So Much Done Today!

I found the picture of this little boy through Pinterest and as soon as I saw him I thought of this childhood rhyme.  You can find the picture HERE.

I used Tim Holtz Distress Paint Daubers (Peeled Paint and Broken China) to start the background.  I added various stencils using TH Vintage Photo and Walnut Stain distress Ink.  The wrought Iron fence was done by using an edge stamp and adding lines for the fence using a Pitt pen.  I don't know the name of the stamp because I misplaced the packaging but this is the set below.

Sorry there is a glare on it but you can see the stamp that I used at the very bottom of the set.  I used TH Hanging Sign Die for the sign.  I colored it using Scattered Straw, then went over that lightly with Vintage Photo.  I sprinkled it with water, let it dry and then went over it again with Vintage Photo.  I printed the saying on computer paper, tore it to fit the sign and distressed it the same way I did the sign itself. I used a black Gelato to edge the sign.  I added eyelets to the sign and then did this.....

 

I put my trinket case back on the shelf and it slid off, hit the floor and spread all my brads. eyelets, buttons, keys, etc. ALL over the floor.  So I swept them up and dumped them back in to be sorted at a later date.  UGH!

Lastly I drew music notes using a Pitt Pen.  I also drew circles at the top of the sign for chains.

NEXT CAME THIS LITTLE CUTIE!

 

 

 I did the background using TH Scattered Straw, Broken China and Stormy Sky. I used TH Moon and Stars Die and colored them using TH Distress Paint, Scattered Straw and Wild Honey.  Then I used TH Splatters stencil, an Embossing Pen and Stampendous Pirate Gold Embossing Powder to add some dimension to the moon.  I also randomly outlined the stars with the embossing pen and used Stampendous Gold Tinsel Embossing Powder.  I drew some dangley lines from the moon to the stars and added some bling stars that I had in my stash.  The sweet little girl was also a Pinterest find,which can be found HERE.  I colorized her using water color crayons, added a paper crown cut from an old Thesaurus.  I managed to cut the word Moony, which I thought fit nicely.  I added some bling to the crown and pearl buttons for the dress.

I am very happy with both pages BUT, I am finding that Little Tommy Tucker is getting gold glitter all over himself because these pages are opposite each other in my journal!

Affirmation Tags!

I have seen a lot of personal affirmations posted on Facebook and Pinterest.  That gave me an idea of how to use some of the tags that I have made while trying new inking techniques.  Below are my first three tags.  This is fantastic because now I have a place to practice techniques, lettering, Zentangling, doodling and collaging on a smaller scale.  I had a lot of fun and can't wait to make more of these.  You could even make a small journal with pockets and add these.

Anyway, for now I am off to babysit my grand kids while another one comes into this world!  So much excitement!

This page started as a big mess...but it turned out pretty good.

I love how this turned out,especially since I thought I was just going to rip this page out of my journal.  I don't even remember what my first attempt was, but it wasn't good!  So I gessoed the page to start over but then that looked terrible.  So I left it for a while contemplating whether I should give up on it or not.  Then I started playing with my Gelli plate and started thinking, what am I going to do with these beautiful prints. So I started by collaging some torn pieces to the background.

I also used modeling paste through a stencil and when it dried I rubbed over it with Inka Gold.  Then I used one of my Gelli prints and die cut it with the Sizzex Branch w/leaves.

 I used Tim Holts distress paints to color the berries on the branches.

 

I lightly touched the dauber of each color to the berry until I got the look I wanted. I punched two of the leaf branch die and cut and glued them to make the long stem.

 Then I used these two Martha Stewart edge punches to make the flower trim above the lace and for the leafy stems for the orange flowers.

I used Tim Holtz distress markers to color them.













I made the flowers using TH Tattered Flowers die and TH Tattered Flower Garland dies.  I secured them with a brad.  The butterfly was in my stash.  I made it a while ago.  My sentiment was hand lettered on a card I punched from the tag punch below.  I LOVE this punch and use it ALL the time.

I wrote the word Bliss using my Pitt pens and then I colored the tag by dragging it through Distress ink sprayed with water that I applied to my craft mat.  When it dried, I flicked it with water, stamped it with brown ink and a circle stamp.  I crumpled it up to distress it a little more then went over it with TH Distress Tea Dye and a blending tool so that the wrinkles would show a little better.  I went around the edge with TH Distress Walnut Stain.  I added a ribbon that I rubbed with TH Tea Dye.

The little girl with the bird is a picture I found on the Internet that I colorized using watercolor pencils and a water brush.  I edged the page with TH Tumbled Glass.

All in all, the page was saved and I like it!

Another Try With The Gelli Plate. I Like It!

Last week when I did my Gelli Prints I was frustrated with it. It was more that I wasn't organized with items that I would use while printing and I wasn't sure how to add more layers to a print without totally messing it up.

Once I became a little more daring and just "tried" things, without worrying about the results, that is when the magic happened.

I  love the dandelion stencil in these prints.

 Notice the tan background is one of the prints I did last week.  I used my brick wall stencil on it.  It looks great.

   

This is the same print as in the picture above it but I wanted a closer shot so that you could see the detail. I used the method where you let the paint dry from a previous print.  Then cover the plate with another layer of paint (off white).  I used pieces of torn paper across the plate for the white space. You can see the video of the technique HERE. I love how it turned out.

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 The colors are a little muddied on these but they are still very pretty.  The bottom line is that I DO like my Gelli Plate and have had fun playing with it.  I see more experimenting in my future.

THE Gelli Plate!

