Guest Designer at Stick It Down

Hey Friends!

I am so excited that I am a Guest Designer at Stick It Down for May.  Check out this fun sketch:

I love this sketch!  For me it inspired mixed media so I got out my Tim Holtz Distress Paints.  I dabbed the paint in the background with craft sponges.  I made white paint splatters to give a little more interest-and I am totally inspired by the painting I'm standing next to in the picture. :)

These are words from Tim Holtz Sizzix thin dies.

These pretty little sequins are from Doodles Paper Playground.  Fun Fact! I bought these sequins at White Rose Crafts with a gift certificate I won a while back from a Stick it Down Challenge.  :)

This is a crystal (There's 6 of the at the top.) It's Studio Katia.

Here's a close up of the journaling.  I started writing and couldn't stop and then saw it was slanted.  Gah! Oh well.  :) 

Thank you for stopping by!  This awesome challenge closes at the end of the month so you still have plenty of time!  

Until next time my friends...keep crafting! :)

Fairy House

Hello Everybody!

I am super excited to share with you my most recent project!  Like seriously excited! First, I have to tell you that this is the first time I have ever made a Fairy House (or any place for a mystical creature to live.) Second there are a lot of pictures.  So I am going to take care of business first-and then please feel free to proceed on if your time allows :)

So here is my before and after photos:

I would like to submit this Fairy House to the following Challenges:

Frilly and Funkie: Home Sweet Home


Mixed Media Warriors: #40  Old to New

I have to first tell you also where my inspiration came from.  I was scrolling Instagram like I do and came across this house that Adrijana at Paper Beauty AK posted.  And I like fell in love with it.  Crazy-I know but it totally inspired me to make my house.  So Thank you Adrijana!  

I have had this house for about 2 years.  I bought it at Goodwill in August 2017.  My husband and I used to go to thrift stores a LOT and I would collect wood things with the hopes of transforming them into other things.  I buy faster than I create LOL.  And it's been awhile since I made anything this big (usually I make cards and scrapbook pages).  

                                        

It's funny because when I have shown a couple of people the before picture they say "oh that's cute."  And it makes me feel bad because all I saw was a project.  LOL  It's about an inch or so thick.  Before I decorated it-the house could stand on it's own.

I cleaned the dust off with a wet rag.  And started to gesso it.  Then I realized I didn't want the shutters-so I took those off.  The little nails were left behind so I left them there.  

I added Power Tex 3-D balls (some might call them art rocks) and painted the house white (Martha Stewart Paint).

On the right you an see the supplies and the finished paint.

Inspired by the other house-I wanted to use a nest too.  This is a Melissa Frances nest and those are Dollar Tree golden eggs.  You can find these kind of nests at Hobby Lobby also (like in the moss or fairy house section I cannot remember which).  I hot glued the eggs inside but not the nest just yet.

I painted the roof gray.

The roof makes me want to have a PayDay candy bar.  This is little gravel that came with a beta fish set.  I did not use the gravel for the fish because I refuse to clean dirty fish gravel.  So these are clean straight out of the bag and I used hot glue to apply them.  I only burned myself like 3 times.  ;)

I used my silhouette machine to make windows and a door.  The cut files came from the Silhouette Design Store.  I took clear extra laminating and applied yellow tim holtz alcohol ink.  Then I cut them to fit the window and glued them on with glossy accents.

I painted the underside of the roof a beige color.  It was gray before and didn't look right.  Then I added spring green paint mixed with white and dabbed it off with a paper towel.  This was cool because it created a lighter more organic feel.  The inspiration house is what gave me that idea.  That's one of the things I loved about it.

I wanted dimension and I figured an awning above the door would be a perfect way to accomplish that.  I took some light cardboard and cut it into pieces and curved them.  I covered them with these fake leaves I found in my stash.  I used hot glue to adhere and then I added more leaves to the front of the awnings.  

The door-I painted with tim holtz distress mustard seed.  Adhered material to the window using mod podge fabric glue.  That stuff is awesome for adhering fabric (me just sayin').  Bliss sign that came in a scrapbook kit and an orange brad for the door knob.

So here is what it looks like now.  Time for some greenery!  I added paper grass to the front and it's a Lawn Fawn die.  Then in my stash (gifted to me) are the green "bushes." I added moss (so fun!  and totally inspired) and then I found some little critters to put in places.  Also, I glue on the nest.

