Testing Facebook Feed

testing facebook feed to new facebook.

Daily Mixed Media Project Days 1 thru 4

I am posting days 1-4 together since I am finished with those layers. I will add links to some online places where you can buy the supplies I used, but PLEASE check your locally owned art store in your city first - ours here in Des Moines,IA recently closed and I MISS IT!!!!  If I could I would open one over in the East Village where many artists reside and work, but sadly not an option for me - but someone should.
I end up buying alot of my stuff at our local Michaels with the 40% off coupon and whenever I go visit my sister in Madison,Wi  I drop a few dollars at the Artist and Craftsman Supply store - they have pretty fantastic prices.
So far I like it and am MAYBE forming an idea in my head for the focal image. Comments, questions and suggestions are welcomed and appreciated.

Day 1
I am just using a bi piece of poster board, since this is kind of an experiment and I do not have any big canvases. First thing I did was I put on a couple coats of Golden White Gesso -love that brand of gesso!  Next I decided to kind of do a purple gradient from right to left. I started with some Liquitex heavy body acrylic in Brilliant Purple and mixed in some Golden Regular Gel Matte medium, white craft paint and Golden Acrylic Glazing Medium in Satin finish. As I created darker shade I reduced the white and eventually added in some acrylic paint Neopaque by Jacquard in Violet. For the most part I was happy with the blending except from   the first to second shade, but decided to embrace the imperfections ...haha.

Day 2

I wanted to add some script as a  layer so I used my Speedball  pen and nib with Bombay black India ink and wrote some words pertaining to family and love and some hearts.

Day 3

Now to cover it all up! I toned down the purple and script by using some watered down white craft paint. Then I had some bubble wrap that has big bubbles and I put some white paint on that and pounced it in random places.

Day 4

Time to add color back in. I used FW Pearlescent Inks in Sundown Magenta and Waterfall Green with a stencil I had created using Make the Cut Software and my Cricut Expression. I make most of my stencils this way rather than buying them. I do own a few Crafter's Workshop stencils in designs that are more intricate than my Cricut can cut neatly or that I can't do in MTC, but I enjoy designing my own. 

I am thinking that today will be more stenciling in different pattern and colors or maybe some stamping in black. Decisions, decisions...

 Thanks for checking it out!

Daily Mixed Media Project

I have not been blogging and am going to remedy that and get my self into the habit of posting more often and showing my work. I decided the best way for me to get in the habit was to start a project and post my progress everyday. So begins the Daily Mixed Media Project.....
My idea is that I will start a large scale project and post my progress and pictures everyday. My thought is that this piece of art will have many layers and take around 10-14 days to finish by adding maybe 1-2 layers or elements a day, I have no idea what the finished project will be at this point. I plan to get up each day, cruise around the internet for some inspiration( I would also welcome any ideas my followers have!) then once inspired add on to my project.
Here is a list of just some of the mediums I have available to use:

• gesso
• Absorbant Ground
• acrylic paint - fluid and heavy body
• molding paste
• masks, templates and stencils
• fabric
• patterened paper
• rubber stamps
• alpha stickers
• Winsor Newton Drawing Inks
• India Ink
• rub ons
• tissue paper

 I in no way consider myself a professional artist and have NO art schooling at all, this is all just my own thing - which will probably be obvious to any professional - but that's OK - I LOVE IT! I have never been good at following the "rules", I just like to get my hands in there and get messy, doing whatever comes into my head or my heart and out through my fingers. 

I have the first 4 days completed  before I posted this because I was not sure I was going to do it because I am a chicken. In my next post I will show you what I did the first 4 days.

Art-full Horizons

I so want to attend this! I love Donna. 

Hellooooo Scrapbookers!!!!

Registration for Art-Full Horizons is now OPEN to the public!!!

We are so excited to offer this event to you – there will be 6 fabulously talented instructors presenting cutting edge classes, deminars from your favorite manufacturers, fun, friendship, gourmet food, resort hotel accommodations and more!

To register, go to:http://art-fullhorizons.blogspot.com/p/register.html

Here’s the details:

Date: May 27-29, 2011 in Palm Springs, CA
Location:  Renaissance Resort Palm Springs
Included: Hotel Accommodations, Food, Drinks, Prizes, Exclusive Tammy I Tote Bag filled with Goodies and much more!

Cost:

Triple - $469

Double - $549

Single - $769

Sign up today! Space is limited!

