And So It Begins

I've thought about it for years and I guess with the big surge lately I am finally taking the plunge and starting an art journal!!  This is my first spread in it.  Dylusions sprays and stamps... Stencils... Some Studio 490 stamps... The scripture is computer generated.  I really had a good time and have another set of pages started.  There's some watercolor paper flowers again (I actually made these ones first).

Rock Out

This is the other card I mentioned in my last post.  I made this for our son and mailed it to him while he was at camp last week.  He's 15... yes, pink is his favorite color... and, yes, he plays guitar - both acoustic and electric.  It was when I made this card that I learned what a cool pattern it makes to spray Dylusions onto Ranger's Specialty Stamping paper and dry it.  There is not any added flicking of water or anything with this piece.  All the variation in the pink color is just from how the color lays on the paper.  I stamped with Archival Ink jet black.  The guitar and amp are from I Brake For Stamps.  I drew the cord with a black pen.  I used alphabet stamps for the writing.  I haven't had my alphabet stamps out in forever but have been inspired lately by how much Tammy Tutterow uses alphabet stamps.  I originally didn't plan to add the black ink around the edges but while I was stamping the letters I somehow got some ink on my finger and smudged it in the bottom right corner.  I thought about leaving it thinking Tim probably wouldn't care anyway but it really bugged me so then I added the black in using the ink blending tool and it actually looked really good. Added white dots along the top and bottom... perfect.  The piece is attached to a folded glossy black cardstock card.  

Very Awesome

Check out the background.... isn't if fabulous!!!  And oh so easy!!  I started with Ranger's Specialty Stamping Paper... sprayed it with Dylusions Spray pure sunshine and dried it - No blotting, No pressing, No manipulating the color at all... leave it along and just dry it with your heat tool.  On the specialty paper is makes the most wonderful design if you just let it be... somewhat pooling and giving you lighter and darker areas all by itself... now for this one (I have a card doing this that I haven't shared yet, maybe tomorrow) I wanted even more "spots" than you get just spraying and drying so I also flicked on some water, blotted it and dried it again... this gave it some even lighter areas and more variation... for the most part the spots you see that are more round are from the flicking.  I then added mowed lawn Distress Ink around the edges using a blending tool.  For the flowers I used a really inexpensive watercolor paper from Michael's... an Artist's Loft value pack... you get 100 sheets in the pack... it's not that great of watercolor paper but it works great for flowers (and I'm sure I'll find other uses for it).  I die cut 6 flowers (Tim's tattered floral die)... sprayed the center of each flower with Dylusions pure sunshine and the petals with Dylusions london blue and also sprayed on some water... mostly, but not all the way, dried the flowers, crumpled each one up and finished drying them.  Stamped each with the Studio 490 dots background using Archival aquamarine... stacked up 3 flowers and stapled them in the center with Tim's tiny attacher.  Stamped the scripture (Our Daily Bread Designs) on the card with Archival ink.   Added the crystals to the card, glued on the flowers and then glued chunky silver glass glitter to the centers using Glossy Accents and let it dry.  The leaves are die cut from grungepaper (larger leaves are Spellbinders and smaller are Sizzix)... colored them with Distress Ink mowed lawn... tucked and glued them in as shown.  Dyed some seam binding with dylusions pure sunshine and added as shown.

I'm entering this in the Frilly and Funkie Inspiration Photo Challenge.

Journal Tag Swap

I recently participated in a Journal Tag Swap with a small group of online buds!!  This fabulous tag is the one I got from Lori!!!  That lady image is now on my want list!!!  If you're wondering, it's a dylusions stamp.    

And this is the tag I sent Michael.  I used dylusions sprays... TCW stencils... dylusions and  Studio 490 stamps.  The circles in the bottom right are done with light modeling paste through sequin waste.  There is doodling with both white and black pens.

