Ombre blooms....

When I'm designing workshops options/ideas get discarded along the way (because they're not quite suitable for the event etc etc etc)... and this canvas was one of them... I'd painted the backgound (I love an ombre background!) and the flower stem (grunge paste through stencil PS131) and it sat propped against the side of my desk for a while... and then I caught it with my foot one too many times and I picked it up again to work on it....

This is a 50x20cm canvas... which is quite large (!!)... (for me anyway!)

I stamped scribble flowers randomly along the bottom area of the canvas using Pearl Glaze - I like how it catches the light but doesn't crowd the area.

The top edges are filled with dangling leaves and tendrils.  The gold spots are created by running glue dots around the edges and laying foil over the top...

Here are the stamp sets I used:

I think the canvas might need some butterflies or something but for now I've reached the 'put the paint brush down, move away from the canvas' stage of the project.

I'm saying its done... finished.

Thanks for stopping by

A little bit of this'n'that....

... went in to creating this 5x7in canvas board.

I was just playing around and so didn't take any process photos, but after being asked about it on Facebook and Instagram I wanted to list the products I used.

PaperArtsy stencil: 

PS130

PaperArtsy stamps: 

JOFY73

(and a secret something...)

Dies:

Elizabeth Designs:

Kaiser Craft:

Foliage (DD506) :  sadly now discontinued :o(  

Paint colours, Fresco Finish (of course, lol) were.. I think...
Lavender, Cerise, Vanilla, Koala, maybe Bougainvillea, and possibly some Seaglass (gotta love a Seaglass! lol), and a touch of Green Patina/Sargasso

These might not be the exact colours but when you blend them they are going to look FAB.U.LOUS!

Play with the colours - you'll find things you didn't expect and have fun!

Search for these items at your local shops, and online.

Thanks for stopping by!

Craft Stamper Magazine, July...

.. available in all WHSmith shops and independent craft stores now (and online if you'd rather get your creative fix that way!).. and I'm happy to have a project in there this month...

Its a really lovely summery issue - you won't be disappointed!

JoFY Bingo Wk.6

Welcome to Week 6 of Jofy Bingo - lots of great flower elements this week (which seems ironic as this week there aren't any christmas/snowy stamps but its the week we have snow here in the UK!)

I chose to create another spread in my art journal this week... (you can find my short process video at the bottom of this post!)

and LOOK!  I used YELLOW!!!  (and I recently bought a yellow top and a yellow handbag!!!)  I am FINALLY FULLY embracing yellow!! (it might be because I really want spring to arrive and bring warmer weather with it!)

aaanayhoo for this project I wanted to use paperpiecing - the flower head on JOFY35 really lends itself to that technique.
For the paper piecing I stamped the same images several times onto different scrapbook papers (I use 6x6 pads of paper for this as the designs are smaller/daintier..) and set about cutting them out.

I've laid the pieces out in the photos below so you can see how I put them together and get the most amount of flowers out of them.  The green/teal flower has its centre cut out and is reattached on top of the other layers - noone can see the hole that's created and it doesn't affect its structure/stability... the centre of the yellow layer could also be removed (and used elsewhere) as it is covered by the white layer..

Here are the finished pieced flower heads..  they are all the same but different - complementing each other..

I added shading around the layers to add a bit of depth, a touch of white gel pen (everything looks better with a bit of that doesn't it!) and some glitter glue to contrast with the matte grey background.

I made a quick video showing you how I created the spread... enjoy!

Right, I'm off outside to build a snowman....


ha ha ha

who am I kidding - I'm staying indoors where its nice and toasty warm!

Stay safe and warm everyone.

Art journal doodle flowers....

In my recent release of stamps and stencils for PaperArtsy (you can see them HERE and HERE) I designed a big loose flower and matching stencil:

  

I planned to use them on a journal page and one of my 'clean your paintbrush and use up the paint' 'patchwork' pages seemed ideal:

I started by adding the flower stamp.

Then I added stencilled flowers in pale colours - making sure that the stencil IS UP THE RIGHT WAY!!... or the stamped image won't fit over the top! (not going to lie - I found that out the hard way on another project lol)

Here are the stencilled flowers with the line image stamped over the top...

I used a black pen to colour the background - I found this easier/quicker than using paint - this isolates and defines the doodled flowers...

I stamped the flower image onto book text and added pieces of this to the page... I finished the page with some white and gold pen doodles..

Really happy with how the flower stamp and coordinating stencil work together... I think this is going to be used often! 

Thanks for visiting

ALBOTAT...

This spread in my small Dylusion journal started as a place where I was painting areas to clean the paint off my paintbrush and so it looked like this... Prawn, Squid Ink, a yellow (I lost track of which!) and Gold Fresco Finish paints...

