April in Paris . . .

. . . . . Well, a girl can wish! Instead of taking a trip to France . . . sigh . . ., my online Face Book group, Craft That Divas, had a tag swap event. Each participant had to make two tags with the April in Paris theme and send them to their swap partners, affectionately known by us Divas as "swapners".  :-)  I made the tags and a few related items to send to my swapners, Rachel and Janice.

The first one is very fitting for the kind of weather we have been experiencing. Rain. Rain. Rain. I thought that Paris would be romantic on a rainy day, so I tried to evoke a misty day in Paris.

The second one is more along the lines of what most of us might think about April in Paris . . . beautiful blossoms and sweet fragrances on the spring air.

Take a look. I have put captions on the photos.

For Rachel . . . 

A rainy day in Paris . . .
I made this one a shaker with some fine silver glitter as the rain.
I could not find an umbrella image that I liked, so I drew this one.
I cut it into sections and trimmed them a wee bit so you can see them on the umbrella.
The umbrella handle is grungeboard
I used my little block letter stamps to print the letters of the words.

I made a little box to hold a surprise for Rachel.
The top closes with a Velcro dot.

A stick pin in rainy day shades.
Crafters use stick pins in projects and they can also be worn as an accessory.
Remember the '80's? I used to wear beautiful large-brimmed hats with a stick pin in the brim or on my lapel.

The stick pin and box.

Altered Dominoes.
I made a little Domino Book.
These are fun to make and as my friend Tiffany says . . . they are PNP . . .
Pretty 'n Pointless.
That does't mean she doesn't like them, though!
But isn't it fun to play, even when we are grown ups?
I love these little books!

The interior of the Domino Book.
As you can see, anyone can read this one!

I made a card for Rachel, carrying out the April in Paris theme.
I used an embossing folder to give the envelope some pizazz.

Here are the things I sent to Rachel.
The little packet on the right is some hand-dyed seam binding I included.
She can use it to hang her tag, or keep it for another project.
The hole at the top of the tag is still there. It is behind the trim, that is popped up on pop dots.

I used the Nature Garden paper stack by Prima for Rachel's tag and extras.

For Janice . . .

For Janice, I used the same Eifel Tower die as I did for Rachel's tag.
I embossed and painted it and the fleur-de-lis with a paint I mixed to resemble bronze or metal.
I used part of a die that is a branch-like "on the edge" die by Tim Holtz.
I cut it out of grunge board.
To give it the look of bark, I embossed it with my script embossing folder and painted it brown.
I glued seed beeds in the centers of the flowers.
I added a stamped image of a fleur-de-lis on the background paper.

Just like the box I made for Rachel.

And a stick pin for Janice, too.

The stick pin and box.

Janice received a Domino Book, too!

There is a little bit of reading in Janice's book. LOL!
(Although, it might even be in French!)

Janice's card and embossed envelope.

Here are the things I sent to Janice, including some hand-dyed seam binding she can use to hang her tag, if she wishes.

I used the Something Blue paper stack by Prima for Janice's tag and extras.

There are so many projects I have made in the past few months that never made their way to a blog post. I am playing catch up, so you will be seeing posts more often for a while. I am grateful to have the time today to post this because I was supposed to be in Buffalo at a check up with my doctor. He had to cancel due to an emergency. Now, onto some of the other projects that are on my craft table. I might even break out the sewing machine and sew for a change. I have a few projects with deadlines in my sewing room, too!

Thanks for stopping by and until we meet again, may the Lord hold you in the hollow of His hand.

Emmy