A Fish Tale

I made a handful of cards to donate to Kris for her silent auction at the seminary. I also donated some socks I knitted, and a hat and scarf.

Anyway, I spent this weekend making cards. I made a couple versions of this card. The inside says "Another fish tale."

Winged Angel

The challenge at Weekend Taggers was to make a tag featuring wings, or winged things. Rather than a bird, I thought about this Stamper's Anonymous angel stamp:

Stamped the image with CS "Earth" hybrid ink, colored with Copic markers, and blinged it up with my gold leaf pen. Instead of a ribbon, I found a package of bookmark tassels I've had for years -- voila, not only a tag, but a bookmark!

How readable is this dreck?

On a blog I read occasionally, the blogger found a website to test the readability of a website. Naturally, I was curious about my writing. Here are the results:

Readability Results
The following table contains the readability results for http://mossagate.blogspot.com/ .

Reading Level Results Summary Value
Total sentences 640
Total words 2204
Average words per Sentence 3.44
Words with 1 Syllable 1170
Words with 2 Syllables 411
Words with 3 Syllables 223
Words with 4 or more Syllables 400
Percentage of word with three or more syllables 28.27%
Average Syllables per Word 1.93
Gunning Fog Index 12.68
Flesch Reading Ease 39.78
Flesch-Kincaid Grade 8.57

Gunning-Fog Index
The following is the algorithm to determine the Gunning-Fog index.

Calculate the average number of words you use per sentence.
Calculate the percentage of difficult words in the sample (words with three or more syllables).
Add the totals together, and multiply the sum by 0.4.
Algorithm: (average_words_sentence + number_words_three_syllables_plus) * 0.4
The result is your Gunning-Fog index, which is a rough measure of how many years of schooling it would take someone to understand the content. The lower the number, the more understandable the content will be to your visitors. Results over seventeen are reported as seventeen, where seventeen is considered post-graduate level.

Typical Fog Index Scores Fog Index Resources
6 TV guides, The Bible, Mark Twain
8 Reader's Digest
8 - 10 Most popular novels
10 Time, Newsweek
11 Wall Street Journal
14 The Times, The Guardian
15 - 20 Academic papers
Over 20 Only government sites can get away with this, because you can't ignore them.
Over 30 The government is covering something up

What I find quite odd is that I am as inclined to use FOUR syllable words as I am to use TWO. Guess that law school education is paying off!

Here's the link to test a website: http://juicystudio.com/services/readability.php#readweb

The Valentine Pie

Commissioned by a friend for her husband. Reportedly, he enjoyed it.

Romance and Robert Burns

This weekend's tag challenge at "Tag, You're It" was romance. I just got a new stamp set from Stampin' Up called "5th Ave. Floral" with a lovely rose stamp. From there, the leap to Robert Burns was easy.

Here's the first try. I colored the rose with watercolor markers and a blending pen. The reddest pen is rendered rather more pink. The first stanza of the familiar poem is printed from my computer. The rose is covered with clear Copic Spica; as I always say, the sparkle is never picked up by a scan.

The next one used the same elements, just assembled in a different order.


I couldn't finish without producing at least ONE "red, red rose," so stamped on solid red and assembled with a tiny bit of ribbon:

Just a Note

Weekend Taggers challenge this week was a specific pattern. I complied, except I left off a horizontal line at the top, for lack of room:

I can't recall the stamp companies, and I am too lazy to run downstairs and look.
This was actually the last in a series of tags that began orange and blue. This was the last tag in that series, and the only one worth seeing:

These stamps are all Stampin'Up.

Plum Crazy

I got a little carried away with the Weekend Taggers Purple challenge. Still in a Valentine mode, I made the first tag:

The wreath and sentiment are from a Hero Arts clear set. I stamped with Colorbox Chalk ink, and added little plastic flowers with brad centers from Queen & Co. The background is lightly figured with swirls, from Crate Paper.

I wasn't totally happy with this tag, and remembered my Sizzix posey die. I dug up three shades of purple and cut the flower set out three times. I assembled a flower, and free-handed some leaves, and made my first posy tag:

The sentiment is Hero Arts; background paper is Lasting Memories. I used the last bit of the ribbon from the first tag.



I still had two more flowers to assemble and use. Here, with a Stampin'Up sentiment:


The last tag is my favorite. Sentiment is from Memory Box.

I love the bold graphic quality of this tag, probably because I didn't use the printed paper background. All these tags will eventually end up on cards, most likely. That's one reason I love these challenges -- I end up creating elements for use in cards, for those times when I've got no card mojo.

