Irises for you!

I'm cringing at the possibility of snow flurries today after several weeks of springlike weather and the emerging of hundreds of irises, surprise lilies, daffodils, peonies, and MORE in my yard... hoping for minimal damage from the cold so we can see what's really planted here - I'm getting all the feels I used to get as a child reading the Secret Garden and Rainbow Garden. There are surprises every day!

My mom celebrated her birthday yesterday, and this was the card I sent to her - over the years she has taught me so much about plants and gardening, and I wanted to share a little piece of the beauty that's about to be here! Happy birthday, Mom!

This iris is from Sheena Douglass' line of stamps from Crafter's Companion, and I love all the details in the image as well as the large format! Floral stamps are one of my excesses... my Evernote catalog tells me I have 632 stamps, digis, or dies tagged "Floral"...! Hmm.

I used watercolors from various companies to color in my panel, as well as a script stamp from Impression Obsession. This is Fabriano Studio Hot Press paper, which works really well for stamping. I buy the heavier weight and the larger size pad so I can cut the paper to size. It's great for die cutting too!

Here's a little peek into my yard!

Have a great weekend!

Splitcoast Tutorial: Canvas Panel Card

This week's tutorial over on Splitcoast is a fun little mixed media project called a Canvas Panel Card. It's the creation of my friend Kae Pea over at the Moon and the Maker - I have learned so much from her!

Here's my project - I did have canvas panels, but decided to work with matboard instead, since I had these nice scrap pieces that were 4" x 5". I started off by covering the panels with some scraps of paper I had on my desk (I've been working on cards for an upcoming Summer catalog release!) using matte gel medium.

Next I layered some crumpled tissue paper over the panels with gel medium to add some texture and soften the background.

After the gel medium was dry, I highlighted some of the texture with a little white gesso...

...then stamped myself a design to paint. I love these Paint Fusion sets from Sheena Douglass... they're a little harder to get now, but they're such a great size for this type of project, and so easy to arrange and paint.

I used acrylic paint to fill in the design, then added stenciled modeling paste and stamped details...

the sentiment is one of mine from Impression Obsession - always a good reminder. :)

Hope you'll pop over to the tutorial and try a project of your own!

Mix-Ability - Get Well Soon postcard drive

This week's Mix-Ability challenge is a postcard drive for one of our Internet Brands managers that is recovering from a bad kitchen accident. There was a secondary challenge to use a city theme... I missed that memo and went with a pretty floral matboard postcard instead.

I started with a lilac stamp set by Sheena Douglass from her Paint Fusion line... it looks like that line of stamps is still available from the UK. I sprinkled and spritzed some Colorburst and let it spread, then blotted with a paper towel. The leaves were painted with acrylic paint, and then I used the Colorburst again and diluted acrylic paint to shade the flowers.

I added some stamping to the background, a little more Colorburst (sprinkled and stamped), and embossed the sentiment over it all, using the MISTI for placement.

I hope you'll play along with us this week, and bring some joy to Alison's mailbox! You can find the challenge details HERE.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers while I was in Idaho! My appointments went very well - that was the easy part... next comes a 7 week detox, even-cleaner-than-before diet, and supplements to rebuild my organs and other systems that have been depleted by Lyme disease, co-infections, and adrenal fatigue.

 Woo hoo!

Mix-Ability: Rice!

This week's Mix-Ability challenge is to use rice with watercolor for a fun effect. Dry rice absorbs liquid, so when it's sprinkled over wet watercoloring, it soaks up some of the water and color, and leaves an interesting pattern. I've done a similar technique with rock and table salt, but those usually leave a little salty crust on the card. This has a similar look, but nothing left behind! Here's my card for Lydia's challenge.

I started off my background with a wash using pigment from an Inktense Block. The first layer was the yellow orange, and I used some rice in the upper right corner. I haven't used any of the Paint Fusion sets for a while (Sheena Douglass, via Crafter's Companion), so I pulled out the Fuchsia set. These outline stamps are so fun to work with! I watered down acrylic paints to fill in the images... I'm so used to working with transparent mediums - it's fun to build up layers with acrylics! I beefed up my collection so I can do more with my Gelli Plate.

Here's a closer look at the flowers - that stencil pattern is from Martha Stewart. I found a great deal on HSN last week, and enabled a few others as well. ;) Below you can see the painted details a little better, as well as the texture left by the rice. The sentiment is one of my own designs from Impression Obsession, found HERE.

