Crow ATC

 The theme is Crows for the 9ATC Group.
Applied yellow Distress Ink to card stock with DTP (Direct-to-Paper) technique. Heat set. Then put on a circle mask and applied orange Distress Ink over the surface and let dry. I didn't worry that the masked area was irregular.

 Placed a tree stencil over the ATC and sponged on rusty hinge Distress Ink and let it dry.

Used black Distress Ink to stamp on feather image. Tore off a piece of a music sheet and adhered tot he ATC. Stamped a crow and crown with black Distress Ink on white card stock, cut them out and adhered to the ATC. Used red glitter pen to color the crow's eye.

Asian themed card

The theme for stamp club is Asian. I choose the Haiku bunny stamp and stamped it with black ink. Placed a mask of the rabbit over the stamped rabbit and sponged red Distress Ink over the exposed card stock.

 Highlighted some of the stamped image with a Gold Gelly Roll pen. cut out the image and layered it on gold metallic card stock over a strip of Origami paper on black card stock and layered all onto a gold card. Used the gold Gelly Roll pen over a stencil on the lower right of the card.

Eight Altered Playing Card

We are doing an Altered Playing Card (APC) Swap on ArtVentures Group. The theme is Numbers, for October it is the Number Eight.

First, coated the playing card with Gesso and let it dry. Then covered the surface with Vintage Photo Distress Stain and let dry.

Placed a heart shape piece of paper over the APC and stamped a musical score image over the APC with black India Ink.

 Placed a heart shape mask over the APC and sponged Old Brass Lumiere Paint into the heart shape opening.
















While the paint was wet, pressed in a flourish stamp and removed some of the paint. Let it dry.

Punched out 8 black musical notes and added over the heart shape. Added the phrase "My heart beats in eight counts" and the word eight.

Christmas ATC Inspired by Tim's 2007 Day 6 Tag

 Disclaimer: I tried to do the same technique with different designs from Tim Holtz's 2007 Day 6 Tag, but my efforts look very different. Make cure you check out his tag, as I love the look of it!
I have problems with the masks. They work great the first time, and then, I don't know, either I don't know how to clean or my work space is to dusty or something. I can not get the masks to stick as well after that first use. Anyway, following directions, placed a mask on my card and sprayed over it with a home made mist (I used one I'd already done up with light brown re-inker and gold Perfect Pearls. Let air dry, then remove mask.

Colored card with aged mahogany and fired brick Distress Inks using a blending tool.

 Flicked on water drops with my fingers (again, I'm a bit heavy handed). Leave water on for about 10 seconds, blot off with paper towel, then heat with heat tool.

 The heat causes the bleached look. Distress the edges with a distress tool and colored with black soot Distress Ink.

 Stamped an angel image with black soot Distress Ink.

 Sprayed home made mist over grunge paper flourishes and adhered to card. Stamped the word "joy" with black soot Distress Ink.

It's much different than Tim's, but I still like it.

Mini Memory for Melissa

On DCI, Melissa picked the colors Blue & Aqua for her Mini Memory, with any theme of the artist's choosing. For the background on the canvas, I used the Alcohol Dissolve on Acrylic technique.
Made a stencil with a flourish die cut and the Tim Holtz Mask Sheet. Used this stencil to add Pearlescent Stencil Paste flourishes to the canvas and let them dry.

To finish the canvas, added wings made with Fantasy film, a vintage image, a quote on vellum and some metal star charms with blue fibers.

Update 3/31: Thanks to a good friend who emailed me and let me know I had a typo before I had the opportunity to mail this Mini Memory. I have re done the quote and fixed the error. The above photo is the corrected version. Thanks Rena!!!

