Dreamer of Dreams

Are you a member of the facebook group Soul Sisters? It is affiliated with the shop Art and Soul Studio. The reason I ask this question is that not only is it a wonderfully supportive group but they also have twice weekly prompts to get you creating. The prompts are for a project called Artsy Circles, using the prompt you can create anything that you like as long as the substrate is a circle.

A couple of weeks back the prompt was stencil. I used two, one from The Crafters Workshop - Mini Cubist and another from Scrap Fx - Day Dreamer. I love stencils, for me it is an addiction, that I just cant get over.



In my stash I had some gelli prints that I had done a little while ago. This is what I decided to use as my background. I attached the circle to my print with matte medium.

 Once I decide which way I liked the texture of my gelli print I then used my tcw stencil and dina wakley paint to add some colour.

I used versamark ink through my Scrap Fx Stencil so that I could emboss the image. I was so cross with myself as I used some tape to hold down my circle so it didn't move but then I went and ripped the print in two places when I removed the tape. I decided not cover them up, it just adds to the journey the Artsy Circle took me on

Here is a close of the embossed image.

 

The final step was to attach the words and add a little colour.

 

Products that can be found in the Art and Soul Studio shop are listed below

dina wakley media heavy body acrylic paint - umber, turquoise, tangerine and ocean

tim holtz idea-ology - metallic stickers

 

Happy Creating





You Have To Believe

Lately I have been struggling with my inner art demons, they are telling me that what I create is not good enough. They are telling me that I should give up and choose another hobby. Sometimes it is hard not listen to them when they are very, very loud. Most times I am able to turn then off, but lately it's been rather difficult. This morning I put them back in their sound proof box and proved to them and me I am good enough. I think I created one of my favourite pieces that I have ever made. It is an art journal page that I created for Art and Soul Studio.

Here are some close ups, if you would like to see the entire page and my process please follow the link to the blog.

Happy Creating

Wild at Heart from Cocoa Vanilla Studio

Today up on the Shop and Crop Scrapbooking blog I have a trio of cards that I created using the Wild at Heart Collect from Cocoa Vanilla  Studio.

If you would like to see more then please visit Shop and Crop Scrapbooking and a photographic tutorial which explains how I created this background.

Happy Creating

Live In The Moment

Today over on the Shop and Crop Scrapbooking Blog you will find a layout and an art journal page.  I am not sure that I love either of them but I know I have fun creating them.

 

The two of them couldn't be more different if you would like to see a the complete pages please follow the link to Shop and Crop Scrapbooking.

The products below can be all found in the Shop. If you would like to purchase any of them please use the code DO5 for a discount

My Mind's Eye - Hooray,

TCW - Light & Fluffy Modeling Paste

Chartreuse Iridescent Creative Medium,

Colour Blast Shimmer Pot Water Colours - Snow White and Royalty,

Lindy's Stamp Gang Magicals Freaky Franken-Lime and Witch's Potion Purple,

Dusty Attic Stencil - Circuit,

Tim Holtz Collection Layering Stencil - Stripes

Archival Ink - Jet Black

Happy Creating

Follow Your Dreams

Currently I have 5 bound art journals being used and 2 just patiently waiting for me to break them out, but I really love using mixed media paper or heavy watercolour paper that I have cut up myself.  Having all these different size journals and paper lets me just follow my journey where ever it leads.

The art journal page I am sharing with you today has a little story behind it which I hope you don't mind me sharing with you. It started out as a page painted with black gesso, then letter stickers stuck down. Once this was all dry I added colour with my Twinkling H2Os, which were pretty in colour but the design was ugly. I put it aside for another day. That day final came and then after many, many, many layers of thick gesso, texture paste, I was able to cover the old page up. My piece of mixed media paper that is 21.5 cm x 21.5 cm now weighs 64g. The same size and kind of paper with nothing on it only weighs 13g, that's a lot of product to cover something up.

Much happier with the new page

products used: mixed media paper, art basics heavy gesso - white, lindy's stamp gang sprays starburst - tiffanylou blue, blue hawaiian blue, lindy's stamp gang sprays flat fabio - tilt-a-wheel teal, tim holtz collection layering stencil - stripes, uni pin fine line - black 0.1, kaisercraft rubons - dreams, indigoblu stamp - limor circles, dina wakley media stamp - textures

Happy Creating

Stay Curious

For the second day running it is raining here, yesterday I got soaking wet doing the grocery shopping this morning I am sitting in my craft room listen to the rain and the washing machine. Today I thought I would share with you some mini canvas panels that I have been working on.

