Artful Journeys week 39 - Tea time

This week over at Artful Journeys we decided to have a bit of a party....a tea party, that is.

My spread didn't turn out quite the way I'd hoped it would, but I don't hate it, so I'll leave the gesso where it sits, lol.

I started by printing up pics of pretty teacups I found on Pinterest and fussy cutting them out...then I chose one of my prepped backgrounds and got busy with a glue stick, coming up with this....

And here are close-ups of the left and right pages....

The background was done with cheap craft acrylics and stencils....thanks for looking!

Artful Journeys Week 38 - Fall is in the Air

Wow!  Week 38!  I am beyond surprised by how fast this year is moving along.  It's hard for me to believe that it's already the middle of September, but the calendar tells me it is.  And of course there's the pennant race in baseball, school just started back up, and there are Christmas decorations EVERYWHERE!!!  I'm looking forward to cooler weather, that's for sure.  

And, as always, with cooler weather, comes fall, falling leaves and the inevitable raking.  It seemed appropriate that we have  a prompt about leaves...that's it...just "leaves".  It's open for interpretation and artistic license, but you have to use leaves.  One big one, lots of little ones...however, whichever you want.

So I fiddled around with a few thoughts, tried a couple of different ideas out, but my spread was a flash of inspiration that came out of the blue.  

Gathering up some of my underpapers, painted papers and a piece of a map, I started cutting leaves out of them.  Nothing fancy, just a basic leaf shape in all sizes.  Nothing too large, but lots and lots of small ones.    Then I printed a pic off Pinterest and fussy cut out my subject.  

I started by gluing down a few of the leaves, then gluing down my fussy cut pic, then I got to work making a leaf pile!  It was so much fun creating this little spread, and I was incredibly glad I'd thought of it.  And here it is!

Isn't she just the cutest?!?!?!?!  She looks like she's laughing and having so much fun!

That's it for me this week...hope you enjoyed looking, and be sure to visit Betty and Shana to see what they pulled off for you!

Later, y'all!

Week 37 - Artful Journeys-Go to the Fair

When I was a kid, I spent all year, every year looking forward to the fair.  Even as an adult I still look forward to it...more for the food than anything....things you can't get, and probably wouldn't if you could, any other place than at the fair.  Things like Chicken Fried Bacon, Fried Twinkies and Beer, footlong corny dogs, funnel cakes the size of your head, salt water taffy and so much more.  When I was a kid, I had dreams about the cinnamon rolls we would get every year at the fair.  As you stood in this HUGE line, you could watch them making the rolls, and I just remember thinking how much I loved all the butter they used, and the sugar, and the cinnamon...oh, hell, I loved it all!  Then there were the strawberry crepes...with a mountain of whipped cream.  And Dan's Indian Tacos.  Unfortunately, you can't get those at the fair here in Texas, so I've had to scour the internet for a passable recipe.  But I digress....

I had all these different ideas for my spread this week, but I couldn't get any of them to work for me, so I pulled up my PicMonkey and got busy doing a little pasting and what-not.  It still isn't what I was wanting to achieve, but after numerous failed attempts, I decided to take what I could get and leave it at that...so here it is....

I hope you like it...thanks for looking, y'all!

Artful Journeys - Wk 36 - Oh the places you'll go

So, I have always dreamed of traveling...I love exploring "new" (to me) places.  I love looking at houses and buildings and all the sights a new place has to offer.  But the one place I have ALWAYS dreamed of seeing in person, is Ireland.  So since this week's prompt is about "creating" a "travel ad" for your favorite/dream destination, I was really excited about doing a spread on Ireland...that excitement was short lived, lol.  I had a lot of trouble finding images that were just the right size so that I could get them all onto my spread.  It wasn't working!!!  Well, Betty said she was going digital, and with all the pics I had saved on my puter, I knew I could do the same and still be able to use almost all of them without any problem or extra paper!

A Pinterest search of Ireland gave me access to SO MANY great images that it was hard to choose, but I did my best, saving them to the computer to print and cut...ugh, cutting!  The problem was, a wallet size was too big, and a contact print was too small.  With the online amazingness that is PicMonkey, I could make the images as big or as small as I wanted!

I started by uploading a background from a previous prompt....this one to be exact....

