A Great Class

Hello, everyone!  I'm so happy that you are visiting today.  I have a quick post to share some of what I did over the weekend.   My daughter and I signed up for two classes with the wonderful Seth Apter.  Seth is one of our favorite mixed media artists.  His classes are always fun and I always come away feeling I've grown in my art.  This time we had a class on Saturday that concentrated on stencils and different ways to use them and different mediums to use them with.  Sunday was a mixed media class creating a piece that exemplified urban art.  Unfortunately, we had an ice storm that caused the class to be canceled and rescheduled for June when Seth will be at The Queen's Ink for another set of classes.  But, Saturday was fantastic! Seth gave us each a stencil from his collection that he designed for Mary Beth Shaw's company Stencil Girl Products.   We used stencils to create a reference guide of different mediums to use with any stencil in the morning and in the afternoon we used what we learned about the mediums to create our own mixed media creation.  

The reference guide was done on three sheets of watercolor paper.  We used inks, sprays, modeling paste, color interference paste, crackle paste and embossing powder with small stencils.  Two areas were painted with black gesso to show the difference between background colors and metallic mediums. 

 

 

 

We used mediums that Seth had already experimented with and his guidance was important.  Some of the pastes are new to the market and are really fantastic.  One that my daughter really liked is Prima's new Finnabair Graphite modeling paste.  It's the third up from the bottom left in the picture above.

 

 

This is what I did in the afternoon.

 

 

 

 

We layered the background with paint and then used stencils to create a design.  I love the window.  It's a Prima stencil that my daughter had.  I deliberately used the gold paste randomly.  I like the effect of a worn image.  The graphite paste that we loved is up in the corners.  Here's a close up so you can see the wonderful texture that's achieved with this new product. 

 

 

 

 

Very cool, I think!  Here's the last detail photo.

 

 

 

 

 

 

That gold modeling paste is very cool.  Wendy Vecchi has one that is very similar to the one we used. 

 

 

If you haven't jumped on the stencil band wagon you should give it a try.  It's great fun and there are so many beautiful stencils out there along with great products to use with them. 

 

 

Well, that's it for today.  Thank you so much for visiting with me today.  I hope you are having lovely spring weather where you are.  We're supposed to be getting more snow tomorrow.  But, next week will be much better, I'm sure ;)!



 

 

 

 



 

Flowers of the Frost

Hello, everyone!  I'm delighted to have you stop by here for a visit.  It's a snowy morning here and so the title of this post is rather appropriate!  We're almost into March and I'm dying to see some of the flowers of the frost.  What are they you ask?  Well, they are the tiny little bulbs that brave the cold of winter and pop up to bring brightness to the dull winter landscape. I've loved them for years because they are a harbinger of what is to come with the spring and summer.  I love my garden and every year I add new plants and shrubs.  I also add some of these little gems.  I tuck them into small areas where I can see them from the windows on  a cold blustery day.  Years ago I read the quote attributed to Gertrude Wister that says "The flowers of late winter occupy places in our hearts well out of proportion to their size."  I agree with that wholeheartedly!  So, I've wanted to do a project incorporating that sentence for a long time.  Finally, I've done one! 



I'm always cutting pictures and whole pages out of magazines and keeping them in file folders.  The biggest folder is one that is filled with flower pictures.  So, as you might imagine, many of the pictures are of those little gems of late winter.  That was the starting point of this canvas.  I covered the canvas with gesso and when that was dry I added fiber paste to some areas with a palette knife to  add some texture.  I used a combination of  paint and stains in Bundled Sage, Weathered Wood, Iced Spruce, and Shaded Lilac.  I also used Lindy's Stamp Gang Glitz Spritz in Cactus Gold add some shimmer.  When it was completely dry I did some stamping with Watering Can archival ink. A technique I learned from Seth Apter and that I use a lot is cross hatching with paint and a credit card to create some texture and color on a canvas. I did some of that, adding more color and texture to the background. I glued down the magazine clipping of potted snow drops and crocuses and then dry brushed it with gesso to blended it in and weather it some.  I printed the quote on cardstock and cut it out attaching it to grunge board to pop it out. I darkened the edges with Weathered Wood DI and used my finger to lightly rub some gesso over it.  I wanted to high light one of the snow drops so I used a stick on acrylic disk over one of the flowers.  I used a tag cut of the same CS and darkened  the edges of that and added it to the top of the canvas with a piece of ribbon from the stash under it.  I used the same ribbon along the bottom to ground the whole composition and keep it from looking as if it was floating in the air.  Here are some details.

I'm so pleased with how this turned out.  I enjoyed working on it and it kept me thinking that soon I'll see my snow drops and crocuses.  Of course, we need to get rid of the snow on the ground first!! 

Well, that's it for today.   Thank you so much for visiting with me.  I appreciate your visits and your kind comments very much.  I hope you have a wonderful day and get some time to be creative in whatever medium you chose. 

A Late Little Valentine Project

Hello, all!  Welcome to you all on this snowy morning in the Mid-Atlantic!  Boston and New England have gotten most of the snow this year but last night and today it was our turn.  Of course, ours wasn't anything like what Boston has endured this year but we can't handle snow the way New England can.  If we ever got 90 inches of snow in a season we'd never dig out!!  Anyway, I don't mind snow if I don't have to drive in it and it certainly is pretty out my window!

Today I want to share another Zentangle project.  My friend, Patti, designed a pretty Valentine Zentangle project and showed a group of us how to make one.  It's a cornet or a tussy-mussy holder.  Here's what it looks like.

 

 

 

Patti supplied the holder and the paper, we chose the tangles we wanted to use.  I added a pop of red throughout because I've come to like the black and white and one bright color in my Zentangles.   I didn't finish it until the day after Valentine's Day but next year I'm going to fill it with chocolates. 

 

 

Here are some details.  The photos aren't very good because the weather hasn't been very cooperative with the light!

 

 

 

As you can see, I've lined it with red card stock and used a red satin ribbon for the handle and the tassel at the bottom.  I'm really pleased with how it turned out. 

Well, that's it for today.  I hope you have a wonderful day.  I'm hoping to do some beading for a change!  Thank you so much for visiting with me and leaving your wonderful comments.  I really appreciate it. 

 





It's almost Valentine's Day!

Hi all!  I'm happy to have you visit.  Well, I'm over winter now and I'm so happy that it's the first week of February.   To me that means that March is that much closer!  And, happy day, my crocuses and daffodils are showing their green!!  Crocuses are my favorite flowers because they are the first ones I see in the late winter and early spring.  Of course, February also means Valentine's Day is right around the corner.  I've been thinking of what I'm going to make for dinner that night and what yummy heart shaped dessert I'll serve.  I always have made a special dinner and dessert for my family on Valentine's Day.  I spend the beginning of February planning and making things to celebrate this pretty bright day in the middle of a dull winter.  This year, there are still cards to be made and dinner to be planned but I took some time to make a Valentine card to put on the table in the family room.  Since the Frilly and Funkie blog has as their challenge theme "Be My Valen-twine"for the next few days I thought I would enter it in the challenge too. The "twine" is the requirement to use twine in whatever you make.  Here is what it looks like.

 I started with a piece of kraft card stock and used Wendy Vecchi's embossing paste and a new Memory Box stencil to make the background.  I tried a new-to-me technique I found on the very talented Astrid's blog.  While the embossing paste was still wet I sprinkled some of it with gold embossing powder and the rest with red glitter embossing powder and heated them.  I love the way the embossing paste bubbled and puffed.  I let the gold spill onto the red so I had a two toned embossing.   I cut a piece of red CS with the TH trellis die and used my finger to rub some gold Gilders' Paste on it.  I also rubbed Gilders Paste on the edge of the CS. I had the vintage Valentine clown image in my stash.  I wrapped the card with gold wrapped bakers' twine.  I glued the kraft CS to a striped paper that I had distressed and rubbed with Vintage Photo DI on the edge.  That was glued to a piece of red embossed CS which I rubbed with Gilders Paste.  Here are some details.

 

 

 



 So, there is my first Valentine for this year!  It looks great on the table. 

I have continued on with the #28patterns challenge which I talked about in this post. 

Here are two of the Zentangles I've posted the last couple of days.  

My initial done in Joanne Fink's Zenspirations style.

 

 

 

 

 

So, that's what I've been doing the last few days.  I think the Muse is beginning to wake up!  Must be seeing those crocus and daffodil leaves!!

 

 

Thank you so much for visiting with me today.  I hope you have a wonderful and creative day!





It's been a while!

Hi to all of my wonderful visitors!  It's been a long time since I last posted.  But, there have been reasons.  The first one is that after the rush of the holidays my mojo went into storage along with all the decorations.  That sometime happens to me after the hustle and bustle of Fall and Christmas. My muse needs a rest I suppose!  Then I caught a horrible cold.  It wasn't the flu, just a plain old head cold but it lasted for a long time and I felt I lost about 10 days because I really didn't have much energy.  I'm happy that it's gone!  I'm not sure my mojo is back but I feel like it's beginning to come out of hibernation. 

I saw on Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's blog a challenge she's sponsoring on Instagram called #28Patterns.  Now, I have to say I'm not a hashtag kind of person!  I'm not on Facebook or Twitter, I have enough to occupy my time, I don't need any other time drains.  Sorry if I've offended anyone by calling them that but that is how I think of them.  But, I do post pictures to Instagram, usually of  my projects or flowers from my garden.  Not very interesting stuff but I do have some friends who enjoy seeing them. Anyway, I thought this might encourage the muse to return.  The idea is to get down on paper a pattern a day for the month of February.  It can be any medium.  So, I'm giving it a try.  I'm not really good at keeping up with things like this but I thought this could work because I can always practice Zentangle.  And, even if I don't do a pattern a day, I'll do some days!!!

