Artist Trading Cards!

Creating collage cards a.k.a. Artist Trading Cards or ATC’s is one of the most popular forms of mixed media collage art today. A basic card, in the most common size, is a 2-1/2” x 3-1/2” rectangle cut from paper, most often cardstock. Scrapbook papers are also fun to use as they offer so many bright and interesting patterns and designs. One sheet of 8 ½” x 11” will yield 10 cards as follows: cut two lengthwise strips 2-1/2” wide, leaving a strip 3-1/2” wide. Then, cut the strips crosswise so that the 2-1/2” strips will be 3-1/2” wide and the 3-1/2” strips will 2-1/2” wide.
Individual cards can be artistically embellished in a number of ways: watercolor markers, crayons, stickers, paints, rubber stamps and really just about any craft you love working with. Any unique idea is fine as long as you are having fun creating your artwork. Making collage cards is an excellent craft project for any age. Children as well as adults can enjoy creating and personalizing their cards.


For the collage cards in the photo, I scanned a few old black & white photos, colored them with watercolor markers, cut the figures out, and pasted them on to the cut cards. Stickers, cut out words, & rubber stamp accents added that extra sparkle!Trading collage cards with friends is great fun especially if you have a group of crafters who love to get together to “make and take” projects. There are also gatherings in various cities, maybe one near you—as well as online trading events open to the public; information is available on Google.

Quilting: Paper Pieced Quilts of the 1940's!

Once in a long while I come across a true treasure while searching for old quilts, vintage fabrics and feed sacks from the 1940's. This scrap or string quilt (top), made from a combination of vintage cotton and feedsack cloth scraps, is an ideal example of the newspaper-piecing techniques used by quilters during the WWII era. In order to use the smallest of scraps saved from much-loved fabrics, quilters made “string quilts” by sewing scraps together using newspaper for a foundation.

It was particularly exciting to find that the newspaper in this quilt was still attached and intact when I discovered this unique piece of history. Look at the headlines: Single Bomb Wrecks Whole Greek Harbor, and Pepper Urges Military Action To Check Axis. The news piece includes the following WWII information: "President Roosevelt met for an hour and a half with his principal advisors on defense and was believed to have discussed the probability of speeding the production of bombing planes."

In the newspaper folds of this unique quilt, you may also be able to see the ad which states that girls' percale dresses sizes 7 - 14, regularly priced at $.66, are on sale for $.33. Now that was a bargain even for the times!

It's not every day I find a quilt quite as exciting and unusual as this one, but there's always the possibility of finding another true treasure. Surely that's what keeps me going back again and again to those wonderful antique malls in the midwest! Never know what I might find!

Quilting Memories from the Past!

Through the years I’ve made many quilts for my children and grandchildren. One of my favorites was the quilt I made for my grandson Bryan when he was in high school. He was here for a visit from Upper Michigan when he asked me to make him a quilt. I was surprised but delighted when he came with me to the fabric store and carefully selected the fabrics he wanted me to use. Bright orange for one of his high school colors and blue/green/aqua watercolor batiks and plaids to go with it. I wondered how that would all work out. But it did and he continues to enjoy it today even though he’s away at college.

Another favorite quilt was the quilt I made for Bryan’s dad, my son Paul, when he was in college. The colors were in calico browns, tans, and oranges with strips made to look like arrows. I named it “Peace Treaty” and he loved it!

In the 1970’s my daughters Tamara and Carrie accompanied me to art fairs in Michigan where I sold my quilts, quilted pillows, and stuffed and puppet animals. On one particular art fair day, in Manchester, Michigan, we sold a whopping forty quilts. And all of the puppet dogs sold to teenagers who ran up and down the streets having fun playing with their new pets. What a day that was!

But of all the quilt memories that I cherish, the one that stands out among all others is the quilt my mother (who was NOT a quilter) made for my sister and me. She had "inherited" several old suits from my uncle which had been languishing in an old trunk. Winter was coming to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and it was getting mighty cold outside. So my mother cut those old brown and grey suits into squares, zipped them together on her sewing machine, added a blanket backing and tied them with red yarn. My sister and I cuddled under that woolen quilt and were warm as toast throughout the long winter!(L to R: Coralie, Mom, baby Connie.)

A Local Cider Mill!

Yesterday was an autumn day so gorgeous that it should almost have been required to take a drive in the country! And that is exactly what we did. A leisurely ride in the country, going nowhere, going anywhere, going somewhere special. Who knew where we might end up? I wasn't sure; I didn't care. The sky cast a bright blue radiance overhead; the fields golden, stretched out as far as the eye could see; the trees costumed in burnt orange, crimson and scarlet glowed like jewels in the sun-filled air! Enough beauty to make your heart burst!

I don't know how my husband Jim found this wonderful cider mill out in the vastly uninhabited farmlands but he did. He does have a knack for such things, still what a surprise it was to travel down several connecting back roads to suddenly find this wonderful farm, orchard and mill. Pumpkin heaven! The smells of apples, cider and donuts filled the air along with the sweet strains of fiddlers' Appalachian tunes. A day to be cherished and remembered long into the future.

Ginger! Ginger! Pumpkin Eater!

I don’t know why I love pumpkins so much; I just do! A field of glowing pumpkins in fall is a glorious sight! I become smitten with the shades of orange and ginger, carroty colors against bleached cornstalks and fading greens of summer. We cannot pass a pumpkin stand without stopping to buy one or two.

When Ginger, one of my three shelties, was still a pup, we came home with two brilliantly bright orange pumpkins to decorate our back deck. How striking they looked…until…until I was shocked to see a huge raw spot on one of the pumpkins! What—who—could have caused this? Did some wild animal crawl up on to my deck and eat my beautiful pumpkin? Was it a squirrel or maybe an opossum? Or a very large blue jay? Hmmm! Who do you think ate my pumpkin?

Arts & Crafts Fun With Logan!

Grandson Logan, who recently turned three years old, came to visit the other day and we had a fun-filled afternoon of playing trucks. The shelties Ginger, Carrie, & Bonnie Lass barked in time and in tune to the whirring of the cars, trucks, & bulldozers, all the while circling the action.

Then it was time for arts & crafts fun so I opened my treasure box of stickers, some very cute scrapbook paper, plus scissors and photos of two of the dogs. After I cut out the photos, Logan glued them to his paper and began to decorate his art piece with pumpkins, trees, and birthday cakes.

His final project is awesome as you can see! Then, as all good times do eventually come to a close, it was time to say, "so long" but we promised we'd get back together again very very soon! Can't wait!