Unicycle Dream

This piece has been created for Viva Las Vegas Stamps Monthly Challenge for April.

The challenge as usual involves using at least one VLV stamp and to be inspired by the prompts and image given. This month they prompts were: words like SPRING! flowers, doodles, buds, whimsical, patterns, checkerboard, stars, wings, Mary Vogel Lozinak, banners, green, teal, white, black.

I first gessoed a piece of card and then thought there was too much gesso on the card and so placed another piece of card on top to remove some. This left an interesting speckled effect which I really liked and so decided to use this. I applying watercolour which has a shimmery mica type effect, knowing that the gesso would create a resist. The colours are very subtle but just as I wanted.

I have used images and text from Mary Vogel Lozinak Plate 1383 and Writing Circles Background, which I turned into flowers. All these were stamped on tissue and then stuck onto the image with matt medium.

xox

This little piece was created for two reasons. One, I knew this could fit for the Paper Artsy Challenge and when I saw the hearts by Tammy Tuttrow, I thought I could make a little charm for my daughter to take with her on her trip to Europe. Sadly things did not go as planned. I'll have to keep working on my original ideas later.

Maybe I should have tried the kiwifruit! Or the coasters - the leaves remind me of mint leaf lollies - ask Leandra, she'll know what I mean!

Anyway, the problem was (and still is) that the beaded bracelet I bought my daughter when I visited the UK a couple of years ago broke and while we still have the main 'xo' (kiss & hug) charm, the original beads were lost and after re-threading it at least three times, everything I use tarnishes. So I decided to make a temporary 'charm' for her trip. I had some resin which I had bought quite some time ago but have never been brave enough to try. However, when I finally went to do this piece, I found it was white opaque resin and not clear like I thought.

So as an alternative I thought I would use Judkins Diamond Glaze. I had laser engraved the heart, with the 'xox' and set about applying the glaze. So thought it should have set and then went and put my finger in it - not set!! So then I had to add so much more glaze that it didn't set before my daughter flew out. I was away for a few days, seeing her off and not back home in time to sort another project. So another layer of glaze was added and I think it will be ok in the end - I'm just not going to touch it for about 2 weeks!
So my daughter has arrived in France and tonight I have been messaging her and seeing images of her trip up the cable car at Chamonix Mont Blanc - pretty amazing. She'll be in the UK next week and may find she will have some parcels of craft supplies arriving in the post to bring home for me!

Twelve Month Challenge - April

This is my journal page spread created for The Craft Barn Twelve Month Challenge - The Months.

The April challenge was to include primroses or daisies as well as the lines of the poem.
As usual I have created my Southern Hemisphere version of the page a part of my journal spread.

I was going to be away from home for a few days and so quickly laid down some paint for my backgrounds, keeping them similar but using Golden High Flow acrylic in silver to highlight the Spring side and gold for the Autumn side. I punched some shapes from patterned paper, with the primrose/daisy shapes coming from some scraps of geli prints. The scraps left were used to stencil some flowers. I also coloured a piece of watercolour paper so I could create the acorn.

So once I went to create the pages, I stuck on some pieces of gold patterned tissue, then drew and cut out the acorn. I also had some paintings of some hyacinths from some watercolour play and these seemed to fit well. Once I had placed and glued all the images, I chose matching Inktense pencils to outline them.

Mushroom - Our MMM

This is my second piece inspired by the March/April mood board from Our Mixed Media Moods.

The  Mood Board:

I had already been drawn to those mushrooms and then this appeared in the playground ot the school where I work:

I keep calling the piece 'Mushroom' but I thinks it's really a toadstool! These are not a common occurrence for us, but with the very damp weather we have had lately, there have been many different types of fungi appearing.

So I thought I could work with this, recolour it digitally and then apply some mixed media techniques. 

I wanted to overlay different colours and chose these from the stones in the mood board and printed them on tracing paper.

   

I also printed the whole image in grayscale, except the mushroom. which I left yellow.
I ended up with one very bright side and a complete contrast on the other side, just broken by the more pastel coloured small mushrooms.

The bright side has different media added - crackle paste and glass bead medium.

The dull side has some masking tape added as a feature.

The background colour was taken from the strip of purple which appeared in the image when it was recoloured.
Watch my process here:

Garden of Love

So the second side of this double page spread  is completed. I have worked on this spread for the Paper Artsy Challenge - Blue and Ochre.
The blog post entry included some embroidered flowers by Love Maude, which reminded me of flowers I made years ago to make a baby's matinee jacket. I was still a teenager at school and I made dozens of white daisies to make this jacket for my first niece. I didn't have the tool to make them but found a way to improvise and then coloured the flowers with paint. I then found another tutorial for the smaller flower, made by wrapping yarn around a pencil.

And the finished double page spread.

Sunshine for Your Soul

The current challenge from Paper Artsy is Blue & Ochre which did fit quite well with other challenges I am do at the moment (see Angel of Gold) but I decided to work on these pages already started. This is a journal I have repurposed and begun by sticking in paper napkins.

As always there are so many inspiring imageson the PA blog. This fabric from IkoPlusis beautiful and would make a lovely background for a page:

I started playing on the double page spread but decided to finish just one side at present. I plan to work on the other side during the next week. I want them to be different, but also work together.

I added text paper and them gesso over the napkin. The 'circle' paper is scrapbooking paper which had a faint pattern on it, which I darkened up with gel pen. The bottem embellishment was something I had made some time ago and seemed to fit well on this page.

An now to decide what how to complete the opposite page.

Blowin' In the Wind

This page is for The Craft Barn Song Challenge - Blowin' in the Wind.

I had been thinking about what path to take and then watched this video by Marrmi Small Art and thought I would give this a go. I chose similar colours to those in the video, one, because I liked them, but also, because I had several paints in tones from light to dark that would work together.  It was simple and quick but I was very happy with the outcome worked well for this challenge.

Angel of Gold

This canvas is inspired by the moodboard put together by Our Mixed Media Moods for March/April.

I had purchased a set of small canvases, thinking I would like t experiment sewing directly onto them with my sewing machine. It didn't happen this time and not sure if it will work - so that's still a work (idea) in progress.

I don't use canvases much, mainly because I'm not sure what I would do with them - at least things are contained and manageable in a journal. Thought I'd give it a go this time - who will the lucky recipient be? - haha!

My inspiration came from the sculpture, stones and lights. Still thinking about that number 8, so maybe soemthing else will come to me yet.

Now... I'm trying to film some of my work, but not really in the habit of doing so - so the camera just wasn't turned on sometimes because I forgot, and then at the end my phone decided to turn off! Because of this, not everything is in the video - or I just pretended I was doing it!! Here's what I did manage to capture and the stills.