All three I started on retreat, one I actually finished there, the second one I finished last week while I was completely something else and the third one is still not finished but thought I would share it with you any way.

The panels (pack of 5) were purchased a couple of years ago and they have sitting there waiting for the right time. I took them away with me on retreat because they are little (10.2 x 10.2 cm) and were easy to drop in with all the other stuff I took away with me.

This panel is from a combination of a couple of the classes I took on retreat The Way Things Fall (which I haven't shared with you yet) and Fear Nothing.

products used: canvas panel, book pages, artbasics heavy gesso - white, dylusions paint - melted chocolate, kaisercraft stamp, tim holtz idea-ology - small talk.

This panel was one that I was just playing with, no plan what so ever, then again nothing of mine is ever planned.

products used: canvas panel, lindy's stamp gang spray flat Fabio - pop rock purple, orange creamsicle and ruby red slipper, artbasics heavy gesso - white, book pages, the crafters workshop stencil - 12x12 butterfly collage, donna downey signature stencils - mini number repeat, texture paste, tim holtz idea-ology - small talk, archival ink - jet black, cardstock - black, stampin up' dies - butterflies thinlits, dina wakley media heavy body acrylic paint - tangerine, dylusions paint - black marble.

 The third and final panel that I have been working on is incomplete, not sure where this one is going. Love the background, it reminds me of moss.

products used: canvas panel, book pages, artbasics heavy gesso - white, lindy's stamp gang spray flat Fabio - merry-go-round green, lindy's stamp gang spray starburst - black orchid silver & sea grass green, the crafter workshop stencil - mini tiny circles, artbasics texture paste - white crackle.

Happy Creating

Breaking A Blank Page - Chipboard

Chipboard adds instant dimension and texture to a project, it provides lots of possibilities. On one of the breaking a blank page art journal pages I used chipboard.

I used matte gel to adhere my chipboard to my paper, this gave it added strength as some glues wouldn't hold. Once dry I covered the chipboard and paper in gesso, for some reason I don't like brush marks so with my brush I pounced up and down on my page which gave it added texture.

When adding water or wet medium to dry paper I always have the problem of my paper curling so a couple of times now I have beat the system and stuck my paper to my desk with blu tack. It doesn't completely stop the curling but it certainly minimises the effect.

I love the randomness of the magicals, you just never know what result you are going to get, especially when you combine more than one.

I really had fun playing and finishing off this page, cannot wait to start adding colour and embellishments to my other break a blank page journal pages.

products used: kaisercraft stamp - script, sa crafters chipboard, prima art basics heavy gesso - white, watercolour paper, archival ink - jet black, lindy's stamp gang magicals - merci beaucoup mint, c'est la vie cerise, freaky franken-lime, merry-go-round green and hag;s wart orange, posca paint pen - white, faber-castell big brush - orange glaze, stampin' up stamp grateful bunch, tim holtz idea-ology - small talk, liquitex matte gel

Happy Creating

Winter Blues

Today is the start of another month, just where has the time gone?????? This also means that a new challenge is up on the blog at Show Us Your Stuff. This month it is all about colour, remember to make sure that you add a hand made embellishment to your creation.

 

For this challenge I made three totally different cards.



The hand made items I used for this card are the snow covered hills & the fussy cut image which I then coloured.

products used: stampin' up ink - dapper denim, marina mist, soft sky, soft suede & garden green, archival ink - jet black & cornflower blue, stampin' up stamps - peaceful pines & festival of trees, faber-castell big brush pen - permanent green olive, gelly roll pen - white, ranger embossing powder - silver, versamark, stampin; up cardstock - whisper white, mixed media paper, aleens glitter snow, prima art basics heavy gesso - white.

The handmade items are the resin butterfly from The Resin Rainbow, which was white but I altered with alcohol ink and the wooden veneer from flutterbydesigns - circle confetti.

products used: lindy's stamp gang spray - tiffanylou blue, Caribbean blue, blue Hawaiian blue & tilt-a-wheel teal, faber-castell big brush pen - cobalt blue, sharpie - white, Adirondack alcohol ink - sail boat blue, archival ink - cornflower blue, white thread, mixed media paper, stampin' up stamp - helping me grow, stampin' up metallic foil doilies, vivalasvegastamp - plate 1471, the resin rainbow butterfly - white, flutterbydesigns - confetti circles, stampin' up cardstock - whisper white, izink - volubilis.

