Mini Memory for Chris

The final recipient for the Mini Memory swap on DCI is Chris. Her theme was Wings, and colours were shades of purple & silver/gold.

I had bought some items at the art supply store, one being a box type item that I thought would work perfectly.

I started by creating a background paper piece with Brilliance inks in shades of purple, gold and silver with a swirly stamp, cut it to size and glued it inside the box. I painted the box edge with gold acrylic paint and added some corner pieces which have butterflies on them that I coloured with Alcohol ink.

I printed off an image of a little baby girl with some books, and made it 3-d to stand out, and added some glossy accents to the book pieces. On the first attempt I had coloured a peice of a clear ruler, a domino and a little flower piece and attached them to the bottom. Added the word Wings at the top and then placed a butterfly behind the little girl. This was what it originally looked like.

Well, I was not completely happy with it so added some golden acrylic gold mica flakes around the edges and being impatient used my heat gun to dry it. Bad mistake!! I melted the ruler in the process, and as a result had to come up with something else.

I removed all the embellishments at the bottom. I stamped some flowers in Pearlescent Lavendar Brilliance several times and made some small roses, touched them up with some silver and some glitter and placed them on the bottom underneath the little girl. I also added more glitter to the butterfly wings. The mistake turned out to be a good thing as I am much happier with the final outcome.

Mini Memory for Vickie

Vickie is the person chosen for May's Mini Memory on DCI. Her theme is Wings and colours are Purple and Lime Green.

I started with a back cover of an old book and removed the paper from it. I painted it with gesso then added dimension with a stencil and molding paste. I painted over it with green and purple acrylic paints and added iridescent violet over the purple section.

I found the little arch thing at the dollar store and since it was silver, I coloured it with Pinata` ink in a purple colour.  I did the same thing with the scabble pieces to spell out FLY.

I took some purple prima flowers and added brads with green dots on them to the centres, twirled some wire to simulate vines and glued them to the board. I had some left over paper which was a piece of a magazine column that I had stamped on with Versamark, gessoed, dried,  then coloured using a Colorbox stylus and purple stamp pad. I put this behind  the little arch piece then glued it to the board.

The little bird is from Magenta and it is painted with purple acrylic, crackle medium and lime acrylic paint. The final touch was a little gem for the eye.

A surprise for Autumn

Autumn had signed up for the Mini Memory swap on DCI, but dropped out as her life was a bit hectic. I had gone gung-ho on this swap and had all mine made early on. Since I had made one for Autumn prior to her dropping out I decided to send it to her as a surprise.

She had chosen women's faces and blues/greens and patinas for her theme and colours.

I started by painting a coaster with various blues and greens and copper. I added some embossing powders and stamped into it while hot with a flourish stamp. I took a chipboard flourish and embossed it with  copper and green glitter embossing powder and added some gems.

I stamped the "Woman with a Pearl Earring" from Chapel Road  (one of my favourite stamps) and coloured it with Lyra pencils; attached it with double-sided foam tape.

I took a label holder die-cut and embossed it with distress embossing powder, rubbed some off and added various Patina Perfect Pearls over the top. Stamped a portion of a background stamp on a piece of cardstock coloured with fluid chalk inks and placed it underneath the label holder and attached it to the coaster.

I hope Autumn will enjoy my little piece of art and it will be a nice surprise.

Mini Memory for Mel

April's Mini Memory recipient is Mel on the DCI group. Her choice was any theme with aqua and blue as her colour choice.

I started with a coaster from our Don Cherry's pub, covered it with gesso then rubbed aqua and blue inks over it after embossing it with a Cuttlebug embossing folder.

I coloured a little frame with some blue metallic acrylic paint and attached it to the centre. I added a game piece that my friend Muzzy had sent me on a card a few years ago (used with her permission). I took an old pair of earrings and removed the backs and placed the roses with the game piece inside the frame.

I had some Maple Leaf brads (to continue with the shape of the coaster) and embossed them with some navy blue embossing powder, removed the backs and glued them around the frame. Still needed "something" so put some blue stickles around the edge.

Mini Memory for Rhonda

Rhonda is the Mini Memory recipient for the month of March in my DCI group. Her choice was Children/childhood and her colour choice was cream/gold/white.

I started with a coaster from Outback Restuarant and covered it with gesso. I then added some Golden Gold Mica Flake, then when it dried painted over it with cream coloured acrylic paint.

I printed off the image of the little girl from Elizabeth's blog and cut around it. I placed this on top of some scrapbook paper. I took a frame that I bought at the dollar store and coloured it with a gold Krylon leafing pen, added a piece of acetate and placed it over the picture.

I spelled out Dream with some scrapbook letters, added some brads, german scraps and for the final touch glued on an old brooch  from which I removed the back.

Mini Memory for Jackie

Jackie is the February recipient for the Mini Memory swap in the DCI group and she chose vintage with earthy tones and gold as her theme.

I took a canvas and gessoed it then added scrunched up foil, cheesecloth and added some embossing paste with a stencil. I painted over the whole piece with various colours of acrylic paints to attain the vintage look.

I printed off  a vintage picture of a woman from digitalcollagesheets.com and glued it to the canvas. In my stash I found an old picture frame, which I touched up with paint. I cut out a piece of acetate and covered the picture, then attached the frame.

Added some vintage buttons that my friend Annie sent me awhile ago, a piece of paper tape and some book corners to finish the piece off.

Mini Memory for Tracey

Tracey is the recipient of the DCI mini-memory for December and her colour choice was cream, gold and brown; no larger than 5" and any shape. Like some of the previous ones it went through some transformations.


I initially started out by making a clay rose and placing it on a coaster that was painted brown, embossed and stamped into with gold pigment ink while hot. I added some hearts and the clay flower. Attached this to a piece of cream paper with stamping and the heads of push pins around it. Not entirely happy with that and was concerned about it making it's way to Australia in one piece.


So I went back to the "drawing board" and started all over again. I kept the coaster and added some gold seed beads to it for more dimension. I then stamped and embossed a butterfly on 130 LB cardstock with gold embossing powder and coloured the open areas with a brown marker; added Crystal Lacquer to the coloured parts. I have a bunch of chipboard frames in my stash, so I took one of the white ones and painted it with cream acrylic paint and stamped a script stamp over it with Memories Artprint brown ink and attached it to the CD.

I printed a freebie image of a little girl from Elizabeth's blog and attached it to some cardstock to make it sturdier, then put it inside the frame. I attached the butterfly with some double-sided thick foam tape at the bottom, then glued one of the hearts over it with a bail underneath. I cut another bail in half and attached it to either side of the picture frame.

Mini Memory for Carol S

Carol S chose a floral/nature theme for her mini memory and the colour choice was left up to the artist.

Now there are two things I know for sure about Carol; she loves her Cuttlebug and butterflies as she uses them a lot in her art. So that narrowed down my choice of items to use for her mini memory.

Carol did not want anything larger than 5X5 square or rectangle. I have some Magenta chipboard frames that were the perfect size. I took some handmade background paper and ran it through the Cuttlebug, then attached it to the frame. I then touched up the raised pieces with some green rub n buff.

I took a chipboard swirl and embossed it with some purple and green embossing powders then stamped into it while it was hot, and attached it in the corner. I added some polymer leaves that I punched out of green card stock and added some veins with my stylus. On top of this I glued a flower that I had from one of nieces' wedding.

I took some chipboard letters and embossed them with purple embossing powder and glued them to the frame to spell "nature". I then stamped and embossed some butterflies on vellum, and added them to the frame in a 3-d effect to make them look like they are flying.



After making this piece I discovered that the butterflies would not stay in place, likely because it is so dry here. So I revised it. I added a shrink plastic butterfly which I had saved from a card I received a couple of years ago made by Trish L. (hope she does not mind that I recycled it). I also added a few beads at the bottom.

Mini Memory for Carol

I am on a roll with these Mini Memories and am thoroughly enjoying the creative process so much.

Carol A. chose the theme of birds/birdhouses and the colours mint green, white and pale mauve (with a condition that we could use pale pink in lieu of the mauve).

I started by painting gesso on a 3x3 chipboard square. I then added mint green pigment ink and embossed with mint pearl embossing powder. I stamped a background stamp into while hot using Old Rose pigment ink.

