Inspiration Wednesday - Week 10

Hi folks! I'm back again with another Inspiration Wednesday project! Are you starting to feel like these are the only projects I'm sharing? Well...if you're feeling that way, you would be right! The truth is that I've had very little time to create and even less time to post. The IW projects are typically quick to finish, and since we're following most of the steps from Donna Downey's video, it's an easy layout to finish...not much thinking required on my part! LOL!

The good news is that I'm making good progress on unpacking my craft supplies, as well as finding all sorts of creative ways to store all of them, so I hope to be back to posting more regularly in a few weeks.

This week's layout featured wrapping paper! Would you believe that I had to go shopping for wrapping paper in order to even work on this project. Dollar Store to the rescue! I found these great papers at my local store and they worked perfectly to create bold backgrounds. (Makes me want to wallpaper my room in wrapping paper!)

The left side of my spread features this amazing polka dot paper and tiny yellow butterflies (from a Martha Stewart punch). Note that both wrapping papers were sanded with a Tim Holtz sanding block...that worn look is divine! I added some rhinestone trails to each butterfly and came across this cute "handle with care" piece in my stash. I don't recall who made the embellishment, but it's wooden and I purchased a bunch of these at my local craft store. 

The left side of my spread featured this beautiful cream and black paper, which was a great contrast to the red polka dots. Again, the paper was sanded and I used a glaze and acrylic paint to add some aging to the page. My collage is made up of a piece of burlap, a Tim Holtz red lined tag, a stenciled face (from a Crafters Workshop stencil, see links below), some twine, a manila tag, and another tiny butterfly. I'm finding that I love these collage clusters...the only challenge is finding enough elements to fill in the space. I love the half a face peeking out from behind the tag.

The inclusion was whitewashed with gesso before I added the letter stickers. The lines around the "beautiful" word was hand drawn, and the butterflies are from more Martha Stewart punches.

Here's the entire finished piece...don't those contrasting patterns and colors look fabulous together! Love it! (Donna's video was based on mixing patterns...very fun!) Links to products below, and stay tuned for something other than IW2016 projects! I hope...LOL! Happy Crafting!

Supplies:

Donna Downey Inspiration Wednesday

Glazing Medium

TCW448 Four Faces Stencil

Inspiration Wednesday - Week 7

Hi kids! Sharing my next Inspiration Wednesday creation! I actually have last week's to share as well, but I'm running painfully behind on my posting. I've been spending my days getting ready for our move back to NH, which has kept me busier than normal. Yesterday I packed up all of my craft supplies and I don't expect to see them again for 2-4 weeks, insert sad face, so I prepped a bunch of projects to share over the next month or two...this is the first!

This project was from a few weeks ago, as you can tell from my date stamp of 4/3. And while my last IW project didn't thrill me, this was made me do the happy dance! It's really such a simple project, comprised of bits of collaged paper, including designer paper, tissue paper, and vintage book text, along with my favorite products..embossing paste and stencils.

The best part of this layout? Glazing medium and umber paint...oh man, this is nothing better than the vintage look that these two products create. I just love the look of the embossed, aged letters...swoon.

I also really loved working with the kraft tissue paper, which is a left over from my store ownership days. The color of the tissue paper provides a wonderful contrast with the white paint, and because it's so thin you end up with wonderful crinkles that translate into texture you want to reach out and touch.

This little bit of script text on the inclusion may be my favorite bit of all...Overall, I had a great time creating this piece, and it will no doubt serve as an inspiration for future projects. 

Happy Crafting!

Inspiration Wednesday - Week 6

Well it only took six weeks for me to get way behind on my IW videos and posting...oh boy! And it also took six weeks for me to hit the "they can't all be winners" creation. LOL! This layout, although very simple, took the most time to create. Those darn flowers were tricky!

However, in the end, I found that I was mostly happen with the final results. The flowers, which were created with Wendy Vecchi's embossing paste, started as white, then blue, then back to white again before ending up as gold. I do really love the look of the gold against the dark blue background.

