Tip-ins I created for Norma in our six person International player swap

I would like to wish each of you who celebrates it a joyous and happy Easter.  I know I'm known for my lengthy posts, but this one is especially long.  It's been even longer for me, because I started this about 8 pm last night and the images finally all uploaded about 7 am.  So I will try to be brief and hope you will stay through to the end.

These tip-ins are for my dear friend Norma, who unfortunately doesn't have a blog.  The pages are shown in no particular order, other than that's how I photographed them.  They were far too dimensional to scan.

Norma's theme is Childhood Memories and I tried to create pages any person, looking back on their childhood might enjoy, appreciate, or remember.  This page is mainly about dominoes and games children play.

Thanks to my friend Kathy, I was able to borrow her rocking horse embossing folder.  The monopoly money is quite old and copyrighted 1934.

The "Surprise Inside" is from a Cracker Jack box.

Each of us creates a tag for our swap partner as a way of remembering the important information, such as our addresses (City, State, Country) and blog addresses.  This is the tag I created for Norma using one of Kathy's dies, an altered domino, and a plastic toy from an old game.

Childhood may be a memory for some, but I have trouble remembering mine.  Seems I have very few memories of my childhood, which I apparently lost (or repressed) after both my grandparents, my only living relatives, died. 

This is a great photo of the embossed rocking horse.

I sewed the tag holder in place, because sewing is integral to my art lately.  I found a photo of these jacks and ball and knew I had to include it.

I found this Chinese "play money" and had to include it, too.

This page is all about games and puzzle pieces.  I created the background using my handmade shimmering mists.

More dominoes, triominoes, and a checkers piece were combined with a game piece from the 1980s.

You would think a puzzle for ages 4+ would not give me any trouble, but every time I moved it, I had to reassemble it.  The bingo marker in pink shows the number of pieces in the puzzle.

This is a much better photo of the puzzle, and I included the bingo marker because I thought the puzzle needed something.

I used old computer keys to spell the word. 

They took forever to level because I had a hard time removing the prongs that originally held the keys to the board.

More game and puzzle pieces rounded out the page.

This page is about toys that teach.  At least that's what the dominoes are supposed to do.

More checker pieces were combined with a thimble from the monopoly game.

I got the idea to include toy inspired stamps when I created an earlier themed page.  I made similar entries, but for these, I "blinged" the holders up a bit.

Since I'm driven by color, I was thrilled to find a green domino in my stash.  Note the "Toys That Teach" and the dominoes.

I have no idea what this game piece is, but I found it in my stash and included it on the page.

Another colored domino found its way on the page.

For this slide holder, I included a mahjong tile.

I had several triominoes, so had to include them.

This was a very dimensional page

with varying heights of the game pieces.
The fact that I chose the thimble over other monopoly pieces will be obvious in a few moments.

Here is a closeup of the bling and decorations I chose for the slide mounts.
This page is a bit of a hodge-podge.

I included the floppy disk from the 1980s as a bit of a joke for Norma.  She has always claimed she knows very little about computers, so I thought she might get a laugh.  Of course, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, most six year old children knew more about computers than their parents.  It's amazing because they can tell their children the internet was not available to most back then.  So these are definitely 80s memories.

More Cracker Jack prizes, S & H Green stamps, and card games fill the spaces.

I found the ice cream card in my stash, but have no idea what game it came from.

I'm a huge Trivial Pursuit fan, so of course, I had to include cards from it.

Monopoly cards, bingo cards, an Uno card, a slide mount with a toy postage stamp, green stamps, and another Trivial Pursuit card fill the page.

The card with Kansas on it has Ohio's image on the back.   I thought Norma would appreciate that, so I created it to swing back and forth with a star brad.  I hid the mechanism under the card itself.

I glued everything to this page.  It was the only one that didn't include sewing.

I forgot to photograph this page, so Norma sent it to me.  You can see both Bleubeard and I had a role in this one where I sewed the Bingo cards to the background.  I added the bicycle washi tape and sewed it, too.  The "gizmo" that has our name on it was from the keyboard I took apart.  I added the bingo marker because there was a piece of wire I couldn't remove, and I didn't want Norma accidentally cutting herself on it.

I'm not sure how many children have memories of sewing, but I remember my Grandmother sewed all my clothes until I was in high school.  She was a fabulous seamstress and could have done it professionally, I'm sure.

As a back story, my neighbor gave me a huge box of patterns, some of which were dress patterns.  I often use these lovely patterns in my art, but don't think to use the envelopes they come in.  The old outfits are lovely and the date on this one appears to be 1965.

Please don't fall over in shock.  I actually stamped the image "For Women's Wear" on the envelope.

I just noticed that the address stamped on the envelope predates zip codes.

The two women inside the envelope will become clear soon. 

I clipped the buttons that can swing back and forth.  They have Bleubeard and Elizabeth on the back and the date of the swap.

I sewed around the envelope

as well as the page.
These are the women who were tucked inside the envelope.  They are paper dolls that Norma can cut out and play with, or leave as they are. 

This page was a nightmare to pack, but Norma assured me it was fine once she opened the package.  This page has it all: the 1980s, the 1950s, and the 1920s.

This was my generation, where the hair and shoulder pads were big, but I don't remember wearing any clothes with the long waistline.  I'd wear one like this now, though (minus the huge shoulder pads, of course)!

I got wild with the stamps

and the sewing, too.

You can see the back of the button card I referred to on the previous page.

I suspect these were Norma's childhood memories.

I had to add this tag

because it reminded me of the sewing machine my grandmother sewed on till the day she died.

I used sewing (and two staples) instead of glue to create this page.  Norma is a REAL seamstress, but I dabble.

The background is a Graphic 45 page of a girl jumping rope.

I have no idea what game these pliable plastic animals came from, but they were so different from what I had created previously, I had to use them.

These animals were so thin, the girl's dress showed through the back of them.

Another of the games I shared on this page was the Same/Different Games.

Bleubeard helped me with this page, too!

The idea behind this game was to remember the card that was the same as before, and the two cats eagerly drinking milk were four paws up in Bleubeard's opinion.

WHEW.  We made it.  While I was loading and writing, we had about an inch of snow hit the ground.  I just looked up and saw it.  It's good because Kansas has been on fire for several days.  We need all the moisture we can get to help the firefighters who have come from several counties and several surrounding states.

Thanks for sticking with me.  It is my Easter gift to you.  Now I must put the ham (for others) in the oven, make my waldorf salad, and peel the sweet potatoes.  Have a fantastic Sunday and Easter.