White Reflection

I was feeling a bit flaky and out of sorts this morning. Just a bit vulnerable after a hectic week.
So the best thing to do when like that is to escape into the crafting world.

I think that this piece really does reflect my feeling of vulnerability.

I started by guessing a journal page and grungepasted through a stencil. I really liked this look.

I scraped some Liquitex Texture Gel glass beads with a palette knife for added texture.

Next I built up layers of scrim, lace, deli paper, buttons and flowers. I had dried an alchemilla mollis plant from my garden a few days ago and after Snowflake frescoing it I attached it to my work.

I finished off with a sentiment….."The fullness of life does not come from the things outside us. We ourselves must create the beauty in which we live."

The fragility of the plant and the paleness of the work also reflects my feelings today. The jigsaw pieces seem to indicate that sometimes all the pieces do not come together and them being obscured with paint makes it more difficult to place them. Gosh, getting a bit deep. 

This journal page has helped me to feel better and I have enjoyed losing myself this afternoon.

Flowers and Fish!

I think that I maybe lost the plot tonight, but I really enjoyed it.
Ellen Vargo's new stamps and her and Jo's interpretations sent my brain into a spin. ideas were popping about like a pinball machine. Also may I add, without the aid or hinder of alcohol!

I started by stamping in Archival Cornflower blue onto a Dylusions mop up page, using Ellens EEV04 stamps as I am Little Miss Impatient and can't wait for new ones to arrive.

From these I made 2 creations…….

A flower using florist wire with an umbrella spikelike top to attach petals.

And then I played with the other petals on a mop up background…….

And made a fish picture, using PA bubbly stamp, black, white and silver pens and some Portfolio pastels. Yes, it is a bit mad and it would look very at home on a junior school display but HEY, I enjoyed playing and it could lead to more refined work. 

Thanks for looking!

Splats!

Just  a quick post to show my splat cards.
I have got the decorators here at the moment, blitzing a couple of rooms so found it a good excuse to play.
I used Daler Rowney Mixed Media paper which is very hefty and recommended to me by Deborah.
I sprayed Dylusion inks onto it and blew it around with a straw. Dried each colour before adding more.

 Then I stamped with Black Archival, mounted them and have 4 quick cards.

Rescued flowery background

Lots of people in Patwitland have been mentioning how they have gone back to work in progress that was abandoned and looked at later with fresh eyes. This is my latest rescue piece and I am now happy with it.
On my last post I showed my glue gun flowers and leaves. This was another play with them which I totally overworked and trampled to death….or so I thought. I started with Dylusion sprays over my leaves and flowers, did a bit of stamping then started to crayon over with Portfolio pastels. I wrote fun and then chucked it on the craft room floor.

Today, I was looking at some artwork on Pinterest and pinned a lovely journal page with houses cut from a book….just by coincidence the work belonged to a friend of Darcys' called Nicole Maki, she lives in the USA.

So, I pinched her idea and die cut some flowers from a dictionary page, scribbled on them and stamped one of Lin Brown's sentiments.

Bingo, much better. A rescue job is sooooo satisfying.

Glue Gun flowers

This is my first Stampotique Challenge but knowing me, I will not work out how to link or miss the deadline.

I created some Rudbeckia flowers and leaves on my craft mat with my glue gun.

Next I used them as stencils and sprayed Dylusion inks through them.

I removed my flowers etc and then began to work on the flowers and leaves, filling them in with inks. Then I used white and black pen and coloured the flower centres with brown pen.

I stamped my characters around the flowers, masking parts of the flowers to give the feeling that they were peeping out from behind them. I highlighted them with white pen and finished off with a sentiment.

i enjoyed this challenge and found the glue gun experience easier than I thought. 

Rudbeckia inspired by Clare Lloyd

Meet Rudbeckia or Becky for short. She is my face that I am entering into the PA challenge inspired by the talented Clare.

I do like drawing faces and feel that, since our tuition from Clare, my technique has improved.

I followed her instructions and was inspired by the flowers in my garden.

I also used the colours as my inspiration. I used Yellow Submarine and Chocolate pudding for my flower hat and a mixture of Toad Hall and Limelight for my background. 

The sentiment was stamped using Archival Leaf Green. Her wings are skeleton leaves folded in half.

I loved doing this…thanks Clare. 

Here is Becky….

And then the sun came out to greet her!

We'll meet again

This piece of work was inspired by Kate Yetter's Art Journal Page. I love the way that she has combined so many techniques and produced such a stunning piece of art.