Your Days are Numbered

The Weekend Taggers challenge was to use numbers in the creation of a tag. Here's my interpretation:

I ran a piece of Lasting Memories white core cardstock through my Big Shot in a Cuttlebug folder, then lightly sanded the raised surface to take off the brown layer of paper. Prima flowers, with beads glued on as centers. I added a birthday greeting, since this tag will likely be the focal point of a birthday card.

Iguana Be Your Valentine

Created for an ATC swap:

The stamp is a dollar stamp I bought at Joann's; it came with a birthday sentiment. I thought he needed google eyes, which I've been hoarding for a long time. He's colored with Copic markers, and a Martha doily punch finishes the Valentine theme.

Chocolate Drops

I've finished by ATCs for Susan K.'s "Chocolate 3 Ways" ATC challenge. The challenge itself really had nothing to do with chocolate -- it was a challenge to use only the colors of dark brown, medium brown and light brown. My mind fixed on the "chocolate," so I went very literal:

The candy is a Qwikut die; the stamps are some old unmounteds I've had for a long time, possibly from Sunday International.

Sweet Treats

I'm working on lots of Valentine cards to donate to Pat Adam, so I used all the V-Day supplies spread all over my table to make these tags for the Weekend Tagger's challenge:




No stamping, these are all Qwikut dies. The cookie is very time consuming, to pick out all the sprinkles in the icing, then replace with sprinkles cut out of maroon and pink. But well worth the effort, I think!

Stripey Goodness

Last Friday's challenge by the Weekend Taggers was to use stripes. Here's my tag:


Stamps are by Flourishes. Thanks for the challenge!

Franklin!

Franklin Habit, author of the blog "Panopticon," taught a class at Wild Purls in Billings, MT this past Saturday. He lead us through the classic Elizabeth Zimmermann pattern for the Tomten Jacket.

We knit up most of a miniature Tomten in the hours from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. It was an interesting knit, and Franklin was a good teacher. He told us about the origins of his delinquent roommate, Dolores, to the delight of us all.

A Snowy Day

I went down to Riverfront Park last Sunday on a photo expedition. We've had lots of snow this season.


Dutcher Trail, about 1:30 p.m. The shadows are already long, with the shortness of winter daytime.





The Yellowstone River, with the South Hills. The north bank is iced-in; the south channel is still open. In fact, there was a cool video at the Billings Gazette website that showed a deer on an ice floe, rafting down the river.

Love Ya!

The holidays are behind us, and I'm getting back to the mess on my table. The tag challenge this week was to use some new item we got/bought over the holidays. I bought some red paper to make valentines, so I used that to make my tag:

The image stamp and the sentiment are both by Inkadinkado. I've got sparkle on the moon and stars; naturally, scanning the tag eliminates most of the glitz.

Merry Christmas!

Triangle Tag

This week's challenge was to make a triangle tag. Here's my attempt:


All the images are Stampington. The egg is cut free-hand, and chalked. The scanner doesn't pick up the shading, so like I always say, the tag looks much nicer in real life!

Snow Fairy Tag

It's time for another tag for the Weekend Tagger's challenge. The image is from Stampendous, stamped with a metallic ink:


I added silver leaf around both the dark panel and the tag, and used the Diamond Dust around the dark panel and on the punched snow flake, too. I found some sparkly fiber in my stash.

My first prototype is lilac:

I used the Diamond Dust on the body of the fairy.

Thanks for the challenge, ladies!

Another tree tag?

Yes! This is for the Weekend Taggers -- although I'm cheating a bit on the design. Here's my take:

There is supposed to be horizontal text toward the bottom of the tag, but I skipped that, because the background paper is text.

The image is Impression Obsession, I think. I used the same ink around the outside of the framed image to make it stand out a bit more -- the background paper is surprisingly busy! The tree is spangled with a Stardust gelly roll pen, but it doesn't show up on the scan. Nor does the diamond dust show on the punched snowflake -- oh, in real life this tag SPARKLES! I would like to put diamond dust on everything.

I found it by mistake at Hobby Lobby -- there was none in the paper crafting section. I was browsing the Christmas aisles, and found some fake plastic snow. Someone had abandonned the container of Diamond Dust in favor of the fake snow. It's made to "sugar" fake fruit and flowers, apparently, and is usually located in the floral section.

O Christmas Tree -- Red & Green Challenge

This week's challenge is to make a red & green tag. It seems I only think Christmas when I think red & green, so I made another Christmas tree tag:


The image is from Tin Can Mail (Inkadinkado), stamped in moss green ink (Club Scrap). I used a red marker to color in the holly berry, and then got carried away and filled in the notes at the bottom, too. I dotted glue randomly on the tree, then shook on some Judikins Prisma Glitter. It's a pity the picture doesn't pick up the glitter; it's quite pretty. Finished with a satin bow.