Clean-up, Aisle 5

I spent much of my art time Saturday cleaning up a mess I made. Nope, I'm not going to recreate it here, but here's what I did. You need to use your imagination and go with the flow.

I decided to use a spray adhesive in the house because it was raining. I used the box seen above as my catch all. The cardboard in the box got glue on it. Can you see the discoloration? That's when I decided to grab my craft sheet, which is supposed to repel any and every thing I can throw at it. Well let me tell you, it just isn't so! I had the biggest gooey mess you have ever seen. When I tried to wipe the spray adhesive from the craft sheet, I got an even bigger gooey mess, this time accompanied by a Bounty paper towel that stuck, bit by bit, to the gooey mess and the craft sheet.

Next I tried water. Water only puddled onto the craft sheet, exacerbating the problem. So, I got out the "little gun," turpenoid. It is an expensive alternative to turpentine, sold in craft stores at an exorbitant cost. I could tell it was trying to work, but I simply refused to use as much as would be needed to clean the craft sheet.

That was when I got out the "big gun," turpentine. Now this stuff smells to high heaven, so I had to take it outside. Thankfully, it had now quit raining. I grabbed a large plastic container and dumped a bunch of turpentine in the bucket, threw in the craft sheet, and prayed that I hadn't ruined it. Thankfully, the turp did the trick, as can be evidenced in the above photo, except the craft sheet is still a bit sticky feeling, because now I had spread the glue over the entire sheet, front and back.

There really IS an up side to this mess tale.



Back in 2008, I made some turpentine papers using National Geographic magazines. I had very little success with the process and was deeply disappointed.


Then, in 2009,

I did it again. That time I had marginal success. I had more success with the plate in the photo I was rusting!

Saturday was a different story. Since I had all the turp sitting in the bucket, I decided to try this technique one more time. I didn't use a brush, I just dumped the National Geographic pages into the bucket of turpentine, allowed them to sit for awhile, then separated them, allowing them to dry in the now sticky Kansas heat and humidity. Later, when I checked on them,

I was jumping for joy. Sure, they still smell and I mean SMELL, but they are awesome. The good news is, most of the scent will be gone in about a week. If you are sensitive to the scent, be sure to leave them in a place where there is plenty of open air.

I truly believe this is how they should have looked the first two times I tried this technique.

In a way, it made cleaning my gooey craft sheet almost enjoyable. OK, maybe not that enjoyable, but you get the picture.

Speaking of pictures, the top one is from 2008, the next two are from 2009, and the last ones are from Saturday. And I used that same can of turpentine, too (free from my Household Hazardous Waste Swap and Shop).

To answer your potato stamp questions from Friday, the HANDS were "cut" using a cookie cutter. I turned the cutter over so I would get both hands. I just cut completely through the potato halves.

For the numbers, I freehanded a number backward onto computer paper, cut it to size, laid it over the top of the potatoes, and marked the number after I found the right spot on the potato. A potato is limited by its size, so you may have to fiddle with position for awhile. For the birthday cake (not shown, but used in one of my anniversary pages), I freehanded the cake and did the same as the numbers. To cut out a center or middle, you will need a paring knife, which IS appropriate in this instance. Also, I cut deeply around the images, then cut slices away from the potatoes, so the stamps would be deep enough to not leave an outline.

Before you stamp anything, be sure to allow the potato to sit for no less than a few hours so it grows a slight skin. Before applying ink, be sure to pat the potato to make sure no moisture is leaking out. You can expect your potato stamp to be good up to a week.

Of all these techniques, the easiest is to cut the potato using a cookie cutter. Be sure the cutter doesn't have a back.

Today's blog is going to knock your socks off, well, at least if you are into book arts. Some of you may have heard of Randi Parkhurst from Washington (state in the US). I'm sure all the serious artists out there have. So, what is her specialty, you ask? Besides making her own handmade and hand painted papers, binding her own books, and constructing her own boxes, she makes the most incredible mixed media books. Talk about interactive. They fold into cubbies, hide in other books, then open up and become lives of their own. Randi's blog is aptly named Cubbyhole Book Arts, and even if you don't work in handmade books, you will love these. Now please don't tell me they don't put a smile on your face!

So clean up something and look at books that move (you) today. See you tomorrow for Tuesday Tea, when we enter the Spice Merchant and see what's inside.