r words

I feel a little like I'm exposing my underwear when I show projects like this.  It's very uncomfortable and likely to be embarrassing, but here I am anyway.

I'm a quilter, and I have a pretty high comfort level with my skill as a quilter. I love to share quilt projects, because I'm pretty confident about them.

I'm trying to try some other things, and when I do they end up looking like I'm back in elementary school.  Which, I suppose, is true in a way -- my "art" skills are frozen back in the day when I decided I didn't really have any "artistic" talent, so I quit trying that avenue of creative pursuit.  (The words "art" and "artisitic" are in quotations to denote the fact that yes, I have figured out that maybe I do have some talent in that direction, it's just different than I thought it had to be in order to use those labels in regards to myself).

After seeing a variety of altered book projects online, I've decided to try one of my own.  It seems to fit in with the fascination I seem to be displaying for letters and words, and I hope that maybe it'll lead to some fiber art ideas as well.

I've done a couple of pages.  I haven't decided if I'll post all of them (maybe in a separate blog?) or not.  At any rate, I'll probably post the ones here that fit in with my letter a day series.

For today's entry I turned to the next page and circled all of the words that started with the letter R.  I used Prismacolor pencils to color in the grid.  (Plus a few Derwent pencils, but I discovered that I vastly prefer the Prismacolor -- much creamier and easier to color with).  The black "R" is glued on top.  Originally it was colored in with a red and purple grid (with 2 purple blue dots), but I decided to color over the top with a black Prismacolor art marker.  Something about the scan makes the "R" look odd -- it doesn't look that ugly in real life.  Honest.  I may try photographing the page instead of scanning to see if that might look better.  Or not.

I do like that you can still see the hint of the grid underneath the marker.

You do not need to be kind if you choose to comment. (LOL)  I won't even be offended if no one feels the need to comment! (VBG).

And now, I'm ready for bed.  It's only 9:10 PM, but my day started at 5 AM when one of the boys crawled in bed with me and started to chat.  He would let me snooze for awhile, but then he'd think of something else to say.  He was waiting for 7 AM when he could get up and go check out what Santa brought.  He fell back asleep and we had to wake him up at 7:10.  It was a busy and wonderful day, and I'm exhausted, so time to go throw on one of my new pairs of jammies and hit the sack!

Comments

[Debby]

I am so interested in doing one of these...Tell me, do you just turn the page and work on the next page after this one? If so, does the prior page show through either in indentations or drawing medium? Or do you skip a page..or?? I have enjoyed looking at Kim's blog where she posts her book...So COOL! =-) I love the idea of the 'R' words...these books are always so fun to look at...

[Vicki]

This is very interesting - I can't see where you take this. I don't know much about altered books and the "how" of it.

[Debra Spincic]

I've done some altered books and the best I can tell you is that anytime you start a new "arts and crafts" genre, you are starting at the beginning again. It is frustrating, in many ways, but how can you jump in and be the best? I think you have a lovely start and you will be surprised how much you will improve by the end of the alphabet!