Apothecary Challenge

When Laura Carson of Artfully Musing and team designer for Alphastamps posted her Apothecary Challenge I thought why not. Boy what a challenge it was. It just kept growing and growing. Here is what I started with, a grape crate.

And this what I ended up with. My darling husband got right into the challenge also. He added shelves and this trim I found laying around. He figured out how to add some doors. I just had to have doors. I covered the inside of the crate with some flocked scrapbook paper.

Here it is with the doors shut.

I'm going to start out with this is a long post with many photos. There was just no way I could share and not really share... so here it is. I would love to hear what you think.. please leave me a comment when your through. There are two separate challenges. Both using items made from images Laura designed for Alphastamps. The first challenge was to create at least 3 potion bottle from her images. The other a much grander challenge was a apothecary cabinet. I started right in creating my potions bottles. It took awhile longer to come up with a cabinet. In her video Laura uses paper mache boxes. This was not the direction I wanted plus I wanted something compact and that I could close up when done and store.

This is where I will make this a little like Where's Waldo and let you search for potion bottles. My apothecary bottles from Laura's apothecary sheet are, Frog Slime, Sleeping Death Powder, Bottled Ghost, Rotten Pumpkin and Poison. In there I also have some glow in the dark dragon eyeballs, zombie fingers, werewolf fur, bottle blondes and much, much more.

I do like the creep factor.. so along with your search you will find cockroaches, spiders and webbing, a rat or two and a plate of brain.

Here are a few up close and personal pics of bottles.

And some more.

More.

And one last one.. Here it is with the lights on. I can't finish this posting without stating after many failed attempts at photographing. I ended up taking most of these in night mode.

Please let me know what you think.

Come see what the Ravens brought in...

Last week I had a wonderful opportunity to spend the day with some of my "local" art friends. We took a trip down past Detroit to Monroe to a place called Craft 2000. There I found this wonderful spooky wire tree, that I just had to have. I recently participated in a couple of charm swaps over at ArtCharms, a Halloween and Day of the Dead. I knew this tree would be perfect for either one.

I wish I had taken a picture of the tree before I coiled up the limbs. They were long strands. Which didn't work real well holding the charms up to the top. So I took my large bail rounders and went to town. This also added some volume to my tree.

The Halloween swap was the first to arrive so it has the honor of being on my tree. I am always amazed at what others create. Here are some closeups. You can get an idea of what awesome charms I received.

There is so much creativity in this group. I love to see everyones take on the theme. This was my first swap with them and I am delighted with my charms.

I should add in here.. that I had been looking for something to hang my charms on and had thought about a wire tree, but not really wanted to create on myself. Being the impatient, instant (well kinda) gratification person I am. A week ago I had bought a mini fake tree that was metallic lime green in color. I spray painted in navy blue, then some flat black. A little of green had peaked through. Now I liked this tree and it would do. But when I say this one, it was a must have. Plus I had two swaps coming.. so BONUS!!!!

Now patiently waiting for the next swap to arrive. What will I do with them.. hahaha...

My skeleton book..

Here is a page I'm working on in my skeleton book.. its a work in progress.. now that I have taken a pic.. I see I need more work on this page.. but time will lead me to what is missing...