Using Vellum to Mask

Over on Tim Holtz's blog, he showed his new masking sheets to create your own masks, wonderful idea. I couldn't find any masks at my local stores, yet. I wanted to experiment and I thought a thin vellum sheet would give me the "clear" look through the open areas. (Go look at this post on Tim's site to see his fabulous tag and how much fun the masking sheets will be, I have some on order, so I can play with it later.) I stamped an image I wanted to use on thin vellum with StazOn ink, placed removable adhesive on the back and cut out the image (I did not cut out the small flowers at the end of the image). I realized I picked an image with very little "open" space, but I did want to keep those "open" areas clear. I stamped my image on a piece of Manila folder with black Archival ink.
Placed the mask over the stamped image. Stamped a flourish with metallic pearl white acrylic paint over the paper, let it dry. Added shades of red Distress inks with a cut-n-dry foam piece and let it dry.

Stamped on music score and holy flourishes with black Distress Ink, let it dry. Used a misted paper towel to gently dab off ink off the acrylic flourishes. Not how the mask allowed the flourishes within the reindeer and some at the end remained "clear". I did 4 cards, and by the end of each of the steps the mask was in pieces. Vellum was a good stand in, but does not have the durability of the mask sheet. Used VersaMark ink to stamp on the word "Believe" and embossed with detail gold embossing powder and heat set. Covered the reindeer with Liquid Glass to help it stand out (since it was mostly black) and added red and green glitters to some of the flowers.

Used gold Encore! ink to color the edges. Added a floral accent to the upper left corner and adhered it all to a dark green card.

Birthday Present for a Good Friend

Been dithering about what to get a good friend for her birthday and decided to risk making a mini canvas for her. Started with 4"x4" canvas board. Painted over surface with small amount of red acrylic paint and super sparkle Lumiere paint. When dry, placed a Heidi Swapp floral mask over the surface and thickly applied more Super Sparkle Lumiere paint over the surface.
Used heat tool to heat up the thickly applied Lumiere paint to add texture.

Softened the contrast by painting over all the canvas with pearl white Lumiere paint and coloring the outer edges with pearlescent beige Brilliance ink.

Decided to add a bit more color. Rubbed some red poppy Brilliance ink over the surfaces and then wiped it off the raised areas. Rubbed tattered rose Distress ink over the raised surfaces.

Stamped a saying onto the upper left of the canvas and another saying on the bottom of the vintage image with pearlescent chocolate Brilliance ink. Used this same ink to color a piece of ribbon, then heated the ribbon with heat tool to warp the shape.

Used same brown Brilliance ink pad to stamp on French script to right hand side of canvas and along the edges on the right. Glued on pearl-like beads between bronze metallic letters on the right side. Adhered lacy daisy chain over brown ribbon and adhered a bronze butterfly to the center of the canvas.

Hope this mini canvas brings a small amount of joy to a friend how has added much joy to my life.

Another verse page

Sprayed several pages with an assortment of yellow inks and just a hint of red. Windy day, so I have a fine mist of yellow covering me. On one page, I laid down Tim Holtz Music Score Mask and sponged on dark red Distress ink with a Jumbo Dauber. Repeated over bottom half of page.
Wrote out the verse with a black sharpie and cut out a vintage image I like and adhered to the page.

Mini Memory for Carol

Worked on another mini memory for the DreamCreateInspire Group. Carol choose the theme of bird houses/birds and the colors White, mint green and light mauve (or light pink). Started with a canvas board and colored with mint green Fabrico ink and heat set.
Placed part of a Tim Holtz mask over the surface and thickly sponged on pearl white Lumiere paint. As it dried, heated with heat tool to get some bubbling texture where the paint was thickest along the edges.

Stamped on some swirls with the same mint green Fabrico ink and let dry.

To lighten the green a bit, watered down some pearl acrylic paint and brushed over the surface, let dry.

Very faintly colored the raised edges of the Lumiere painted areas with pink Fabrico ink.

Changed the coloring of some vintage images, printed them out, cut and adhered to the canvas along with some white lace, paper flowers with mini rhinestone in center, some white beads cut in half and a white metal brad to the girls hair.