So Sweet

A quick tag.  The background was mostly greens picked up after another project... laid on a stencil and used Dylusions spray... stamped in white with bubble wrap.  The image is from Retro Cafe Art.   Some meshy ribbon, a grungeboard flourish coated with picket fence Distress crackle paint, a Prima flower, sprayed seam binding, Ideaology chit chat sticker, and some sticky back pearls.  (ps... the colors match better in person than in the picture, just couldn't get them to look right on my screen.. if they're good on yours, great!!)

Making Art Challenge 43 and 44

New challenges on the Everything Wendy Vecchi Yahoo Group are issued on Wednesdays and run usually either 1 or 2 weeks.  

We are up to Challenge 44 as of this last Wednesday but first I'm sharing my tag from Challenge 43... I managed to get it done just in time on Tuesday night but haven't had time to blog it yet.  The challenge was to use 2 hearts and 3 circles in our project (and as always we need to use at least one Studio 490 stamp - all the stamps I used are Studio 490) and Lori took the inspiration for the challenge from Wendy's Book 3, page 28.  I made a very quick tag.  I started with a 'I have lots of color left on my craft sheet that I don't want to waste' tag from my pile of these tags.  I stamped the 2 hearts on white cardstock and cut them out.  Stamped the saying onto the tag with Snow Cap paint dabber and added the 3 dabber circles under it.. decided I didn't really like the saying in white and thought I'd attempt to stamp it again with Archival Ink jet black... so holding my breath, hoping it would line up well, I stamped it, and it worked... yay!!!  Stamped the hand with jet black, cut around the fingers, added the heart.  Stamped the weed image with snow cap.  Attached the other heart.  The came the hole... I didn't want to just leave and I kept laying on things to tie through it but nothing said yet... then I noticed a scrap piece of Ideaology composer tissue paper and thought "hmmmm"... yep, I like that... glued it on and trimmed it.  

Now onto Challenge 44 which is to use Wendy stamps and products but use bright colors!!!  Now I'm not completely sure I totally like what I've made and as it sits around I might do a little more to it... but it's done for now.... I like all the individual pieces, just not sure I'm thrilled with them together.  The circle base, flourishes and flowers are all Studio 490 Art Parts.  I covered the circle with a piece of paper I had after working on a card yesterday.  It uses Dylusions sprays for the background and this piece that I used is the extra piece I got while working... on the card (which I'll share sometime this week) I layed on the flower stencil and sprayed and then on this piece of paper I pressed the stencil that had spray all over it.  The paper I used is Ranger's Specialty paper.  I glued it onto the circle with Ranger's Glue 'n Seal matte, let it dry, cut around the circle, sanded the edges to be sure they were smooth, and then painted the edge of the art part with Pearl Paint Dabber also getting a small line of pearl on the front.  Next I stamped the splatter stamp (all stamps are Studio 490) using Archival deep purple.  Then moved onto working with the flourishes and flowers... I painted them all with Pearl Paint Dabber, both sides, just dabbing it on rather than wiping leaving fantastic texture.  Next I used alcohol ink on the pieces.. the shimmer from the pearl paint shows through the alcohol inks.  I inked both sides.  Then I stamped the flourishes with the screen image using Archival emerald and the flowers with the large alphabet background stamp using Archival manganese blue.  Lightly brushed white paint dabber on the edges of the petals.  The went to work on placement... I knew what words I wanted to stamp and first stamped them right on the circle but they just didn't show up as much as I wanted so I took a scrap of the original paper that didn't have the flowers on it and stamped the words with jet black, tore it out and glued it on.  Stamped a small week image around the edges of the circle with pearl paint dabber... glued on the flourishes and flowers... decided to stamped some weeds with color, Archival magenta hue.  The white centers on the flowers are part of a berry bead... when we (mostly my hubby) use to make beaded animals, berry beads were used for several things but we made these owl magnets that only used part of the bead and I've kept the left overs for years... the piece has a whole in the center that I didn't want so I used liquid pearls to fill it in which went very well with the bead.  Added white dots on the saying and white stitching around the circle with a pen.

