Shadowboxes of Asia

These were the final (and very late) handmade Christmas gifts I gave this year. One for my dad:

And one for my sister: (you can click to make the photos larger)

My sister lived in Southeast Asia for 5 months in early 2007 working as a tour guide. In March my dad joined her for a side trip to India. To say it was a step out of my dad's comfort zone would be an understatement. I wanted to make a little something for each of them about the trip and when I saw this post on Poppytalk I knew I wanted to make shadowboxes.

I took some photos and memorabilia from my sister, added it to some stuff from my own trip to India and backed each box with pieces from a prayer flag they got in the Himalayas. I hope it's not bad luck to cut a prayer flag. The weird straw thing in my dad's is an ingenious bubble blower made of recycled wire and a twist tie. Came with a film canister full of bubble stuff. On the bottle, I transfered a photo of them in front of the Taj Mahal using water slide decal paper that I also used on another project.

And did you know Ikea is now carrying some fantastic shadow boxes? Exactly what I was looking for and only about $8 each!

Finally, when you take the mat out of the frame, it makes a cool photo prop. This was just a quick in-the-moment snapshot but I think it'd be fun to try to get Biscuit to pose again with the mat.

That's it for today--hope you're having a great Monday.