 

The handmade items used here is the chevie border from burdys embellies and the wood veneer from flutterbydesign - abstract 2 which I altered with silver emossing powder.

products used: archival ink - forget-me-not blue & jet black, versamark, burdys embellies - chevie borders, stampin' up ink - dapper denim, ranger embossing powder - silver, stampin' up punch - circle 1", stampin' up cardstock - whisper white, white cotton, flutterbydesigns wood veneer - abstract 2, kaisercraft stamp - script, stampin' up stamp - honeycomb hello (retired)

Hope that you are able to join us this month

Happy Creating

How Do I Begin

Today I want to share an art journal page that I created. This page came about because of a post that I put up in one of the facebook groups that belong too. The title of this post was suggested by one of the ladies in the group for our journal page to get us creating. So from the words How Do I Begin I went on to have fun.

This journal page started a little differently to how I normal start. Sometimes writing down how you feel helps you move past the thing that is blocking you. I wrote down my feelings on my water colour paper and because I did not necessarily need it on my page I covered it with gesso and then some paint.

I had so much fun creating this page, my hands were stained for a couple of days afterwards.

Products used: derivan matisse structure paint - titanium white and cobalt turquoise, stencil hero arts - tweed pattern, lindy's stamp gang magicals haunted halloween - tainted love teal and freaky franken lime, faber-castell pitt artist pen - indanthrene blue, archival ink - cornflower blue and watering can, whipped spackle, embossing powder - stampin' up black, ranger silver and adriondack stream, stamp vivalasvegastamp - plate 1471, die cut, strips of scrap paper, sequins, versamark and gauze.

Happy Creating

Cheeky

This month at Show Us Your Stuff the challenge is a sketch. I wanted to do create a card or a journal page because I just don't do layouts, but in the end I gave in and created one.

I kept putting off creating it as I just had no idea what I was going to do. Then I had no choice but to leave it till the end of the month as we had a huge rain fall that according to the news it was a 1 in 100 year storm and the rain came in the window of my creative space. I then had to empty a lot of my stuff out first to dry the carpet, which lucky didn't take long and then while it was all out I decided that I really needed to go through it all. Stuff has be either thrown out, give to my children's school for art or kept. I still haven't completely finished but i am certainly a lot happier with the way things are organised.

Ooops got a little side tracked there, sorry about that. Getting back to the challenge, I really am very happy with how my layout turned out. My hand made item would be the journal circle which was very simply die cut and the edge inked. I did colour the stars and heat emboss them which changed the chipboard.

The sponsor for this challenge is Rainbow Splendour please pop on over and say hi to Chloe and her design team. The robot and rocket ship can be purchased from there.

I hope that you are inspired by the sketch and enter the challenge.

Products used: die cut circles, orange thread, chipboard stars, whipped spackle, decoart stencil - short circuit, distress inks - festive berries, mowed lawn and salty ocean, ranger embossing powder, lindy's stamp gang magical - freaky franken-lime, faber-castell - fine pitt pen black and big brush deep scarlet red.

Happy Creating

Letting Go or Control

People art journal for many different reasons, whether it be to release their emotions, trying a new technique or to do something creative. Sometimes I sit down in my chair and wonder what I am going to create but lately my creativity seems to just flow. I believe the reason behind this would be the art journal prompts that members from the Wanderlust class are receiving. They seemed to have opened up a dam inside of me.

The prompt this fortnight is "Sometimes what you're most afraid of doing is the very thing that will set you free". It didn't take me long to know what I am most afraid of and if I do it, it will set me free. Letting go of Control is a big issue for me. Whether it be in what I am creating, a situation I am in or just life in general. So hopefully by creating this page it will give me a big kick up the butt in times that I haven't let that control go but I need to.

Not only were we to be inspired by the quote but also a video from Kasia about composition building. Yes there are rules in composition building and they are very helpful but we were also encouraged to break them, not all of them but some of them. I love breaking rules.

Well if you have got this far reading I thank you and I hope that I can inspire you with my journal page. Its not very often that once I start creating I know what I am going to do but this time I did and it turned out even better than what I had imagined in my head.

I love how when using Lindy's Stamp Gang Magicals 

that you don't need to use a lot to get such a big impact

Products Used: lindy's stamp gang magicals - orange creamsicle, gesso, mixed media paper, bakers twine, tags, chipboard, black cotton thread, x-press it tripletac glue

Happy Creating

1 stamp, 2 Cards

Today I am up on the blog for Off The Rails Scrapbooking I have created a tutorial using 1 stamp from Stampin' Up called Swallowtail and creating 2 cards. The colours that I used were from the current challenge on the blog.

