Found Some Time To Relax Today

I've had this mermaid stamp for a while and have wanted to do a page in my journal with her and I finally had the chance today.  I stamped her with archival ink and painted her using my Twinkling H2O's  I colored her skin with my copic markers. I drew in some sea weed and stamped the sea chest.  I colored the rest using water color pencils, distress markers and H2O's.  In some cases, like the chest, I had to go back over the outline with a fine black pen.  I added the blue bubbles and the green flourishes through the seaweed.  The picture doesn't show all of the sparkle from the Twinkling H2O's.  Photo's never seem to do colors justice. I am happy with how it turned out and I love this mermaid stamp.....So pretty.

Stampotique Stamp Fun.

I just received my stamps from Stampotique and wanted to try them out.  I stamped them on white card stock.  Then I spent a quiet evening coloring them in using Copic Markers and Distress Markers.  Love these guys...So cute in a weird way.

Madhatterz Tea Party

I had a lot of fun putting this page together.  It was inspired by coming across the lady with the teapot body.  I put that together a couple years ago and never did anything with it.  When I saw it, while going through some of my stash, I thought, it is about time she had some legs.  So I went through some of my paper doll collection and found the perfect legs for her.  However, she was a bit misproportioned.  Looking at her made me think of Alice in Wonderland's Madhatter's Tea Party.  So I started doing some image searches on google and found the wonderful picture of the rabbit here.  I found the teacup here  I tried to find the link for the tea party sign but I can't find it.  I have it pinned on my pinterest board but the link brings you to some UK shopping site.  Have no idea how that happened.  I pinned it so that I could refer back to it to give credit but..... I colored the rabbit and the teacup with distress markers (I really love these markers. They're so versatile).  the little birdies were from a teacup photo I found here
 
I created the background with pan pastels, stencils using distress inks, and some stamps. I printed the words "curiouser and curiouser" and cut them out and colored them with my distress markers.  Then I glued everything into place and outlined everything with a Pit Brush pen, to make it stand out.  I added a little doodling and there you have it....a page that makes me smile when I look at it.

A Loving Heart Is The Truest Wisdom.

I love how this turned out and there was a bit of a learning curve involved.  I used the Tim Holtz Hanging Sign die and The Bird and the branch die and cut them using chip board (the type that comes at the back of paper tablets).  I cut two of the hanging posts and glued them together to get a longer post to hang my sign from.  I found this idea on the following youtube video http://youtu.be/Rwh6WSxq7UA.  The learning curve came when I tried to add the eyelets.  I never used the crop-a-dile big bite for anything other than punching holes.  It required a phone call to my sister who immediately asked me if I read the directions.  Well, how could I when I threw them away.  Who needs to read directions when you have a sister that can walk you through the steps.  Anyway, I figured out how to do the eyelets after a few attempts of crushing several beyond use.

I covered the sign with Adirondack "Espresso" paint dabber.  I used "Pool" and "Gold", applied them to my craft mat and used a dry brush here and there to add an aged look.  I stamped the sign with a textured stamp and embossed it with clear embossing powder.  I typed the quote and printed from my computer.  I distressed the paper by tearing it, covering it with scattered straw distress ink and then using vintage photo around the edges.  I glued it to my sign with good ole Elmer's glue.

I cut the bird and branch from chipboard that I covered with scrapbook paper.  I cut the bird from the branch with scissors and inked the edges with "Vintage Photo" distress ink.  I colored his beak with yellow copic marker (can't remember which color).  Then I added some bling for his eye.

I inked my background by covering it with scattered straw distress ink and using various stencils and sprays.  I stamped the white square pattern by rubbing Gesso on my stamp and randomly applying it to the page.  I did some stamping with black archival ink.  Then I glued down the sign and the bird.  I added a flourish stamp to show his singing.  Then I added stamping using "Sepia" archival ink.  I don't know if you can see it in the picture but I also randomly stamped a crackle background stamp using "Tumbled Glass" distress ink.  I tried to put a little blue in the background to pick up the bird.  The final step was outlining the bird with "cool gray No 3", to help define him a little.  I added the silk flowers with a glue gun and there you have it.....done.

This next photo is from some experimenting that I did tonight.  I bought a new embossing powder today (aged teal).  I was hoping that it would give an aged look to some of my die cuts.  I saw a tutorial for distressing and aging the Tim Holtz Jalopy http://layersofink.blogspot.com/2012/04/faux-rust-tutorial.html and thought that this embossing powder would be perfect.

I cut two pieces of chipboard and coated them with the Espresso ink dabber.  I stamped the whole thing with the textured stamp and clear embossing ink.  I added the embossing powder and heated it.  The first attempt came out too blue.  So I used the same method but rolled the stamp in small spots.  I liked this one better but it also came out with more blue than I expected.  The powder looks like a mixture of turquoise, gold, and brown.  I didn't think the turquoise would be so dominate.  I will probably still use this method but go very light handed with the stamping.

Learning ...

 

When I started this project early this afternoon, I thought that it was going to go quickly and that I might have time to do a couple pages in my journal.  Yeah....that didn't happen.  I thought I had my Cricut machine all figured out.  It may have taken me a while and I may have had to cut a couple times BUT, I DID IT!  The peacock is from the Art Nouveau cartridge.  It is cut in layers and it took me a couple tries to figure it out.  The flash from the camera washed out the colors.  It is a little brighter than how it appears.  The mandala in the middle is from the ornamental Iron 2 cartridge. It is Gate 3D, which is a half circle.  I cut two and glued them together to make a circle.  I inked the background with scattered straw distress ink and rubbed peeled paint distress around the edges.  I stamped the flourishes using various colors.  I printed the comment on my computer and inked it with bundled sage ink dauber.  I glued down the mandala, then the peacock and then the comment.  I traced around the peacock with a black pen and doodled around the comment to make them stand out.  I added some bling to his tail feathers and another bling for his eye.  I like how it turned out.  Now I have to clean up the mess I made while doing it!

His Eye is on the Sparrow

I saw this method for using the Tim Holtz Distress Markers on the video on youtube http://youtu.be/jmYdEsHdnjs.  I wanted to give it a try.  I started out stamping the two birds and coloring them in using the method they described.  It looked easy enough.  I think it came out pretty good for my first try.  I definitely need practice with blending.  I then did some searches for poems about birds and found this beautiful poem and knew that is what had to go on my page.  I typed it up, printed it from my computer, distressed it, glued it down  and added some doodling.  I love the message.  A simple reminder that "He" is taking care of us.  What a nice reflection to end my evening.

Spending Spree...Big Smile!

The first picture is a picture of all my loot.  The next few pictures I broke up my stash so you could get a closer look.

I took the last one so that you could see the side of the crate that I bought at Michael's for $4.00 (not on sale).  I plan to paint it the same white as the trim in my craft room.  Then I will have a nice neat place to store my embossing folders.  I love it!  Now it is time to play with some of my new toys.