Ta-Da!  I painted a wood veneer butterfly pick raspberry (TH Distress Paint).  I bought moss from the Dollar Tree and Hobby Lobby.  There are many different types of moss.  :)

Outside Picture

Side View

Other Side 

Inside Picture

And these are closeups of the little critters I found-that I didn't remember having.  LOL

And here it is again.  All finished.

If you made it this far--thank you and big hugs!  Until next time my friends...stay creative! :)

Pipes Thank You Card

Hello Everybody!

I am happy to show ya'll a card that I made with a die cut that I have been wanting for a long time-and finally bought!  Yay!  It's the Pipes from Tim Holtz/Sizzix.

Here's my card:

So I knew I wanted to do something grungy with the pipes.  And I saw a video on YouTube-and I knew what I was going to use--sand and some tiny 3-D balls from Powertex to create the mixutre.  The lady on the video altered a phone so if you would like to see that check it here. 

First I cut the pieces out of watercolor paper so I would have stronger bases.

I used distress rusty hinge and fire brick inks to give the pieces color and then I used gel medium and glossy accents to put the sand and balls on.

I wasn't 100% sure how this process would go.  So I painted everything black!  Using black gesso.

It gets a little crazy here.  I used foil tape paper by Ranger and embossed it.  I used caramel and red pepper alcohol inks on the embossed foil. (I don't have the newer alcohol inks boo!)  Then I grunged it up a bit by adding and wiping black paint.  This background looked great when finished-but you know this doesn't get used.  No-it competed too but with the little pipe pieces-and I couldn't have the background still the show.  I liked the brick so much that I used just plain o' black cardstock.  But I had to share this!  It's beautiful ;)

Here's a close up of the pipe.  I used black, silver, distress bronze, distress salty ocean and shabby shutters and distress gold paints to try to achieve a patina rusty effect.  The drop of water is a recollections tear drop.

The sentiment is a Tim Holtz-and the background of it is ranger yupo paper and various ranger alcohol inks.  Not the new ones-I must use up what I have first! (Which is a lot-I'm just sayin is all I'm sayin.)

I love the pipes.  I am excited to make some more projects with this die cut.

I am submitting this to Watercooler Wednesday: WWC226 Dawn's Masculine Anything Goes Challenge.

Thanks for stopping by!  :)

Mixed Media Thank You Card

Hello Friends!

It feels like years since I have made a card.  It hasn't been lol but it feels that way.  I refocused on scrapbooking-trying to do some memory keeping.  And I have (my next post is proof!).

So I was looking through Pinterest and many things always catch my eye.  So between something there and some cheesecloth-I created this...

I cut some watercolor paper to card size.  I used mod podge fabric glue to adhere the cheese cloth.  Once dry I used some spun sugar distress paint and watered it down and painted it.  I mixed a little spun sugar paint with modeling paste and used a tim holtz stencil.  

I added buttons, a wood clock, a clay butterfly, a wooden lady silhouette-and I painted all of them with the spun sugar.  The thanks sentiment is a flash card from Tim Holtz.  And lastly I added little silver micro beads here, there, and everywhere! :)  No all of them stuck onton the card lol.  

I made this card with a certain friend in mine-so hopefully she likes :)  

I am submitting this card to the following challenges:

The Rainbow Card Challenge: #4 Perfectly Pink

Watercolor Wednesday: WWC218 Marsha's All About Occasions-When someone does something special for me-it is a wonderful occasion for me to make them a card showing appreciation. :)

Here are a couple of closeups:

Thank you for stopping by!  Until next time my friends...mix it up! :)

Festival of the Arts Layout

Hello Everybody!

I am sharing a layout I made for a Facebook Challenge group.  It's called Confessions of a Paper Addict and a super talented lady named Virginia Walker.  You can also see her on Instagram and YouTube and she has an awesome store on Etsy with cut files!

So I used her messy circles cut file for this layout out. 

I have been wanting to do a rainbow effect for awhile so this seemed to all come together.  I sponged Distress Paint on the main cardstock.  And when I cut those letters (silhouette store font Fun) I painted those also.  

The little bits are chipboard pieces from EK Success-a disney set of them, and then Pebbles from a loonnngggg time ago.  LOL  And some Queen and Company gems.  

I'm trying to do my own challenge which is to make 30 scrapbook pages before I buy anything new.  This is my 10th one.  I haven't bought anything new (woohoo!) I don't always post the layouts but I'm definitely trying to stick with it.  :)

Thank you for stopping by!  Until next time my friends...stay colorful! :)

Happy New Year!

