Making Ephemera - Clusters!

 Clusters are some of the most relaxing little journal bits to make. The repetitive motions of laying out your strips and attaching them all in the right place just feeds my soul.

I like to make clusters out of scraps - scrap fabric, laces, papers, etc. Then, I tend to find a focal image (smaller things since my clusters are usually pretty small - meant to embellish rather than be an ephemera piece on their own) and attach that piece to the top of my little meticulously placed scrap pile.

*End cuts of paper (think journal pages being cut down to size)
These are just a few scraps from a very large collection of scraps. The good part about clusters is that you can use these smaller bits and strips that are otherwise too small to turn into anything else besides collage.

                                    I usually have shorter pieces of lace - 2ft and less - that work great in these because you don't need a set amount. A small triangle of lace? Perfect. Long strips flapping in the breeze? Looks great. No one has ever looked at a cluster and said, "this cluster looks awful," Every cluster I've ever seen is beautiful in its own way and you definitely know where it belongs and how it should appear in your work. That's what makes you an artist.

Larger pieces of scraps and book pages work great as bases.  A few other great base ideas:
*Playing cards
*Corrugated cardboard pieces
*Game cards of all kinds
*Index cards
*Guest checks
*Post cards/greeting cards
*Packaging


I always keep a bag of eyelash trim handy. All colors, all styles...I keep a bag nearby. This stuff really works wonders on all kinds of projects and clusters are no different.

* Ribbon, Lace, Trim (eyelash trim is awesome!)

*Fabric bits

*Scrapbook papers

*Dyed, stamped, stenciled papers

*Painty papers

*Wallpaper/wrapping paper (these add some fun texture/color to your projects!)

Here are some of my completed clusters. I got really into the small yearbook images as my focal points. I sell a packs of yearbook portraits (small ones to large ones) in my Etsy store (here)  Follow that listing on Etsy so you will be notified when I add other fussy cuts. 

All kinds of fussy cuts work great as focal points in your clusters.

Never underestimate book page images, either. They are some of my favorite pieces of ephemera to use. I love repurposing books and being able to use as much of it as possible.

My little flags you see...I made those using scraps and cutting a triangle out of the bottom after folding it in half. You will see that in-depth on my Youtube video of my cluster process.

Doilies are awesome to use, also. You can tear them into pieces or use them whole as the focal point. They add a lot of texture and interest to a cluster regardless of how you use them.

Here are a few more finished clusters. A lot of my focal points are pieces I received in happy mail from others. Some of them are printables.  

Buttons work great on clusters, just keep in mind they are dimensional and can be difficult to write over if they are in a journal. I tend to use buttons on my greeting cards and covers.

You can cover your staple on the cluster and I have done that numerous times, however, its not necessary. Its all a matter of personal preference. If you choose to cover it, you can use things like buttons, sequins, flat-back gems and such, etc. Just make sure it doesn't take away from your focal image. 

ORRRR...use your staple cover as your focal point. I have done that numerous times.

Are you interested in a craft-with-me? Check out my YouTube video of cluster making that I made!
Cluster Vid

Have fun creating and remember...scraps are beautiful, too!

~M

National Geographics pre - 1960s

I have no issue coming across National Geographic magazines 1960s-current. I dismantle them and sell them in my Etsy store as page packs - you can get a random pack or a themed pack with a few themes of your choice and the page choices are at my discretion (I like to think I'm pretty darn good at picking them out, though). But earlier than the 60s were always difficult for me to find until recently.... I came across a few different lots of them and I spent a good few hours flipping through them last night and let me tell ya.............they are awesome!

None of them are perfect. They are blemished, stained, marked....but they are so much fun to go through. The black & white images are wonderful. I mean, they were state-of-the-art in their day and the image quality is terrific, Not to mention, most of them have illustrations that are rich and gorgeous. Once you get into the 40s, colored photos start to appear more and they remind me of an old black & white that was colorized after the fact. And who knows? Maybe that's how they did it then. I've never really researched the behind-the-scenes work of these magazines.

These photos here are a little better quality from being 1950s, but they are still a lot of fun to look through. The cultural differences of our history and the ads make these books a real treasure.

So what do I have? I have a handful from the 30s, a lot from the 40s, and a handful from the 50s. But they are all wonderful in their own accord. I have them listed in my Etsy (a portion of them anyway. Etsy has variation restrictions so I was only able to list through 1946) but if you are looking for themed (I saw amazing floral illustrations, fish illustrations, etc), feel free to contact me. Again, Etsy only lets me upload so much in the way of photos.

Just a few other examples of pages from some of the 1940s mags! Head over to my Etsy to check them out!

Here

~M

 

Book Page Ephemera

After every live sale, I have a major decision to make - what do I do with the leftover books? Some of them get resold at the next live sale or in my Etsy shop but there are others that I hold on to. Those ones, I generally cut up to make into book page ephemera!

Books have so much more potential than just journal covers or altered books that you tear pages out and glue others together. They have the potential to become journal pages with its text and beautiful end papers (usually pretty thick and great quality, too!) and if you are lucky, you will come across a book with some beautiful images, quotes, poetry, and other content.

This book didn't sell at a few live sales in a row. The yellow end pages and illustrations are beautiful. After cutting most of it up without reading any of the content, I realized I missed out on some beautiful poetry so I did try and save a few pieces as I went along.

