Another online class

I also took the Building a Mystery class online at Altered Diva, which is a collage building on each piece.

I chose to follow along with the one Karen was doing, but will be trying some different pictures in the future when doing a collage canvas. The background was supposed to be done by spraying watercolours, but I did not have any so used some watered down dye inks in a spray bottle. For the middle one, I wanted more vibrant colours so I added some pigment ink directly to the canvas after it dried.

These are some of the ones I did for this class. The second one went to my friend Pea for the monthly "It-Girl" Swap and the last one is on the way to the UK to another friend as a surprise for her.

Online class

I decided to take another couple of classes with Karyn Gartel at the Altered Diva online site. One of them was "Heart and Soul", which entails learning how to draw and paint faces. I made a couple of attempts which I was NOT happy with and was almost ready to give up. However, that is not in my nature and I persevered.

I decided to add some stamping "words" to the background, and also used stamps on her dress and hair.


I am still not entirely happy with the piece, but since it is my first attempt, it is not bad. I really need to work on the eyes and nose, but I am sure that will improve with more practice. So feel free to leave a comment.. good or bad!!

12 Days of Christmas

We did another Twelve Days of Christmas swap again this year on CC Swaps, and were only allowed to sign up twice. I had been thinking about this for a while and had some silk scarves that a vendor very generously sent me when I commented on her instructions that she posted. I ordered some more from her and set to work on decorating them.

I coloured the white ones with dye inks and some with pigment sprays. Stamped with pigment inks and then heat set them, rinsed them and heat set them again. The black ones were stamped with Lumiere paint and heat set.

For the second set of gifts I bought some trinket boxes and altered them. I painted the tops then added acrylic gold mica flakes to some, tiny beads, buttons, air dried clay pieces (received from Adrienne last year) and various other things from my stash.

Some Christmas Cards for this year

Each year I make Christmas cards for family, close friends and a few other people whom I know appreciate them.

The first card is a simple one using a Hearts in Touch image. I did direct-to-paper with pigment inks and a Colorbox stylus. I stamped the image and coloured it with Lyra coloured pencils.

On the next two, the background is done with a technique where you "build your own Rollergraph" using clear acrylic stamps, a rollergraph and Fluid Chalk inks. The quote on the first one is stamped on vellum and embossed with glitter embossing powder. On the second card the frame is a piece of acrylic die cut then embossed with the Cutllebug and coloured with metallic paint.

On the next card the main images are stickers, which were attached then covered with clear embossing to protect them. After that the background was stamped with white pigment ink and embossed with white embossing powder, coloured with Fluid Chalk inks, sprayed with Alcohol sprays then ironed off to obtain the resist background.

The saying was stamped and embossed with pearl embossing powder. The main image of the deer was protected with a post-it note mask, and then the entire card was embossed with glitter embossing powder.

These last two cards are variations done in different colours. The background 0n the red one is the shaving cream technique. The Believe stamp was stamped directly on the stamped image with Stazon black.

The background on the green one is a technique called "stamp-smooshie" where you use your stamp as an applicator, and it was done with Fluid Chalk inks. I stamped the Believe stamp on acetate then covered it with clear micro beads on

I lightly coloured the little girl image on both with distress inks.

More Post-it Note pads

Dh and I are hosting a pre-Christmas supper this weekend, so I decided to make some Post-it note gifts for the ladies.

For the first two I used acrylic and stamped images on them with Stazon ink and then coloured the edges with permanent markers. My Freind Lea loves Hummingbirds and fortunately I had a stamp for hers, my other friend Sonny loves Roses, hence the rose on the second one.

I coloured the back of the vinyl with alcohol inks. The back pages were done with a technique called stamp-smooshie which I learned at a rubber stamping class.

The other two for my DH's siste and roomate were done on the Cuttlebug. The first one is vinyl, which I double embossed. The firs time was the top and bottom edges only, then I embossed the whole piece again with a different embossing folder. I ran some paint around the edges, then rubbed the Goldfinger antique gold over it.

The second one is simply embossed with the Cuttlebug, using Fibremark paper and adhered to chipboard.

Cuttlebug play

I have a Cuttlebug swap in CC swaps and made a notebook/post-it note holder.
I started by putting some of the plumbers silver tape over a piece of cardstock, then ran it through the Cuttlebug. I then attached it to 130Lb paper (doubled), and cut it down to size.


Then I coloured it with metallic paint and ran some Goldfinger antique gold (similar to rub-n-buff) over it, which resulted in kind of a verdigris look.



I wanted to make a little pocket to store items, so I cut down a page protector to fit. I found that if I put some scrap paper over each side I was able to make the holes with the cuttlebug, otherwise it was a problem and they did not cut properly.


I printed off an image I found in an advert onto a transparency and punched the holes and placed this at the end to cover the post-it notes and remain transparent. The final touch was to stamp the back with a saying.

SSSHHHHH! It's a Secret!!

On one of my groups we are doing a secret swap ( similar to the Secret Santa). We are to make a gift and also send a gift which costs a maximum of $10; handmade or store bought.


I decided that handmade gift would be a canvas. I started by painting the canvas with acrylic paints, lavendar, yellow and green. I added a couple of pieces ripped from an old dictionary. I then went over it with an iridescent violet using my PearlEXpress mica watercolours.

I stamped and embossed some flourishes (Hero Arts) around the edges. I then added some opals embossing powders around the the canvas to give it some texture.

I stamped the image (Stamps Happen "Harmony Angel) on tissue paper and colored with coloured pencils, then very carefully attached it to the canvas. I wanted to try something a wee bit different for the angel, so I painted her with my glass paints. after the paint dried I added the stars on and around the angel with gold stickles.

I also decided to make a necklace using the Faux Carnival Glass technique by Zeb Loray in addition to a store bought gift. (http://www.amstamps.com/fauxcarnival/index.html).