A little cropping and it was just the backgroun and I was ready to roll.  Now I won't be posting pics of the images  I used, as that might be a copyright no-no and I don't wanna be getting into any trouble, but I will show you a pic of my completed spread after everything was added to the background above.  PicMonkey is just wonderful!  Easy to use, and with plenty of options for creating digital layouts or just editing existing photos...it's really up to you!


So, without any further blabbin', here's my spread for this week's prompt:

I was incredibly pleased with how this turned out and want to give a shoutout to PicMonkey for making it possible.


That's it for this week....thanks for stopping by to take a look and be sure to go and see what the other girls have created for you this week!

Later, y'all!

Artful Journeys Week 35 - Sweet Memories

It's funny.  When I first started planning this prompt, I was grousing and grumbling about how I was already over it and hadn't even started the damn thing yet, lol.  But once I got started painting it, I knew I had to finish it, because the memories it brought back were ones I had almost forgotten and now I never will.  Before my folks split up in 1976, we used to go to the lake all the time to fish and camp.  One of my most favorite things to do was to catch fireflies after dinner, and while my mother was freaking out about ticks and whatever else she could think of, my daddy was in the bushes with me, helping me catch fireflies.  I never kept them for long, certainly not more than an hour, but that hour was long enough, and the memories are so wonderful...sometimes the most irritating noise, or a seemingly aggravating prompt, can refresh our memories and bring a smile to our faces after all.  

So let me tell you what I did...

I actually painted over a background in my altered book because I didn't like the way it had turned out, so down went 4 shades of red, some orange and some purple...once all that was dry, I then went across the bottom of the page with black, making trees and bushes for my fireflies to play in.  I used a nail art tool and a toothpick to create my little fireflies, then added some acrylic inks to give the image of the setting sun reflecting off the clouds in the sky...I added a few stars as well, then my little quote.  I ended up having quite a bit of fun with this quote even though I was not even close to being jazzed about it when I started.  

The initial layer

After the "trees" were added.

Here it is after the acrylic "clouds" and fireflies were added.

And here with the "stars" and the quote.

Left page

Right page

close up of the quote.

That's usually how it goes for me, although occasionally I will find one that I still don't like even after I'm done with it.  But that's what art and this group is all about...pushing yourself to step outside of your comfort zone and try new things...even if they're only new to you.

So there you have it....my take on this week's prompt.  I hope you enjoyed it, and thanks so much for stopping by.

Later, y'all!!

Artful Journeys-Wk 34-Take a look

When you think about it, how many windows do you see every day?  Do you even know?  Do you ever wonder what goes on behind those windows?  Maybe you can see from the street, if it's dark out, the lights are on and the blinds open.  Of course, there are some folks that go to extreme lengths to look into windows even when they shouldn't, lol.  My spread this week is a reminder for all of us, that just because we're at home, we might not be alone....

For this spread I started with my usual papers and gesso, then came back at it with two shades of red and a couple of different images....the image on the left is from Va Va Voom..., and the one on the right, behind the window from a bill envelope, is from the back cover of a magazine...a little stenciling and a quote, and I was done!

Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Week 33 - Who's "Bad"?

Oh, man, let me tell you what....this has been a hella crazy week artistically speaking!  Altered playing cards, journal spreads and challenges, and of course, this week's prompt...all have seen some work on the "studio table" (insert "dining room table" and you'll have an accurate description of my "studio".  I don't really mind having to work in the dining room until a certain spouse, or children start pestering me about feeding them...then it's kinda a pain in the ass.  Can't lock them out of the dining room....sigh, but, sometimes I get lucky, and in just over a week, the kids will be going back to school and the house will be mine alone during the day!  Can you say "happy dance"?

So, anyways, back to the prompt for this week...."Bad Poetry". Let's get to it, shall we?

So I started with these supplies:

Yup...that was it...minus the paper, glue stick and gesso.  The thing that took me the longest for this spread, was finding the words to use for my "bad poetry".  I've recently been dismantling magazines, cutting out images and words for using in my art journal, and even my art for swaps and to sell, and so I have a small bucket that I'm keeping words, phrases and more in...so I went to digging in it to create some "bad poetry"

I started by creating my background.  Artist's Loft Turquoise and Liquitex Basics Titanium White, laid down over various papers & gesso.  I then grabbed a few stencils and still using the same two colors, did a little work with those.  I got turned on to the restricted color palette work by a challenge we did earlier this past week, and really fell in love with it, and knew it would be something I would be doing again.

