It's a been awhile

I discovered Instagram and have been posting over there instead of here. It's so much easier, and the response I've gotten, the friends I've made over there, well, it's kept me away. I feel badly that I probably won't have a blog book published this year. But I'm so lazy! Posting photos here requires some footwork, but with Instagram all I have to do is upload directly from my phone, boom, it's done. *whine*

I just now tried to figure out to post photos from my Flickr, but I've forgotten how, argh! So I posted directly from my computer, which isn't the best way because it eats up storage.

Here's a card I made for a friend. I'm in love with this stamp! I water colored the card and then used colored pencils for the envelope. I like this so much I'll definitely be doing this again.

A Little Watercoloring

It's December already!

Shortly after watching a couple of watercoloring videos on YouTube by The Fugal Crafter, Valerie surprised me with this adorable puppy stamp by Stampendous. It was after Midnight and I couldn't sleep, so I sat took out my Watercolor Confections by Prima and went to work.

The next day I made it into a card for my sister-in-law, who's been in the hospital for over a week now. It's pretty serious, so I didn't want to the sentiment to be the run of the mill get well thing. I was happy to rediscover this stamp for her.

I loved watercoloring this little guy so much, I stamped a few more with the intention of making more cards.

I roughed up the edges of the watercolor paper and popped it up with pop dots, easy-peasy. As you can see, it's a good-sized rubber stamp and takes up most of the  of the 6" x 4-3/4" card front. I like that because it doesn't need anything in the background except a piece of pretty paper. It's a great stand-alone image I feel I can make more than one of without taking hours to do it.

Watercolored Butterflies

When I'm in the mood to craft but I don't know what I want to make, I'll usually break out the watercolors or some type of mixed media project like the playing cards I've been working on. The other night I brought out my good set of watercolors, the set my daughters surprised me with. They're so yummy! Can you see the shimmer of the silver? Magic.

Tonight I tried out a new set of butterfly stamps on the watercolor paper. I stamped the dotted image on parts I thought would make pretty butterflies then cut them out. They're lovely.

I don't always know what I'm going to do with the stuff I make, but it always comes in handy.

I love how imperfect they all are.

These will probably end up on a card or in one of my art journals. They would make sweet little magnets, but they wouldn't be practical, just for looks. I had to stop myself from making tons more.

Pensieve

Silver watercolor my daughter said reminds her of the Pensieve in Harry Potter.

By the way, I use the little scoops that come with our soap powder in my crafting. They have a handle that makes it easy to rest my paint brushes on in-between use. They're great, too, for messy paint you don't want to bother scrubbing out, just allow to dry and toss.

Watercoloring and Cards

I'm a little behind in posting some of things I've been up to the last few months, so I'm posting several of my favorites.

The above was my attempt at making a card-sized bouquet, but it kept getting bigger and bigger until it took up the entire 8-1/2" x 11" piece of watercolor paper. So I put it aside and thought I would use it during one of my die-cutting sessions, maybe make some butterflies and leaves.

While I was making this card (inspired by a couple of photographs of flowers with these colors; the person I was making it for posted them on her blog), Valerie discovered the big one and claimed it as her own. She called me to her place and when I saw it on her wall, I was taken aback. It actually looks like a piece of art! Framing and matting makes quite the impact.

These are a couple of cards I made. I need to practice my signature and find a better color to sign my work.

This double page spread is in my just-for-fun art journal. I always wanted to try using a page from an old book as a background. I love the results and will definitely be doing that again. The flower on the left was created using a rub-on and gelatos. The one on the right was cut from the image from the rub-on left behind. I found the center for the flower in my scraps (cut from deli paper), and adhered it on top of the layer of gesso and the spritzing I did. I like flipping through my art journal and seeing this.

I have a deck of cards that was my sister Martha's, and I've been altering them like people do with ATC's (artist trading cards). I use things like gesso, tissue paper, paint, ink, molding paste, ribbon, twine, and whatever else I feel like experimenting with. I usually grab one when I want to clear my head or in the mood to make something just for the fun of it. I've given a couple away as bookmarks, and I'd like to put a few in a shadow box I picked up for this purpose.

One more picture. I made these cards for a Dachshund rescue group as a way to thank people for their donations. I love the background paper with the sewing on it, it gave it such a nice touch. One of these days I'd like to try my hand at sewing on the paper myself. But right now there's no place to set up my sewing machine; it's all I can do to find room for my paper crafting.

I'm currently working on a note card order (!), all dog-themed. I sent an on-line friend a sympathy card for the loss of one of her dogs and she asked if she could order some note cards. I've made 12 cards so far and I'm on the final two (they're bonus cards). I'm nervous as all get out because I rarely sell anything. Maybe this will give me the confidence to finally start putting things on Etsy like my daughters have been encouraging me to do forever.

Watercolor and Mixed Media

These are the watercolors I still can't believe I did for our craft swap. I really like how they turned out.

I stenciled these glassine bags to wrap them in.

I also stenciled a shadow-like image on each one.

There was a lot of ink left on the stencil, so I pressed it onto white cardstock and will use the prints for future projects. The craft swap was a lot of fun and I received some wonderful art in return.

I Can Paint!

I don't know where this painting thing came from, but I'll take it! (Color photos coming soon.)

My Latest Cards

I made several cards the last couple of weeks, here are two of them. The first one is for my daughter’s co-worker’s birthday using a die that looks like a postage stamp. The cut some very thin brown paper I saved from a package and layered it with the candle printed paper. I inked the edged of the printed paper and used a rub-on for the sentiment. This one was passed around my daughter's office so everyone could sign it.

The other card is for my best friend (of well over 40 years!), a “just because” card that’s sparkly all over. Our motto is “Through Thick and Thin,” I’m thick, she’s thin (I’ve always struggled to lose weight, her struggle is to gain it), so I was tickled when Dawn discovered a package of stickers with this one in it.

I started with sparkly orange card stock and added the center square of watercolor paper colored with watercolor pencils. I used a paintbrush and a little water to blend it, then splattered metallic watercolors all over. At first I thought it looked a bit too much like blood, but then, she’s a phlebotomist, so it fits. haha! I inked the edges with orange and yellow and added a few rub-on butterflies and gems.

I even wrote a 3-page letter to my BFF. We were fierce letter-writers back in the days before email and texting, and I still have a bunch of them stored away. I told her I missed seeing her beautiful handwriting; I’m hoping she’ll write me back.