Here are some examples of the beautiful images througout the book. Yes, they do have a gloss to them, however, that doesn't bother me much. There are ways you can dull down the shine, however - matte mediums, clear gesso (lots of homemade recipes for gesso online), and even scuffing it up with nail files and sandpaper. Sometimes, if the gloss clashes with my project, I will use one of the white napkin backs and glue it to the image with Elmer's. It dulls down the shine A LOT and it also gives an opaque look to the image.

I feel like the Great Repurposer whenever I gut one of these books and harvest its bounty. Covers can be so beautiful, like this Audubon book that also didn't sell a few months in a row at my sales.

The cover has faded with time but I might paint over it and repaint the birds or I might just use it the way it is! Maybe I will add to the color with some ink...who knows!

So, the next time you visit my live sales on Youtube (first Fri of every month), take a look at the books I have...maybe you will find some that you'd like to cut apart and use piece-meal.

Now, the question I have for you..... What do you suggest I do with the thousands (and counting) of images I harvest from these books? Should I sell book page ephemera packs? Include them with my general fussy cut packs(right now are mostly magazine images)? Should I back some of these with a tea dyed or graph/ledger/lined paper to create journal cards and tags? Any and all opinions are appreciated!

Thanks for reading...I hope I gave you a little inspiration today!

~Malia

Painty Papers (Introduction)

 I'm sure this will be one of many Painty Paper blogs. If there were one thing that truly speaks to my soul, its using scrap, junk, crap paper and turning them into works of art with simple everyday items and some cheap (and I mean CHEAP) paints. Its the most inexpensive way to create something beautiful and wonderful with color, texture, and style. Not to mention, colored and patterned paper that is commercially made costs a fortune and I'm sure the production of it is bad for the environment and repurposing papers and household items instead of throwing them away gives you a GREEN advantage to this whole art business.

I'm sure that someday in the future, I will get into details about all of the things that I use in my mixed media painty papers but for now, let's go through a rundown of what these are and what you can use them for. 

**And even if you are a "painty paper" veteran and think you can skip all of this, please don't! I can't tell you the amount of videos I've watched and things I've read about topics I thought I knew about (Painty papers being one of those topics), but come to find out, I was far from an expert! Inspiration and new ideas come from all over, so keep reading before you close out!**

I apologize for so many blue pages - when I grabbed a stack of base coat pages, the majority of them were blue (and maybe I was in a bit of a blue mood anyway). But this brings us back to colored paper. I create my own blue, green, red, orange, yellow, grey, etc. pages and stock pile them. Then, I make holiday pages (Christmas, Falloween, Spring, etc.) and I stock pile them. They work amazing in just about all of the journals, ephemera, ATCs, happy mail I've ever used them for!

So, what is my process?

Let me start by saying its different for everyone - but I will tell you what works for me.

I work in steps. 

Step 1 - the base coat. It is where I scrape, brush, gel print, sponge paint on the paper. These go very fast. Unless I'm painting specific shapes (i.e. squares/rectangles were a big one at one point in my base coats - pictured below)

And these ones here with this gorgeous stencil are among my favorites, so I hoard these ones (and turned them into digis instead).

Below I used some mesh as a stencil.

Step 2 - is really artists choice. Sometimes, I stencil, other times I stamp and alternate between the two depending on the paper and base coat. 

Once in a blue moon, there is nothing after the base coat. Sometimes, they come out so perfectly that nothing else needs to be done. This type of painty paper is called "the unicorns" (just kidding- but they seriously are like unicorns).

Step 3 - same as step 2...using the alternating tool -  stamp or stencil.

Step 4 - doodle, mark making, pastels, crayons, paint pens, pencils, markers... Whatever you can think of... Mark up however you see fit!

What are some things to do with painty papers?

Painty papers are such a versatile tool to have in your arsenal. After a few uses of these babies in your projects, more and more ideas start flooding in until you are a crazy painty person like me who uses these in place of fancy colored scrapbook papers and such.

They work in place of any papers. 

-Backgrounds are especially awesome. It really helps focal images POP when used in collages or on ATCs, mixed media, scrapbook layouts, art journaling, etc.

-Journal pages. I often use book page FOLIOS ( when each pair of pages is pulled from the center of the signature(s) in each book). Then I have a double-wide set of pages which work best for sewing signatures of a junk journal. I'm a real weirdo about proper orientation of the pages in my journals (random upside down oooopsies not included).

-Die Cutting/shape cutting. I always die cut my painty papers and they come out amazing. Sometimes, even the ugliest painty papers looks amazing in smaller chunks. So, don't throw out your ugly painty papers (and if you are hoarding them rather than trash them, trust me, try smaller pieces of the ugly page). Shape cutting is the same as die cutting except you are cutting by hand/punch.

-Greeting Cards. Either torn up and glued onto the card or covering the entire thing, painty papers give greeting cards a real unique, authentic flair. I like to tear corners off and only cover half of my cover diagonally. Or, leave a thin border of the original card and cover the rest of the card with painty paper (I know there's a word for this, but it eludes me at the moment).

-Big Projects. Book marks. Journal covers, focal point of a mixed media piece. You know the projects I'm talking about - the ones that make the pages SHINE. For instance, my favorite pages up there - I have made a few of those into digital images and I print them and use them as covers on some things.

The picture above is of some ATC and inchie bases that I made with some of the uglier papers I had. Smaller pieces make ugly papers look much better most of the time!

I'm sorry for the novel but I'm passionate about everything Painty Papers are and everything you can use them for! I even started selling mine in my colorful collage packs (available in my ko-fi store). So, grab some cheap paints, stencils, stamps, markers and pastels and start turning your junk mail into art!

~M