Glitz and Glamour - TSP Challenge #13

I really struggled this week with this challenge at The Sailing Pineapple. I didn't really have an image that jumped out at me and said Glitz and Glamour .... so I improvised :) I used iridescent ice embossing power to make my posh poodles shine. A LOT of little detailed fussy cutting went on here .... LOL. I printed the sentiment from my computer.

Some tags

It is my pleasure to be facilitating the atc trade on the Stampotique facebook page, there are lots of the atc's I have made here on my blog, but I often send an accompanying tag too .... Here are a few recent ones : 

 Loved how Mothloved's face looked stamped in black on white and paper pieced :

Hope you find some inspiration here, please comment and subscribe :)

Dr Who inspired atc

For a recent Stampotique atc trade we did the title of 'Outside the box'. I am a long time Dr Who fan and would love to be the Drs travelling companion, so it made sense to do an atc to depict this :

 Mothloved it looking longingly at the tardis ...She's outside wishing she was inside ...

The background was done with gelatos and then the image embossed with black embossing powder. I painted the arms and neck in a thinned coat of acrylic paint so you could see them. I stamped the thought bubble in brown ink and added white detail. Then I made a gel skin : I printed the image of the tardis from my pc onto white paper. I added a layer of gel medium and let it dry. I then submersed the image into water and carefully rubbed away the backing paper, but the image is stuck to the gel medium. At the end you  have a thin, semi transparent film with the image on. It was really cool. I adhered this into the thought bubble and added a coat of gel medium over the whole thing, stamping circle impressions into the gel when it was nearly dry. I then stamped and fussy cut the face, glued it on top.

This is the back, I doodled and wrote using a signo white gel pen and used Kroma crackle glaze.

Now that was fun ....

Thanks for stopping by, please leave me a comment or subscibe to my blog - thanks x

A significant book celebrated

Yes, I am an avid reader, I constantly have a book on the go, but there are some books that have been more influencial in my life. The Famished Road by Ben Okri being one of them. For me this book marked a turning point, it was so magical and well written, and signified change and a desire to live, love and flourish. I can honestly say I made some significant life changes after reading it ....

So I decided to celebrate this book by dedicating a mixed media page in my art journal to it, and I loved the final line in the book : A dream can be the highest point of a life. Just have a little think about what that means ....... its so deep and meaningful.

The background was created with torn patterned paper, then I added a thin layer of gesso and colored with my gelatos. I then added a layer of tissue paper and wrote the first and last paragraph of the book all over the background in a purple gelli roll pen. I did some stamping, embossing, added stars and chipboard pieces from Southern Ridge Trading Company which I painted with my Paper Artsy Fresco Chalk Acrylic Paints. I also added some detail around the strange planet-like asteroids using a Tim Holtz stencil. The edge border was stamped with a border stamp from Lost Coast Designs, to frame my picture.

The hill is a pattered green paper, and the words are heat embossed. Agatha Star, one of my favourite Stampotique stamps, is stamped on mixed media paper. Her face and legs colored with copics, her dress in acrylic paint. She was then fussy cut and added to the page, looking longingly into the magical and mysterious heavens  ...

I wonder if anyone else finds so much meaning and significance in books, sometimes I feel the author is speaking those words just for me .... and I just love it when it happens :)

Thanks for visiting x

Die cutting plates ...

I just had to share this awesome video on keeping your die cutting plates in tip top condition :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppSvvdZ_-L8&feature=youtu.be

The Frugal Crafter is pretty awesome, she has lots of great ideas :)

Christmas in July ... TSP week 11

There was a Christmas in July challenge on The Sailing Pineapple Blog, so I made another page for my positive affirmation / sayings book : Wish Everyday was Christmas.

To make the background : I adhered triangular pattered paper, intended to simulate Christmas trees. Then I colored extra thick gel medium with red acrylic paint and painted it onto the background in swirly patterns with a hard bristle brush. When it was dry I doodled the circles and ornament shapes. Adding some white gel pen for highlights and a few glimmer brads. I stamped messy white snowflakes in the background too - used my Dylusions stamping pad for the first time for this - I sprayed the white into the empty stamp pad. Saw Dyan Reaveley do that. It worked out well, gives a scattered look, but the background is very textured with ridges from the gel medium. I edged the whole thing in a red artist big brush pen, smudging with my fingers.

For the main image : In 'word' I made the cat the desired size and printed him onto pale grey card stock*. I colored him with my copics markers, a lighter and darker green. Then I took my blending tool and some alcohol ink blending solution and just pounced lightly over the top of the cat. It gives a really cool mottled look.






The cat was fussy cut, a Christmas hat was made from tissue paper and a bell added to his tail. He was popped up with dimensional tape. Doesn't he look funky in his shade of green :)


For the wording I used a combination of Tim's words from a word stack, my own handwriting and a sticker ....

I had an awesome time creating and having fun with this project, in the heat we are having here, thinking about the coolness and festivities of Christmas .... lol.

