Working my way into "Artful Blogging" one mushroom at a time.

I've had a year-long running joke that if I could just get enough handmade fimo mushrooms in a field to photograph myself in (wearing ethereal faerie garb), I might just make it to the ultimate crafter's blogging goal:  being published in Artful Blogging*.  Truth is, I've dog-eared enough issues to know it's not really going to happen.  I'm too busy trying to be funny to take such lovely pictures for each post and while I LOVE the shabby-chic aesthetic of so many of the Artful Blogging's subjects, I can't live that way.  I just wish I did. 

Still, I can't look at mushrooms without thinking of Artful Blogging.  The birthday invitations my little girl and I made for her upcoming Fairy Art birthday party are a good example.  Naturally I had to do a little photoshoot before we ran around the neighborhood passing them out.  It might be the closest I ever get to a field full of mushrooms and fairies again (well, that's probably not true since we are planning a trip to FaerieWorlds this summer in Eugene,OR).  And for the record, my husband AND son declared the photo of a forest of little Tabitha Fairies on mushrooms (above) "creepy."  So much for my attempt at being "artful!"

These were really easy but, like most of my projects, fairly time consuming.  I just sketched out a free-hand mushroom as a template and traced the top (red) part of the mushroom on textured Bazzil cardstock.  I traced the mushroom on a fold so it would work as a card that opened from the top.  I traced the stem of the mushroom on beige textured Bazill and used adhesive to affix it to the inside of the mushroom top.  I randomly cut free-hand "spots" for the mushroom making sure they were organic and not too round (my daughter tried to do this for awhile and declared it too hard but we did use some of hers- I just couldn't covince her that they weren't supposed to be "perfect").  My little girl was very cooperative about posing on a kitchen counter in a her white ballet recital gown for the fairy photo.  I simply reduced the size of the photo, cut it out and added anything wing-like I had in my stash.  My favorite wings were made by taking Melissa Frances Vintage Transfers rub-ons and adding them to some luggage tag laminate I had laying around.  I cut the finished product out for realistic looking wings that were translucent.  Ditto with the little crown.  The other, more colorful, crowns are Fiskars raindots  (which my daughter added to all the little fairy photos of herself) and the colorful wings were butterfly clips that had the misfortune of being in my line of vision when I ran out of Melissa Frances rub-ons.  The last step was printing the invitation detail on cardstock which I then cut to size and added to the inside of the mushroom top and we were ready to move on to my daughter's favorite part of invitations- going to her friends' homes to pass them out!

*I WILL be speaking at this summer's BlogHer conference in Chicago, though and that's not too shabby!  Details here:  http://www.blogher.com/blogher_conference/conf/10/speakers/2

Comments

[Maya]

How CUTE! I just love it! I love everything with mushrooms LOL (Can't sure explainwhy)
Did you see this? http://www.fiskateers.com/community/photo/38271/
:)

[Niki_Ray]

This are so great I had to come on onver a see....They are so sweet a great invite to any girls party!!! XoXo Niki_Ray

[Michelle Salazar]

I love them and do not find them at all creepy in the forest photo. . . what a wonderful invite and what a lucky little girl she is!

[Annie Fiskateer#1326]

I love this invite. She looks like a beautiful fairy!!