Empress Wu Designs with Wilma

And all my days are trances   And all my nightly dreams  Are where thy grey eye glances  And where thy footstep gleams—  In what ethereal dances  By what eternal streams.” —” To One in Paradise " - Edgar Allan Poe   I made a collage tag for Tag Tuesday's  current theme  "Edgar Allan Poe", just in time for the season of  spooky  stories and Halloween.  I used  pieces of torn  paper - text, painted or printed household paper, tea bag, magazine page and a photocopied image of  E.A.P.  I finished  the tag with a rows of machine stitching.  Such a challenging theme set by Design Team member, Michele , but please visit the Tag Tuesday blog to see amazing tags  from very talented artists. 

Art Dolls /Stick Dolls : copyright Wilma Simmons  I confess to being a fan of Angry Birds and challenging myself to a game of Angry Birds Ham'O'Ween will be about as far as I will go to celebrating Halloween here in Australia. However it did start me thinking about how birds became associated with this celebration with its Celtic origins. I can understand spiders, bats and even black cats  and wolves associated with spookiness, but birds? Halloween Art Tag :  copyright Wilma Simmons  It appears that the black raven has long been considered rather ominous, in spite of  a harmonious history of sharing the environment with human beings. Associated with wizards and witches,  the raven supposedly inherited some secret powers " to carry magic across long distances  and collect secrets to bring back .. . " (from natureworldnews.com)   Add this information to its throaty  territorial "kraa" call and scavenger habits, it is no wonder that th...

I am determined this year to be better prepared for Christmas. I decided to give cards as gifts for a few people this year, so this meant having them made and sent, ready for them to use as Christmas greeting cards. This last week was devoted to card making. I went crazy and spent almost every spare moment making cards. I was also very happy that I used only paper and card which I already had. Some are in traditional colours and others are just using leftover bits and pieces. Having sworn that I would not take up yet another creative interest, I started some life drawing classes last month - only of course, to help me improve my doll making. Tonight will be the fourth week of a six week course and I am really enjoying it. Ann, my teacher is great and  has classes for beginners and the more experienced. Look on  Facebook the drawing room . These are some of my drawings from last week's lessons. And, I almost forgot - Happy Halloween to blog friends particularly i...