I was a little late in getting this artwork for Paula Dion finished, but I completed my pages and got them in the mail today, only 1 day overdue, phew! (Click on any photo for a close-up). Paula and I are both in a group of mixed media artists gathered together by Frieda Oxenham and Debby Harriettha called TipTop Journals. On the 15th of every month, Frieda gives us a partner with whom we exchange pages with by the 14th of the following month. We are all working in the same size blank journal (8x8) and so we simply take pages from our own blank journal to create on for our partner. Then we mail JUST the pages, not a whole journal, which has been really great!

Paula's Theme was Cowgirls & Prairie Doves (ladies of the night - Saloon Girls). To tell the truth, I had never worked on this particular theme before and I had no images on hand to inspire me. So I went to Google images and looked up various phrases - Cowgirls, Women of the West, Prairie Doves (soiled doves!) cowboys & cowgirls, etc. and found a number of good images. Then I started gathering a few fabrics I thought might work for the background; I knew I definitely wanted to use denim for Paula's spread of pages on a Cowgirl theme.

I originally thought I might work with the images I found right on top of a piece of old denim jeans. But when I went to play with the denim, I decided it might be too bulky to attach to the blank page. It was then that I got the idea to color COPY it. I laid a section of an old pair of Steven's blue jeans on top of the copier bed - inserted a sheet of fabric that was already prepared to go through my printer/copier and much thinner and flatter than denim - and pressed COPY! I was really happy how it came out, as when you look at a scan or photograph of my pages I bet you will think you are looking at a pair of real blue jeans. I did fool the eye a bit by removing the actual belt loops from Steven's jeans & gluing them directly on where they are located on the photo copy! I also took the real "Original" twill tape out of the real jeans & glued it on the copied pair of jeans as well.

On the left side of the page I use a transparency, which got a little muddled (I glued it on) but I decided it was OK after all. I added some small studs, a chain from a bracelet, some lace (one of paula's wishes!) bingo chips, alphabet letters that spell out "COW GIRLS", and a piece of 'rope' that ends in a tag with matching leftover printed denim fabric attached. This was really oh so much fun, Paula, ThANK You! Get ready to lasso your postmaster - the pages are on their way!