Tuesday 24 February 2015

Paperartsy - Topic 4 - Miniature Art Challenge

Over on the Paperartsy blog they have a new challenge, Miniature Art.
Having not felt in the land of the living for the past few days (man flu passed on from hubby), I decided to have a go. 
It's quite a simple piece really, a tiny bottle and cork  inspired by http://blog.paperartsy.co.uk/2015/02/2015-3-repurposed-vase-by-wanda-hentges.html obviously my little bottle is smaller a lot smaller but the basics are the same. I  wanted to paint it, my own little masterpiece.

At the time I decided to take part I must admit I'd only read the title and looked at the pictures of miniatures on the Paperartsy blog, I knew immediately that  I wanted to paint a mini bottle especially as whilst on the hunt for a different item I discovered the small items hiding in a draw.




I began by painting the bottle twice in snowflake to give me a solid base to start from.
I masked off an area of Lynne Perrella's stamp LPC030 and inked up the bit I needed with black archival ink, I lined up the bottle and rolled it over the stamp transferring the image, this process was repeated with a different stamp from the same set.


A quick blast from the heat gun set the ink for me to paint on.

Paperartsy fresco paints in Irish Cream, Blush and Chalk were used for the completion. Cherry Red for lips, Hey Pesto for the eyes and Chocolate Pudding for the hair.
Chocolate Pudding and Mermaid were used around the rest of the bottle.
 Treasure gold in Onyxite, Indigo and White Fire was added to the upper and lower parts of the bottle.
A left over bit of string was tied around the neck of the bottle and a metal embellishment  with a small note was pushed through the string, another metal bit was added to the top of the cork.



Initially I was going to do a message in the bottle but I'm happy with the outcome, small and simple.
 Hope you like it.

Monday 23 February 2015

Quick Card

Today I felt yucky, I have a cold.
After several loads of washing, hoovering and endless other little jobs I decided I needed to make something. The girls have been off school for a week along with the hubby, so not a lot of crafting has been going on at all.

I had a need to craft and here  is the outcome.


I must admit that the image had been stamped and coloured a few months ago. I found it whilst looking for a stamp and die I  thought had gone into the bin,  the good news is I found both.
 (When you have a multi function room I often find myself scooping everything up and placing it in the nearest empty box or bag and fortunately that's where I found it).
 I finished off inking the edges of the image then misted it with water using a sheet of plenty to remove excess water and some of the colour, the image was originally coloured with distress ink pads pressed onto a glass mat  using it as a water colour applying it with a  small round brush.
In my lucky dip bag (lucky because that's were I found my stamps and coloured image) I came across numerous die cuts of lace, one of which was a lovely green, also a bit of  green  spotty card
(an Anne Marie purchase) and a imitation ledger page. All of which I needed to use, I stamped a greeting onto a left over bit of mount board from a birdhouse project before Xmas, coloured it with distress inks and misted with water again.
Dressing the card up with a length of green twine and all adhered to the card base.

Wow, sounds a lot but really took ten minutes.
It's actually taken longer to write up than it took to make.
That's all for now, going for another lemsip to perk me up a bit.

Monday 16 February 2015

Re-vamped!

As you may have gathered from my jam jar post
 I wasn't overly happy with the results.
 It wasn't long (a few hours) before I had given it a lick of  black gesso.

Bang goes the colour.

With more or less a blank canvas I re-coloured or rather high lighted the raised areas with many different treasure gold colours. White Fire, Silver and Ruby.
I also added more pink to the flowers.

Ta-Dah !
 


Much happier now.

Saturday 14 February 2015

Butterfly Journal Page


I decided it was high time I created a journal page.

I'd used the butterfly stamp in the past few days for a card and  it was still visible on the top of the pile, I decided I should use it ( you never know when it will surface again).

 I began by coating the page with a layer of gesso, closely followed by a texture paste applied through a mask. Beads were added while the paste was still wet then left to dry.
Dylusions spray inks were used to colour the page in blacks and greens.


Once coloured the butterfly was stamped across the centre of the spread and heat embossed with   Black and Silver UTEE, it was coloured with Rusty Hinge Distress ink. The beads were coloured using Spanish Topaz Treasure Gold to tie in with the colour of the butterfly.

