Work in Progress

Ummm, yeah I know-what a disaster but I swear there is some magic happening here somewhere.

Tim Holtz 12 Tags

Tim Holtz is hosting his 12 Tags of Christmas event again this year...it is beyond inspiring. Every year I think I am going to participate day by day but it never happens...maybe after the Holidays I can try out some of the techniques? This year he added the ability to upload your interpretation of his tag which is Fabulous...everyday there are hundreds of additional inspiring tags to look at!
My Ebay store is clearing out FAST...there are a few Tim Holtz dies,folders and embellishments left-I think one or two Holiday stamp sets, and a few of his tools. The place is echoing though..LOL..I have a very small order coming tomorrow with a few additional items. The week of Xmas I will do my year end inventory, clear out the old stuff and start fresh for 2012...are there any special requests for the NEW YEAR? I will continue to carry Memory Box dies(sorry the last order sold out with three hours of listing it) plus the additional of the Poppystamps dies. I am looking into dies and stamps from My Favorite Things..I adore their Pure Innocence line and would like to carry them along with their thin steel dies.
I suppose I should get my Holiday cards done(or even started before i end up having to make them into Valentines)...I have three or four ideas...I need to narrow it down to which one I can actually make multiples of within a reasonable amount of time. Sigh....

Memory Box Craft Dies

Have you tried the craft dies from Memory Box? The designs are unbelievable and I cannot keep these little gems in stock...I received two orders in the past month and have two more coming within the next 3 weeks. I haven't even been able to keep any for myself yet. These are super thin steel dies, made in the USA and are compatible with all the leading Die Cut machines. The basic "sandwich" is the same as you would use for the Spellbinder dies, you may need to "shim" it,every machine cuts differently. I am trying to get some Sizzix thin die adapters in stock but the darn things are always sold out.

In other news...have you started your Christmas cards yet?? yeah me neither...I have two stamps picked out to use but more than likely I will change my mind a thousand times and end up creating 5 or 6 different designs. Do you settle on all one design or do several?

my newest treasure

I picked up this wonderful chippy aqua bench the other day, it was filthy,sitting in some guys front yard...it is the perfect addition to my art room. I found a few other goodies that are in various states of being cleaned up, I will share more as they reach a reasonable "doneness"

Two in one day?

Here are my third set of banners...I will never understand how Blogspot photos work, it doesn't matter in what order I upload them they are never in that order when published?? Whatever-at least they are all there.

it figures

It figures, I sign up for a class and suddenly my life gets very busy. That's OK, I am still plugging away. I finally got the 2nd set of banners photographed and only need to assemble the third set. THEN I have to get caught up on three days of class...I will enjoy every second of it.
This class is helping figure out changes I need to make in my art room to make it flow better, my vintage stool, while VERY cute is not working for me, I need to be able to spin around to access the drawers behind me, I need to be able to wheel out to stand up ( I do a lot of standing while I am creating). I need a CLEARED surface to put my cuttlebug and paper cutter on...flat surfaces do NOT stay clear around me, this is gonna be a tough one...I think i will just have to keep the two pieces out all the time to prevent myself from piling things on the top of the cabinet I keep them in. I am going to have to index my clear stamps so I can flip through a book to see what I have..it is too hard to flip through the basket and know what is there ( love/ hate relationship with clear stamps...so many cool designs but I just find them frustrating to work with and put away so i end up with a dish full of random clear stamps that all need put away with their proper set.)
OK-I think I should have a couple of hours today to get busy in that room!

dry embossing on black glossy

I learned a little technique in the class I'm taking using your embossing folders on glossy paper and sanding lightly to expose the un-glossy paper and inking it...pretty cool but I got to thinking about black glossy paper...here is the result..oh the possibilities!!

Class Day One

Here are my pieces for Day One of the Inspiration Showcase Class. I decided to make a banner rather than a canvas because I am in the middle of revamping my art room and I thought a banner would be more versatile.
I just watched the Day Two videos and am so inspired to go back to my room and play some more!

on a roll

I find this idea fascinating...inspiring...intriguing....do-able...I like the idea of a kind of "journal tape journal"...informal,random,colorful,personal, & funky.....
Artsyville for more photos and info

OnLINe Class

Have you all seen this...
http://www.onlinecardclasses.com/inspirationshowcase/classinfo/ an online class featuring some of the biggest names in the stamping world and it's only $19...it took me about 5 seconds to decide before signing up. Hopefully this is the boost I need to get creative again.
It has been a busy summer, my youngest daughter graduated, we had her graduation party which was a huge success and then she moved out last month. I still see her often but it isn't the same as having her living here. My nest is officially empty, I guess we must have done something right,we raised two mature, independent young ladies who aren't afraid to go out and do things on their own! But now I am floundering a bit until I figure out my new role in life. I have a million and one ideas that I need to pursue.
I will share my progress in the class here, anyone want to join me?

Spot of Grace

"Spot of Grace" a mixed media painting I created...lots of layers on this one. It started as a different painting that I liked the texture of but just couldn't get the colors right on. I sprayed over the entire thing with Colorwash Inks,masked with some gravel along the side and sprayed with Matte white spray paint. I wet the spots and lifted some of the color to brighten them up and added some detail with a charcoal pencil.

Winged Heart

A small tag, the background is done with Smooch Inks(marbled by applying drops to a bowl of water and dipping the tag into it), the heart is from Dawn Houser-I watercolored it then applied Glossy Accents to the heart and Stckles to the wings. When it was dry I cracked the glossy accents by gently bending the heart in a few places(for a broken heart effect) The sentiment is from Catslife Press.

