Altered Houses

For my monthly altered book swap group, Dorothy decided to try something different. Instead of a book she chose to have each of us alter houses instead. It is all part of her current obsession with HGTV! I certainly know what that's all about...She provided us with an assortment of house shapes cut out of heavy cardboard. Including some plain rectangles for us to customize as we like. Above you can see two houses Dorothy did, the house of cards, plus the sign in sheet house. Shelley did the house of blues and the beautifully textured house of secrets.
I just adore houses. Especially great big ones - victorian gingerbread, collonaded colonials, spanish meditteranean with wrought iron touches. But my current obsession is mid century modern. So for my first house i took my own family's 1957 house in Chateauguay, Quebec. You'd call it a ranch, but we called it a bungalow. it wasn't quite that colourful, but the slate stonework does indeed have shades of pink and blue grey, and the peak was painted to match BOTH at one time or another. My parents also had a 1956 two-tone Chevy. That's my two brothers, Mark and Ricky on the front steps. Let's pretend that's me in my parent's arms, but more likely it was Mark as a baby. Donna came later. Think we had a '62 Pontiac by then.My next house is a "tres californie" contemporary with lots of groovy accessories. Grass cloth wallpaper (actually rubber shelf liner), a teal shag (microsuede) a tumbled stone fireplace and exposed wood beams (realistic scrapbook paper). I used a chopstick for a curtain rod and black leather for the ottoman cubes. mirrored circles create the ultimate wall hanging and irridescent shapes are used for the lampshade and pottery. I just want to move right in...