Angel in a Jfar

This is actually a re-post from 2011! In case you are new to my blog I thought I would post this again. It was a fun and quite easy project. I just can't believe it was 2011 that I made it. Time goes by fast. To find the instructions on how to make this, just click first on LABELS and then on ANGELS and it is the second one that opens.

Have fun and make it your own! No need to follow mine instructions exactly because I just made it up as I went along using things I had on hand.

 Cheers

Violet

Three Angels

I've had those poor 20 angels on my mind all weekend so today I'm posting three angels that I painted several years ago at Shelley's Painted Treasures, now in Dresden. They adorn my tree every year.

I really love angels and these were fun, but persnickety to paint. The blue one in the middle was the hardest. At one point I looked at her face and told Shelley she was beginning to look like Tammy Faye Baker (yes, it was that long ago I painted them). That really cracked Shelley and the class up but she assured me to keep going and she would be fine in the end. She was right.

Snow Angel in a Jar - Mixed Media Project

Yesterday I mentioned that I just had to have a new printer when ours died. Well, this is why I just had to have a new printer - so I could print off this vintage angel picture so I could make this snow angel in a jar. I saw one of these on another blog earlier this month and thought it looked like a cool project.

I'm not sure how they did theirs but I printed off the image on photo paper so it was strong enough to stand up on its own by bending over the bottom and gluing it down. I just cut it out, inked the edges, and added lots of stickles and then more glitter to the wings. I didn't have any artificial snow that it looked like they had in their jar, but I did have some white doll curly hair so I just cut it up into sections, pulled it to fluff it and dropped it in. The wire and pearls came from a roll I picked up from Fabricland on sale - had no idea what I was going to do with it at the time but it was one of those things that was just oozing with potential. It needed some colour so I dropped in three red tiny pompoms left over from when I made elves. The sign is popped off her with pop dots. The top has a piece of lace from an old lace dickey that I won from Avon, never wore but kept anyway and then the fancy lace was glued around the top, then a gold ribbon and some feathers were glued on. She is a snow angel so she needed snowflakes so I had some peel and stick ones and I stuck them onto the inside of the glass.

It was hard to photograph because of the reflection off the glass. Here's a shot from a different angle.

A Christmas Angel

I love angels. I feel them around me all the time. We are all suppose to have a guardian angel - well, I'm such a klutz I expect I have several because one couldn't keep up with me. I must be exhausting to watch over.

When I first started tole painting - about 1992 or 93, I found this pattern in a tole painting magazine and decided to make it.

I'm not sure now who cut the wood out for me but they did a great job. As I look at it now I can see where I what I would change if I was doing it over - many newbie mistakes! But, overall I like it and it still hangs from our entertainment centre every season. The bow she is holding and the bells below were added after she was painted. I actually, pretty much, followed the pattern and this is what it called for. It does add a nice dimension to the piece.

Garden Angel Painting

I thought I'd switch things up a bit and post an old painting I did when I first started tole painting. I only took a couple of lessons at Shelley's Painted Treasures and then just worked on my own. This is definitely tole painting and not fine art!

I sort of shudder when I look at this - so "I'm new at this" look to it....but I post these in case someone else is just starting out and is discouraged. I got better at this painting bit and so will anyone else who sticks with it.

Irish Angels and more

Aren't these cute. I painted these many, many years ago when I first started tole painting. I hung them in my office cubicle every March back when I was a working girl. Now they just hang in my "lower studio" (aka the basement) and mostly forgotten as they are more or less behind a line of scrapbooking books. I happened to see them yesterday and decided to move them over to where I could see them.

Then, even further behind the books, were the Valentine angels that I had also totally forgotten about. I brought them out for a picture and then put them back....but I hope to remember to bring them out next February.  Not sure which ones I painted first but both are the same pattern but different colours.

The hair on both of them is that wild, curly doll hair that comes in a small package. Something a little different.