Fairy Of The Secret Garden

Well here is another collage and oh my gosh she was a difficult one.The background took me ages as I stuffed it up.See I stamped with white gesso onto my green coloured Vilene and tissue base and then I did a wash of Golden Quinacridone Nickel Azo Gold.Then without thinking I grabbed the Golden Dioxazine Paurple and did a wash...now these colours on a green base do NOT work LOL.Anyway I blotted off a lot but the stamping sort of got quite lost....sssooo I stamped again.Then I did washes of Golden Nikel Azo Gold,Golden Phthalo Green and Green Gold.

I rubbed in some Crayola Portfolio series water soluble oil pastel colours here and there,section of Cuttlebug texture paste at the right,painted gauze and German scrap at the bottom.I was happy with all of that but then got stumped again .The fairy was gazing up and to the left and I just couldn't find something that I wanted to put where she was looking.After looking and trying all sorts of things and several hours later I gave up and went to bed.Within minutes of waking this AM I remember the "Le Jardin" page pebble I had in my stash and used that.At last it all came together.

The Almost "Full Monty" card

This is a large card made using Opals embossing enamels to cast the large Monty Krafty Lady mold with.The background is very shimmery and is Luminarte Pimary Elements Polished pigments mixed with floor polish.I dipped the gauze in that and then pressed the wet gauze onto white gloss cardstock to make the background.Will be collaging again tonight but today I was trying to use up some embellishments and backgrounds I had made in the past...hence the almost "full Monty"

Beaded card

Okies I had to laugh at myself and my own silliness yesterday.You see I have often admired beading done around fixed objects but had never know how people do this....I truely thought that it was some sort of firm type of beading stitch that made the beads hug tightly around the central item.Well Kelsey and I got chatting by e-mail and she sent me a file on how to do this and I had a HUGE "doh" moment when I realized the beading was done thru a layer of felt or stiffening that you had attached the fixed central item to bead around too.Well I gave it a go around a lovely Krafty Lady face mold I had.My seed beads are not sorted to size so I had some larger then others and hence the beading isn't snug in some places but I loved doing it and the effect it gives.The background is Luminarte Primary Elements Polished Pigments mixed with floor polish that I pressed white gloss card and the gauze into.After Midnight Art Stamps Butterfly stamp stamped with Stuart Superior black glue and stick pad with Pearl-ex dusted on once heat activated and the leaf is a Karfty Lady mold caste with Friendly Plastic.

Felt the card still needed something so added the words and the little beads to the gauze

Asian Collage Card

This is a card made for a friend using collaged stamped images and Cuttlebug texture paste elements as per how I did the other in the post below.I used After Midnight Art stamp images and a quote I found on the web.I sent it to her over three weeks ago so sure hope it found it's way to her in America before she sees it here

Collage cards

I have a heap of backgrounds made using Vilene,Vliesofix,tissue and Adirondack colourwash sprays.Most are cut to around 15cmx18cm.Awhile ago at Kelsey's blog she let us know how she makes collages with texture paste elements and did a little tutorial.It's much like the way I create too.I printed her instructions and just imagined I was doing a class with her and did each step as she did.The first collage I even used the same ear-ring embellishments and quote she did and my fav vintage image.I had to take the photo of them on an angle as I used Krylon gold for the gold highlights and it's reflecting too much.The only thing I alterd to her insructions was the background used(I used one of my Vilene and tissue ones I just spoke of) and the images on the background I stamped with white gesso rather then ink.I used one of my fav vintage images printed using a black and white Lasar printer

Geodeco made from nappy liner bg

Oh my I can't believe two months has passed since I have posted.We have had six weeks of school holidays,Christmas,New Years,a category 2 cyclone and a ten day visit from my Mum and niece in that time...all in all not much time to be creative though the thoughts to do so are never far from my mind.In late November I participated in a challenge at the After Midnight yahoo group.We were all sent a small wooden salad fork,a small rubber band and a piece of loose weave hessian material.The task was to make a Geometric decoration(Geodeco) from scrap paper and incorporate these items into the end product.Zeborah Loray came up with the concept for Geodecos and has excellent instructions in the tutorial section at the After Midnight Art Stamps web site.
I used some of my nappy liner backgrounds for mine as you need pretty scraps decorated on both sides.The end result was quite large and colourful.It doesn't scan or photograph well but is really vibrant and has lots of texture

SSSooo can you guess where the items sent to us are in mine???.The hessian material I pulled apart and then rolled into balls in my palm with PVA glue.I then dipped the balls in Opals embossing enamels and hit them with the heat gun.They made the red beads you see.The elastic band was painted gold and put around the top glass pebble.Lastly the salad fork was cut in pieces and painted gold and placed in various spots around the item.
All the entries are displayed here and were truly amazing.It's wondrous how we all came up with such diverse end result with three weird items and some scrap card.By the way there is a warning with making geodeco thingies...they are totally addictive and you will never ever throw your scraps out again LOL.You can make them as big or as small as you want.Have fun

Nappy Liner Rubbings

Today I spent most of my time making nappy liner rubbing backgrounds.This was also something I had learnt from Dale Rollerson at the Art retreat I mentioned in my first post.It's easy and fun.Sometimes it works better then others so is unpredictable. Firstly I made some drawing ink and water backgrounds by spritzing a sheet of clear overhead transparency with water.Then randomly drop drips of two colours of drawing ink on top.They spread out and burst into colour. Lay some cheap gloss card gloss side down into the wet mix and lift it back up. Place on news paper to dry. It will bend at the edges but straightens out smooth again once it dries. I use Shiva paint sticks and cheap nappy liners.With some of the liners I painted them with Lumiere's(shimmery metallic fabric paints) first. Select a surface to rub over. I used some plastic rubbing plates I got from The Thread Studio .Rub several colours of paint stick on top of the liner held in place on the rubbing surface till you are happy with the look and the liner is covered. Once done I place the rubbing coloured side up onto the card stock I made earlier. I put this between two sheets of Galdbake and ironed over the surface using a very hot dry iron setting.The nappy liner burns off and the paint stick part sticks to the surface. It works better on a matt surface as the gloss was a bit too slick. To overcome this I then added some Vliesofix between the liner rubbing and the gloss card and ironed and that looked good too.



and some more



Another thing I tried was painting the nappy liner with Lumiere's.When dry I tore them into bits and ironed them onto the back ground using Vliesofix bits between the painted liner and the back ground.I then placed other bits of Vliesofix down and put foil on top coloured side up and ironed that.On other drawing ink bits I just placed some Vliesofix down and then the foil and ironed that.It makes nice back grounds but is very hard to photograph as it's so shimmery.