I started with a piece of Chatsworth paper and grungepasted with some already painty grungepaste which I had saved from  previous work.

Next I chose some PA frescos and spread them with a palette knife.

Next I stamped in Versafine Vintage Sepia using PA Ink and the dog stamps and built up layers of vellum manuscript and war posters . My focal point should have been another war poster but it lacked visual impact so I have used a very dear original photo of my Mum's brother, Uncle Len. He was on the now famous Russian convoys and endured such hardship and ridiculous temperatures that we will never be able to conceive, thank goodness. He sadly died last Autumn, just before he could receive his very special medal.

I managed to find an anchor in my collection and a couple of suitable phrases.

Special thanks to my Uncle Len, and not forgetting his twin, Edgar, who served in the RAF and is still enjoying life and is approaching his 90th birthday.

Hessian and interfacing page

Having just been away for a week in the Lake District, I feel a little as though I am on catch up. The weeks challenges have been stimulating and varied and it was lovely to see that Sarah B has joined the DT. congrats Sarah.

I chose Penny Nuttall's project because the materials were more or less to hand at the last minute.

I decided to add a page to my small book that I already submitted as a challenge a while ago…this one.

I chose a piece of hessian for the background and then hunted for paper backed fusible webbing. haven't got any so decided to use Iron on interfacing instead…fingers crossed.

I didn't want to get it massively wet with very watery frescos so I rubbed it with my new intense blocks and blended it a bit with water. then I rubbed treasure gold into it. I placed it onto the hessian and wrapped parchment paper around it and it stuck! I added more treasure gold and you can see a texture where the hessian is.

Next I rummaged through my tissue paper box and found some brown paper with silver on the back…was in the wrong box but meant to be. I tore a piece and stamped one of Darcy's new stamps in archival coffee and olive, distressed the edges and curled it to show the silver. Then I stamped Darcy's new sentiment onto the silver side and finished off with screw style brads on the corners.

I had no preplan in my head and just went with the flow and I think that it worked well, so I have a new page in my little book.

Thanks to Penny for the ideas….I strayed quite a long way from the path but enjoyed my detour! 

Embossing Powder Relief

I am  great admirer of the fabulous textural work of lovely Jo Myhill and had to have a go at playing with the techniques that she showed us in this weeks post.

I wrote down all the stages that she did and followed them….Chatsworth paper, fresco stripes, clear embossed, crackled, frescos, sanding, distress ink….whoops, forgot the water droplets, stamped sentiment.
I got into a right old mess with it but carried on through what looked like total chaos until I couldn't do anymore. I used Ellen Vargo stamps for my clear embossing and also printed with distress inks and archival . I sort of tried to save it a bit by using frontage embossing powders.
I think that I have created a kind of cave full of sparkly minerals with stalactites hanging from the ceiling. I took 2 full pictures, one to show the textures and one to show the main sentiment. Had fun and has given me ideas to follow through.

Hippy Chick

I saw an inspiring piece in Somerset studio which was based around The Great Gatsby. I admired the style and decided to have a go using a 60s style.

I began by layering strips of different prints and printed tissue and washed over them with some shiny Silks.

Next I dry brushed some of my trusty PA frescos, trying to keep to typical 60s colours.

I knocked it all back with Snowflake and then sprayed Dylusion inks through a flower power type stencil.

I drew my hippy chick through a Dyan stencil and dressed her in 60s Mary Quant style outfit.

Next I looked on the internet for 60s style fonts and chose this blobby one to write my message. I had to spray over the top of the inks with an acrylic varnish so that the ink didn't run into my overpainting.

I wrote my message in black Sharpie pen and painted her outfit etc with PA frescos. Really enjoyed this, might turn it into a series? 

Lavender bags.

I have only recently discovered the wonderful Somerset Studio and it has fired me up to try some different things.
This week the Stamped and Stitiched sachets caught my eye. But to me they are just lavender bags!
What appealed was the shabby chic finish to them. this is my style as I cannot do neat and tidy anything. I could open a shop…."raw edges are us".
I started by cutting rectangles of muslin and slightly smaller ones of cotton to fit inside. I stamped the TH dragonfly onto the fronts with archival and painted over bits lightly with Silks Acrylic Glaze African Jade.
I filled and machine stitched the inner bags and just sewed around the edges of the muslin attached lace,

ribbon and string hangers. Then I sewed on some buttons. You will see that I also frayed the edges of the muslin.

Then I tried a heart shaped one which is easy when you have raw edges rather than having to turn them inside out after sewing.

So I have a little bit of shabby art which is fragrant and decorative.