Week 4 - China

Well another challenging week for my storyline because not much chance a Romani would be traveling to China in 1925.  What was I thinking when I chose the year 1925!!!!!  Oh well here is how I solved the problem. 

Natalyia has bartered her playing at a local wedding for a large pile of "papers" and in this pile she found this Chinese postcard and decided to send it to Marcello.  I wonder what else she may reveal from this pile in the future?  This week the only thing she has decided to reveal to Marcello is that her grandpa taught her everything he knows about violin.  So she has not yet revealed to Marcello that she can not read music.  How long will she wait before she tells him?


Here is my postcard . . .

ANd so the story continues...

Thanks to everyone for stopping by. 

Jean

Postcard Challenge - Week 3

This week the postcard was from Brazil.  With the characters and the time period in my story, some countries will be more challenging than others.  So I had to get creative in how to handle this.  What I am doing for this week and some upcoming weeks, if needed, is to have Marcello use Postcards his wealthy grandparents brought back to him from their world travels.  So in today's card from Brazil he used it because the colourful samba images reminded him of the flamenco dancer on the card sent to him by Nataliya the week before. 

SO here is the postcard . . .

The image is one I found online and is a samba costume.  The samba came to Brazil with the influence of the Portuguese and  African immigrants.   When will Nataliya tell Marcello she doesn't read a note of music? . . .

Thanks for visitng.

Jean

(MusicScrp)

Postcard From Spain

Hola Spain!  Spanish is one language I have never had to perform in and have very little knowledge of the language other than Hola.  But it is a great background for a Spirited wedding of 2 Gitanos (Romani Peoples in Spain).  Nataliya and her family has traveled to Barcelona for a family wedding.  Of course Nataliya is not revealing too much too soon in her reply to Marcello.  I wonder what she is really thinking.  Well you will have to stay tuned to find out. 

Here is this week's card.  I printed the map and Flamenco dancer from online and used inktense and the dancer with Derwent watercolour pencils.  Not great at this yet as I have just begun experimenting with this medium.  THe postcard back was printed from a file I found online as well. 

Thanks everyone for following my story!  And thank you for sharing your story and fabulous art with me.

Jean
MusicScrp

Postcard #1

Well, here we go on a glorious adventure.  Truth be told this will be the first thing I have ever written, well other than essays and compositions for school.  And of course lesson plans for my teaching.  But let's just say the first "story" I have ever created and like I said in my previous post, the romantic undertones shocked me completely.

As we begin Marcello has spied a young gypsy girl performing on violin in the city market.  Never had he heard such beautiful music emanate from a violin!  Marcello just knew she was letting her heart and soul live in her music.  He had to find away to correspond with her . . . he saw her open violin case in front of her and left a postcard for her . . .

TO create the front I first stamped my image with a music collage stamp by STAMPABILITIES with brown Stazon ink.  Then I used the melted crayon technique i learned from Martha (Seekingforart) then collaged 4 images on that.  The Map of Austria a photo of Mozart, The Salzburg Opera House, and of course the Alps.  The edge of the postcard front and the word "Salzburg" we embossed using ultra thick embossing powder (by Ranger) in bronze.

The Post card back was created by me on PrintShop 2 for Mac.  I used a vintage paper background adding a jpeg of a stamp.  The writing is my actual handwriting.

Hope you enjoy the beginning of this great adventure . . .

Nataliya and Marcello

Oh Austria; what a perfect backdrop for my story to begin since my characters are both musicians.  The home of Mozart and Haydn what could be more perfect!  Those who know me know that I tend to be quite cynical and not a romantic person - AT ALL.  So Explain to me how this story evolved?!

Since I am a music teacher and music is so important in my life, I wanted my characters to also have a connection to music.  But initially, I was going to use Buster and Chauncey - the field mice from Buster and Chauncey's Silent Night.  A great animated Christmas DVD.  But in about 2 minutes flat while discussing this with my friends in Stickam, Nataliya and Marcello appeared instead.  Wow shocked myself completely with this.  See below the character sketch cards I created to give myself a starting point to my story.

 The image I used for Nataliya is Jenny O'Connor who is a musician with CIRCA PALEO and you can find her at http://www.circapaleo.com/

The image I used for Marcello is from Men's Fashions  

Here is a photo of my book that will display all my postcards.  I used Bo Bunny - Timepiece Collection and created the cover from medium weight Graffix chipboard.  The dual binding is a variation of Laura Denison's STACK THE DECK binding. 

Well off I go to create postcard #1>  Yikes look at the time - no postcard tonight.  Off to bed I go.  

Jean

Swing Into 2012

It has been a while since I posted anything.  It has been a very busy month of December with my Mom's 80th birthday party and the memory box and guest book and slideshow I created for her celebration.  Then I created most of my Christmas presents as well. 

I have decided to go on 2 adventures this coming year!  I have agreed to pledge to UIU (Use it Up) this year.  Click on the button on the right of my blog to go to Fran's blog and see more details.  But in short, I pledge to use what I have to create my projects in the coming year.  And if I purchase supplies they MUST be used.  I have lots of projects in mind so I should be able to use up plenty of my "Stuff"!

The second adventure I have signed up for is the Postcard Challenge set up by Darcy W in the UK.  Click the button on the right panel of my blog to get further information.  I have not yet finalized the characters who will be corresponding in my version of the postcard challenge but have ideas that will be finalized before my head hits the pillow this evening, I HOPE. 

I have created my book for storing the postcards and used a modified version of the stack the deck binding by Laura Denison (YouTube Video - Stack The Deck) which she posted as her first of this year's 12 Projects of Christmas.  I created the book on my latest Ustream show and you can see the recording here: Stack the Deck Postcard Book  .  So now I need to get to work and finalize my characters so I can make their Character Sketch pages and be ready for the first post card.

Of course I will also have other creations going on throughout the year from scrapbooking to card-making to minibook making and whatever else peeks my curiosity.  So I will keep you all up to date here and I hope you choose to join me on my Ustream Show on Mondays at 4 pm eastern.  MusicScrp - The Musical Scrapper

Thanks

Jean