I had a stencil from That's Crafty (TC8005) which I was itching to use but the dimensions, when laid straight, didn't suit the page.....hhhmmm tricky... what to do??....  oooh lay it on the diagonal!!

Which I did... all over the double spread using Chalk Fresco....

And to separate them out and make it look more like tiles I painted a black strip between the panels with a smudged pencil lines either side to soften the black and give a bit of dimension (hopefully).

Not bad for 'wiping the paintbrush clean' pages!

Thanks for popping by

ALBOTAT: Sometimes you just 'need' to make something...

.... and today was one of those days... the lovely postman delivered my Eileen Hull Sizzix Travel Journal die and my (small) to-do list was sidelined for a while as I set about making a 'simple' version of the journal - I call it simple because I made it out of basics to create a 'working' version - something that I could refer to when I make more later on.. and I will be making more later... I can feel a version with corrugated cardboard covers coming on... lol

I made this journal out of kraft card and I cut and glued & sewed two layers together to give the covers more strength (and sewed the centre join).  I painted it black (to keep it clean - its a travel journal, & will be in my handbag so may get grubby), stenciled on the letters (a That's Crafty stencil) and sewed on ties - I really like using ribbons to wrap around and keep the journal closed.
There weren't any directions about how big/thick the books should be that fit inside so I made mine 10x21cm (20x21cm folding at 10cm) which made them nice and easy to cut out.  I cut 3 books of 6 pages each - different types of paper giving it a junk journal feel.

Because I cut the pages from larger sheets of paper I ended up with lots of smaller pieces which I used to make little journals...

Can't have too many books ready to be painted & doodled into, can you?

Looking forward to seeing what everyone else is creating with their dies.

x

#365Challenge.... 01-07 March

Hello there!

A new month means a new book for my #365challenge.  This month's book is made up of an abandoned 'journal' I found in a box (while I was looking for something else.... isn't that always the way!), the pages are 16.5x12cm... I really like the book's colour scheme so am happy to use it this month AND it means I'm using up the stash - win win!

I wasn't even put off by the liberal amount of yellow in this collection of papers! Its 'Brook' by Crate Paper, I really like the patterns and the slightly retro designs.  I teamed it with plain pages of dark grey, buff/kraft and white.

This month I'm 'framing' each of my pages to get photo continuity through the month. Marion Emberson, of Sugar&Spice Crafts & WOW! Embossing, used this frame on the WOW! retailer day - such a nice, interesting & inexpensive frame... originally it was white but I painted mine (Slate, Fresco Finish) grey  (we seem to paint a lot of things grey in our house!.... its the new black lol)

01 March:  I wanted to set myself 'goals/aims' on the first day but didn't necessarily want them on show so I stamped (in white ink) a pattern all over a sheet of vellum, cut it to size and attached it with wood print washi tape to the main page... cute way to disguise images and text you don't want seen...

and I also doodled onto the stamped images...  (I used stamps from EKD05, PaperArtsy)

02 March:  I doodled flower heads onto this cute flower print paper, and because I wanted to retain the print I painted a 'fade' over it so the paint (Chalk, Fresco Finish) is more opaque on one side of the page than the other - done by painting over in layers (drying between each layer).  The grass and stems were doodled on when the paint was dry.

03 March:  The word 'focus' always seems to be on my 'list of words to live by this year!' Always and this year is no exception - but this year I am actively doing this... not being swayed/ distracted by the things around me. (big white flower is from EKD05, again! Such a great set of stamps!)

04 March:  This page was created when I was experimenting/playing with the new Distress Oxide paints... that page was as dark as the frame when I started applying the ink - look how opaque they are! Really interesting inks. The background black images are from EKD05 (yes again!... they're on the desk - I can't help reaching for them!)
The 'flowers' are created with a die from a French company called SimplyGraphic.

05 March:  Today's question in the Flow Calendar (yes, I'm still considering those when creating my pages) was 'What can you not throw away?'  Corrugated cardboard!! love it! its so useful and easy to get hold of  - this page was made out of a box that tins of cat food came in.. :o)  Always happy to help with the recycling! lol

The sparkly splats were created using WOW! Mint Macaroon embossing powder - such a pretty colour.

06 March:  I'm getting ready for a demo day at Birds in the Barn, Marks Tey, Essex this coming saturday (11.03.17) and this is one of the samples I made in readiness for that.  Demo'ing paints, stencils and stamps (Kim Dellow's designs).  If you're in the area please come along, its free and runs from 10-3.30.

07 March:  Flow Calendar question of the day: 'What countries would you like to visit?'  For this page I cut up the atlas that formed the cover of February's book.... attacking the stash!  its a book that keeps on giving lol

So that's week 1 of March done... I'll try and post a page a day on Instagram, and a weekly round-up here on the blog... that's the plan... fingers crossed.

Thanks for popping by - if you have any questions pop them in the comments.

x