Sunday, September 2, 2012

August Is The Month For Rushing ...

For those with schooling children, you will probably know - August is the month for rushing out ...  Teachers' Day presents!  Although I always tell myself to start earlier, the children just couldn't decide on what to make, and we always end up rushing.  Not an easy task with 3 children and making around 40 items.  I try to go for something we can do together. Finally, we decided on these felt magnetic photo frames based on this tutorial at "Lines Across". 


The first batch completed.


 Everything done only the night before the children would need to give them out (all except 1 given out earlier, 40 in total!)



Alright, I did manage to squeeze some time to do a bit on my art doll and ATC swaps. The theme for the art doll for Aug is Ancient Egypt.  I came across a very colourful picture book on Ancient Egypt in the library and couldn't resist borrowing it to draw and paint up Ra, the Shining One, the first god to stand on the land of Egypt.    The right one was on its way to Tracy Shave in UK.






August Challenge doll was "Movies".   I could only come up with these.  


The Boy who loves Science fiction movies.

The Man who tries to sneak in for a movie (concept by Golden Village, I just redo the man). 

After doing a postage stamp ATC during our July ATC session in the Bishan Library, MaryAnn (USA) organised a Postage Stamp ATC swap.  Too much of a coincidence! I followed my original idea of a lily pond and developed it into a watercoloured piece, adding a tatted dragonfly on a transparent inchie tile.
Couldn't stop at that, I went on to the sea of fishes with real tiny seashells I picked up from our Singapore shores!
Now, to wait for my swaps to arrive.


I'm ending off with a flower arrangement Kristine did in school for her 2nd lesson.  I quite like this one - simple yet bold!



5 comments:

Michelle said...

These teacher gifts are lovely, but 40' wow!
Wishing there were teaches' day here....

Kathy Niklewicz said...

Well, I'm exhausted just reading this! Please tell me those felt roses came in a package, already made!

You have such artistic ability in so many directions!

I somehow missed seeing your post showing the ATC calendar. I can't believe how small those must be! Did you use size 80 or smaller thread? And I couldn't believe the butterfly (Ruth Perry/Rozella Linden?) I'm still dreaming about tatting that (in size 20)! Weaving those chains is still eluding me!

Singtatter said...

Hi Kathy, well, no, I cut the felt roses myself, from about 3 cm squares, then into circle and then into wavy spiral. I started the roses first as they took the longest and my fingers real sore from all the cutting. The children helped to roll and the elder girl managed to use the hot glue gun to glue the bulk of the roses.

The tatted motifs on the ATCs (2.5" by 3.5") are mostly done with size 20 threads. Yes, that's Ruth's celtic butterfly, and about the only one I managed to tat successfully. I'm also struggling with these celtic patterns :(

Singtatter said...

Hi Michelle, it certainly never occurs to me that Teachers' Day is not celebrated everywhere! It's really a stressful time of the year as I encourage my children to hand make the gifts rather than buying all those commercial ones.

Kathy Niklewicz said...

Oh my goodness! Hand-making those roses! I'm also intrigued at the number of teachers! In elementary school back in the Stone Age - we had ONE teacher each year (grades 1-6)! In Junior High and High School we had maybe 7 teachers at the most each year, including art and music! So I'm totally amazed at the number of packages!