Martha edge punches

Martha Martha Martha...that lady sure can design some amazing punches...my newest one is the Hydrangea border...swooooon..of course I had to have the regular Hydrangea punch to go with it. I created a background with Distress Inks(Concord grape, lipstick pink and tumbled glass)I trimmed a few inches off the cardstock so i could punch some individual blooms from the inked part. The stamp is from Penny Black.
And an old favorite is the Valentine Lace edge, here I just punched a small section and I used the little hearts to add to the upper part and some on the strings.The stamp is from Dawn Houser.

Painted Upholstery

I had this stained and faded old chair in the basement, I tried shampooing it, it wouldn't come clean. So it sat down there, I thought maybe someday I'd learn to reupholster it. Yeah right.
One day I got to thinking about painting it...painting an upholstered chair? Was it possible? What kind of paint? Would the paint crack off if you sat on it? Would it be all stiff and weird?
I knew that Lumiere fabric paint dried soft when you used it on fabric so i thought I'd give it a try...if it didn't work then chalk it up to experience right? Well it WORKED! I thinned down the paint 1:1 with water so it was very thin and I just started laying in down..the fabric is textured and interestingly enough the paint took differently to different parts. I used Silver metallic which was scary but I thought the metallic sheen might distract from any imperfections in the fabric and not show streaks. I was right-love when that happens.
The chair turned out a silvery sage color...very subtle bit of sage. I painted the legs white and dry brushed some silver onto them. The fabric is a little stiff but this isn't the kind of chair you're going to sit in every day, it is more of an accent chair that looks cute sitting by the fireplace in my bedroom. I think it needs a cute little shabby pillow...I'm going to work on that this weekend(keep in mind I can't sew so this should be interesting). Love when I can turn a "what if" into a completed project that I am proud of.

Colorwashed Lace

I played with some Adirondack Colorwash Sprays the other day....fun stuff! I sprayed some pieces of lace, really saturated them, then laid some tags down on top of them and brayered over it transferring the lace pattern to the tag....LOVE! I was surprised how long the ink stayed wet and continued to transfer color-I did at least a dozen tags and a couple full sheets of card stock.

Dawn Houser Beauty Tag

I adore Dawn Houser's images from Inkadinkado-for this one i used her infamous dress image(a smaller version from a set of cling mounts) I created the background for the tag with Distress Inks and stamped the images in Adirondack Stream ink, I went over the lines of dress with a damp paintbrush to blur the edges. I added some fun chunky glitter to finish it off.

playing

I have been messing around with the new Distress Stains from Tim Holtz/Ranger-on this tag I used Broken China and Weather Wood and used a technique that my pal Carolyn Knapp shared with me...I guess we call it the "Splat Technique" LOL- because the stains come with a spongey dabber top you can splat them down onto your tag (or card stock) and they make a fabulous splattered mark, do this over and over and you get a pretty cool back ground! I then went in(after the splats had dried completely) with an ink blending tool and added some color in between the splats with Spiced Marmalade and Barn Door distress inks. I dried it with my heat tool then stamped over it with a background stamp from Prima, stamped the Umbrella man onto some scrap paper that had some distress inks on it and cut him out(this is from a clear set of Tim's stamps-have to admit I am not a fan, I MUCH prefer his red rubber images and will invest my money in those from now on. I also took a quote stamp of his from the Good Thoughts collection and inked only the word DISCOVERIES from one of the stamps. Lastly I added some Stardust Stickles to the umbrella man-which wasn't dry when I photographed this, it won't look quite so clumpy once it dries completely. I used memento tuxedo black ink for all the stamping.
You can check out the link in the sidebar for my Ebay store where you can find the Memento Ink, some Distress Stains, some Distress Ink pads, some Tim Holtz stamp sets, the ink blending tool and tons of other fun stuff. I am always happy to order anything else you might be in need of also!

Tim Holtz shows us even more using Ranger’s Distress Stains!

Tim Holtz shows us even more using Ranger’s Distress Stains!

check out this video for ideas using the new Distress Stains.

Tutorial

Ok here is a quick tutorial on the technique featured in Take Ten magazine.
Start with a pile of Tim Holtz's Distress Inks(I used a white paint pen to mark the colors on the sides so I can find what I need faster), a non stick craft sheet, a small spritz bottle filled with plain water(I got my bottle at Walmart for 50 cents-the Ranger Misters work well also) and some plain white cardstock-you can experiemnt with different types of cardstock, some are more absorbent than others.




Rub a Distress pad over your craft sheet,just a smallish area-maybe 3"X5"?
Spritz it lightly with water until the ink beads up like this.
Lay a piece of cardstock down onto the ink-do not move it around, just straight down and back up. Notice there will still be some ink on the craft sheet, you can use that on another piece of paper.Sometimes you get speckles and sometimes you get more of a watercolor effect-depends on the amount of water.
Let the ink dry completely-you can use a heat gun to speed that up. Then repeat the process with a 2nd color.
Coming up with color combos is half the fun-some are better than others,this yellow(wild honey) looks like pee to me..ewww,but if I had used it with something like rusty hinge or another warm color it would look nice.
This technique is fun to use on tags also-this one has Olive and Mahogany.
and look at the paper towel when I finished...that's awfully cool, I will have to keep that for a future project.
If you have any questions just shout and if you need any of these products I will gladly order them for you. OK-go make a mess!