This is a wooden plate I painted years ago...The outer edge is done is a deep mauve that was then sponged, the center was painted with the birdhouse and dogwood blossom scene...
I just had to try the cow on a card...the card is strathmore watercolor paper, and I used acrylic paints...
I just love this pig...he is one of my favorites...I just had to paint him again...
I did this Angel one time as Christmas tree ornaments...I may make another Angel tree this year...I have a small 3 foot Charlie Brown tree and it would look cute covered with Angels...
This is a paper mache box shaped like a chicken...I painted the box base red and added some black dot work around the bottom edge...
I painted the top off white and added red and black detail work...
I have really been missing my painting days here lately...I still have some mini wood shapes and so I decided to pull a few out and play...this is my mini pig...he is so cute...I used to make these as shadow box pieces...
Same chicken as above, but in blue...
Well, just working with those mini shapes was not enough...I had to pull out some lumber and crank up the band saw...gees, i hope hubby does not miss that piece of wood...oh well...I had fun...LOL...I cut out my shapes, sanded and painted them...This is my sheep/lamb shape...i used a wood pattern for the shape, but the detail work is all free hand and my own design...
Here is my pig...I just love this little guy...I will have more pigs later...
This is my chicken, similar to the small one above...but larger and I did a different look, as I wanted it to coordinate with the pig and sheep...
I had time after work today, so I made two more of the Mini Popcorn Boxes...gosh, these little buggers are addictive...I used images from Innovative Stamp Creations on these two boxes...
these are the four boxes I made today...check out the studio blog to get your own Mini Popcorn Boxes http://thestudioinpreston.blogspot.com 
This ATC envie is great for making matching ATC and Envie's for trading...I used images from Innovative Stamp Creations to decorate the envie and ATC...I also used a label nestie shape, cut in half to layer on the ATC...Be sure and check out Betsy's new stamps...they are perfect for Collage Style Stamping... http://www.innovativestampcreations.com
I finally got to play before work today...I made two different Mini Popcorn Box samples, using stamps from Innovative Stamp Creations and Prickley Pear Rubber Stamps...
I used punches and nesties to make the embellishment for the tops of the boxes...
You can get the Mini Popcorn Box die cuts at http://thestudioinpreston.blogspot.com Order them by Sunday April 26 and get an assortment of mini and small die cuts to embellish your boxes with...
This is our new ATC envie...perfect for sharing your ATC creations and artwork
This is our Mini Popcorn Box...this is a great party favor treat box...Samples will be coming later this week...they are available for purchase now in the studio http://thestudioinpreston.blogspot.com 
This matchbox kit is a special limited time offer on my studio blog, while supplies last http://thestudioinpreston.blogspot.com This one is a gift for a counselor at school where my granddaughter goes, we are the Eagles so she will get a kick outta this...Stamped image of eagle is from Prickley Pear Rubber Stamps...
I had played around with this idea last year...then kinda put it to the side...I got it out the other day while going thru a box of unfinished projects...I coated the denim fabric, left from a pair of cut of jeans...with Royal Coat Decoupage Medium...one of my favorite mediums to work with...Let it dry, I let this dry for a whole day...I die cut my balloons...
added to the front of a card...Background is stamped with an ISC background stamp, verse is from Paper Hollow Xpreshons Clear Stamps...I have another project in the works, but will have to wait until next week...I have to work the day job the rest of this week...LOL...hey, I gotta eat...
This is what the plastic template looks like...hard to photograph so that you can see the detail...its not very deep detail, as it was designed to just leave an impression in a piece of leather for carving, etc...I bought my templates back in 1976/1977 when I first began tooling leather as a hobby...I was just outta high school, 17 years old, my parents would not let me work a full time job...and I was bored with sewing and crocheting...so my daddy and me went to a Tandy Leather store one day...and I was hooked...I made belts, wallets, billfolds, small purses, boots, gun holsters and more for quite a few years...
Some of the designs are in stamps, they are metal shapes that you hammer into the leather to leave the impression, like the horses, wagon in this belt strip...the mountains, fence, clouds, were hand carved...This is the end scrap from a belt I made in the mid 80's for a friends little boy...
This is a hand carved design from about the same time as the belt, was done for a friend, then she decided she wanted a different design after this one had some wear on it...it was designed to hold a bic lighter...her initials were stamped using alpha stamps...
This is the rack my daddy made for me to keep my tools in...this stayed on the backside of the desk I work on, so that all my detail tools were handy...
This is the buffalo template image, I made a wallet with this buffalo on it, in the early 80's for a friends birthday gift...
I was able to find more of my Leather Crafting templates...so I played around with running a few of them thru the Big Shot this afternoon...they work great on the cardstock...brings back lots of memories from my Leather Crafting days too...
I added color to the cardstock, by just rubbing an ink pad all over it...so I could see the actual embossed area...its actually debossed, but i think its a pretty cool look...these were templates I used to make carved wallets and billfolds with...I used to do lots of wallets with deer, as that was my daddy's thing, I would make him a new wallet every year...
The templates were used on dampened leather, to impress the images enough, then you would take a carving knife and carve the design into the leather, then taking a series of tools, you would add all the detail to the piece...lots of work, but I enjoyed doing it... Its neat that they will work to deboss the cardstock and make some neat cards using my old tools....
I decided to use the indian and make a quick card...word stamp is from ISC...and I thought it was very fitting.... I trimmed the cardstock around the border on the debossed piece and rounded the corners...I indian image was designed to be carved on the front of a wallet...
I started with a package of 8x8 page protectors, I cut off the section that had the prepunched holes, like for post bound books...
I cut chipboard covers, covered with pattern papers and then punched the covers the same way...
This is the inside front cover and the first page protector page...I will work on this book later this week and add photos of what I put in it...The package of page protectors I bought came with 5 protectors, so that is how many pages this book will have, 5 pages with 10 layouts...Making covers and using the page protectors in this way will allow you to make more books to share with family and friends, and making themed books is a great way to share photos with people that don't get to see your family very often...
