- Autumn Poppy Field

 Alison Bomber stamps - Poppy and Grasses Editions

Welcome Fall CVC #2 September 

1. Start working on the bottom half of the card first.

2. Make watery puddles of antique linen and vintage photo, dip card and dry several times.

3. Using iced spruce and hickory smoke repeat the same process as above on the top half of the card.

4. In the background dip in a little bundle sage and dry.

5. Dab vintage photo, aged mahogany and gathered twigs closely together on a craft mat and spritz with water. Tap stamp into the colours and stamp onto the card and dry. Repeat to create a collection of poppy seed heads.

6. Use masking paper and stamp the poppy heads enough times to cover all the stamped images. When they are covered stamp grasses using different brown and green oxide inks. Dry.

7. Remove masks and use black and white drawing pens to emphasize shapes, outlines and details of the poppies.

xxx

Materials

Distress Oxides Antique Linen, Vintage Photo, Iced Spruce, Hickory Smoke, Aged Mahogany, Gathered Twigs, Peeled Paint,

Stamps - PaperArtsy - Alison Bomber EAB37 Poppy Edition, EAB40 Grasses Edition.

Permanent Black pen White Posca Pen, masking paper.

Butterfly panel - watercolouring with distress inks

 Butterfly Metamorphosis

The Great Outdoors CVC #1 July

I'm doing a workshop at CVC headquarters this month with a theme of butterflies, bees and moths and it's focussed on creating sketchbook pages. I had created so many pieces to add, that I am completely zoned in on butterflies again and I wanted to create a butterfly painting by watercolouring using distress inks, but rather than draw and paint I decided to use one of Tim's butterflies being used in the workshop but use it in a completely different way.

To begin I stamped it in antique linen so that I could use the shape but not the pattern.

I used salvaged patina, rusty hinge, ground espresso and uncharted mariner with a fine round brush.

I cut out the butterfly .....

.... and blended ground espresso round it.

The orange edges in the wings looked very sharp against the blues so I blended them using white charcoal pencil.

Then used a white posca pen and black drawing pen to add final details.

xx

Supplies

TH Distress inks - Antique Linen, Salvaged Patina, Rusty Hinge, Ground Espresso and Uncharted Mariner,

TH Butterfly stamp - Perspective CMS213, 

White charcoal pencil,   white posca pen,   black ink pen fine 

TH - Collage Strips, Snippets, Remnant Rubs, Mummy Cloth.

Gesso

Herbarium Reference Book

 Using dried flowers and sketches to create a reference book of plants.

I've been thinking and playing with the idea in my head to create a sketchbook/scrapbook/reference book of some flowers I collected and dried last year. 

I am using a Seawhite pocket concertina book in a box.

The sketch of the Black Medic plant which has tiny yellow flowers and black seed pods. It is also known as Hop Clover or Yellow Trefoil. It is a wildflower found on dry grassland, road banks and waste places. I found this quite near to home on a path between a school and a field. It is a valuable source for pollinators.

Here the dried flower itself can be see quite clearly, especially the seed pods.

xx

Incorporate your own sketches into a collage 3

 Pen and Ink sketches on distress ink backgrounds with collage.

POTENTIAL

Following up two posts earlier in January (see links below) this is #3 in my pen and ink, flowers and seed heads, collages journal. It is dated 27/02/21.

I love seed heads, I pick them in the wild, I save seeds from the garden and grow them and I love drawing them.

Poppy seed heads always make me happy to look at and .... to gather the hundreds of tiny seeds that fall from those beautiful pods.

Like the previous 2 collages in this collection I have used papers, ephemera, die-cuts and a focus word.

Thanks for looking.

xx

Links to previous collages

 CREATE

http://www.bumblebeesandbutterflies.com/2025/01/during-pandemic-i-did-very-little-art.html

CONSERVATION

http://www.bumblebeesandbutterflies.com/2025/02/incorporate-your-own-sketches-into.html

Incorporate your own sketches into a collage 2

Pen and Ink sketches on distress ink backgrounds with collage.

CONSERVATION

Following up a post earlier in January (see link below) this is #2 in my pen and ink, flowers and seed heads, collages journal. It is dated 24/02/21.

The drawing is on a distress ink panel .....

.... incorporated with papers, ephemera, tag, die-cut leaves and word.

The stars on the bird ephemera have been stamped.

Thanks for looking.

xx

Link to first collage CREATE

http://www.bumblebeesandbutterflies.com/2025/01/during-pandemic-i-did-very-little-art.html

Flower Collage Dandelion Seed Head

 Hand Drawn Flower displayed with collage

Workshop Country View Crafts 2023 Deconstruct - Reconstruct

I am playing catch up keeping a record here of the samples I created for my workshop last year.

This is Flower Collage 1, it is actually a Dandelion seed head (clock).

We started  by looking at photos of the Dandelion clock and carefully unpicked the structure of the flower drawing each piece of it individually.

I then sketched and inked up the picture....

... and made a distress ink background and drew it again and painted in the leaves using the distress inks.

Finally I created the collage around it and displayed it in a black paper art book.

I have several more of these to come as I made lots of samples to give the participants a variety of collages as inspiration for putting theirs together.

xxx

Watercolour painting with Distress Watercolor Pencils

Coneflower or Echinacea

Set up with under drawing on smooth watercolour paper and pink colours mixed on my palette.

Wet on wet using the pink colours and clean water. I'm not yet at a stage where I can mix colours on a brush to achieve variations so I use different brush for each colour and mix with water. This was left to dry naturally as I didn't want the colours moved about more by drying with a heat gun.

As each layer progressed so the painting emerged ......

I finished off my painting by using black Uni-Ball pens to outline and add some squiggles for more interest.

If you are here visiting me, thank you for stopping by.

xxx

Materials

Tim Holtz Distress Watercolor pencils Spun Sugar, Worn Lipstick,Candied Apple, Blueprint Sketch, Back Soot, Mowed Lawn, Bundled Sage, Rustic Wilderness, Wild Honey, Chipped Sapphire.

Watercolour brushes sizes 4,6,8 and 10.

UniPin Fineliner Pens Black 0,1, 0.5, and 0.8