I hope you like it and got inspired - enough to leave a comment ? LOL

*My new favourite paper/card to print digital images onto is pale colored card stock, there are a couple of reasons for this. I have an inkjet printer and often if I print onto white, smooth cardstock the image will easily smudge or react with whatever product I use over it, to color it etc. Many colored card stocks are more absorbent, meaning there is no need to seal the image and it dries much faster. Secondly, colored card stock is often thicker than white, so when I pop up my image it is stronger and remains flat. A good comparison here is Stampin' Up! whisper white compared to a pale subtles color. It has taken me some time to move away from using the traditional white as the stamping base, but I am going to color the image with a variety of mediums anyway, so really it doesn't matter what color I start with :)

Anything goes challenge - TSP Week 10

So I could make anything this week for the challenge on The Sailing Pineapple blog ... so long as it wasn't a card. I decided on a bookmark using a flower background stamp. I put the image into word and changed all the aspect ratios to get a more elongated shape - suitable for a bookmark :) I really do like to versatility of digital images ...

I printed the image onto pale grey card stock, then colored with my inktense pencils. I actually further cut down the image so it flowed outside of the edges of the bookmark. I doodled around the edge and then ran it through the laminating sheets with my Xyron. Gosh that thing is so cool ... and now my bookmark is super durable. I added co-ordinating ribbons and taaaadaaar ..... completed bookmark :)

Thanks for visiting, please leave a comment :)

'Sing a Song' - Stampotique atc trade July 2014

I had sooooo much fun making atc's for this trade. The title conjoured up karaoke .... and off I went making a full series of atc's. I made 6 in total, where 2 where sufficient ...... LOL

Here is Ignis disguised as LMFAO.

 And a cute innocent little cat as the raunchy Madonna of the 80's .....

The background was black gesso so that the colors showed up better. I always find black card stock is too absorbent and the colors become dulled. I used versamark and perfect pearls in various colors, stamping shapes from a retired Stampin' Up! stamp set, and a musical wheel stamp. I fixed the perfect pearls with a spray of a starburst spray from Lindys Stamp Gang. The back was super shiny .....

The images were then stamped onto mixed media cardstock with stazon ink and colored with Inktense pencils. They were duly adapted or supplemented with various accessories and make-up sponges for microphones. I coiled wire for the lead ..... The words were printed from my pc and adhered.

What fun .....

The others in the series ..... The Birdy Song:

Queens Bohemian Rhapsody :

New York New York : (Loved the idea of the little quail making a go of it in NY)

 Micheal Jackson, Billie Jean :

And finally a close up of the shine :

'Under the sea' atc

I had sooooo much fun making this atc. And yes, incase you are wondering, the fish is farting ... hence the brown bubbles. LOL It amused me greatly.

 And then I had to show my enjoyment of this atc by making the fish 'laugh out loud' on the back of the atc.

To make this atc I adhered some predominately green patterned paper to the atc, torn into seaweed shapes. I then used my gelatos for the background, adding some pen squiggles and translucent molding paste - my new pet squeeze ! The fish by Dylusions was stamped, colored with gelatos and cut out. The bubbles are also from the same stamp set and have been colored brown with my india ink pens, with a little hint of white. I glued it all together, with a sentiment from a digital set by The Sailing Pineapple. Then I doodled  around the edge and taadaaaar .... a farting fish .... LOL

Never a dull moment around here ... I tell ya ..... Have a fun day everyone x

Remember to breathe ...

Once I saw these little wooden trees, I knew they would make awesome bronchioles for a mixed media project. So began the creative process of making lungs featuring wooden trees by Southern Ridge Trading Company (Wood-341). I am loving the symbolism of this, the wood and trees being the source of our oxygen. The sentiment is all about how busy and stressful life can be, sometimes we have to remember to slow down and take a breath ...

This is a 6 x 4.25" postcard. I am making my projects this width so I can bind them with my bind-it-all, into a book of positive affirmations and quotes I like. For this project I colored by background with red and orange dylusions. I then sponged red through a stencil and I loved how cell-like it was - if you can see near the Bre of Breathe. I added molding paste through a stencil, old book paper strips and white gesso with my fingers. I drew the lungs to accommodate the trees, then went over them in blue inktense that I then wet with a paintbrush. I adhered the wooden trees with diamond glaze and edged the whole project in white acrylic, with a little green on the book pages. The words were stamped with blue distress ink.

 Hope you find some inspiration here. Please take my advice and 'remember to breathe.....'

Sew Happy in your new home ... TSP - sewing challenge Week 9

Fun this week painting mushroom type houses with my new inktense pencils ....  for The Sailing Pineapply sew it challenge. There is faux stitching around the image and a little X stitch in the top left and bottom right.

After printing the image from my computer, I did actually coat it in a thin layer of clear gesso. I was using regular white Stampin' Up! whisper white cardstock. I did not want the colors to absorb into the paper, but stay vibrant ontop of the gesso. And besides, I loooove the scratchiness of clear gesso.

The background was made using the bargello quilting technique. I used a variety of papers and a thin coat of gesso to subdue them a little as they were pretty stark colors. I added some splatters of white too :)

There is a really cool pair of flip flops as a freebie this week at The Sailing Pineapple blog, maybe take a look and play along .... sailingpineapple.blogspot.ca/2014/07/challenge-no-9-sew-cute.html

Thanks for visiting, hope you found some inspiration here, if so please leave a comment :)