My page ended with some cork letters, aren't they fun, and a few sentiment stickers. Next week I'll share week 7, which came together much faster and easier. Hey, they can't all be winners, but keeping a journal filled with all of our art, not just the very best, is a satisfying experience. I love looking back on older projects and seeing how my techniques have evolved or improved. It's a great keepsake...like a diary packed full of color, texture, and artistic growth!

Enjoy!

Inspiration Wednesday - Week 5

Hello strangers! Sorry for the long absence from my blog. I actually have a lot to share, just haven't had a lot of time to write and upload photos. Hard to find time for everything lately as I have some big news, which the quote included in my week five Inspiration Wednesday project kind of alludes to...

Get ready because it's a doozey! We're moving back to NH! That's right...our time in CT is to be short lived. We don't have a specific time frame yet as we need to find a home, but my hubby starts a new job in a few weeks.

This certainly wasn't part of our plans. I mean who moves state-to-state twice in six months?! That's craziness! And I'm still trying to wrap my brain around it, but it seems to be the way that things have worked out. (Unless there's another plot twist around the corner...oh man, I hope not!) 

Long story short, the new job here wasn't working out. My husband loved the work, but there were some other issues that were unable to be resolved. We knew that a job change was in the near future, but we didn't know how near. He was contacted by someone he interviewed with over the summer, who is now ready to hire. It's a great opportunity and I'm so excited for him! Of course this means we need to go through the entire moving process again, but I couldn't be happier! I'll dearly miss some folks we've become friends with in CT, but I feel that we're returning to our home. And I suspect that we'll be back in CT for many vacations in the coming years...

Now on to this week's project!

This was a tough week for me...I reworked these pages a bunch before I was happy. Donna had used a giant number stencil on her page, but I didn't have anything similar so I went with the heart texture stencil (from Donna Downey), which didn't work quite as well as the letters were a little small.

There are many layers of paint on these pages...paint, glazing medium, more paint, and a new product from Finnabair, Thick Modeling Paste.

Once my many layers were dry I added a hint of black by using a few Crafters Workshop stencils. My favorite part of this project are the tiny bits of teal showing through on the pages and the heart. Oh, I used a 3D Gloss Gel for the heart, which is a new Prima product. Want step-by-step instructions for creating a similar project, check out Donna Downey's Inspiration Wednesday videos. It's only $35 for 25 classes! Interested in supplies I used? Check out the links below:

Supplies:

-Donna Downey Art Journal

-Heart Texture Stencil

-Prima Art Basics (3D Gloss Gel and Thick Modeling Paste)

-Glazing Medium

-Golden Acrylics

-Believe Script Stencil

-Specimens Stencil

Inspiration Wednesday - Week Three

Greetings all and welcome to the next installment of Inspiration Wednesday! I have to tell you...I love when each new lesson rolls around. I love watching Donna's videos...she's a hoot...and this week we got to see her struggle with what steps to take next in her journal. Maybe some people enjoy a very polished video, I adore seeing her creative process played out on the screen. For me, it's encouraging and inspiring!

This week's lesson had us playing with lots of paint, more glazing (love that stuff), and stencils. The triple threat...some of my favorite supplies! (You can see a list of all of the products I used on my project at the end of my post)

When I first created my background, with just a yellow and blue band, I was really hesitant to add the pink, which was added using a glazing medium. However, once it was finished...swoon...love those pink accents. Totally fun!

Enter the torn tag...but the bottom part instead of the top. I think you'll see, in the lower right hand corner, where the bottom of the tag came from. *wink* All of the pink numbers and quote were created with Wendy Vecchi's embossing paste (the best out there!) and the glaze. The stencils are almost all from Donna Downey.

Isn't this a fun stencil? Like script writing, but I didn't have to do the writing myself! Love that! I used Jet Black Archival Ink to add all of the stencils. I also added some very small white splatters as a final touch. Kind of looks like the night sky...