Below is our mood palette and I would love to see how you would use it.

All the Products I used are from Stampin' Up

Stamp - Swallowtail

Stamp - Butterfly Basics

Stamp Birthday Blossoms

Ink - Basic Black

Ink - Daffodil Delight

Ink - Soft Suede

Ink - Pool Party

Ink - Cucumber Crush

Cardstock - Whisper White

Cardstock - Basic Black

Re Inker - Cucumber Crush

Re Inker - Daffodil Delight

VersaMark

Clear Embossing Powder

Card Number 1

Card Number 2

 

If you would like to see how I created the above 2 cards then please pop on over to Off The Rails Scrapbooking.

Happy creating

Where Flowers Bloom

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to a friends place for a creative play. I had no idea what to take so I did ask for some advice from a group on fb and the suggestions were fantastic but I still was confused. In the end I took pre gessoed timber boards, most of my stencils (and I have quite a few), gesso, a few stamps, heat gun, printed tissue paper, embossing powder and my gel medium.

I really had no plans of what I was going to create. In the end started creating a back ground and an idea started forming in my head.

This was the background I created at my friend's place and below is the finished piece.

Happy Creating

Lessology Challenge - Typeface

The theme over at Lessology Challenge Blog is Typeface. Its all about using different fonts. An additional requirement they have for each challenge is that you have to upcycle something.

Finding different fonts wasn't the hard part as I have a huge amount of different stamps (alphabets, words), many letter stickers, lots of chipboard letters and stencils. The hardest part was deciding what I was going to use.

In the end I used 2 different Prima stamps - Rust and Dust & Don't Forget to Fly. Both of these fonts are a little hard to see as I did use them in the background. I used a Letter Jumble stencil by Dyan Reaveley, which form the main background. My quote I had in my scrap draw, it was to be used in a class that I did a little while ago but I didn't use it. The font is from a typewriter and the final typeface I use was my own hand writing. I don't really like my own hand writing but it seem appropriate to use it in this challenge.

Before i started this challenge I had decided that I was going to create a male card. Typeface just lent itself that way. Guess what that didn't happen in fact it didn't come even close to a male card.

To create the main background I used mixed media paper as I knew that it was going to have a lot of liquid to stand up to. I then used my stencil and texture paste to create a very textural background.

The stencil wasn't big enough to cover the surface of the paper, so I laid it 4 different times in different spots and different directions. I just love using stencils, they would have to be one of my favourite things to play with. You can get so many different results.

To add colour to my card I used Magicals by Lindy's Stamp Gang. When using them in this project I added the powder to water and painted it over the background with a brush. Once the background was dried and spread a layer of Texture Paste - Clear Crackle from Prima. I waited over night for it to dry as the instructions on the back suggested that but I had also watched different videos which said this was the way to do it to get that wonderful cracking.

 

Let me show you my card and then I will tell you about my upcycled item.

I have two upcycled items on my card, only because while I was looking for one I found the other. My first one is the sewing thread that is wrapped around my card. It was used to make a parcel I received in the mail pretty and the second item is the round circle that my flowers are on.

It is actually half a toy yoyo that we used to put in my daughter's birthday favour bags. My daughter had one and so did my son and both of them broke. I have no idea why I kept them, but I knew they would come in useful one day.

Looks a little different on the card as I coated it in gesso then used a spray to give it some colour.

Happy Creating

The Challenge was Set

Just recently I completed an online course with Michelle from Michelle Grant desiGns. It was all about finding my style and developing my skills as a scrapbooker and oh boy do my skills need a lot of developing. After completely the course, Michelle set us a challenge. Now this challenge was different from other challenges that you see, it was all about discovering how we had enhanced our skills with the knowledge that Michelle shared with us. Yes there were some guidelines like colour, background etc but the main theme was just to have fun. I am not sure about the fun part yet, but i did take on the challenge and completed it.

Products I used
Prima Finnabair - Don't Forget to Fly cling Stamp
Lindy's Stamp Gang - Magicals
Lindy's Stamp Gang - Sprays
Gesso
Texture Paste
Ranger Super Fine Gold Embossing Powder
Dylusions by Dyan Reaveley - Alphabet Border Large Stencil

Happy Creating

Lindy's Stamp Gang Magicals

I have a some new toys. Last week I brought some Lindy's Stamp Gang Magicals. They are a mica powder, so all you need to do is just add water and watch the magic happen.

If you would like to see how I created this background and what I ended up doing with it the please pop on over to Off The Rails Scrapbooking.

Happy Creating