March Easter Tag Swap

At the Collage Stuff Yahoo Group, the March swap is an Easter tag swap.  I used the following items available at Collage Stuff:  inventory tags, white lace, burlap string, Victorian scrap, vintage sheet music and small dragonfly brass charms.  I started out making a background using acrylic paints and Stencil Girl stencils.  The honeycomb  in the background is from Tim Holtz.  I added vintage sheet music and an image of Easter sheet music.  The Easter Victorian scrap was applied next, some vintage sheet music at the bottom, and added the dragonfly charms.  "Easter Greetings" was printed and aged with Antique Linen Distress Stain. White lace and burlap string in natural and red finish off the tags.  Thanks for coming by to see my Easter tags!

May Tag Swap

The May swap at the Collage Stuff Yahoo Group is a rubber stamped tag swap, meaning to use at least one rubber stamped image in the art.  I made my usual background on vintage text or sheet music using stencils and acrylic paint. I used a text stamp in the background as well.  I used glitter bead gel through stencils as the final background layer, but it's hard to see in the photos.  The stamped images are from Dylusions colored with glaze pens, metallic gelly roll pens and colored pencils.  The stamped image are popped up.  The little flowers are old chipboard buttons from Maya Road embellished with a white Signo pen.  Thanks for coming by my blog today!

March Art Journal Page Swap

 The theme of the pages I needed to make for March was "home".  I used stencils by Stencil Girl, Tim Holtz, and The Crafter's Workshop with acrylic paint.  On the home sweet home page, I used a Tim Holtz die and Tim Holtz label letters. On the heart makes a good home page, I started out with a gelli print, put down the women mask and sponged black paint around the mask.  After that, I put another stencil down over the mask and sponged gold paint. I used a white signo pen and black Fude ball pen. I had fun making these pages!  Thanks for taking a peek at my pages!

I can shine art journal spread

Here's an art journal spread I made using the fabric paper or crazy paper from my last post.  I cut some strips of vintage book pages and pasted them around the edges of the pages.  Then I applied my crazy or fabric paper.  I used a Dylusions mask to make the women images.  I added sequin stars on the left-hand page.  I printed the words off from my computer for the right hand page.  I used a white stamper's big brush pen to highlight the black woman silhouette on the right-hand page.  With such a busy background paper, I don't need to put  a lot on the pages.  Thanks for coming by my blog!

Lin's Art Journal

My friend, Lin (click here for Lin's Etsy store) and I are participating in a little art journal round robin - just the two of us.  Here are the first two pages that I've finished in Lin's journal.

The top spread, the birds, was a lesson in how there are no mistakes in art, only opportunities.  I had a perfectly fine background created and messed it up adding more stuff.  I can save just about anything!  I ended up painting over the top of it and trying it again.  I used Dylusions spray inks and rubber stamps.  I used 2 of The Carfter's Workshop templates.  I added texture with modeling paste.  I love the Dina Wakeley "Scribbly Birds" stamps.  I colored the birds and houses with the new Dina Wakely heavy body acrylic paints.  In both spreads, I used a page or part of a page from a vintage children's spelling textbook. 

The second spread uses mostly Victorian scraps available at Collage Stuff.  I love the timeless beauty of these images.  I used lace, a doily, buttons, two items from the Tim Holtz Thrift Shop ephemera pack, Petaloo flowers and lots of butterflies!  I fins some sort of stencil to be a must and used one of The Crafter's Workshop templates - available at Collage Stuff.  For this spread, I also used a paper that I created with my gelli plate.  I toned it down a little with white gesso.

I encourage everyone to art journal.  It's art that you create for yourself.  I love the feeling of artistic freedom that I get from just playing and trying different things.

Thanks for stopping by!

June Vintage Wedding ATC Swap

The June swap at the Collage Stuff Yahoo Group is a Vintage Wedding ATC swap.  I made a background paper using my gelli plate, acrylic paints, stencils and deli paper.  I applied a vintage dictionary page to the ATC base and then glued my custom background paper over it.  The marriage certificate image is from the Graphics Fairy.  The wedding couple is my maternal grandparents and may be found on the Family Weddings collage sheet.  I added the Victorian scrap heart, brass charm and lace all available at Collage Stuff.  The numbers are from the Theresa Collins Basics line also available at Collage Stuff. I almost forgot about the Tim Holtz Filmstrip Ribbon that I applied over the bride.  Thanks for stopping by!