My Facebook Give-away #2

The second comment that I got on my Facebook Pay-it-Forward give-away was from my friend Cindy. She has three horses and rides every day, so I wanted to do something with an equestrian theme. For reasons that I don't quite understand, doodling has become a rage and is considered art now. When I covered all my binders and notebooks back in school with this same style, it was even called doodling by my art teachers, but now has the title of 'zentangle'. Call it what you will, it is still fun to do, and gives me an excuse to revert back to my younger days and recall the bittersweetness of school days. Not that I don't still doodle. You don't want to get a piece of junk mail or a phonebook anywhere near me while I'm on the phone. Or a bill, or a newspaper, or the family pets. I'll doodle on anything.

This isn't the best photo in the world, but I was just trying to get a quick pic for the record. It isn't going on ebay or etsy after all. The first thing that I did was draw a horse. Simple line-drawing. Then of course came the 'zentangling' - (doodling, sorry people, get over it). I decided that the picture alone wouldn't do, so I figured that I would make something with the artwork. I reduced the work down and printed it out on heavy beige recycled paper to make cards. I had to make the envelopes, since I didn't have any that fit, so I opened one that I had on hand, and enlarged it here and there to make a pattern.

Okay, now what to present them in? A trip to the thrift store wielded me a cedar box for $1.49. So I went out in the snow and cold with a palm sander on an extension cord, and removed the old varnish. Didn't want the garage full of dust. Then all I had to do was give it two coats of paint. I also applied a a full size copy of the original art to the inside of the lid. It was still a little plain, so I used a permanent marker to doodle the front of the box, then applied Goo Gone to remove most of it, making it look older, and a bit like carved wood at first glance. Done! I hope she likes it.