ATC for Art Lottery

The theme for the Sept. Art Lottery on NGS is "flourishes & swirls". So there was a bit of method to my madness when making my worksheet wonder earlier today. Here's the section I cut out to use for the ATC I'm working on. I love the punched holes in the side and have to incorporate them in the piece (sorry for the blurry picture).
To make the holes more prominent and to add more blue to the piece, I ran a bit of blue metallic foil under the punched holes:
I choose an image I liked, I stamped bits of the same flourish on it with Lumiere paint:
Before adding the image, I stamped the same flourish with the same Lumiere paint over the background. Added a red ribbon, black paper to make the image stand out, and a flower.
I like the quirkiness of this ATC. Maybe this month, I'll win the lottery and will be able to keep it : )

Worksheet Wonders

I was thrilled that I had the time to participate in another one of Trish's Background Noise Challenges: #13!!! This one takes the scrap paper you use under your work to protect you counter tops, and turns it into art paper. I had a sheet handy that I'd used this way and had also used in the bottom of my spray box. Here's how it looked at first, a big mess: I colored the blank areas with a lavender Distress ink: I wanted to pick up on the flourish that was already on the paper. I used the same stamp with gesso to give the paper a unified feel (note how the white stamping soften the big black area): After the gesso dried, I used some script and postscript images to stamp over the paper: While the ink was still wet, I covered the whole sheet with clear embossing ink and heat set:Next, I wrinkled up the paper to cause some areas to crack. Then working in one area at a time, reheated the embossing to make it sticky, laid down some colored foil and rubbed with my fingers. This added fun metallic highlights to the paper. It still looks messy, but it's now ready to be used in projects:
Here's a close up to give you an idea of all the shimmer this paper now has:

My First Jam

Stephanie emailed me and asked me if I participated in JAM. I had no idea what it was. She explained: she'd make 3 similar backgrounds, mail them to me; I'd add 3 identical elements & then send them to a third artist of my choice, who'd finish the ATCs, keep one, send the others to Stephanie who would send one completed one to me. I said ok and she sent me the backgrounds you see below (the photo doesn't show the cool metallic sheen these have):

I decided to add 3D butterflies and choose the papers you see below. The piece on the left was made by using the leftover paint I made to cover the top half of the second page in the board book project I'm participating in. The piece on the right is copper colored metallic foil:

I cut the butterfly shapes out with a Cuttlebug die and ran the orange piece through the Cuttlebug two times: first with the swiss dots embossing folder and colored with Brilliance ink; second through the collage embossing folder and colored with black StazOn ink. I ran the copper foil one through the swirly embossing folder and colored with black StaZon ink. I then attached the two butterflies back to back.
Oh, before running the paper through the Cuttlebug die, I ran the heavier orange paper through the Zyron to apply adhesive. Now I have the backing sheets cut out in the butterfly shape complete with the embossed designs. I'll save them for a future project.
Here's a close up of my addition to the backgrounds. (Sorry for the screen shadow, I put the ATC on my window sill to get a picture in daylight)

Here's a side view:
These are being sent on to Annie, who agreed to do the final step. I'm looking forward to seeing how she finishes these off. Thanks Annie for agreeing to play!!!!

Music ATC

This is also for the Music and Dance ATC swap on ccswaps. I love this gypsy image. I wanted the background to go with the red & green scarf she's wearing.

Back when I was working on page 2 of the Board Book project, I mixed green and gold acrylic paints, and spread the extra on card stock. Later, I added another layer of paint and used my paste paper tool to make this paste paper for the green side. The other side is red card stock with a music sheet stamped on with black ink.

Dance ATC

I've signed up for the Music and Dance ATC swap on ccswaps. For this ATC I used the background I made of cut colored tissue paper on glossy card stock. I stamped a music sheet with Brilliance ink and heat set. Then stamped flourished with Lumiere paint.
I stamped the same flourish in the middle of the ATC with black Archival ink. Edged the ATC with the same Lumiere, and when it dried with the black Archival ink pad. I cut the "wings" out of fabric and added a ballerina image on top.

