NO MORE SHOPPING!

 

Gelli Arts has come out with some sets of small gelli plates.  Ooooh, I was so tempted.  But I keep telling myself, "NO MORE SHOPPING!".  "Could I do this another way?" I asked myself.  "These look awfully like some old foam stamps I have somewhere.  And if I used stamps, I wouldn't have to use acrylic paint.  I could use any kind of paint or ink.  Hmmmmm."

 

A trip to the basement.  Rifle through the old sets of Making Memories foam stamps I bought at a craft store bankruptcy sale.

 

Voila.  Some ATC backgrounds.  Now what?

 

Chalk Ink



I Couldn't Stop at Just One

After I made my last 8 fold book, I saw an article in the Bow Valley Calligraphy Guild journal for a larger 8 fold book.  My first was made from an 8 1/2" x 11" piece of paper.  This one was made from an 11" x 17" piece.

The article provided some different decorating prompts:  watercolor, collage, and pencil crayon, in addition to letters.

These really are addictive.  What I love most about them is that you begin the process by decorating the full sheet of paper, before folding.  After you have folded your book, you have partially decorated pages on which to write additional quotes and apply finishing touches.

Home to Roost

My mom used to say "One day your chickens will come home to roost."  Now she's immortalized in my journal.

This page uses some stamps I haven't used in awhile, as well as a brand new hand carved chicken.  The stamps were stamped in Versamark and then sponged with Pan Pastels.  I'm loving this technique to get coloured images into my journal right now.

Alpha Background stamp by Hero Arts

Palm Trees stamp by Beeswax

Foam Star stamp by Making Memories

Small star stamp by Rubbermoon

Stencil by Balzer Designs for Crafters Workshop

Rylan is 3!

Birthday Card - 5 1/2" x 4 1/4"

Distress Inks

Hand lettering

"3" stamp from Making Memories

Aquamarine Bicycle

The design prompts for the Vancouver Artist Trading Card swap this month are Aquamarine, Bicycles, and Scale.  It isn't often that I can manage to use all three at once, but the different sized circles completed this one.

Letter to 2011

I'm still catching up on my 2011 preparation for my 2012 Book of Days.  Our instructions from Effy were to write a letter to 2011 and put a pocket or envelope in the front cover of our journal to hold it.  I decided to do a card; inside I'll write the letter.  My word for 2011 was BIGGER.

Masks by Tim Holtz

Spritzed Watercolor

Pan Pastels

Stamps by Hero Arts, Autumn Leaves, Making Memories, Rusty Pickle and ME!

My word for 2012 is "Inspired".

Stencils are All the RAGE.......

in art journals.  They look like this:

Only I didn't do this with stencils.  I did it with stamps and masks, which I already have.  Recently, I was admiring the lovely stencil work done in journals, and was contemplating the acquisition of some stencils.  They aren't horribly  expensive, but another storage problem I DO NOT NEED.  Then I thought "Wait a minute, can't I do this with stamps?  And I have lots of those."

Right about now, you may have some questions, such as:


What's the difference between a mask and a stencil?
A mask covers an area so you can apply colour around it.  See the bird in the tree on the left side of this journal page?

With a stencil, you apply the colour inside the cut out area.  So a stencil is a positive image and a mask is a negative image.

Are stamps positive or negative images?
They can be either, but usually they are positive images.

Happy Birthday, Rylan!

My great nephew, Rylan, is two tomorrow, but his birthday card isn't moving very fast with the mail strike.

The cupcake stamp is hand carved.

Octagons

One of the October themes for the Vancouver Artist Trading Card Group is Octagons.  Using a hand carved octagon stamp for a background, I created some stamped ATC's for fall:

Text Messaging

This month Michelle Ward, over at GPP Street Team, is challenging us to "cut or rip lines of text from magazines.  Apply it to your page to create a message or use as an abstract background."  Another fun challenge.

Some of those who read my post about grids, applauded my use of baggies to sort my paper scraps into colours.  Well, I have another baggy for bits of text I've cut out.   Yeah, I'm a serious organizer.

For this page I chose text on white backgrounds, glued it down with gel medium and then stamped over it all using foam stamps and red acrylic paint.

I encourage you to follow this link and give it a try!

Step on the Scale

Some of you may have heard me say how much I love alphabet stamps. How much do I love them? Well, let's just say that I have a few of them.

Michelle Ward at GPP Street Team is challenging us this month with size. Here are a few different size alphabets:

Tissue Paper Painting

Painting tissue paper with gesso and acrylic paint toughens it up so that you can easily punch, cut, glue or otherwise manipulate it as a collage item. Try it in your journal, before putting using it on a more formal piece. This was inspired by Michelle Ward's GPP Street Team: Complete instructions can be found here.