RSS Challenge 4

The latest challenge from Ready Steady Stamp! was very interesting again, this time the ingredients were these:

and of course, the usual no cute, no digital and at least one stamp.

So here is my entry:

It's a small canvas, 7" x 5". I stamped the "A" (Elusive Images, Classic Alphabet) at the bottom left with Golden's white Gesso quite thickly - it has a lovely consistency. When it was dry I coloured the canvas with various brown and cream Promarker pens, and brown and cream shades of Distress inks, wiping colour off the "A" if I got it on there and leaving part of the canvas white. I shadow outlined the "A" with darker pens. Meanwhile I made some clear dewdrops with Golden Clear Tar gel and put three small ones next to the "A". I used a Paper Artsy Mini script stamp on cream paper with a Distress ink which I then tore and distressed and stuck over a brown patch top right. The "A" on the scallopped circle was also stamped with Gesso onto cream paper and sprayed with Tattered Leather glimmer mist, which I rubbed off the gesso which had partly resisted it. This was mounted onto a larger scallopped circle and fixed as shown. The oblong of brown and blue cloth was cut from my paint rag (a clean corner) as it just seemed to fit and I like the contrast of textures and colours. Then I punched lots of little squares from brown, cream and white vellum and paper, stamped "A" on some of them (Hampton Arts Old Book mini's) and stuck them on randomly as shown. The remaining dew drops were stuck on last. Hope you like it! You can see the challenge here:

http://www.readysteadystamp.blogspot.com/

Art Journalling yet again

Here is another pair of pages, on the subject of the sea and ships. I am a seasider, or to be more accurate, a sangrownun. Seasider refers to anyone from the Fylde coast, sangrownun is more specifically someone from St. Annes - literally some one ('un) grown on the sand. St. Annes is probably one of the sandiest places outside of an actual desert! Anyway, although there's not a lot of sea there, I spent lots of time in my teens (long ago) in Blackpool where there's loads! At the same time, my dear dear Dad, who is a very gifted artist and sea-lover and ex Royal Navy (WW2) was filling my life and home with pictures and tales of tall ships, my English teacher was filling my head with The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and John Masefield and Fleetwood Mac had a hit called Albatross. All the above references can by found in these pages I think. I'm a bit more pleased with the colours here than I tend to be with most of my work. Hope you like them.

Art Journalling

This is another page from my Art journal, which I completed over the last few days. Like others I have become a bit addicted to this, not all pages are OK to share, but I kind of liked this pair, even though the colours are a bit fierce. Somehow they look even fiercer on here than they do in life, which may be something to do with me being an incompetent photographer. The left hand page is just coloured with spray inks, mainly Glimmer Mists but ther are some Sticky Fingers inks in there too. I sprayed a couple of colours then dried them with a heat gun before spraying any more, to try and avoid either muddiness, or the page becoming soggy! Then when completely dry I added a few splodges of yellow emulsion paint to provide a contrast in texture. The frilly ribbon was aquired in a strange shop somewhere I know not where - I think it was an ironmongers, somewhere in Yorkshire. It's actually elastic with coloured organza and the colours were just right for my page! The facing page has a stamp from Tim Holtz about creativity, and the images tell the story that he tells in the words - the stuck on embroidered flowers represent the safety of the comfort zone, and the wierd flowers stamped and stencilled around the edge are supposed to be the wilderness where you find yourself. I am represented in there somewhere!

Hope you like them.

Monumentally Blue

No, I'm not feeling particularly miserable! The RSS challenge this time, which you will find here: http://www.readysteadystamp.blogspot.com

has ingredients which include a monument and the colour blue. Also required is at least one stamp, no cute, cuttlewax technique, (see their website for a tutorial) a metal embellishment and cork. I made two pieces this time, the atc was completed first, and I was trying to make a larger item with the same elements, but it wouldn't come out right. I stopped and went off to make a journal page or two, which turned out to be about the sea - they aren't quite finished yet, I may post them when I'm happier with them. So when I came back to the challenge the sea and seaside was in my mind. I love the seaside particularly in cold winter weather - I was brought up there - in summer it always seemed to belong to the visitors, and we all had to work in our holidays anyway. I was a waitress, assistant cook, chambermaid, shop assistant, but one of my schoolfriends, Jane, had a fabulous job (I thought) looking after the donkey ride! But in the winter it was given back to us - we had more free time and there was more room. Anyway, this Crafty Individuals stamp appealed to me immensely and reminded me of Jane so here it is on this little wall plaque. Yes it was near Blackpool where I lived as a teenager! The crown on the donkey's head is metal, the lettering is cork and mounted onto a cuttlewax piece. I hope Blackpool Tower counts as a monument - it's certainly monumental! The Big Wheel is there also. On the atc, the only cork is a picture of a cork in a bottle - but we were told cork in any shape or form!

RSS Challenge 2

Time for another Ready-Steady-Stamp challenge. This time the recipe is as follows:

1: Sun

2: Yellow

3: Ribbon

4: Shape - Triangle

5: Acetate

and of course, use at least one stamp, no digital and no cute!

Here is my entry - it's the second attempt, as the first ended up looking very messy and almost impossible to photograph - too many dangly bits and far too many colours! When I was doing my Art "O" level (that dates me) my art teacher banned me from using colour as she said if I added colour I was guaranteed to fail as I had no sense of restraint. Hopefully I've improved a bit since then, but I can still get a bit carried away with colour sometimes.

Anyway, this is a small square cream card, the front has been chopped off to make a reverse-opening triangle. Back and front have been stamped in shades of yellow and orange with small stamps from Impression Obsession and Paper Artsy.The back has been overlaid with an acetate panel, which was run through the Cuttlebug with a floral folder and coloured in with Promarkers. The front has grosgrain and floral ribbons stuck on to represent sun rays and a garden respectively, and the sun image was made with Nestabilites shapes cut from different yellow / orange cards and attached with a sun shaped yellow eyelet. Hope you like it!