Stitch, Cloth, Paper & Paint by Angie Hughes

I'm in love with this book. From the gorgeous pictures to the challenging projects. Her bookwraps, frames for artifacts and sundials are amazing. I suggest you take a look at it while having a cuppa at Barnes & Noble. It's a hefty investment of around $30.00. It is either going to be a little more advanced or something that you have already done. It's worth looking at. Again, I'm treating this as a course of study.

Silk Unraveled by Lorna Moffat

I have never worked with silk. I am in awe of it. I have seen wonderful, beautiful things done with silk. It intrigues me.

This is an eye candy book for people like me. Lorna Moffat does offer experiments in tearing, (oh my god tearing silk!), fusing, layering and stitching.

She has actual projects for each technique. This is very doable. I plan to do the book as if I was taking it as a course.

I need to get beyond my fear of ruining silk. I can do this. I can do this. sigh

Hot Textiles arrived today! What a beautiful book, lots of eye candy! Kim Thittichai certainly covers everything you would need to know if you were just starting to experiment with heat tools. Those of you that have done so probably would enjoy looking at the pictures but wouldn't necessarily learn anything new.

If you haven't experimented with Bondaweb (Wonder-Under), Tyvek, Pellon, Lutradur, plastic bags you will enjoy her information on the subjects.

If you have a heat gun and haven't used it yet, her safety instructions are excellent so pay attention.

I wish the type was bigger for those of us with older eyes.

The second picture is one from the book of a beautiful basket made from shopping bags threaded onto wire and formed into a bowl shape.

There are lots of full page color pictures which is great to look at but I sometimes wish there was more information, you know.

The Big Ass Book of Crafts

I love the cover. I love the title. Thank you Mark Montano for making me smile.
A good friend of his told him, while he was working on this book, to make sure that the crafts were "home worthy".
These aren't projects that involve painting chickens on ceramic pitchers. If you go through the book you will probably find at least one thing that reflects who you are and your personality. And that's what he felt she meant when she said home worthy.
These are wonderful ideas for making gifts for family members and frankly with the times the way they are a home made gift is a nice thing to give.
The directions are clear and very easy to do. I'm looking at a couple of interesting chapters that I might do with my granddaughter when she's here in August.
I am getting some ideas for taking his suggestions and giving them my own twist. It's a fun and big thick book to own.

Acrylic Revolution

By, Nancy Reyner. Most of us who have worked with acrylics know a lot about techniques. I would say from glancing over at my bookshelf that I really don't need another book about it.

That said, I'm glad I own this one. Clear instructions, good photographs, some new information, for me.

She covers painting on anything, painting WITH anything, surface treatments, spatial effects, texture, transfers, collage and mixed media, innovative stenciling and line work, how to customize your paint, simulating other medium (this one was new for me), magical effects and finishing sheen's and then the basic clean up and care of your art supplies.

I have to say the one thing that made me smile and was a great reminder was just a little tip box on page 11 about keeping your acrylic containers from getting stuck and difficult to open by putting a thin coat of petroleum jelly around the top outside edge of the jar or plastic wrap between the jar top and lid.

Since I had a rough time opening a jar of medium that I brought back from Florida I wish I had remembered this tip.

Peak Vitality, Raising the Threshold of Abundance in Our Material, Spiritual and Emotional Lives

This book is PACKED and I mean PACKED with information from about 53 different big name authors, about how to boost your energy levels in every single aspect of your life.

There are short chapters where you get a short condensed version of the big names' most powerful wisdom.

What I like about it is that the distilled information is good and if I am really interested in more I can check out the person's original books on the subject.

Mehmet Oz, Andrew Weil, Deepak Chopra, Alice Walker, Ling Chen, Marianne Williamson, Stanley Krippner and Eckhart Tolle are just a few of the big names in this book. It's edited by Jeanne M. House and I think she did an interesting job of it.

Digital Family Album

I found this in Joann's Fabric Store. I used my newsletter coupon on it so the $25.00 price was 40% less.

If I could find my Digital Book for Dummies I probably wouldn't have needed this one. Or maybe it's Photoshop for Dummies, I can't remember. Either way, I have Photoshop and I'm not getting the most use out of it so I looked through this book and it covers a great deal of information.

She uses Photoshop Elements and spends an entire chapter introducing it and going over all the basic editing options.

There are ten chapters filled with information about building a family web site, scrapbooking pages, books and announcements, greeting cards, calendars and so on.

It looks to be a good basic book for your library if you are interested in improving your digital skills.

I bought my Photoshop Elements used at Amazon and I have to say I have had 99% good luck with all the used items. That ranges from CDs to DVDs to computer programs and almost all of my books ordered. The only problem I had once was that one book, in great condition was actually a library book. No biggie, I suspect they ended up paying for it.