Final page with a tag, some random numbers, lots of layers, and small words. Oh, and tiny pieces of washi tape. Another fabulous week completed! Links to where you can purchase products below. Happy crafting!

Supplies:

-Golden Fluid Acrylics (Paynes Gray)

-Distress Paint (Fossilized Amber)

-Dina Wakley Paint (Magenta)

-Liquidtex Glazing Medium

-Donna Downey Stencils - Mini Numbers Repeat, Scribble Script, Count Downey

-Wendy Vecchi Embossing Paste

Inspiration Wednesday Week 2

Happy Monday! It's a great day to make ART! Today I'm sharing my next Inspiration Wednesday project. Woot! Woot! (See the end of my post for supply list)

This week Donna impressed us with not just another wonderful art journal layout, designed to inspire and encourage, but she also had fun burning some of her pages! Seriously, her videos are so much fun to watch...you just never know what she's going to come up with or what technique she's going to try! The look of the burnt page edges is pretty darn cool...(PS - Always burn near a sink or big bucket of water!)

When I told my kids that I was going to try burning some of my pages, they almost fainted! "Mom!" they exclaimed, "You can't be serious! You're going to burn the house down!" LOL! Thankfully, I wasn't very successful with burning the edges of my pages as the flame would go out as soon as it hit the grunge paste. It was if the grunge paste wouldn't burn...maybe that's a good thing...

This week's lesson was all about paste, glaze, and clusters of goodness. I combined a whole bunch of trinkets on my left page, using an already gelli printed chipboard coaster as the base. That fun light bulb chipboard piece is from Blue Fern Studios...love their stuff! I also added a bunch of other fun goodies, such as a partial tag (see the burnt edge!), buttons, a piece of crinkly plastic, and material. The coaster was embedded into the wet paste and then the other elements were glued on top once the paste was dry, which took overnight.

Donna also experimented with mark making in wet paste. That was super fun and looks amazing once you had the glaze. (I used a combo of Golden paint and Glazing Medium to create the rust color)

The right hand page also featured some pieces of masking tape, also embedded in the wet paste, vintage text, another tag top, and a few other goodies. My sentiment, by Catherine Scanlon, is also featured on this page.

Now can we just stop a minute and talk about the inclusion. Do you see that circle in the middle of the inclusion? Oh man, that makes me do the happy dance. I LOVE it! It was created by accident when I was applying paste to the other side of the paper...this side ended up pressing into the coaster. When I pulled the paper up, that circle was left behind..swoon...Once the glaze was added, it appeared by magic. A few random numbers added to this page and this week's lesson was complete!

This was a really quick project to complete, once the paste was dry. There was a boatload of paste on these two pages and it look almost 24 hours for it to completely dry. 

I hope you enjoyed today's project and if you're interested in learning how to make projects like this one, sign up for Donna's Inspiration Wednesday videos...it's only $35 for the entire year! 

Supplies:

-Donna Downey Art Journal

-PaperArtsy Grunge Paste (You can also use molding paste or Wendy Vecchi embossing paste, which is my preferred paste)

-Golden Fluid Acrylics - Quinacridone Nicket Azo Gold

-Glazing Medium

-Catherine Scanlon Stamp - Words of Wisdom 3

-Blue Fern Studios Chipboard

Inspiration Wednesday - Week One

Greeting friends and welcome to my week one Inspiration Wednesday project! If you're familiar with Donna Downey's videos then you may recall a few years ago she used to post a weekly project, titled Inspiration Wednesday. When I first starting working in an art journal, I was obsessed with her weekly videos. Last year she made the videos private and charged a modest fee, $35/year, to see the videos. While I held off on signing up last year, as I had signed up for Life Book. I adored my year with Life Book, seriously a great experience that I would highly recommend, this year I wanted to scale back on how many online classes I took so...Inspiration Wednesday to the rescue! (I like that we get two weeks to complete each project...I can manage that pace!)