Beautiful Day ATC and a Winner

I started with a piece of Authentique paper from the Splendid 6x6 pad and glued a piece of old book text across it.  The girl image is from Collage Stuff - Crazy For Kids collage sheet.  I cut out the image, brushed white paint around the edges and then edged it with green paint.  I also edged the background with green paint.  The leaves are cut from grungepaper using a Sizzix die, colored and also embossed.  The flowers are prima, some I've inked around the edges and stacked holding them together with a yellow brad.  On top of the brads, in the smaller flowers, and in lines on the right and left edges are drops of Liquid Pearls.  Beautiful day are Ideaology chitchat stickers; after sticking them on I added black dots and black lines around the stickers.  s

 

And now onto the winner of the tag in the previous post.  Random Number Generator chose the number 3 which is

Ally White Cat said...

Everyone is so cute of course we all love your art..who could chose they are both beautiful.
hugs,
susan s.

Congratulations, Susan!!!!  Send me your address and I'll 


get your tag in the mail!!!

Would You Like A Tag?

I took a little play time last night and thought I'd make a tag for the current Frilly and Funkie Challenge which is Kraft and Twine.  I also just got all the Dylusions sprays this past week and had to have a go with them.  I started with a Ranger #8 manila tag, sprayed it with water and 3 colors of Dylusions spray - squeezed orange, bubblegum pink, and melted chocolate, layed another tag on top to pick up excess liquid, pulled them apart and dried them.  So now I had two tags started and normally I would have thrown one off to the side for later use but decided I'd just go ahead and make two tags.  I continued to layer using stencils, sprays, inks, water, and then added some stamping... decided I'd like a lighter area for the quote and used Jenni Bowlin malted milk paint dabber to lighten an area large enough for it, dried it and stamped the quote (Tim Holtz) using Archival jet black.  Added a piece of old lace, a torn piece of corrugated (a free gift from Linda with an order from the Funkie Junkie's Boutique) with a little paint rubbed on, burlap string (another free gift from Linda), a metal filigree also from the Funkie Junkie, and a flower.  The flower is die cut (Tim's tattered floral die) from kraft glassine... I stacked 3 together - 2 are sprayed with squeezed orange and 1 with bubblegum pink - after sprayed I did NOT blot off any extra, I just dried them with a heat tool... Love the speckled color!!  Stapled the flowers together and then glued an Ideaology button on the top (shank cut off).  Tied a piece of jute (from my stash) at the top.

Since I now have two tags I thought I would give one away... just leave me a comment before I check the computer early Monday morning and I will randomly pick a winner... oh, and if you like one better just let me know which one in the comment.   

I Wouldn't Have Missed Being Your Friend

Isn't this quote just an awesome stamp!!!  It's part of the newest release from Quietfire Design that I hadn't used yet (there are still a few more to use).  I have several friends that are going to be getting this on a card sometime!!

The folded base here is Distress Core'dinations... sanded around the edges after it was folded.  The main piece is Ranger's Specialty stamping paper... first inked with all the newest colors (Spring Set) of Distress Inks (Totally LOVE these colors!!!)... then I stuck on some Heidi Swap leaf masks and inked again with the same colors... stamped with a Studio 490 text image (Live and Make Art set) in peacock feathers (I had started taking the masks off but not all of them, so some leaves are stamped over with the text and some not), removed the rest of the masks, dried it, flicked with water, blotted, dried, and the quote stamped with Archival Ink jet black.  It's layered on a piece of medium purple cardstock leaving a small border.  The Tim Holtz butterfly border die is cut from the Specialty stamping paper, inked with shaded lilac, doodled on with a black pen and a white pen and then yellow sharpie over the white pen, black gems on the bodies, and glued to the bottom of the card.  A scrap strip of the same Distress Core'dinations sanded and layered on top of the white edge.  Tim's Ideaology roses trim added on top... the roses are inked with squeezed lemonade, sprayed with water, dried, and the top rubbed over with peacock feathers.