Art Geeks JUNE 2013 mail art swap

I love swapping art with people, as it not only gives me an excuse (as if I need one) to get the paints out, but I love the idea of a little piece of you winging its way to someone else.

I am taking part in the Art Geeks mail art swap which is a group of people who swap mail art 1:1 on a monthly or bi-monthly basis to a theme.

The swap theme for June was Juno (the Roman Goddess) or the Solstice. You were free to interpret this how you wanted.

We had a very sad day on Monday and I am still sad three days later. We lost our darling Bertie. It is still hard, he was such a little character full of a zest for life that it is so hard not to be sad and miss him. He was a very old boy though, the vets called him a geriatric as six and a half is old for a guinea pig but at least I like to think he was happy. Trouble is we have only had four years with the little guy as he was a rescue. Still we will always take rescue / rehome animals where we can as we find it very rewarding and like to give them a loving home for the rest of their lives and with Bert we did just that. We knew it would be soon, we could see him slowing down but even so it is still sad, at least I was cuddling him until the very end telling him that we loved him very much. The vet seems to think he was hanging on until we moved to see the new house and make sure Betty settled in OK. Our blind little girl is pining like crazy and whilst it is still so raw for us, our first priority is her so we are going to find a friend for her.

Just a very short time after Bertie had passed our postman arrived and delivered a sunny happy piece of mail which gave me a lot of hope and a reason to smile. This is another reason why I like mail art swaps, I like to think I am helping people on the other end too. I don't think my mail art swap partner will fully appreciate how I was feeling and what I felt when I saw that bit of post. Believe me, art does heal, even if you are not doing it yourself just receiving it heals.

So do you want to see what I was lucky enough to receive?

Here we go...

Envelope - Front

Envelope - Back

Decorative chipboard embellishment pieces

Beautiful hand made paper

Beautiful hand made paper

Hand made journal made from a map

Hand made journal made from a map

Thank you so so much! I can't wait to start working in my new journal!

And of course I sent something out to my partner too. This is what I sent:

I decided to go with the Solstice theme particularly the aspect of the longest day and the shortest night. I opened an envelope out and divided it in half. I stamped with a text stamp with purple in on the day side and blue on the night. Then I gesso'd with a stencil: swirls on day and harlequin on night. I then used oil pastels to create the suns and the night sky. I blended them using a baby wipe for a little gesso resist on the stencil. I then used glitter on both the moon and the suns and some white paint for stars.

 I then folded the envelope back up again and you can see how it looks front and back:

Solstice to me I thought sounded like a girls name so I painted a picture of a girl on cardboard to go inside.

Oh the pressure I felt creating this! I started and restarted so many times. We had literally just moved in so things were a bit chaotic and I only had the bare minimum art supplies out so I was really testing myself. So much stress but I did enjoy the process too. I just hope the recipient like it too.

Will we see you on the next swap?