This is my project for the first week...and I am crazy about it! This week Donna combined my love of embossing paste, stencils, glazing medium, and (of course) teal paint!

I am working in one of Donna's handmade journals, which are 6"x9", a perfect size for quicker projects and easy storage (or for art on the go). This is actually the last page in my journal as the first few pages already contain various completed layouts. I'm giddy over the aged pages that contain just a hint of color...dreamy. This has to be one of my all time favorite art journal pages. I'll leave you with more photos from my project along with product links, at the end of my post.

I'm not a huge "word of the year" person (see Ali Edward's blog), however, the word grateful is one that has been popping up in my head over and over again this past few weeks so I opted to highlight my word on my first IW2016 project.

My word was tucked in among a variety of papers, tickets, twine, and ribbon.

This page with just three colors dripping down the page...swoon...

This is the opposite side of the inclusion, the other side has the word grateful on it, and this might be my favorite part of the entire piece. This little snippet makes me want to create an entire page filled with embossed number, blue flowers, and orange splotty dots!

I hope you enjoyed today's project! Consider signing up for Donna's Inspiration Wednesday video series so you can see all of the specific techniques used on this, and other, projects. 

You can find the products I used on this project by following the links below:

-Donna Downey Stencils - Mini Numbers Repeat, Artist, and Budding Branch

-Golden Fluid Acrylics - Quinacridone Burnt Orange, Paynes Gray, Pyrrole Orange, Raw Umber, and Teal

-Glazing Liquid - Matte

-Matte Medium

-Wendy Vecchi Embossing Paste

Art Journal Layout Featuring Donna Downey Stencils

Hi friends! I'm popping in today to share a sample of an art journal page that we'll be creating in this weekend's "Art Journaling Made Simple" class. (Actual class samples will vary, but the techniques used on this page will be used.)

I have a few photos to share of some of the steps taken to create this journal spread. Contact me at ksdm@comcast.net if you have an interest in signing up for the October 3rd class, where we'll explore more quick and easy steps to creating your own beautiful art journal pages.

This spread started with Tim Holtz tissue wrap and Distress Paint. I love tissue wrap! It's a great starting point in art journaling.  The tissue was applied with matte medium and then Distress Paint was added on top. Don't mind that blue peeking through...these pages contained some extra paint from another product. That will be covered by the time I'm finished.

Next, I used Wendy Vecchi's embossing paste and the Flower Bed stencil from Donna Downey to add these beautiful, textured flowers to my page. The blue paint, any paint, will be absorbed by the paste so remember that if you want your paste to be pure white. No worries on my page as I painted my flowers.

My flowers were colored with paint and then shaded with Faber Castell Big Brush Markers. (I put the stencil back over the dry paste. This protected my background and allowed me to easily color all of the flowers and leaves without worrying about paint getting on the background). I did add a bit of stamping, used a cracked glass stamp from Tim Holtz, around the edges of the page, as well as a bit of aging on the page edges, using Potting Soil Archival Ink from Wendy (love that color!) And, of course, I had to add a few white splottie-dotties using watered down white gesso. The sentiment is actually from a Donna Downey stamp set, You Are Important, but the sentiment in the set was too small for my page so I used alphabet stamps to add the saying. 

Interested in learning more? Check out the details on my Art Journaling Made Simple class, coming up on Saturday, October 3...There's still time to register!

If you've been intrigued by the idea of art journaling or have recently jumped into this wonderful form of creating, but are overwhelmed by all that's involved...this class is for you! This class is perfect for beginners and intermediate students.

During our four hour class, we'll create three different art journal pages. I'll walk you through the steps taken to create beautiful, quick and easy backgrounds using a variety of mediums, such as Distress Paint and embossing paste. We'll also discuss which tools you'll need to produce the best results, along with providing you with a quick list of some of my favorite go to products. Lastly, I'll teach you how to create beautiful collages and art in your journals. 

