Wednesday Stamper - Openings

I was incredibly flattered when Belinda asked if she could use my ATC that I made for the Oxford Impressions swap as an inspiration piece for today's Wednesday Stamper. I absolutely love interactive art - from slider cards to pop-ups and everything in between. It takes something static and makes it more interesting.

Since I gave my muse the week off, I didn't participate in the Gothic Arches 'Grunge' challenge or the Created Byhand 'Love' challenge. I decided I'd try to incorporate both into my WS piece.

My background is made of pieces of aluminum I cut from cans and then ran through my Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder. Probably not the way most people use it! I think it looks really industrial. The heart, wings, hinges, and oval piece are all Grungeboard. The love stamp is from Oxford Impressions' My Story plate. This is definitely best viewed large.

I think my muse just needed a break. Now, if I could just get that Madonna song out of my mind. :-)

Wednesday Stamper - Gesso

I almost didn't do Wednesday Stamper today, even though it's one of my favorite challenges. And, I love gesso! What's wrong with me? Sometimes the muse just flees......

I decided I would just throw something together without thinking. I grabbed an old French cookbook page thinking I'd do some kind of French Country thing w/black gesso and a chicken. Whatever. Just do something! I had a piece of tagboard that I thought, huh, glue it on that I guess. I had some acrylics sitting out so I grabbed those and did a wash. Hmm....I'm liking it now. Grabbed the closest stamp - a flourish by Tim Holtz - and stamped part of it using black gesso. Used the Painted Mesh technique from Technique Junkies to cover it more.

Ahhhhh...now what? Photo stamp? Collage image? How about some Grungeboard? Paint it with the black gesso. Oh yes, that's it, coming together now. A few words, more Grungeboard letters, stitching to tie it all together. Done. And I'm glad I did it too. Sometimes you just have to slap your muse around a little. ;-)

Created ByHand - Flourishes

Had to do a quickie for Created Byhand this morning - I'm headed here to eat here with her and then go here and maybe buy one of these.

Have a great day!

Gothic Arches - New Year

For the New Year challenge on Gothic Arches. Stamps are from Heidi Swapp (clock), Artistic Outpost, and Vicki Enkoff.

Art Creations Friday

I finally got a chance to participate in the Art Creations Friday challenge this week. I love the background they featured this week - absolutely gorgeous! I added my own touch to it with the painted mesh technique and also added some extra color with various Distress inks. The flowers are from my new Grungeboard pack and stamps are all from Oxford Impressions.

Have a great weekend!

Theme Thursday - Something New!

Our challenge for this week's Theme Thursday was to try something new - new technique, new stamps, new products, etc. Well, I just happen to have all kinds of new stuff, so this was a great challenge!

For my background I used a technique called painted mesh from the latest Technique Junkie newsletter. This is the first time I've tried it and I can see all kinds of possibilities for future projects. Great, easy technique - my favorite kind!

Next I used some of my new Grungeboard that I bought the other day. I love the designs in this package! I hadn't seen it before, but it's full of flowers, birds, butterflies, and letters. For this piece I painted the Grungeboard with gesso. When it was dry I covered it with Martha's glitter and sponged the edges lightly with Broken China Distress ink.

The little girl is from the new Fairy Sweets plate from Oxford Impressions. I think she looks adorable riding on that bird! The white background piece was run thru the Cuttlebug several times until it was all embossed. I'd never done that before, but it came out looking pretty cool. Something to try when you have a piece that is larger than your folder. It was ok to overlap on this because I was mostly wanting a lot of texture, not necessarily a distinct image. Hope that makes sense! :-)

I'm glad so many of you have been stopping by to download the clock face. Please feel free to leave a comment if you'd like to!