Day 123 ~ Be inspired by an eggshell.

I had already colored white eggshells for the dying project on Day 80, so I couldn't do that again. Thought of creating little bowls out of the egg pieces, but, of course, they couldn't stand up on their own, so needed wire stands.

Day 122 ~ Make a musical instrument.

Whether it's musical or not may be a matter of opinion... It makes a not unpleasant sorta clunking sound. The tubes are made of Super Sculpey which I rolled out and wrapped around a dowel and stamped with metal stamps, then put in the oven, then forgot about them while I watched a movie, so instead of baking at 275 degrees for 10 minutes they baked for about two hours, BUT they came out fine, in fact they turned a wonderful dark brown, which I painted over with acrylics (Titanium white and gold) just enough to enhance the stamp design. They are tied to a deer rib, also painted, with sewing thread. This was a trip to photograph! Talk about a moving target.

Day 121

Make something out of aluminum foil. This little guy measures about 7" high. I started with 3 balls of foil mashed together for the torso, then wrapped the legs and neck shapes around that base and built them up with more pieces of foil as I went along. It was a bit frustrating that the foil wouldn't stick to itself and I ended up experimenting with different glues. Not Super Glue, although I can tell you that definitely works on your fingers. Jewelry glue worked sorta. I finally just stuck pins in places, like to hold the tail on and secure some of the flaps of foil.

This was the most fun so far! The project idea simply suggested making something out of wood. I decided to go big. The wood used was collected from our property. I began the construction by tying a bundle together and placing over a table, then attached the legs, neck and head from there, adding more pieces of wood by tying them on with baling twine. The twine was bright orange. I hate to admit this, but I used spray paint to get rid of the orange and help it blend in. It was a huge improvement. I hope the ozone layer will forgive me.

Day 108

Create something in the steam on a mirror. That was this day's project. I held a hand mirror over a boiling pot on the stove, got it steamy and carried it over to Mishi, under the kitchen table. I found that the steam turned into just wavy water very quickly, so I had to try this a number of times and ended up having to move fast from stove to cat in order to get it to work. I held the mirror so that the cat was looking into it at an angle that I could photograph the reflection. I took many shots, of CJ, too. Love the way the whiskers look, and the distortion on the upper left image. Wanted to use all four of these, the strongest results, so I created a collage in Picasa.

Day 102

A palindrome was the assignment on this day. To write and illustrate one. A palindrome is a phrase that reads the same forward and backward. I had to work at thinking up something, but when I came up with NOT A TON, the feather was easy as a subject to illustrate it. I held the feather (I found this on a morning walk) up to the perfect, cloud-decorated sky and snapped the picture. Used Photoshop to erase my hand. (Don't look too closely, please, I'm a real amateur with this kind of stuff!) Used the Picasa type app to add the copy.

Day 80

These eggs were first emptied of there contents by poking holes at each end and shaking them. I rinsed them out with water, too. The project was to experiment with dying something using unconventional materials. I used various kinds of inks, applying wax in some areas first as a resist.