Art in Progress: Board Book: Page 3 step 1

You can read Trish's instructions on Art Buzz for what we were supposed to do. I was too impatient to let any of the steps dry overnight. LOL I used my heat tool as necessary to speed things along. Glued scraps of paper on with Elmer's glue. Sponged on gesso. Then used the same combo to make my brown wash as I did on page 2. Now I'm eagerly waiting for the next instructions for this page!!!

"I Love Your Blog" Award

Thanks Rob for nominating my blog. I love so many blogs. You can see the list of blogs I enjoy on my side bar. I know I need to take some time to clean some out that haven't updated in a long time, I just keep hoping I'll see more art on their sites.........

Anne Le Toux's Art giveaway.

I was so glad I saw this link to Anne's blog. Her art is gorgeous, and at the moment, she has a giveaway of one of her beautiful collages, go take a look and leave a comment here and you might have a chance to win.

Busy Sewing

My favorite princess turns 3 soon, and I have to mail her gift to the Midwest, so I've been sewing. Like her grandma, blue is the favorite color. I couldn't resist making this gown for her. I'm not used to working with material that slides all over the place. Then the detail of encasing all the netting, so nothing "itchy" touches her highness. LOL I'm sure she'll love it. Next something in cotton for everyday, then back to paper arts!!!

Art in Progress: Board Book: Page 2 finished

You can see all the instructions to creating this spread over on Art Buzz. I made a brown wash with walnut ink, decided it was too faint. Sprayed on Adirondak ink and then sponged on some Distress ink to get the color I liked.
I cut the flowers out of scraps of background paper, and used 3 different brads for their centers. I found this flower quote that I thought went well with the bright & bold design and added an image of one of my favorite babies.

Medieval ATC Holder

On Art-Venturers, Adrienne will be the "It" girl in September. I got an early start, since it will be sent to Wales. Her theme is medieval. I wanted to make an ATC holder for her, and was inspired in the design by the Gothic Door Covers Wendy Thrift in Australia made for her Angel Skinny book. She doesn't have a blog, so I can't show you her gorgeous covers.
I made the template by laying the plastic holders where I would attach them on both sides with the Bind-It-All, and cut out cardboard in an arched door shape. I cut out another piece to match and then cut it down the middle to make the front doors.
I painted over the cardboard with gold acrylic paint. When it dried I ran the front doors through the Cuttlebug, using a wood like embossing folder for the lower portion, then used the swirl embossing folder for the upper portion. I used a Brilliance ink pad to run over the surfaces. Below you see the front and back side of the doors:
To decorate the inside back, I printed out an illustrated text, wrinkled it up and opened. Sprayed with walnut ink and heat set. Ran a light Distress ink over the surface then stamped flourishes with a dark Distress ink.
I choose an angel image to use on the inside of the doors, cut them out, then over stamped a texture design with a light Distress ink to give them an aged appearance:
To make aged looking door handles, I cut out grunge board with a flourish die, and painted with bronze Lumiere paint. Then hammered with a texture hammer and layered on color with Distress inks:

I finished the front by stamping Adrienne's initials with black ink on gold paper and mounting on bronze card stock.
Inside:
Inside back:
Back of holder: I just ran a brown Brilliance ink over the surface with a streaking motion and stamped an image with black Archival ink.
Hope it passes for medieval.