I recently picked up some small wooden house pieces at my little dollar store and thought they would be perfect for a bird house. My hubby drilled a hole for the entry and the perch. I painted the house with gesso, then white paint, then pink paint on the roof. I added some sequins for the tiles which Annie sent me a while back. To finish off the roof I added a piece of white german scrap paper which my friend Mel sent me.

I added a piece of the stick from a Q-tip as the perch. I took a washer and coloured it with pearlescent turquoise Lumiere` paint and put this over the entry. I stamped a leafy type Magenta stamp on the body but felt it needed more dimension so I took some Glossy Accents and added some green seed beads (which looked more mint green in the bottle). Felt it needed a bit more so when the green beads dried a bit I added some pink seed beads to give it a bit of a floral effect.

The little bird is the one that was originally on Trizzy's Mini Memory and I attached it to the roof to make it look like it was coming in to the bird house. The final touch was to add the word home with some little alphabet beads.

I hope Carol does not mind my taking artistic license with the colour combo, as I tried to stay as close as possible to her colour choice with the supplies I had on hand.

Mini Memory for Heather`

I decided to get a start on September's Mini Memory, which is for Heather. Her theme is birds and butterflies and the colours are white and violet.

The theme was not a problem, however, the violet was as I think of blues (i.e. the flower). However, as a colour it can be a mixture of red and blues, so as usual I just did my own thing and hope that Heather will not be disappointed with the colour.

I started by painting a chipboard coaster with Gesso, then painted it with African Violet acrylic paint, toned down with some white acrylic. I then stamped the flourish stamp in frost white pigment ink and winter white embossing powder. After that I painted it with Mica watercolours in iridescent violet.

I have some Magenta chipboard pieces and I painted a bird with the two colours and crackle medium.

I also had some mini canvases so thought I would use it for the centre. Painted it with gesso, then added molding paste and smooshed it around with a rubber stamp. I added some Pearlex pearl white to it when dry, then dabbed some of the African Violet paint mixture over that with my fingers.

I attached the canvas to the coaster, then the bird. I rummaged through my stash of beads and bellies and found three feather beads and added them to the bottom of the canvas. In the picture the background flourishes look different but in "real life" they are white.

Mini Memories

I belong to a small group DCI comprised mostly of Australians, but there are few of us from North America. The current swap is to make Mini items that can all be placed into a larger frame. Each participant has chosen a theme and a colour scheme. Some have stipulated a certain size and others have just left it up to the artist.

For the month of August Trizzy is the chosen recipient to receive a creation from 10 other people. Her theme is "Wings" and the colours blue and/or green with silver, with no specific size.

I recently bought a couple of stretched canvases at the dollar store and decided to use one for this project, but using the back instead of the front.

I covered the whole piece in gesso, then painted the inside with 3 different tones of blue acrylic paint. Still thought it needed "something" so went over it with blue H2O's - still not happy. So I took some silver fabric glue paint and slapped over the top portion and ran an old comb through it and rather like the effect as it looks like rain or a waterfall.

With my Cuttlebug I embossed some plumbers tape using the bird embossing folder (keeping the wings theme) and cut it to fit around the outside of the frame. I coloured the embossed parts with Adirondack pens then sprayed it with a setting agent.

I painted the inside edge in green but it did not seem finished so I tried several different things...stamping, lace, beads and even some green cording, however, none of them appealed to me. Into my stash!! I found some sea glass but it was too bulky; then I discovered some little plastic mosaic pieces and there were enough blue and green ones to fit around the edge. I adhered these with some of the wonderful Sookwang tape (Picture and giveaway on this blog) then used silver seed beads as the grout.

I stamped and coloured a cattails stamp by Hero Arts with Prismacolor pencils and and H2O's, and cut it out. I did not like it with the brown cattail head so cut them off and attached the rest of the image to the inside background. I had some little icicle embellishments in my stash and added them as more fauna. I added a jewell to a round paper clip and attached it to simulate the sun.

I have had the dragonfly ornament thing for years and this was the perfect opportunity to use it. I added some bead chain to the body and some beads on the tail, then attached a butterfly charm. I glued this to the frame with some super glue. However it would not stick. So I revised the piece. This was the original.

I took off the bird and replaced it with the butterfly. I cut off a piece of the dragonfly's tail and screwed it to the frame, then added a green jewell to hide the screw head. Much happier with it now and will mailing to Trizzy this week!!