An Altered Book:: The Motor Girls on Crystal Bay

The Discovery ~ Conclusion :: Altered Book :: The Motor Girls on Crystal Bay

Text:

The Discovery - Conclusion

Summer is running out, and Winter's coming on-
We'll soon have to go back home-
The motor girls, Lottie, Bess, Belle, and Cora
had already gained a reputation for Beauty strength bravery and Grace.
Yet leaving seemed about the most difficult thing to do.
Do we have to leave these shores?
Why not anchor here for now and for eternity!
We can come back next year,
and When we do return,
-something is sure to happen.
Something always does.

Ingredients:
Invent-It! Body Sticker Tatoos, card stock tags, gold metal foil, embossing powder, acrylics, PearlEx powder, stickers, assorted fibers, alphabet stamps, Krylon gold leafing pen, Brilliance ink, graphic images from Alphonse Mucha prints

Lessons Learned:
1) Sometimes things don't work out the way you plan, but sometimes that makes them better.
2) Don't rush; if the idea doesn't leap out at you, take your time and think, think, think.
3) Staring at something without doing anything can yield positive results - it's okay to do nothing but reflect.
4) Don't decorate the end pages until the end of the book.

Reflections:
Here's how I did these two pages. I got these images of the Alphonse Mucha prints several weeks ago off the internet by doing a search for vintage women. I knew they'd be perfect for the book, but I wasn't exactly sure how. (That does seem to be a common thread throughout this process. Find something intriguing and then figure out how to use it.) I heard about this stuff called Invent-It! Body Sticker Tatoos that you can use with an ink jet printer. I had originally discovered it while working with polymer clay, but thought it would be a cool way to do image transfers. So I made the Mucha images into body tatoos.

I painted the book pages with Lumiere pearl magenta acrylic and then brushed Aztec gold PearlEx all over the page while the paint was still slightly damp. I took some book pages that I had torn out of the book, painted them with gold acrylic and transferred the body tatoos onto those book pages. I used some decorative trim scissors and cut a border around the images.

I took some white card tags and trimmed them so they'd fit across the book pages. I colored the tags by stamping directly on them with different shades of Brilliance ink. I glued the tatooed book pages onto the tags. Then I put a gold border around each tag with the Krylon pen.

I cut little gold metal tags out of the foil and using my alphabet stamps, stamped the words on them. I then used gold embossing powder around the edges. I put the art fibers through the large tags, attached the tiny gold tags and then used double sided poster tape to adhere them into the book.

The pretty gold border sticker at the bottom of the page was used to cover a mess-up I made with the text. I had glued on one additional phrase of text, but decided I didn't like it. So I used a wet sponge brush, carefully soaked the sections I didn't like with water, and used an exacto blade to gently scrape up the text. It didn't look too bad, but I thought the stickers would look nice there anyhow so decided to use them.

I had a lot of indecision on this page. After I had made the women tags, I wasn't really happy with the colors I'd chosen for the backgrounds. I'm not much for the pink and green combo. By using the Krylon pen along the border of the tag, it took away some of that color, softening its effect.

Also, I could not decide on the best way to finish the text. The words seem important right now because I'm so close to the end of the book, and really this is the last chapter of the book, although it's not the last page I'm doing.

The book is really overstuffed right now, and I still have one more page to go. The back cover is completely separated from the pages of the book and is just holding on by the cloth along the spine. I'm going to have to cut the cloth, split the spin of the book, widen it and reconstruct it. A pretty daunting task. If I could I would just remove the entire cover and rebind the book with a new cover. But I decorated the title page right on the inside of the front cover, so I can't remove it without destroying the title page, and that just won't do.

As I get close to finishing the book, I'm finding my pace slowing down. Even though I know what my last page is going to be, I'm dragging my heels a bit. I really don't want to be finished with the book because I've grown very fond of the motor girls; I guess I don't want to have them go. Why can't I just anchor with them here for now and eternity?

Ahead to Page 9

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