Bandanna Tags

While I was in town yesterday, I picked up a white Gelly Roll pen to try out on the tags I colored earlier. I thought this pen worked great. Here is one set I did:
The other set:
I couldn't pick out a favorite color, I like them all. But since blue is my favorite color, I picked out those to show a close up of what I made:

Art in Progress: Board Book: Page 2 steps 1 & 2

We were given instructions for the first steps on the second page of our board book project on NGS. Purple text is Trish's instructions to us:

Board Book Page 2 - Step 1:1. Gesso the next 2 pages of your book, if you haven't already done so.2. Use a pencil and ruler and mark a feint horizontal line across the book going right across the 2 pages - you want the line to be just below the halfway mark(middle) of the book - in other words there should be more surface area above the pencil line than below it.3. Using the pencil line as a guide & using the same pencil; draw a wavy line across the 2 pages along the line - you can make the wavy line super wavy or a gentle incline or go all out crazy wavy - its up to YOU. Just make sure there is a nice wavy line going across the pages. Do NOT worry about being neat and tidy. 4. Paint the area above the wavy line with bright ORANGE paint - acrylic or similar - paint right up to the wavy line - don't worry if you go over the lines as you can neaten it up afterwards. Let paint dry. I didn't have orange paint so I mixed red and a yellow gold acrylic with a little acrylic glaze. 5. Paint the area below the wavy line with lime green acrylic paint or similar -as before paint right up to the wavy line. I used green and yellow gold to make a bright green color. Let it dry.Once you've done that scan it in and share it! And give me a shout... I painted the extra color mixtures onto scrap card stock to be used in the future.

Step 2:1. Paint a thin red stripe along the wavy border across your page - paint it on the side where there is more orange background colour. Don't worry about neatness.2. Using the same red paint add colour to 2 pages torn out of a paperback book -if you don't have a paperback book you can tear text pages out of a magazine instead and add colour to them. Set these aside once dry for future use. 3. Take 3 sheets of paper from a paperback book - or you can use 3 pages of text torn from a magazine, using a damp sponge lightly gesso over these 3 pages - do not completely white out the text - you want the text to still be visible through the gesso. Let dry. 4. Take 1 sheet of the gesso book paper and cut it into narrow strips, use pva glue to glue strips of paper to the green part of your book pages as if creating candy stripes - leave a gap roughly the same size of the paper strip so that you create stripes across the pages of green and book paper. Trim off any excess,don't worry about making the strips fit perfectly over the top of the red border. 5. Using the other sheet of gesso-ed book paper, use a circle punch or cut free hand to cut out lots of little circle shapes. Set these aside for later use. 6. Take a pencil with a small rubber/eraser on one end and use this as a stamp - dip it into gesso and apply white dots to the orange background, don't worry about being exact - just stamp the dots till your happy with the results and set aside to dry.

Looking forward to the next steps and seeing how this turns out.

Carol C's deco

Carol is a member of Art-Venturers participating in the 'Art' deco round robin. I decided to revisit a couple of fabulous techniques for Carol's deco. For the front I choose the March Technique Challenge from Tim Holtz's blog. I had done this in March. Instead of using acrylic paint, I stamped images with gesso and let it dry.

I made three different sprays with Adirondak inks & perfect pearls in mini misters and sprayed over the card stock and heat set.
Used a baby wipe, to wipe the spray off the gessoed images. Then I stamped a bird and some words with black Archival ink, added a saying and ran a gold Krylon pen over the edges to finish the front of the page:

For the back, I used the Textured Cuttlebug Card technique similar to the one shown by Annette Husband. I played with this technique in June. I ran 4 papers through the Cuttlebug with 4 different embossing folders. Tore them and used 4 different sections and glued them onto card stock. I slipped an image in the center and gessoed over the entire surface, then wiped most of the gesso off the center image with a baby wipe.

I placed a torn piece of paper over the image and sprayed the surface with a color mist of red ink & copper perfect pearls. I added more color with Brilliance ink pads and gold spray, the lightning black Brilliance ink was rubbed on with my finger and then wiped off, to make the embossing show more.I covered the image with clear embossing powder and the rest with holographic embossing powder and heat set.

Added a flower and a saying and colored the edges with a gold Krylon pen. Punched holes to finish the back: