inspiration

Inspiration is a tricky thing.  Sometimes I really want to make something and there's no inspiration.  Other times, like today, I should be doing important things like shoveling snow, again.  Then, bam, the inspiration hits.  As much as I'd like to be out there shoveling the fresh berm of snow the snowplow so kindly left for me, I ran to the craft room instead. 

This is a piece of palette paper left over from our adventure in making a color wheel this week.  Kyle is still sick, so we've been doing a bit of homeschool to make sure he keeps up.  High school is much harder than I recall, especially algebra.  It definitely got harder in the last 30 years.  His lovely art teacher offered that he could make a color wheel using just the primary colors with black and white.  I loved showing Kyle about how to make darker and lighter hues with the black and white.  When he was finished with the color wheel, there was still some paint left on the palette.  I used a palette knife and smeared it all over a piece of acrylic paper for backgrounds for something else, and left this palette paper to dry.  Today when I was picking up the dry pieces, I saw flowers in this piece of throw away palette.  So I made these:

I used an EK success 5 petal flower punch to punch out areas of the waxy palette paper and then curled up the leaves a bit.  I stacked up 3 flowers and used a brad in the middle.  I think they're kind of fun.  I love trash to treasure projects.  Thanks for stopping by today.

I painted today!  I love painting.  Do you recognize the base for this ATC?  It's one of the vintage bingo cards from a couple of posts down that I picked up on my treasure hunting.  Ok, so it's not tons of paint, but it really made me happy.  A bit of titan buff with some glazing liquid gave me just the right amount of milky white to still see what's underneath. The little frame around the bingo babe is made with microbeads sprinkled over a line of glossy accents.  Did I mention that I painted today?  It was a good day.  Thanks for stopping by.  

paint

This is a card I made with a bunch of paint. I love playing with paint. It's the sample for my book review up today over at Craft Critique. Supplies used: golden fluid acrylic paints, foam stamp, watercolor paper, grungeboard, laminate sample, grosgrain ribbon, stazon ink, penny black stamps, and krylon copper leafing pen.

Thanks for the funny comments on my post of my messy craft room. To calm your fears that I am a complete slob, please know that the rest of my house is very neat and tidy. I do laundry regularly and the dishes are clean. It looks much better today than the photos.

I had hoped to be sharing a post with you today about my yard sale treasures, but mother nature had other plans. We got snow instead of yard sales. Here is a view off the front deck this weekend...


Happy Memorial Day to all. Thank you to those who have and are serving our country.

a completely wonderful day

I spent the most glorious day yesterday with some very creative friends. Julie has been telling me and anyone else who will listen about Golden products forever. It's not that I didn't listen, it's just that I didn't have an opportunity to play with them until yesterday. Oh my goodness, really I had to raise up my arms and cheer right in the middle of the painting class. It's really that good. We took a class with Chris Cozen who is exactly the kind of teacher we all hope for when we pay for a class. First we painted some backgrounds. We used 3 different papers with the same paints to get an idea of the different effects you get with acrylic paper, watercolor paper, and canvas paper. My personal fave was the acrylic paper. Such a smooth and sturdy paper. It definitely has a future as some gothic arch bases. The paints were really incredible and gave a depth of color that I've never experienced with paint before. I have a bit of experience with painting, but this paint takes it to a whole new level. I forgot how much I love to paint. I really need a brush in my hand more often.

Then we used a part of the backgrounds to create a base for a paperweight. I have been playing a bit with collage, but really don't know what the heck I'm doing. I was so grateful to have Chris there to explain a bit of theory about composition. She is writing her next book on the subject. I now have a better understanding, but I have to take more classes from this teacher. I've already inquired into a class in June with her. The goodies in here under glass are layered on a piece of the canvas paper that I painted and include a postage stamp, some egg and nest images, a piece of an old ledger from Julie's stash, a dictionary word, and 2 coin charms.

After such a wonderful beginning to the day, I was on a creative high. We had lunch and did alot of treasure hunting and chatting. It was so fantastic to be in the company of like minded artistic women. I don't get that much here on my little mountain. It was good for my soul. Thanks Chris, Julie, Kim, Andrea, and Heather for such a beautiful day. I'm still smiling.

adventures in art journaling

My friend Julie is sharing a weeklong tutorial on creating art journal pages. I've been reading along this week, but just didn't have the motivation, time, whatever to play until today. I'm all caught up from the first three days in just over an hour's time. Here is the progression of the page so far.

Assignment #1~ Easy job here, tear some paper and glue it down with a glue stick on the page. I used some handmade papers, an old map, and play money. I'm using a spiral bound book filled with watercolor paper from my stash.

Assignment #2~ Add paint. I forget how much I love paint until I start playing with it again. I used 2 different kinds/colors of paints here. Watered down the aqua and sort of water colored it on. The fresh green is more of a dry brush effect. I don't really like this yet.

Assignment #3~ The fun begins. I sprayed on a green and a walnut ink. Then I cut a strip of map with deco scissors to put on the end. I sprayed the map of my area with the same green ink. I smudged around the outlines of the papers with a pencil. Finally, I stenciled on some white ink. I'm liking the page now. The doodling is next, and that makes me nervous.

A pic of the hi-tech tools used so far.

I am loving the beginning of the art journal adventure already. Thanks for the fun Julie.