Ivy Lily Creative

Incoming mail. It's been a while since the last time. But I got this lovely package today! Jemina held a blog lottery in November and the prizes were packages of mail art supplies. I didn't win the lottery, but Jemina decided to send something to everyone who entered after all. :) So here's what I got: a lot of cute nature themed stationery and envelopes, and  stickers and priority tags. Check out Jemina's blog here .  Saapunutta postia pitkästä aikaa. Matka maailmankaikkeuteen -blogin Jemina piti marraskuussa blogiarvonnan, jonka palkintoina oli postitarvikepaketteja. En voittanut arvonnassa, mutta lopuksi Jemina päätti lähettää kaikille osallistuneille jotain. :) Tässä siis saamani paketin sisältö: paljon söpöjä luontoaiheisia kirjepapereita ja -kuoria sekä tarroja ja priority-merkkejä.

Turban Girl. Acrylic on canvas. 27 x 34 cm. July 2013 (girl) + February 2015 (background). I wanted to start a new painting on thursday evening, but ended up finishing an old one. I painted the girl with a turban in 2013, but the sunset + acacia tree background is new. The background is similar to the African sunset painting from a few years ago. I started by painting the whole background pink and then adding circles of colors from yellow to red to purple to blue on top. Then fixing up the figure a bit and finally adding the acacia tree silhouette. I also painted the edges of the canvas so the painting doesn't have to be framed. Work-in-progress and close-up photos at the end:   Halusin aloittaa uuden maalauksen torstai-iltana, mutta päädyinkin jatkamaan vanhaa akryylimaalausta. Maalasin turbaanipäisen tytön vuonna 2013, mutta taustan auringonlasku ja akaasiapuu ovat uusia ja muistuttavat aiempaa Afrikkamaalausta . Töpöttelin koko taustan isolla siveltimellä ensin vaale

I started making candy wrapper chains last summer , but never posted a tutorial on how to make them, so here it is. I have been making more chains, whenever I've gotten more used candy wrappers, but haven't sewn them together yet to make a bag etc. But here are the steps to making a candy wrapper chain:  Aloin tehdä karkkipaperiketjuja viime kesänä , mutta ohjepostaus hakaketjun tekemiseen tulee vasta tässä. Olen tehnyt uusia ketjuja aina, kun olen saanut lisää materiaalia, mutta en ole vielä ommellut ketjuja yhteen laukuksi ym. Tässä kuitenkin karkkipaperihakaketjun ohjeet:

Holi. Acrylic on canvas, 40 x 30 cm. Background: January 2015. This is an old painting, but I made a new background for it one evening at the end of January. I was feeling really stressed at the time and painting something colorful and abstract was relaxing. I was inspired by Tanya Shatseva 's painting process: painting with very watery, dripping acrylics on canvas so that the result looks like watercolor. I renamed the painting as Holi, which is an Indian festival of colors. I thought it was more fitting. The older version of the painting was this: Within Your Reach .  Here are some progress photos and close-ups: Tämä on vanha maalaus, mutta tein sille uuden taustan yhtenä iltana tammikuun lopussa. Olin stressaantunut tulevasta lopputentistä, gradusta, esitelmistä ym. ja värikkään ja abstraktin taustan maalaaminen oli rentouttavaa. Sain taustaan inspiraatiota Tanya Shatsevan maalaustyylistä: märkää akryyliä kankaalle niin että tulos näyttää vesiväriltä. Maalauksen uus

The worst part is over! I'm talking about my studies. I haven't finished my master's thesis yet, but I'm finished with the compulsory exams and courses as of today. The last few weeks have been quite tough, but today I had the last presentation. The watercolor paintings in this post are ones I did with my 4-year-old niece a couple of weeks ago. So they were just something fun, colorful and abstract (although, I do see a blue Hello Kitty face in the second painting). But I kind of like the results. Wet on wet technique (with the paper tilted a bit) and splattering some paint on top of everything.  One more colorful painting coming soon. :) Pahin on ohi! Puhun nyt opiskelusta. Gradu ei ole vielä valmis, mutta pakolliset kurssit ja tentit ovat ohi. Viime viikot ovat olleet aika rankkoja, mutta tänään oli viimeinen esitelmä ja nyt vähän helpottaa.  Postauksen vesivärimaalaukset ovat parin viikon takaisia ja tein ne 4-vuotiaan siskontyttöni kanssa. Ne oli

I've made my mother a paper pearl keychain necklace for Christmas every year since I started making paper pearls. Or at least spruced up an old one. The thing is that, even though I put two varnish coats on the pearls, they don't stay good forever. Especially the ones that are in the neck area of the necklace and have daily contact with skin, will start to deteriorate over time.  Olen tehnyt äidilleni avainketjuna toimivan paperihelmikaulakorun joululahjaksi joka vuosi siitä lähtien, kun aloin valmistaa paperihelmiä. Tai ainakin parannellut aikaisempaa kaulakorua, koska paperihelmet eivät ole ikuisia, vaikka ne päällystää lakalla. Varsinkin niskan alueen helmet, jotka ovat päivittäin kosketuksissa ihon kanssa, kuluvat vuodessa aika pahannäköisiksi. 

One of the search terms people come to my blog through google is "Interpals experiences". So I thought I'd actually I write about that. I have mentioned before that I had a couple of card swaps through Interpals. One went very nicely and the other one not so much . However, what I was mainly using Interpals for, was finding letter penpals. (And the past tense here means that it's been a very long time since I was last active on Interpals.) So, Interpals is a place where you can find snail mail penpals, email penpals, language exchange pals, friends or even love online. You set up your profile, where you can write about yourself, your interests, what you're looking for on Interpals and add photos. You can tick boxes of what you're looking for so that when other people search for that particular thing (for example, language exchange in Spanish), your profile will come up in the search and they might send you a message. But when looking for snail mail penpa