Come play along!

Mix-Ability - Monochrome

Kyra's Mix-Ability challenge for us this week is to dive into one color, and create a monochrome project. We are in the final stages of packing for our move to the States, so I had the added challenge of working with extremely limited supplies... thankfully I hadn't packed my watercolors YET, and I'm leaving my acrylics here with the fun prospect of updating my collection. I had a stray piece of drywall tape and some chalk inks out too. Most of the chalk inks ended up making the 'take' list because of this project - there was a fun little resist effect going on that needs some more exploration... The Lilac stamps hopped into my suitcase as well. (Hahaa!! What was I thinking?)

I stamped the blooms and leaves in a yellowish brown ink, then spritzed some water and worked wet watercolor paint into the wet areas and around the background. When everything was dry, I used acrylic paint on a "scruffy brush"  to dab in more detail to the flowers. The next layer of color was done with chalk ink again (Colorbox Fluid Chalks), stamping text randomly, and adding texture through the drywall tape.

We're getting to the stage of 'lasts' over this weekend, and up to our departure date Wednesday. I've spent quite a bit of time walking in circles and staring at things! This is such a hard move in many ways... we know the timing is right, but there are so many unknowns otherwise.

I'll be in touch when we get things set up on the other side... but don't be surprised if you see a few more scheduled posts while we're on the move!

Art Canvas

I finished this canvas a couple of weeks ago - it was a few days in the making, and expresses a piece of my heart... with some upcoming changes in my design focus, I really wanted something physical to look at to remind me what I want my art to be - genuine, an expression of heart, and a gift back.

Here's a picture of the canvas after the initial pencil sketch and first layer of paint - I dropped acrylic paint on the canvas and used an old library card to move the colors around. Seems a lot of my favorite techniques lately involve a library card! The canvas is 8"x12".

Here's a close-up of the quote I used... and HERE is a link to the context of the quote and Ann Voskamp's beautiful words.

These poppies are my favorites, and I do have a few to choose from! These are from Sheena Douglass's Paint Fusion line at Crafter's Companion.

The face close up... it has some 'me'-ish features... I was thankful just for the courage to paint her with acrylics!

The weeks are just flying lately!

Unfinished Business...

Lydia's Mix-Ability challenge this week is to make a mixed media project on a white surface (canvas, cardstock) where you only finish part of a stamped or sketched image - sort of like mixed media spotlighting. You must use three or more mediums on your project... I think I used 6 altogether!

I started by stenciling a piece of white Neenah cardstock with white spray paint., then dripping gelatos, watercolors, and distress ink down the panel. I love this resist technique - just very subtle and unpredictable.

The Fuchsia stamps are from Crafter's Companion, my favorite Paint Fusion line by Sheena Douglass. I filled in the flowers with acrylic paints, but left the leaves uncolored, since they fell into a mostly green area of my background.

I used Prismacolor pencils to highlight one edge of each leaf, and shade underneath, so the leaves would stand out just a little.

The sentiment I used is from a set by Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps.

Hope you'll check out the new challenge details and join us!

Three Surfaces

I made 2 cards for this week's Mix-Ability challenge, and since both feature stamps from Crafter's Companion, I thought I'd share them together! Really that's the only thing they have in common, besides meeting the challenge requirements... hee!!

The challenge this week is to incorporate 3 different surfaces on our projects. For my first card I used one of my craft sheets as a base (these protect my desk when I work, and collect extra ink and paint, etc.). The stamped flowers (Christmas Rose set) are from Sheena Douglass' Paint Fusion range and are painted with acrylic paints. My 3 surfaces are cardstock, vellum, and metal. The sentiment is from Flourishes.

 

For the second card my 3 surfaces are textured cardstock, matboard and wood... I used a 2-inch Art Square from Inchie Arts for a spotlight effect, coloring with Touch Twin Markers. The colors I used are below. HERE is a link to the image - so cute!

The wooden flower button came from Craftpon's Etsy store, and the sentiment is from Penny Black. The clouds were 'painted' using ink from the Touch markers, blended with a waterbrush that I have filled with rubbing alcohol.

Click here for more Inchie Arts products!

Hope you have a great week!

 

woot!!