The Creative Side of Katie
**Disclaimer: There will be a gazillion photographs in this blog entry. Prepare yourself!
Now that Christmas has come and gone, it is time for me to blog about my artistic endeavors for 2011. I am a creative person by nature, and I have found that if I go a long period of time without doing something artistic, my chipper attitude towards life dwindles a bit. I am also an adventurous sort of person, so you’re going to see here a variety of projects in a variety of mediums. I can quite honestly say I enjoyed every single project I attempted, though some were definitely more of a success than others.
Let’s begin with last Christmas. I’m only doing this so I can show the difference between last year’s Christmas cards and this year’s card. Last October (or was it September?), my fellow crafter Jen and I took a vintage Christmas card class at Archiver’s, our local Scrapbooking store. Feeling inspired by the beautiful cards we made in the class, I decided to hand-make ALL SIXTY of our Christmas cards for 2011. It was painful, it took up most of my time in October and November, and I had the time of my life!!! Here are the different cards I made:
After all of those cards, I had to take a break from the paper-craft world. My hands ached and, as much as I hated to admit it, I had kind of burned myself out on the art. However, in January, I joined, along with Jen and again at Archiver’s, an Artist Trading Card class. Each month, a group of twelve of us met and traded 2 1/2’ X 3 1/2” cards that we’d designed centered around that month’s theme. For example, in the month of January, each of us selected a month and made thirteen identical cards (one for each person and one for the store’s display) to trade, the theory being that at the end of class, each of us would have a full “calendar” of months. After ending the class with this:
…I was hooked! It was SO MUCH FUN! (My card was the December card.) Our February theme was “flowers” and we were each given a polka-dotted paper that we had to somehow incorporate into our cards. This was mine:
For March, we had to use something clear on our cards. It could be whatever we wanted. I chose to make an oven with a clear door, allowing for a view of the cookies baking inside! YUM!
In April, we were supposed to use something recycled, something you wouldn’t usually use on an ATC card. My grandfather collected stamps, and in his collection, I found a bunch of old airmail envelopes. I decided to do a war-themed card using the envelopes as my background:
In May, our theme was “Game ON!” Each of us selected a game around which we would theme our cards. I chose my favorite game, Scrabble, then searched for a month for Scrabble tiles that had the first letter of each person’s name in the class.
In June, we were each instructed to create a card with a Texas theme. I decided to sew my cards for this month, and after about six, I completely regretted my decision. Since I was halfway through at that point, though, I felt like I should finish them out. I’m so glad I did!
In July, it was HOT! HOT! HOT! We decided to do a summer/beach theme using teal, orange and yellow as our colors. As an avid flip-flop lover, I had to incorporate my favorite stamp:
Our August theme was “It’s a Zoo out there”:
And our September theme was “Halloween” – we had to use candy wrappers on our cards, so I made a candy corn piece out of different wrappers!
Unfortunately, both Jen and I left the class after our September meeting because a lot of people quit coming regularly and we felt like we were putting a lot of effort into our cards only to find that we weren’t getting a complete set for our hangers each month. It was very frustrating, and we weren’t enjoying ourselves as much anymore.
Another project I took on for the year was “Scrapping 2011.” Unfortunately, I didn’t stick with it after this summer, so I have a lot of catching up to do. Once I get the book finished, I will post pictures in another blog. ~ In April, we went with my side of the family to the opening season Red Sox vs. Rangers baseball game in Arlington. I had a new camera (thanks, babe!), so I took a million pictures. I decided that, for a joint Mother’s and Father’s Days gift, I’d make a mini-album for the parental units. I’d seen mini-albums on display at Archiver’s and had really been wanting to make one. They are just so darned cute!!! I collected everything baseball – stickers, stamps, papers, embellishments, etc. – for over a month before I felt like I had enough to make this album. Here it is in 2-D glory:
Stepping away from crafting for a while, I explored other creative outlets like gardening. I had a wonderful time planting things in our yard this spring — before the drought seriously hit and killed pretty much everything. Hopefully next year will be better and stuff like this will actually live:
A friend of mine was having a baby shower in June, and I had always wanted to make a diaper cake. My wonderful friend Jen, who, even when my ideas are bat-poop crazy, is always willing to dive in headfirst with me, and I made the following cake. Not bad for our first-ever diaper cake!!
Also in June is Father’s Day and Scott’s dad’s birthday. I made him the following cards. The first was golf-themed as he loves golf:
For the next card, I drew his airplane. The final version looked a lot better because I drew a nice border around the card. Naturally I forgot to take a picture of the finished card. Oh, well.
My neighbor down the street is a phenomenal stained-glass artist. He offered to teach me how to do stained glass, and I certainly couldn’t pass on that opportunity. My motto tends to be “go big or go home” in most things – turns out, stained glass isn’t necessarily the best medium in which to uphold that saying. Rather than starting with a hummingbird (like most of his students), I chose an angel. A really big angel with a lot of pieces. Good going, Katie. Thankfully, he’s a great teacher and I got the hang of things fairly quickly (which is good – I’m not sure how much longer my fingers could have taken the daily bleedings I was giving them). Here’s what I made:
I’m going to give stained glass another shot in 2012. It was a lot of fun. I don’t think, though, that I’ll become an expert at it. I definitely prefer hobbies that don’t leave me covered in BandAids and little cuts. :D
In July, Jen and I attended a Creative Keepsakes convention in Houston. I had a great time shopping, taking classes, and meeting other like-minded women. One of the booths that caught my interest was put on by a Heritage Makers consultant named Kelly Doan. I was intrigued by how easy she made digital scrapbooking look. I’d been interested in it since 2009, when my friend and awesome photographer (seriously – check her out!!!) Mallory Buck did a photo shoot with Scott and me and then made our Christmas cards. I’d had no idea that you could do something like that without using pre-made designs like those at Shutterfly, Snapfish, Walmart, etc. Now, Mallory is a PhotoShop genius; I needed to start somewhere easier, smaller, which is why I was so drawn to Heritage Makers. I cannot tell you how much fun I’ve had with Heritage Makers since joining! Check out my Scraps page to see what all I’ve done. I spent most of September and October working on the Alaska book, then I started trying new techniques with experimentations such as my Disney-themed book and planner. The perks of digital scrapbooking as opposed to dead-tree scrapbooking are endless: cheaper; more professional looking; cheaper; you can re-use embellishments as many times as you want; cheaper; if you screw something up, you can just start over without having to go back to the store; cheaper; more environmentally-friendly; and did I mention cheaper? The downside is, of course, that you lose a lot of the hands-on you get with paper scrapbooking. Although I am not going to completely leave the hands-on scrapbooking, I am definitely more into this digital business these days.
In October, Scotty and I created this website. You can read about our adventures here. In November, I made our Christmas card; I did it with Heritage Makers, so I only had to make one card this year. Horray!!
In December, I talked my friend Shannon into trying out Painting With a Twist with me. Even though I hadn’t painted anything since middle school and she’d never picked up a paintbrush in her life, we thought it would be a lot of fun. Turns out it was more than a lot of fun. We had an absolute blast. The instructor made the class so much fun, and even though you paint it all by yourself, no one ended up with a bad painting. I gave mine to my brother’s girlfriend for Christmas and forgot to take a decent picture of it, but here’s my phone picture from the end of class:
Also in December, I made a highlights book from our different trips to Las Vegas. You can check that out on my Scraps page, too!
That about does it for my 2011 creative endeavors. If you made it this far, thanks! I know it was a lot of reading and a lot of pictures, but it’s nice for me to have all of this logged in chronological order in such a way that I can share it with my friends and family! :)