I pulled out my Gelli Plate today and played around with it.  The videos that I watched sure made it look easy.  I found that it required some organization skills that I didn't seem to manage. I didn't know which stencils I was going to use and I found myself digging for the right stencil while the paint was drying.  I think that I need to be more prepared with my tools before I start and be a little more daring in trying new prints.  I worried too much about putting on another layer for fear of ruining the layer that I already had.  Anyway, these are my results, which I think are very pretty:

The prints that look like roses are from a stamp I made with "Marshmallow Foam Shapes"  found at Micheal's craft stores.  You heat them up with a heat tool, press them into something with a pattern on it and Bingo, instant stamp.  There is a tutorial of how to do this HERE.

I used this paper clip (also found at Michael's) to get the impression, which looks like a rose to me.

Back From The Garden!

I see that the last time I posted something was back in March.  That was when the weather turned nice and I was out in the garden every chance I had.  The weather is turning dismal again and I am back in my craft room.  My sister came up from Florida and helped me rearrange some things to make my craft room a little more organized.  Organizing created more space and therefore led to a shopping spree to take up that new space.  These are the new goodies:

 

It was hard to get a picture without the glare but I think you can see everything.  I went to A. C. Moore and they had EVERYTHING in the store on sale for 40 % off and sometimes more than that.  So of course more ended up in my basket than I had originally intended.  The items that I am most excited about are the "Typewriter" stamps.  I bought upper and lower case and can't wait to use them.  (the butterfly on the package is one that I stamped on vellum and colored with markers and perfect pearls.)  I added a couple new colors of acrylic paint in the hopes that I will pull out the gelli plate to make some prints.  I added Tim Holtz "Autumn Gatherings" die, a "thing a ma.jig (I've wanted one of these for a while now) and I bought several stamps to add to my collection.

I can't wait to spend some good crafting time with all my new stash.  In the mean time here are a few pages that I worked on but haven't posted yet.

I did this page a while ago.  I love the stampotique stamps.  I used the gold varigated flakes and a heat glue medium for the angel wings.  I stamped the girl on a separate piece of paper, colored her with markers, cut her out, stamped the image on the page and glued the cutout over the stamped image.  The circles were done with inka gold (in red) through a stencil and then embellished with a black Pitt pen and a white Signo pen.  The angel was left unfinished for quite a while.  It took me a while to be inspired before I created the "creeper".  This page started as a waste page.  I used it to clean my stencils or stamps.  After looking at it and wondering what to do with the page, it came to me that the angel needed an admirer. So I used the same methods to create "creeper"  Then stamped the words and embellished with the white Signo pen.

NEXT

I used this Hummingbird stamp to create the next page. 

 

 

I stamped the image on the page and then went about doodling.  I colored it using glitter pens.  You can see the glitter a little better when you enlarge the picture.

This is a close up of the bird to give a better view of the shiny glitterness!

This is the most recent page and commemorates a road trip that I took with my sister.  We were "trying" to get home from Marion, Illinois and ended up going the wrong direction.  We had directions from mapquest and two GPS's and we were still, going very fast in the wrong direction.  The nice police officer did not give us a ticket AND pointed us in the right direction.  I can't wait for the next opportunity to be on the road with my sister again.....never a dull moment.

Just Playin'. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't!

 

I used a lot of different techniques on this page.  I don't feel like it ever came together.    I did have fun while doing it but I have to say it certainly is one of my least favorite pages.

Best Snow Day Ever!

I had the day off due to the snow storm and I had the best creative day ever.  This was so much fun to make.  I took two pictures, one with the flash and one without.  The flash shows the details but washes out some of the color.  The one without the flash is a little darker but you see the color a little better.

  I started with my background using Tim Holtz Distress Paint " scattered straw" (one of my favorite colors".  I added some stenciling using "wild honey" distress ink.  I don't know the name of the stencil (sorry).  Then I found the little girl in a stash of vintage photos and cut her out.

 I used Tim Holtz "Angel Wings" die and colored them with tumbled glass, used a Signo pen to add dimension and distressed the edges with "vintage photo" distress ink.  I found the bird and nest from a book about birds.  I scanned it and cut it out.

 

This is the picture I scanned.  It was too big to get the whole page.  But the bird and the nest were perfect for what I wanted to do.  The leaves were done using the stencil technique here.  This is a close up so you can see the texture.
 

I glued the girl, the wings and the nest together and let everything dry.  I used a heat tool on the texture paste leaves to help it along.  Once the texture paste dried, I sprayed them with Tim Holtz Adirondack spray "Meadow".  Then I glued the girl and nest to the page over top of the textured leaves. 

I punched a tag from scrapbook paper with old writing on it using the tag punch shown here.

Then distressed it with "tea dye".  I went around the edge with "walnut stain" but that didn't seem to make it pop so I used "black soot".  I glued a violet on that I had in my stash for a long time.  I either got them at Michael's or Joanne's. They are very fragile.  After the glue dried, I went over the whole tag with Tim Holtz "Rock candy" crackle paint.

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This is a close up of the tag.  You can see a little more detail.  It is reallllly beautiful.  I'm not sure the picture does it justice.  I stapled the tag with a scrap of old lace to the page.

The border at the top was using a Martha Stewart edge punch from scrapbook paper. I also used distress inks on it so that it blended with the page.  I cut the eggs from a picture in my stash.  I used "Pumice Stone" distress pen to go around things to help them stand out a bit.

The flowers were made using Tim Holtz "Tattered Flower Garland" die.  I cut them from white card stock and colored them with Tim Holtz distress Pens.

I LOVE how this page turned out.  Now I am inspired and have all these ideas in my head but it is back to work tomorrow.  Hopefully I can stay inspired till the next chance I get to play!!!!!