Bananas Must Be Accompanied by....

a plastic bag...

I had a little incident last week. Pulled out my stencils to spray paint some backgrounds for cards and Rolodex cards. There was something sticky on some of the stencils. I didn't think much of it until I started to dig through my stencil bag. I found a very over ripe and squished banana at the bottom of the bag. I'd wondered where my snack had gone....before Thanksgiving!
Some major cleaning was done.This was one of two sheets of spray painted paper. I sprayed turquoise Glimmer Mist afterwards to cover any white areas that didn't receive paint. "Stitches" was the theme for The Rolodex swap this month so I ran the papers randomly through the sewing machine with two different colors of thread.
Here are the finished cards. The reindeers are made from thick felt and they had an eyelet smack, dab in the middle of the body. I picked up a bunch of these a few years ago at an after Christmas sale. Been sitting in the studio ever since. I bought the silver snowflakes for a Winter themed swap a long time ago too but these were either left over or not used for the project. Everything found a purpose this week.These were my cards for the two most recent card swaps. The leaf on the brown card is made using stencils, modeling paste, (or was it spackle)? Next was a combination of Glimmer Mists and lastly a "Simple Things" was stamped and outlined with a brown gelly roll pen.

The reindeers came in handy for the cards too. A variety of felt trees, stars and snowflakes also went on the cards. The blue paper is spray painted using stencils and embossed. A hodge podge of holiday themed paper was coordinated with cardstock. This is spray central at school. I was on the prowl for a big box to contain the spray from going everywhere. There's an exhaust vent directly over the kiln which is what the box is on top of. The checkerboard rug was a cast off that covers the kiln perfectly. I've taken some online classes but have been reluctant to spray paint without a good mask. This is a really good mask!

The problem here is that sometimes the exhaust fan works, sometimes it doesn't. It didn't on Monday but I left the switch flipped on anyway. it was working when i walked into the room yesterday in the morning... Eight years of putting in work orders to get this repaired through the district with the same end result. It always turns on when the guys from District come to check it. Figures.....Ta Da!!!!!! Once I was done with my Rolodex cards I was on a mission. I've been wanting to get this one started this past week. Another Crown "Name Tag" a la Cindy Novack. The picture was replaced with the number.This was made as a gift for RV Guy. He's celebrating a very special anniversary. I had a blast putting this all together. A little bit from here, a little from there. Beads, word beads, an ancient drawer handle, Tim Holtz supplies, Maya Road chipboard frame, a domino, letter beads, charms... I gave it to him last night. He had no idea it was coming. I believe he was speechless for a few moments. It was a perfect gift.

This was my gift this morning. Ran outside, fed the dogs while in my jammies. The house looked a little extra pink. Looked through the front window and saw this spectacular sky...Wow! great way to start the day.
Marissa