Mini Memory for Trizzy

The DreamCreateInspire Group is running a Mini Memory swap. Each month we make a mini canvas in the theme and color choices of one of the participants. This month is for Trizzy, she choose "wings" as her theme and the colors blue or green with silver. Painted a 5"x5" stretched canvas with p. blue acrylic and then washed off some of the paint.
Found a vintage angel image on the Internet and recolored it blue. Mixed the p. blue acrylic paint with pearlized white acrylic. Sponged over sequin waste on two of the corners and dabbed some of this color on to the image's wings.

Placed a large Tim Holtz music staff stencil over the canvas and sponged on some p. blue acrylic paint.

Stamped a collage image on the lower border with turquoise Lumiere paint, then over stamped it with black Archival ink. Stamped a larger image in the lower right corner with black Archival ink. Lightly colored the angel's dress with silver Lumiere paint and used this paint to highlight the edges of the image.

Stamped on portions of musical score with a mixture of blue acrylic and silver Lumiere paints (wash acrylic paints off your stamps right away).

Found great butterfly charm, but it was a dark silver and black coloring. Changed the color using alcohol ink. Also changed some dark metal letters with silver alcohol ink.

To finish the canvas, sewed on the large wings and adhered a small image to the wings. Attached the silver letters to the bottom of the canvas and the main image to the center of the canvas. "Music Gives Us Wings".

Made sure to carry the background design to the edges of the canvas. Don't know how Trizzy will assemble all her canvases together, so made sure all surfaces are part of the design.

Hope Trizzy likes my interpretation of her theme.
Rosie has suggested that I enter this on the Mixed Media Monday blog site as it fits the current theme of Blues and Greens. I have just discovered this blog and there is lots of wonderful art to enjoy.

Usings Masks

I've signed up for a "Masks or Stencils" swap on ccswaps, I choose to use masks. I had lots of extra purple acrylic paint on my brush, when I was doing last week's project. Knowing that I was going to get to this mask project, I grabbed some of my home made paste paper, placed down a large flourish mask and brushed over the mask and paper with the brush filled with the purple acrylic paint. I let it set for a week, only because I didn't get back to it until today, LOL.
Decided to make a long ATC holder book. Grabbed a large sheet of scrapbook paper that I didn't think I'd use in a scrapbook:

Cut it down to be the outside covers, placed the large flourish mask down and sponged over with gesso. For the second sheet (top), I placed the mask upside down, going for a reverse image. Worked fairly well, considering I had the sticky side up. Because I used a very light application of gesso, they dried quickly.

For the gessoed covers I stamped some french script with silver Encore! ink, and some with black Versafine ink on the paste paper ones. Stamped some diamonds on the gessoed covers with dark red Distress ink and heat set.

I trimmed down the paste paper to be the inside of the covers. On all sheets I decided to make faint, sort of ghostly, butterfly images, by sponging on ink over a small butterfly mask. Used dark purple dye ink on the gessoed covers and some dark purple dye ink and some silver Encore! ink on the paste paper covers.

I made pages for the book with long strips of sport card holders, a strip of 3 holders for each page and added 12 pages. Used the Zutter Bind-it-All to put the book together with red wires.

To finish the front, added a strip of the left over masked paste paper and attached two decorative hearts to it. Stamped the words "The Journey" on a vintage image with silver Encore! ink and layered it between red card stock and a silver imprinted acrylic overlay.

Front inside cover, I added a vintage image with a silver design on acrylic overlay accent and an appropriate acrylic strip overlay.

Back inside cover was done similar to front inside cover, just choose different images/overlays.

Back cover, added another strip of the left over masked paste paper.

This booklet can hold ATCs, small Cuttlebug dies or embossing folders, pictures, embellishments or whatever the recipient chooses. I really like how the gesso sponged over a mask transformed this sheet of scrapbook paper.