Flashy

The other day I spotted a new idea-ology product from Tim Holtz, a mini deck of flash cards:



I bought them because I love all things idea-ology, and I thought they might be useful as story prompts, too. The deck contains 72 1.5" X 2.5" cards with thematic words on both sides:



Each word could be a prompt on its own, but with 104 words to play with you can come up with an infinite number of combinations, too. Here are four I drew at random:



And here are the words that were on the back of those four:



I got them for $4.99, which makes them a very affordable mini deck of inspiration. I think they'd make an excellent stocking stuffer for a writer pal, too.

New Idea-ology

While shopping at JoAnn for stuff for my August promotions I noticed Tim Holtz has some new Idea-ology products out on the market:



Starting clockwise from the pack with keys in the upper right corner, here's what they are:

Collage Keys -- four skeleton keys with blank recesses that you customize with ten included picture and epoxy stickers. These would be fun to design with your own images, too. ($9.99)

Compass Coins -- four metal disks in two sizes stamped with compass designs; great as game spinners, journal cover embellishments or whatever you want to make into a compass.  I'm going to try one of the larger coins in Tim's fillable pocket watch case, which you can see to the left of the coins. ($4.99 for the compass pack, and $7.99 for the pocket watch case.)

Custom Fasteners -- 24 large and small pronged, blank-faced fasteners that you customize with 43 included picture and epozy stickers; like the collage keys you could design these with your own images.  ($5.99)

Wishbones -- a fanciful little corked glass vial that contains 15 faux wishbones. As you can see in the close-up pic to the right here, you can remove the cork and the wishbones. I think they'd be great for assemblage art or just a spirit-boost gift for yourself or a friend.  Besides, who doesn't need a few more wishes?  ($5.99)

More idea-ology

I made a trip to my local Jo-Ann's today for some fabric; I'm working on some tote bags to fill with books and goodies for my Nightbred promotions in November and December.  While I was there I also wandered by the aisle with Tim Holtz's idea-ology line so I could drool on the products a little more.  Now I'll have to write him a gushy fan letter, as I found two new items that went immediately into my shopping basket:



I have a thing for old pocket watch cases because they make wonderful holders for ephemera, and you can repurpose them into unique statement pieces and pendants.  The real thing tends to be expensive, though.  Even at thrift stores old pocket watches can run anywhere from twenty to fifty bucks.  On the real deal the watch crystal is almost always missing or badly scratched, and then you have to take them apart, which can get dicey.  Tim's pocket watch case looks like an antique, has a clear glass crystal, and the back pops off and snaps back on easily:



The best part is the price: idea-ology's pocket watch case regularly sells for $7.99, and I got mine on sale for $5.49.

I also love antique keys, and idea-ology is now offering a set of seven that not only look old but have inspirational words inscribed on them:



These word keys are going to make fabulous anchors for the series of steampunk BookLoops I'm working on.  $9.99 for the set regular price; I got mine on sale for $6.99, which makes them about a buck per key -- very affordable.

Little Ideas

I've gone and fallen in love with Tim Holtz's idea-ology line of art products, which a steampunk-loving friend introduced me to a few months back as inspiration for my jewelry-making as well as my 1K Cards Project.  The line mixes antique, metal and artful grunge themes and materials to create that industrial chic that mixed media artists love, and offers unique materials to play with that I think readers and writers can have fun becoming idea-ologists, too.  And since Jo-Ann has practically the entire line on sale this week for 30% off, I thought I'd share some of what I'm doing with my stash (and you can click on any image to see a larger version.

If you've ever wanted to play with a paper version of magnetic poetry, this pad of chitchat stickers is sheer perfection.  The pad features 1088 tiny word stickers printed with words in a typewriter-style font; you get two sets (six pages total) of the words, half on white and half on grocery bag-brown card stock backgrounds.  I used my pad to compose some ATCs for the project, and found that the words stick very nicely, even to a metal surface.  $4.99 for the pad; I paid $3.49 for it on sale at Jo-Ann.

These metal philosophy tags by idea-ology come in a set of twelve, and feature a single inspirational word along with some numbers so they resemble old fashioned stamped key tags.  They're great for jewelry-making and innumberable art projects; I've already used a dozen to make some steampunk pieces.  If you string them like medals I bet these would make fun awards for any creative club.  I bought another set to use them as anchors for some promotional BookLoops; $4.99 regular price, got mine on sale for $3.49 at Jo-Ann.

I've always looked around for a not-childish set of of mini alphabet flash cards to use with my art projects, and here's one that comes with 72 count (mostly letters but numbers 1-9, too.)  These will help spell out a set of 26 ATCs I'm making to pay homage to back-to-school month, but you can also use them to embellish journal covers and pages, to creatively tab a novel notebook or anything you keep in alphabetical or numerical order.  $3.99 regular price; Jo-Ann has them for $2.79.

If you like the look of vintage film strip, this spool of mini transparent plastic movie frames is beyond cool.  It feels and looks like the real thing, and when used as a border for matted photos or journal pages adds a neat antique look.  I do want to mention that because it's made of plastic this ribbon remains in a curly state (you experienced mixed-media artists probably know some clever way to use a hair dryer or something to solve that) so it isn't very glue-friendly, but I secured my photo border on the ends with double-sided foam tape, which worked fine.  This spool was a gift from my pal, but I checked Jo-Ann's web site and they have it for $3.49 on sale.

What I like most about this product line is that nothing costs an arm and a leg; the materials only look like they do.  For example, with the philosophy tags I can make a dozen cool BookLoops for under $5 (a spool of organdy ribbon from the dollar store + the 12 tags as anchors = $4.49 total.) Tim Holz also has some instructional videos here that show you more creative ways to use some of the other idea-ology products.

I'd also like to share some of the idea-ology wealth, so in comments to this post name a creative way you'd like to use one of these products (or if you can't think of one, just toss your name in the magic hat) by midnight EST tonight, September 14, 2012.  I'll draw one name at random from everyone who participates, and send the winner one set of all the products I've mentioned in this post (the chitchat pad,the philosophy tags, the mini alphabet deck and the movie frames ribbon.)  This giveaway is open to everyone on the planet, even if you've won something here at PBW in the past.