Monday, March 28, 2011

The Stampsmith Challenge

The Stampsmith Challenge is a new one for me, but I have long been familiar with their stamps because they have photo style stamps - one of my favorite types. I have been wanting to participate in one of their challenges and made this project for the blue and brown theme. My image is of the Romanov daughters (the "From Russia with Love" plate), stamped on glossy cardstock, cut out and layered onto a piece of Russian book text - I have absolutely no idea what it says! I also stamped a book cover stamp (Tim Holtz-Stampers Anonymous) onto chipboard and cut out a window and added corrugated cardstock underneath it for more depth. The lace piece started out white, but fit much better once dyed with faded jeans and chipped sapphire DI and given touches with a pale gold leafing pen.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Gingersnapper Spirit Blog Hop

With this week's challenge at Gingersnap Creations being the third annual Copper, Ginger or Rust Challenge, there is also a blog hop involving other Gingersnappers to show off their coppery creations. Here's my piece using "Serena" from The Stampsmith stamped on glossy cardstock with copper StazOn. She's layered onto an embossed copper flashing piece aged with black paint, and then further embellished with dimensional flowers die cut from more copper flashing. I used the smallest 5 petal flower on the tattered florals die and cut 2 for each flower. With one piece, I cut off 2 petals and shaped the remaining 3 and then layered that over the other flower and added pearl seed beads to the center. You may notice the tiny leaves - they're single petals of the same small flower, run through a herringbone embossing folder - I thought it worked well for leaf ribs - and aged with black paint. Be sure to check out the list of Gingersnapper blogs HERE to visit, grab a cup of tea or coffee, and continue on your hop - you're sure to be inspired - enjoy!!

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Possibilities with Art Journals

Recently I've been intrigued with art journaling and the entire process of creating multiple layers for a background and then playing around with embellishing it in whatever direction your brain takes you. Use a quote, a random thought, or whatever comes to mind, but just create for the joy of creating whether or not anyone sees it, so you are free to mess up. This week I found videos on Donna Downey's blog about her "Inspiration Week" showing her process of creating a fantastic, artistic canvas journal. So yesterday, instead of doing laundry or cleaning my house, I made 2 handmade journals, 1 has pages of watercolour paper and the other is from bristol paper, sewed them together with waxed linen thread and glued them into bookboard covers I made covering one with papers and gaffer tape and the other with canvas. To the canvas one I added layers of watered down acrylic paints - grey, green and blue and maybe I'll stamp a cool flourish on the cover......hmmmmm....so many possibilities!

Here are some of the blank inside pages - I even sewed in inclusions of a shipping tag, envelopes, and vintage sheet music.



Now I have my own journals to start to play in. And this morning when I checked Donna's blog, I was the winner of her giveaway for yesterday's supplies - how cool is that!!!! I can't wait to play, and who knows, maybe I'll be brave enough to share some of my experiments.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

GC Random Redhead Challenge

With the challenge issued this week at Gingersnap Creations being typewriters, I couldn't resist taking a picture of my card propped up on my folding Corona 3 typewriter circa 1920's! It does work....but must be treated gingerly... I've already had the drawband slip off while cleaning it and while that was tough to get back in place, I fear it will break some day and then my prized typewriter may become a beautiful vintage decoration in my home! Back to my card....

Here's a picture of just the card. I created a 2nd generation stamped background collage so it would be lighter and combined stamps of a typewriter image with typewriter alphabets and even a typewriter key alphabet. On my sentiment strip, I cut out the typewriter key letters, edged them with a Krylon gold pen, and mounted them on foam tape to make them look even more like typewriter keys. My image of the little girl typing is from French Kissed. Why not make a project and join in on the challenge (GC blog post HERE) which runs until April 17th. Hope to see your entry!
Stamp Credits: Dragonfly Laser, River City Rubber Works, Stampington & Co., Studio G

Friday, March 11, 2011

Compendium of Curiosities #35

The LAST technique of the Compendium of Curiosities challenge! I can't believe we've worked through the entire book - such fun! This week uses the concluding technique found on page 67 - Design Details. I created a collage on a corrugated cardboard piece using miscellaneous pieces of things laying on my table. And I got to play with a new set of stamps from Stampers Anonymous - Papillon -great images and script that I think will become a new favorite. These stamped images are combined with another favorite of mine, the flower silhouettes from Donna Downey for Unity Stamps.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

GC Spicy Supply Challenge

"Office Supplies" are this month's chosen supply for the challenge issued this week at Gingersnap Creations. My creations were not only done as examples for the challenge, but they're practical,too! I needed some file folders to hold my little scraps of paper that keep accumulating on my table, so what better use of a very basic office supply - file folders! I played with Adirondack color wash sprays to make them. What incredible, vibrant colors! I know these sprays have been around for awhile, but I've seen them in the work of Dina Wakley, Dyan Reaveley, and Roben-Marie Smith and was inspired to play with them. Currently I see these sprays getting a lot of use in the mixed-media and art journaling world, and now I understand the appeal. Not only do you get intense color, but they blend together well giving even more depth to your piece. They are permanent when heat dried, and you can dry them right after spraying, or roll a paper towel roll across your project to absorb and blend some of the ink - and create a cool pattern from the paper towel texture - and then heat dry. All 3 of my folders are created in basically the same way, I masked off a strip and a rectangle with masking tape, layered Tattered Angels swirl Glimmer Screens, then happily sprayed away! I used a variety of colorwash colors - stream, denim, bottle, red pepper, cranberry, and butterscotch. Once dry, I ironed them flat, added tissue tape where the masked strip was, and embellished the masked areas with border stamps (Prima Build-A-Frame) and alphabet stamps (Technique Tuesday and Studio G). Here are pictures of the individual folders:

Stuff to save:

To do lists:

And that all important shopping lists!
I plan to get a lot of use from these folders and know they're going to look pretty on my table. How can you combine an office supply with your stamping supplies? Be sure to add your link to the GC blog post HERE. The challenge runs until April 10th so you've got plenty of time to show off your creative office supply projects!

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Tag Tuesday - Postcards

I created this "Postcard from Paris" tag for the Tag Tuesday Challenge using miscellaneous snippets of things that were just fun to put together. My patterned background is a technique by Shelly Hickox she calls Gessoed Alcohol Ink. There was a great tutorial on the Gingersnap Creations blog last month (HERE) that I just had to try. Also on my tag is a French postcard from French Kissed - there so many that Trishia has with gorgeous handwritten script and vintage French stamps; it's hard to choose! My image is from Artful Illusions and there's a narrow strip of 7 Gypsies gaffer tape. I had to add an oversized bow to the tag to match that wonderful large Edwardian hat!

Compendium of Curiosities #34

This week's chosen technique at Linda's Compendium of Curiosities Challenge is on page 63 - Dimensional Collage Fragments. After making my pieces, I combined them onto a tag with a vintage paper background distressed with masking tape and distress inks. I think there's only one more challenge to go before we will have completed ALL the techniques in the book - wow!

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Gothic Arches - butterflies

"Butterflies" is the theme at Gothic Arches and this is my arch using a butterfly stamp embellished with scraps of distress inked watercolour paper, French book text, and a stamped scrap of vellum. Stamp Credits: Stampers Anonymous and Catslife Press