July Tag-it

This month Annie is the "It Girl" on Art Venture and the theme is faces.

I remembered that I had some small notebooks that I bought ages ago, so decided I would alter one of them for Annie. I coloured the covers using the acrylic paint technique I learned from my Altered Diva classes. I stamped the swirl stamp with Memories artprint brown.

I found some little mirror pieces in my stash and thought I would use one of them for the main image on the front of the book. I stamped the image on the mirror piece using black Stazon ink, heat set it and attached it with E6000. I added little ribbon thingy and some ribbon to finish the front.

The back image is from some freebies that Trish B was kind enough to share with us and I just changed the colour to sepia.

Embossing Mania

I participated in another swap on CC Swaps where we had to use some form of embossing. I decided to use a technique I learned in a class I took from Cathie Allan at Western Educational Activities. Cathie is a regular contributor to Scrap & Stamp Arts and always is an inspiration to me. She tells you not to get too hung up on making the class project perfect, but to learn the technique in class then go home and play with different mediums and ideas and have fun.

I started with some Monoprinted background paper that I had made using Pinata` Inks and a Krylon Gold leafing pen. I cut the panel to size and stamped a background stamp by Judikins with a clear embossing pad and embossed with clear embossing powder. I edged the panel with gold Krylon leafing pen and layered it on black cardstock

I then took a small piece of the Monoprinted paper, cut a piece of paper towel and laid it over the stamp from Coronado Island. I cut around the area of the stamp image and laid it on top of the small piece of monoprinted paper and dabbed Stazon ink remover on top, smooshed it with my finger and left it for a few minutes. This removes some of the ink from the paper and leaves a faint background.

I stamped the image from Coronado Island on the paper using Colorbox Volcanic Black Pigment ink and embossed it with black embossing powder. I edged the piece with the Gold Krylon leafing pen and layered it on black cardstock and adhered it to the main panel.

I took a stylestone and inked it with Pinata` Ink and let it dry. I stamped the word stamp from PSX with the Volcanic black and embossed it with black embossing powder and edged it with the gold Krylon leafing pen. I adhered it to the panel with E6000.

The piece is now on it's way to Sheryl.

Playing with my cuttlebug

I was intrigued by a technique on Annette's blog (http://goannafive.blogspot.com/ using Cuttlebug embossed pieces and tissue paper, and decided to give it a try.

I had previously done some embossed pieces in various colours of cardstock and so got them out and ripped them into different sizes.

I stamped the image from Coronado Island on the tissue paper with the Graphite Black brilliance ink.

I used 130 LB cardstock, and added some scrapbook paper in the centre. I then glued my cut embossed pieces with gel medium, painted with gesso twice. This was the hardest part for me-waitng for it to dry. I painted the image with Twinkling H2Os and glued it in the centre, and added dictionary pieces and some script paper and tissue paper on the prepared embossed piece.

I watered down some orange and red acrylic paints and painted over the embossed areas. when it was dry, I used some of the rub and buff wax on it. I think I may do a bit more with it and then decide what type of project to use it on.

Angelic Skinny

I signed up for a Tall and Skinny book with the theme of Angelic. I started off by doing the one side with Brilliance blue sky ink; didn't like it so added Big and Juicy over the top. Still was not happy with it so looked through my stash of papers and found some crepe paper with a star motif and decided to use it over the top of the inked piece. This added a bit more texture.

I used an angel image from Dover Art and a punched heart (Dee Gruenig) with stamped wings from Hearts in Touch and a word/saying stamp.

The back evolved too. I originally sprayed it with Adirondack denim and white Memory mists, but it was a bit too dark, so then I painted it with some metallic blue paint. I then stamped the swirly circle with white pigment ink. Still needed something so I stamped a Holly branch with clear ink and embossed with Iridescent Peacock embossing powder. The main image is layers of pigment ink and embossing powder, heated and then the words stamped with gold pigment ink. The angel is another image from Dover Art.

Finished some Art

I took time out tonight to finish off a couple of projects from an online class that I took from Karyn Gartel some time ago.

The first is a canvas using some of her techniques.

The second is from the "Softly Spoken" class.

Shaped ATC's

I belong to a small group that has various swaps and one of them was to make 3 shaped ATC's (Artist Trading Cards). In other words not the normal shape. I have finished them and mailed them off to the hostess.

Since I have been doing so many row houses lately, I decided to do the first one in the "house' shape and added some left over cuttlebug embossed pieces to the top. This was handmade background paper that I rubbed with copper rub and buff after embossing it with the Cuttlebug. The main paper is also handmade using dye inks, then stamped with a Stampscapes stamp. The image is from some da Vinci images courtesy of Trish B.


The middle card is a Magenta stamped image which I cut around and then added the picture with a page pebble; for dimension I used Crystal Lacquer.


The third (which I am not really enamoured with) is also handmade background paper (monoprinting) stamped with a portion of a Magenta & Tin Can Mall stamp . The little Angel Post stamp was made from a piece that I stamped with a Hearts in Touch stamp, coloured with Marshall's photo oil colors and then made into a sheet of postage stamps.

Diamonds Tip-in

The latest tip-in theme on CC Swaps is Diamonds. I found the back page easy to do, but I must have redone the front several times and was not happy with it. I finallly came up with a simple version using scrapbook paper, with no stamping for the front, and am happy with it now.

The back is stamped diamonds (Magenta stamps). and strips of stamped and embossed paper. The background scrapbook paper was stamped with a script stamp.