Also during the class, I'll demonstrate a number of techniques, such as gesso resist and coloring pastes. We'll work with ink sprays, acrylic paints, Distress products, collage, embossing pastes, and stencils. Our goal for the day is not only to experiment, learn, and have fun, but to also show you how easy it is to create beautiful art work, quickly and easily! The added bonus? The class includes an 8"x5" Dylusions journal!

The cost for this class is $50.00. Please email Kim at ksdm@comcast.net to register, an electronic invoice will be generated once your request for registration has been received. A supply list will be sent once payment has been received. Please note that class fees are non-refundable after September 28, 2015. Registration will close on October 1, 2015...

Class location: Fremont, NH

Date: October 3 - Time: 1:00-5:00 pm

Cost: $50 (includes 8"x 5" journal)

If it doesn't challenge you...

Hi friends! I have a fun 8x10 canvas project to share with you today. This was a very simple project that came together in about an hour...grab your stamps and paint, and let's get started!

First, I want to share that I created this canvas piece to be a journal cover for my very first junque journal. Julie Fei-Fan Balzer teaches an online Junque Journal class, and I signed up for it last week. If you have tons of half painted papers hanging around your studio, you MUST sign up for this class! I was able to bind together almost 100 pieces of random papers into two journals. This is an amazing class given by an amazing teacher...Go sign up, just do it!

OK, back to our regularly scheduled program...

I started with a canvas panel from Dick Blick (you can buy these in bulk for short money, click here for the link), two Distress Paints (Wild Honey and Ripe Persimmon), and a water bottle.

I painted the top portion with the Wild Honey and the bottom with Ripe Persimmon. Then the entire canvas was spritzed with water (start at the top of the canvas). The Distress Paints react with water and beautiful mixing will take place...yummy. (I'm not sure why there are small open areas, where the paint didn't seem to cover completely, but I don't care...love the look!)

Next, I stamped this stunning, gigantic poppy image, from Donna Downey (You Are Important), on the canvas using VersaMark ink and embossing with Black Soot Distress Powder. Donna's stamps are perfect for art journaling and canvases because they are HUGE. This stamp is approximately 7" tall!

I painted the poppy image with more Distress Paint (Festive Berried and Abandoned Coral). I used a paint brush to apply the paint and then spritzed the still wet paint to get it to run outside of the lines of the flower. (Tip: When Distress Paint is dry it is permanent, it will not react with water so if you want the paint to flow, you must spritz while the paint is still wet.) After the paint was dry, I used a paint brush to outline the flower. Since I did the outlining by hand, vs. re-stamping the image, I got a nice painterly look. And now, for an important public service announcement...

I've taken countless classes with Tim (Holtz), and during every class he reminds attendees to NOT squeeze the paint bottles. "Don't squeeze the bottles, don't squeeze the bottles..." And every time, someone squeezes the bottle and paint goes all over the place. I teach classes, and shoot videos, all the while saying, "Don't squeeze the bottle..." Guess what I did tonight? I squeezed the bottle... Don't be like me...and do not squeeze those darn bottles!

After I cleaned up that big 'ol paint mess, I added some stenciling to my canvas. (I used Wendy Vecchi's Archival Inks for all of my stenciling.) The leaf stencil is from Wendy Vecchi, Lovely Leaves, and the number design is the Mini Number Repeat from Donna Downey. 

For the final step, I added more stenciling, using Wendy's embossing paste and the Believe Script stencil from The Crafters Workshop. I stamped the sentiment, included in the You Are Important stamp set from Donna Downey, and added a touch of Potting Soil Archival Ink, using a blending tool, to the edges. The sentiment is a bit further to the right than normal because this is going to be a journal cover and the binding will cover up a portion of the left hand side of the canvas. As soon as I get the journal together, I'll take a video to share the goodness! Oh, and I did add just a few tiny splashes of Festive Berries paint to the entire canvas!