Favorite Links

Bits & Pieces Art Program
The Queen's artist friend Melody is on a mission. Each fall she teaches classrooms of at-risk children about the world of art journaling and gives them appropriate supplies. To this end, she puts out a call for assistance to her art friends, asking for help obtaining supplies. This year the project, Bits & Pieces Art, opened an official web site where Melody has a more complete explanation of her Art Program and an introductory video, too.

If thou wishes to help this wonderful cause, we at SkyBluePink have created a Donation Page where donations can be made to offset the cost of Melody's top 4 items: blank books, scissors, ink pads, and loteria sets.

Card Magic
Rob Mendell: Interactive Close-Up Entertainment. Sir Rob is available if thou has a need for entertainment of the magical ilk at thy functions in the Chicago area.

Crazy Art Girl
The blog of our Punchinella Ambassadress, Mixed Media Maven, and friend, Belinda Spiwak. There's always something new going on with her. She specializes in techniques. Lots of cool pictures and inspiration.

Twisted Papers
A wonderful site for CDs with collage papers! Russell and Stan have an amazing collection of vintage images, with lots of holiday, travel, and backgrounds. They also proffer many unusual one-of-a-kind bits and bobs of ephemera.

Tim Holtz
The web site of a popular teacher and a very nice SkyBluePink customer! Check out his books, videos, and class schedule. And don't miss Tim's Blog.

VistaPrint
I know many of you own a business, just like Queen Xina, and so I thought you would be interested in marketing materials at a reasonable cost. I have purchased several sets of business cards and 3 self-inking rubber stamps from VistaPrint, an online digital printing company, and was Royally satisfied. Our cards and stamps arrived in about a week, and they are very nicely made.

VistaPrint has a wide range of goods available with lots of options for customization, and very reasonable prices. You can get stationery, business card magnets with calendars, folders, brochures, postcards, sticky notes, and more. They seem to have lots of special sales and free samples of their wares. By using the link above for VistaPrint's Special Friends Referral Program, you will receive 25% off your purchases.

ERA Graphics
Roberta Altshuler's beautiful original art is featured on her stamps, many showing strong women figures. She also has lots of petroglyphs, including a marvelous petroglyph-entwined alphabet set, collage designs, wonderful sayings, feathers, and zillions more. Her mold boards for use with polymer clay are great. A Must See Web site!

Spirits Journey Designs
The blog of Lady Carol Stocker, one of our Esteemed Customers.

The Artfull Hand
A store for handmade artwork and stamping supplies in Washington, Missouri. Queen Xina is proud to serve as the WebMistress for the Duchess of Dot's site.

Collage: A New Approach
Subtitled "Collage Without Liquid Adhesives." This book by Jonathan Talbot, noted collage artist, "describes a new technique, developed by the author, which makes it possible to adhere collage elements without liquid adhesives. This technique eliminates wrinkling and drying time from collage-making, offering new opportunities for creative spontaneity." It's probably available everywhere, but I like buying directly from the artist!

World Wide Words
Michael Quinion's "World Wide Words" is both a web site and a weekly newsletter filled with interesting information about words, their meanings and history. If you love the English language, you owe it to yourself to subscribe to the World Wide Words free weekly email newsletter. It's nearly as entertaining as ours and much more informative. The origin of the phrase "sky-blue-pink" is revealed on this site, too!

How To Make A Fabric Postcard DebR Style
Step-by-step directions for fabric postcards.

Fabric Postcards
A free project by Kathie Briggs. Step-by-step directions for fabric postcards.

Burnt Offerings
Opie and Linda O'Brien are artists who work with metal and mixed media. They teach workshops, and offer their art dolls and rubber stamps plus various tools and supplies online.

xochico [zo-CHEE'-ko]
A cool site with wonderful vintage Loteria imagery adorning mugs, mousepads, T-shirts, and more. This is the original artwork from the Don Clemente company. [Loteria is a Mexican game played like bingo or lotto.] Quick service and nice people.

Hugobia
Site of British artist Peter Woods, who has beautifully designed card decks for sale, among other things. The "2000 Pips" transformation deck is clever and beautiful.

Image Map
A nice, free online tool for making image maps for your web pages.

Ready Stamps
A division of United Cerebral Palsy Association of San Diego

"Ready Stamps is a full service rubber stamp manufacturing shop offering job training, and employment for persons with disabilities. We have been providing quality product, competitive price, and quick turnaround since 1982. Each rubber stamp order is quality checked through a 15 step, production-to-shipment process."

On the Web page of The Polyclay Gallery there is more discussion about and recommendations for Ready Stamps. If you ever wanted rubber stamps of your artwork, this would be an excellent option for you. [N.B. You wouldn't want to start a rubber stamp company based on their stamps, because they don't use the rugged and much more expensive metal plates that are needed for making stamps in large quantities over a long time period.]