeper self or amusing detail of everyday moments. Very self indulging I must say and never yet for a show case. That’s make them my own and I adore them all, yet most likely making them not replicable. When my friends and I do group projects, I would suggest that they personalized the details and making the stories their own.

Philosophical:

Beautiful mind

Comedy:

(The things I do for a beagle!)

There’s no particular medium or a certain technique I like to use in binding the design or as a finishing touch up, not even favorite glue. If I want to put a certain effect because it’s the look that I want, then I experiment a bit with the mediums I have. There are probably better way to create the effect, but usually after a couple of tries I’m satisfied with what I accomplished.

Since I can’t stick water from the island, I used glossy medium gel and acrylic—what I have handy—for the water effect.

 

I wanted the cover to look like an old hand tooled leather over wood. This is when I first developed my wood finishing, which carried to the next level…

Anything in heaven and under the sun inspires me. A song...

a sofa...

I never rush to finish my projects, I savor the process and subconsciously play the story of what I’m trying to capture. A single object or sentiment will carry me to a story on spot. Perhaps because I have done my share of classical readings. I used to be a literary bum. To paraphrase a friend, “It may be that the characters are not me, but only people who I’ve mingled intimately with. Yet the emotions are all mine.” So scrapping/crafting wise, when I look at a product collection I usually see the story on spot. If I don’t see the story, it means I’m not relating to the visuals and chance is I’m never going to use them ever. No matter how pretty or cute they are.

I’m not a savvy crafter that I can advise others; but I can share my 2 cents worth. Starting this year, now that I know what I’m doing, I will not buy papers because they’re beautiful or cute for later use. I do not want to end up with more wasted materials faster than I can get rid of them, since I’ve been collecting scrapbook materials more than 5 years ago but only started making them last year. Worse, I do not want to be forcing myself to use them up. That is stuck-ism #1. Recently, I decided that the fastest way to get rid of them is too give them away.

Stuck-ism #2 is if I were to try following a step-by-step project. I immediately felt the lack of cohesion because I can’t fit my story into the scene. No matter how impressive and beautiful they are.

My biggest obstacle is I’m not a picture person. duh@me for picking up a hobby. Then, we do not have a proper art/supply/scrap store where I live, Indonesia that is. I’ve been trying to get patina mediums all week with no luck. But it’s ok, I’ll make do. I will just have to make my own patina look or forget patina look for now.

You can find Colette's work on her blog, Merchant of Marvels. You can also stalk her talent at Two Peas and her workshop Facebook page.

Create Well: Make every piece you do from a fragment of thought, feeling or emotion; let it be in your writing or craft. Let each have a longer and personal story which you could easily replay when you look at it

thank you jennifer and may we continue to create well and create often.