Create, Play Laugh, Love, Dream Layout

Here is a layout of my daughter and my sister in 1998. We were visiting my sister Mindy  in Seattle and Tysa was playing dress-up. Aunt Mindy is pretending to be her hand maid and fanning the Red Queen. Tysa spent a great deal of her childhood playing dress up, probably about 80% of her childhood was spent as one character or another - almost always a beautiful princess or queen. I think this explains her love of "the process" of getting ready for school dances - which is also playing dress up. I will be sharing a layout of this kind of dress up - hopefully next week.

I apologize for the picture quality, just could not get a good one today. The paper is a Prima Paintable - I love , love these papers, so much fun!! I used Twinkling H2O's for the lettering,, except PLAY with is gold Stickles. the roses are Tattered Angels Candy Apple Red and the Red Mahogany Distress Reinker, water and Sunflower Sparkle Perfect Pearls. The Love is cut form the Lost and Found collection by My Minds Eye. 

I clipped through the Prima Paper so the picture would set behind the flower and leaves, it just did not look right sitting on top of the flowers.  I still feel this layout needs something, I am not super happy with it, but not sure what else to do so I will leave it. 

Thanks for looking..so far I have been keeping  up with my one layout a week, we will see if it continues.....lol.

Whats on Your Workdesk Wednesday, Spring Canvas and Fleece Socks

I have been itching to do something with fabric and something on these 11 x 14 thin canvas boards I have had FOREVER. I was browsing the Tattered Angels blog and saw a piece that inspired me. So I have spent the last week working on this fabric project. I took a piece of canvas fabric and ripped it into maybe 1 and 2 in wide strips. I sprayed it with Tattered Angels, then decided that was not vibrant enough so I painted the strips with Twinkling H20's -  the colors popped much better.I then used Claudine Hellmuth's Matte medium to glue down the strips for the sky and the grass. I rolled up the strips for the sun, flowers, leaves and stems and used Fabri-Tac to glue them down. I cut a piece of Claudine's stickey back Canvas in neutral and      sprayed it with Spiced Marmalade reinker and water, then used my cropadile to punch out little tiny dots of canvas painted pink with Twinkling H2O's and stuck them to the kite. The kite ribbons are leftovers form the kite and dots. The string is a white fiber from Close to My Heart. I am fairly happy with it, my gluing could have been neater, there are a few spots where you can see the adhesive through the canvas. My biggest dislike is the grass - the color, I wish I had a more vibrant green for the grass but I did not want the grass and the flower stems and leaves to be the same color and that was the best green I have. I used about 4 different green products on the grass trying to get it right, to no avail. Also, I wish I would have used thinner strips of fabric for the grass and the flower petals and finally - I should have added some white puffy clouds...which I still may, or I might make a new version - fixing all my I wish I hads. Let me know if you have any questions about this project, I will be happy to answer them.

I have been coloring with my markers. I have a few Copics,  in basic colors as little as I use them these work just fine for me. I often pair them with my Bic Mark-its, they blend together quite nicely. IF there were more images I liked for Copic coloring, I would do it more. I just am not a cutesy kinda girl..Magnolia's are not for me. The Pure Innocence are Ok and some of the Greeting Farm images are ok, but that is as cute as I get. I do have some monsters and some robots and I love the Daniel Torrente stamps from Stampotique, and I really like these digitals from The Octopode Factory on etsy(which she said she is hoping to have more sets made into rubber this year! She does not have allow for an Angel Policy for her digital stamps and I sell on Etsy so I am holding out for her rubber). I wish there were more rubber or clear stamps along these lines.

I have found some digitals that are ok, but I really really like to ink it up and press it down and hold it in my hand - you know something tangible. I am still searching, so if you know of any funky offbeat stamps that would be good for Copic coloring please let me know. 

Fleece socks are the greatest thing ever. An Iowa winter is cold (7 inches of snow last night -yuck!). These keep my toes wonderfully warm and cozy. 

Thanks for reading my blog and have a great weekend!

WOYWW and some Layouts

I decided I needed to start scrapbooking, I am so far behind - the images I scrapped this week are from 1998!!!
My goal is at least 1 layout a week, I am pretty sure I can do that. My scrapbooking style is more fun, funky, with bright colors. This style just works, since most of the pictures I scrap are of my daughter. They only time I have done a vintage looking layout is when I have scrapped pictures from when my grandparents were young. I am not sure if its unusual or not, but my scrapbooking style is one way, I am all over the style board when it comes to cards - but mainly I like what I call a whimsical retro feel card, but I also like to make pretty florals, watercolor, clean and simple, some cutsie - mainly Pure Innocence(I do not care for Magnolia's 0 just too much) and of course I do some grunge and vintage cards. My altered art is pretty strictly grunge, vintage. Tim Holtz or Wendy Vecchi style. I just love everything I guess!

Here is a picture of my desk and a couple of layouts I did this week.