Hello Everybody!

Happy New Year!  I hope everyone has had a great couple of weeks!  I have had a great time with family and friends-and hope for more of that in 2019 :)

I got to be a little crafty-and I didn't realize how much I missed it!

There is a Facebook Group Challenge to do a Tim Holtz tissue wrap tag.  I had to dust off my supplies (yikes!) and then retrain myself on how to use the paints and stuff.  Very sad I know.  But there is a happy ending.  I made this cool tag and got a few more papers going because I poured out too much product.  A little goes a long way-LOL  It's all good though!

This is about 99% all Tim Holtz.  Here's what I used:

Ranger Tag

Distress Paints: Broken China, Chipped Sapphire, Salt Ocean, Picked Raspberry

Distress Oxide Ink: Picked Raspberry (on the 2019 cardstock under the glitter, around the edges

Melange Tissue Paper

Distress Spray Stain-Picket Fence

Lower Case Sizzix TH letter dies (663074)

Rubons-Life Quotes, Botanical, Words

Big Chat Stickers

Distress Glitter Spun Sugar

Glossy Accents

Mirrored Stars

Natural Trimmings Ribbon

The butterfly takes center stage on this cool background.  I didn't want to cover up that part of the tissue paper.  I added water to react with the paints also.  

Like I said-it has been too long since I made a tag so hopefully there will be more in the future.  :)  There are a few backgrounds in the making from this tag-so be sure to check back!

Until next time my friends...Get your wings and let's fly!

Atlered Paintbrush

Hello Everybody!

I am so excited to share my project with you all today!  There are two parts to how this project materialized.  So get comfortable while I tell you my story! ;)

I follow Finnibair on Instagram.  They create the most beautiful projects.  Somewhere along the way I saw them alter a paintbrush.  If you look up altered paintbrush on Pinterest-a myriad of ideas will fill your screen.  So the next time I was at the Dollar Tree, I bought a paintbrush.  

Fast forward a couple of months and the said paintbrush has not been touched.  So as Ash Wednesday was coming closer my church was talking about members bringing in projects that they create over Lent.  Things like canvases, or if you sew/knit, or whatever artsy or crafty thing you have.  

So my paintbrush idea came back into my head.  I looked up Pinterest and Finnibair looking for ideas.  I got out my pastel color paints and although I was tired (lol) I was able to create.  Which is quite the feat sometimes.  

Thank you for reading my story.  Here is my Jesus inspired paintbrush...

This is how it started...

I covered it in gesso.  Even the bristles were painted with gesso.

Then I got out different findings.  I had tried a different set of wings and then remembered these.  They were a goodwill find. :)

I hot glued the wings and the lace.  I put modeling paste on the metal part.  Once it was smooth enough (which was not an easy task for me lol) I wrote in it.  

What is nice is the first time I didn't like the way it looked.  As a matter of fact I kept trying to write Blessed but it didn't fit.  Then the 2nd time I wrote Jesus-I loved it. 

Yay!  It's not perfectly centered.  But that is ok.  This was the first time writing in modeling paste.  (Some where I saw canvases made this way.)  I am always happy when I can incorporate a new technique. :)

So here is the placement of my found items.  The stars and butterfly and heart are wood.  The flowers are Prima paper flowers.  And the key and Believe are metal pieces.  Believe is Tim Holtz but I don't know the origin of the key.  I also used one of Tim Holtz's small dots stencils and modeling paste on the handle.  I also glued micros beads in the bristles to give more texture.

Here are the paints that I used to paint over all of the findings and lace.  I used the silver paint for Jesus.  The Art Anthology paint has little bits of sparkle.  The teal Art Anthology is called Pixie and the purple one is Wisteria.  I love these two colors together.  I wasn't expecting to use picked raspberries (the bright pink) but it really worked out on accenting the found pieces.

Here is a close up of the handle and flowers.  

Here is the whole paint brush again.  

Here is a different angle on the paintbrush.  You can see the sparkles in the wings as well.  :)

I would like to enter my Jesus Paintbrush into the following challenges:

Use Your Stuff:  #300 Twinkle Twinkle-use something sparkly: The wings are sparkly and the purple and teal paint have little sparkles.

The Mixed Media Monthly Challenge: Photo inspiration: Love.  I believe Jesus is love and there is also a heart. :)

Thank you for stopping by!  Until next time my friends...be the light :)