ATC for a swap...

ATC (Artist Trading Cards) are one of my favorite things to make. Little pieces of creative bursts to make and trade. The only "rules" are they have to be 2.5" x 3.5" and never sold. The ones people make to sell are called something else (I forgot). More info from the source we love to hate, Wikipedia HERE.

So Karen at MMSA decided to have another ATC swap and I made 4 to trade off. Actually the two yellowish ones with stamps and the green/orange one I had already made (and were just sitting around) and I made the abundance one when I was a Leslie's house a couple of weekends ago for an art play day.

My favorites of these 4 are the top two, the bird stamp and abundance. They are all mixed media in that they are painted (gelli print except for the abundance one), collaged, have pen/pencil doodling, and washi tape (except for the green/orange one).

White post cards for a swap...

I made white post cards for the latest MMSA swap when I was at Leslie's yesterday. She had a lot of great white shapes already cut and a ton of other magazines to pour through to find white elements. It is harder than it seems to make something white and actually have anything stand out. Of course, now these are scanned a look darker than the originals a little so you could see the variation. Anyway now I have 3 postcards that I will actually send to the swap (and then I get 3 back from other people). The birdie one I made for the last swap ended up staying with me because I liked it and decided not to send it out!

ATCs and a drizzling afternoon...

I was all set for another sweltering day today and now this afternoon it is 10 degrees cooler than yesterday and drizzling! No wonder it was so humid earlier! If we had cicadas here I am sure they would have been rubbing those little legs together today!

So I got some postage stamp swaps finished (again Swap-bot) and sat down for an afternoon of ATC making.

The bottom two orange ones are for the Swap-bot Orange ATC with a Punched element. Added some postage stamps, then punched hearts, suns and swirls from some gelli-printed paper to contrast the orange-ness of the rest of the ATCs. A little doodling finishes them off and ready to go a few days early!

The other four are for a swap that needs an ATC with a postage stamp and maybe also for a washi-tape ATC swap. I haven't signed up for that one yet but the ATCs are made just in case.

I decided for me the best way to work the swapping is to check out the swaps, make the items then sign up, just to be sure I would get the items done in time. A lot of the ATC swaps are quick turn-around, meaning there is only a week between signing up and sending your swap, so many are for cards that can be made ahead of time. Those seem to be the kind I can keep up with while I am in school.

Getting caught up...

So the last couple of weeks I started back to school, got a rip-roaring cold, managed to get a couple of last swaps done and finally went to check my post office box... and was dazzled with the amazing mail art that came my way! I thought I would show you some of it here.

The swaps were from MMSA (Mail me some art) and Swap-bot as well as a few other things that came my way.

Suzanne @ Stempelkrempel:

Pamela @ Cappuccino Art Journal:

Postal Swap @ MMSA:

Various ATC swaps (Swap-bot and personal):

And several envelopes of stamps traded and other notes and such that I didn't photograph.

And for next weekend, I am looking forward to another Sunday of art play next week with my friend Leslie, who has been very busy making wonderful arty things! Take a peek!

Now that I think I have the being-back-at-work thing figured out again (how quickly we forget over our long wonderful summer break that being back in school zaps the energy right outta ya!), and my obligatory first of the school year cold is done, I think I will be able to get back to being more regular about making art and blogging! Once I figure out how to organize all my new received art! (I should take a photo of my desk now and save it for WOYWW for Wednesday's post!)

Pink Post Cards...

Pink Post cards... Odd thing for a swap (@Swap-bot), I know, but luckily I happened to have a gazillion pink gelli-plate printed deli papers that I could tear up and collage for a post card or two!

These were made by collaging a lot of pink gelli prints (torn up) onto an 8.5"x11" page then cut into post cards and ATC backings. I got 2 PC and 4 ATCs from one page of collage. I like them as is, but may spend a little time looking for other things to collage onto them while I watch TV later.

Linked to:
Paint Party Friday
Pink Saturday

A background page and more ATCs...

To start out, this morning I made another painted collage sheet which I will cut up for ATCs. It is a piece of card stock that I had gelli printed last weekend and I added collaged elements. When I cut it, each ATC will have parts of the whole and then I can add more elements for each card. I can get 10 from one 8.5" x 11" page. (Google ATC template images and you will see)

And then I made some more ATCs for a swap from Swap-bot.

Not sure why these didn't scan so well... guess I need to check my scanner settings again. Oh well, they are already packaged up and ready to send so I will just have to be satisfied with this quality of picture of them this time.

Linked to:
Glue It Tuesday