Wire circle were layered with a bit of cheese cloth and attached with a length of wire as I didn't want to wait for the glue to dry also I didn't want to see lumps of glue.

Finally, Words were stamped onto white paper and distressed around the edges then added to the page  with a touch of 3d foam.






Jam Jar Art?

I have been collecting small jars for some time now. 
First I was going to do some sort of Christmas advent calendar, however, poor Steve can only eat so much marmalade in one year.
With that idea on hold for a while (as I still need 7 more), I decided to do something a little different, for me that  is, which included colour.
 I am getting more adventurous, slowly that is, it's not that I don't like colour, it's just one of those things.

  Anyhow, the project started with a regular jar which I covered in a piece of canvas, I had initially painted a layer of gesso but this didn't seem to cover very well hence the canvas replacement.
I glued on rows of lace and added a few lace
flowers, then covered the jar in a couple of layers of white gesso.

 
I used spray inks to create a base colour, then added stamping in a light grey archival ink.
I had a circle of wire left over from previous project and attached it to the jar.

 
I attached pre-made flowers and coloured them by wetting the petals a little with water, then adding  some of the spray ink with a paintbrush to the edges, letting it seep into the petal.
A few silks colours were used to add a little more interest and add depth to the jar.
Glass beads were mixed with gel medium and pale pink sugar for a little glimmer then applied to the jar. A black charcoal pencil was used to add shading.
 

 
 
What I really would like to do is paint all of the background black and add in colours.
I'll keep that for another day, will keep you posted.
 

Friday 6 February 2015

Journal Without Words!

I've made a journal and now it's time to fill it.

Only thing is, I don't really write in journals or diary's come to that.

I did however find inspiration from  an unlikely source. 
As I was rummaging through a bits box, lots of different Superdry labels  which I seem to have collected over a few years cried out use me, use me, so I did.
 
Great! no need for words, my words that is.  It's a page I can instantly associate with my need to buy clothes (trendy clothes).
 
A few labels were painted black and covered with bits and pieces, they also had orange ribbons on that I couldn't help but leave on and so included the colour on my page.
 

I dragged  black gesso across the page leaving areas of brown showing through, in hindsight as the card wasn't a good quality, I should have covered the whole lot with clear gesso first as it bled through to the back, live and learn.
Other bits included were leftovers from a France Papillon workshop, bits of fabric, tissue paper and another favourite of mine, rusty metal bits. 
Everything was arranged on the page and stuck down with soft matte gel.


Next up, silks paints were used to add a bit of shimmer and colour, they look fab on black.
Primary elements power was dotted around the page and activated with a bit of fine water spray.
Yum.

I even added a black and white selfie. Get me!

Cards for Men!

I don't know why but I do struggle with cards for men.

I have a mental block combined with a lack of male orientated stamps, however with hubby's birthday very soon I thought I ought to make him one, ( he gets a little jealous not having a hand made one) LOL.  I was also given a brief to use a few Indigo Blu Stamps, so I teamed the two together and this is what I came up with.


I used a 7x7 card base covering it in black card then stamping Happly Birthday in the top right hand corner and embossing it with a dull silver power.
Next I had a piece of brown craft card which I stamped a repeated pattern of the Indigo Blu stamp "I Spy" to create the background, the back of the card was stamped with another Indigo Blu stamp "Harlequin".
The Harlequin stamp was then stamped across the page from one corner to the other ,UTEE in Black/Silver was sprinkled over. Prior to heat embossing I used a soft brush to take away the power from unwanted areas which created a vintage/distressed/worn appearance.
The Craft card was  then manipulated so that the top right hand corner revealed the happy birthday message,  a brad was attached to keep it in place then layered onto the black card base.
A rectangle of card board was then distressed/torn  then heat embossed with the same powder.
The frame was a Darkroom door frame stamp which was stamped cut out then heat embossed with clear utee and once completely dry bent and folded out of shape to create cracks (adding to the aged look).
The I spy image was stamped once in Black archival ink and then in Tree Branch archival ink, the 
brown image was mounted on black card with 3d foam to lift it off the page then layered onto the frame. This was then positioned onto the card along with the embossed card board in a pleasing manor and stuck down. The binoculars on the black image were cut out and layered onto the brown image with 3d foam. A touch of Glossy Accents added the effect of glass in the eye pieces.

Ta Dah!

Man type card.
x