I resisted getting involve with Zentangles for a long time.  Patti Euler, my friend who owns the wonderful local  paper arts store, The Queen's Ink, is a Certified Zentangle Teacher and she gives classes from beginner on to more advanced instruction.  Her work is beautiful and I've been drawn to the clean black and white patterning even though I'm a color fanatic.  Finally, last summer my daughter and I signed up for the beginner class.  I've enjoyed it immensely and we've taken other classes since then.  I've been trying to keep up with doing it regularly so the idea of 28Patterns was appealing.  I could always do a Zentangle.  Yesterday was the first day of this challenge so this is what I did.

 

 

There isn't much to tell you about it.  Tangles are like doodling.  When color is added to the black and white they are considered Zentangle inspired art.  Since it's February and Valentine's Day is right around the corner I'm in full heart mode!!  I love Valentine's Day, and have since I was  a child, because it's a bright spot in the midst of a gray, dull winter!  So, I've been doing a lot of heart Zentangles and this is my latest!

 

 

I probably won't post these 28 patterns, or whatever I make, everyday, but you'll probably see some of them.  At least you'll be hearing from me more often :)! 

 

For now though, thank you for visiting with me today and reading all this!  Not much eye candy today and lots of words so I'll end for now.  Have a wonderful day, I hope it's a sunny day where you are! 

 

A Quick Update

Hello to you all!   Thanks for dropping in here today.  I have a quick update to my project for the challenge, A Time to Stitch.  You can find my post about what I made and the challenge hosts and participants here.  At first I didn't know what I wanted to do about a necklace for the pendant and then I ran out of time to make what I decided on.  I wanted to make a chain that wouldn't distract from the pendant.  The  holidays came along and I didn't get to it.   By the day of the reveal I had a few links done.  Over the weekend I finished all the links and jump rings and tumbled them in my new Christmas gift, a tumbler!!!  Here is the necklace completed.

 

 

 

 

I'm very happy with the finished necklace.  The chain coordinates with the pendant but doesn't distract from it.  I used a finer wire than I wanted but the color was perfect and it fit through the holes of the Delicas. I also used some of the fire polished beads in the links. 

 

That's it for today.  I wanted to share the finished piece because some of you kindly said that you would like to see it finished.  I hope you have  great day and get the time to bead or do whatever your do to feed your creative spirit.   Thank you so much for visiting with me today.

A Time to Stitch

Hello, everyone!  Happy New Year!  It's so nice to have you visit with me today.  The holidays are over, all the decorations are put away and now we can breathe slowly and get back to creating wonderful projects!  I know that's what I'm hoping to do.  I actually got back to beading this week so that I could finish the project for this round of A Time to Stitch!  This blog hop is sponsored by Therese and Christine.  It's always a lot of fun and it often spurs me on to try something I've been putting off doing.  The idea behind it is to try a stitch that you haven't used before.  This time that idea was changed up a bit.  This time we were supposed to use a word chart, a picture chart or graft.  I like working with word charts because I knit and use word charts all the time.  I decided to use a pattern designed by Eridhan Creations.  The pattern I chose was one called Twisted Triangle.  I love peyote stitched triangles and I had never done one based on June Huber's idea of using different sized beads to create a "twist".  Here is what my pendant looks like.

I chose neutral colors so the "twist" would be the focus of the piece.  I didn't know what I wanted to do for a necklace because I didn't want something that was going to be too busy.  I decided to make my own chain out of wire and the bronze fire polished beads that are in the center of each side.  But, the holidays brought the entire thing to a standstill and I didn't have time to get all the links made by today.  I do have some finished.

 

 

 

I'll link them together with jump rings and attach them to the triangle.  I'll post a picture of the finished necklace when it's all put together.

 

 

Thanks to Christine and Therese for hosting this hop.  It's always a lot of fun and I always make some thing that I've been wanting to do!  Below is a list of all the participants.  Be sure to check out their blogs and see what they have created.

 

 

1-Therese Frank  (Host)    

2-Christine Altmiller  (Host)

3-Cynthia Machata

4-Samantha Wescott

5-Karin Slaton

6-Wendy

7-LizE

8-Dagi (Kokopelli)

9-Lola

10-Paula

11-Karin G.

12-Becky Pancake

13-Ana Cravidao

14-Alenka

15-Debbie (Kepi)

16-Nelly May

17-LiliKrist

18-Sally Russick

19-Maryanne (you are here)

20-Kim

21-Amy

 

 

Thank you for visiting me today.  I hope you have a great day and find some time to create!