Left page

Right page

Once the background was done and drying, I started looking for something to "write" my "bad poetry" on...and found this cute little folder/envelope that was made for me by my dear friend, Lynn.  I glued down my w

ords and called it good.  But upon further thought, I had decided it needed something more...it just looked unfinished.  Another friend agreed, and I went to work with a Neocolor ii, and my Tim Holtz mini distress pad in black soot...I outlined the words and went around the edges of the spread with the Neocolor, then edged the pages again with my mini pad.  I put down some washi tape, too, just for some added interest, and called it a night.

The folder with the poetry.

The entire spread.

A close-up of one of the pages showing the detail and how great it turned out.  

I have to say I was very pleased with how this spread turned out, even though I'm not sure  my "poetry" was worth a damn, lol.

In other artistic pursuits from this week I got busy creating some altered playing cards...Still working on them, but they sure are fun, and I really like the ones I've gotten done so far.  Here's a shot of them before I started the final stages:

And here are some of the ones I've completed so far:

And last, but not least, here's the spread I did for the limited palette challenge on Artful Journeys...the challenge was to create a spread using black and white...it was great!

And there you have it!  My creative endeavors since my last post...thanks for stopping by!

Later, y'all!!!

Artful Journeys Week 32 - Resistance is futile

So many techniques, so little time...so when you have the opportunity to try something new, how can you resist?  Especially if it requires no purchasing of supplies because you can use stuff you already have!

So this week we did a watercolor/salt resist...WET is key...mist the watercolors, mist your paper well, put the watercolors on the paper, spritz it with more water, then drop some coarse ground salt on top of the WET page..then wait.  It's gotta dry completely before you brush of the salt...Here's what mine turned out like.

 Two different watercolor backgrounds after salting and drying.

But wait!  I'm not done!

So while talking to a friend on the phone, I asked her if you could do this with the Dylusions ink sprays...she said she didn't know...maybe if the paper were wet enough...so I got a hair up my ass and decided to give it a go...just to see what would happen...well, AWESOMESAUCE happened!!!!!

How freakin' cool is THAT?!?!??!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

So, for the spread, I took one of the watercolor pages, did a little lettering on a squared index card and came up with this!

But that's not the only fun I got to have this week!  Check out some of the other stuff I created!

Those are 3 spreads I've created this week...the top 2 in an altered book, the bottom one in my large Dylusions journal...Loving those colors!

Then there were these little motivational altered playing cards I created for a swap:

These were SOOOOO much fun!!!!!!  And my Muse was just screaming at me to keep going...don't stop...grab that...use that stamp.  It was just fantastic and I was so very pleased with the way they all turned out.

I really had a very artfully productive week, an I am looking forward to many more in the future.

What did you create this week?  I dare you to share it with me!  Leave me some love, and as always, make sure to go see the other girls in the team and see what they have to share with you this week!

Later, y'all!!!!!

Artful Journeys-Week 31-Kissed by a Rose

This week's prompt damn near drove me mad!  Go organic.

Really?  It's the first of August in Texas...everything is brown...brown leaves, brown grass, brown dirt, brown flowers and brown plants!  And the last thing I wanted was to put something in my journal that was just gonna crumble and make a big-ass mess for me to contend with every time I open my journal.

Well, it finally hit me while I was at the store, walking by the flowers, that I could just get some flower petals and put them down.  So that's what I did!

Using gel medium on a 7x10 sheet of mixed media paper, I laid down some rose petals in pink and yellow, making sure to leave some of them raised off the page, to give plenty of texture.  Nothing fancy or difficult...just 3 ingredients!

I'll be honest with you....I did NOT have fun with this prompt.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that if I ever have to do another prompt like this, I will vociferously, and respectfully decline.  

Now, onto other things!  So this was the last week for ICAD 2015 - and I managed to complete the entire challenge, creating 61 index cards of art for 61 days!  I was so pleased!  Here are the ones I created this last week:

I've gotta say I was very proud of myself for pushing myself to see this challenge thru till the end.  Last year, I think I got 3 cards done...just 3.  This year I just kept telling myself it was about the creating, NOT the prompts offered to us for inspiration!  

Thanks so much for looking, and have a wonderful week filled with art!

Later, y'all!!!!!