WOYWW #204

It is snowing where I am!!! I would complain, but, ah heck, I'm gonna complain. This is not good. I am so jealous of all those green pictures I see, many with actual flowers in them. Grrrr. I am in Fairbanks - which is north of where I live, but still. We are very busy in Alaska setting all sorts of temperature records...15 degrees below normal. sighhhhhhhhh

BUT here's the good news, it's time for What's on Your Work Desk Wednesday, hosted by our friend Julia Dunnit and I will get to see creative wonders and an occassional travelogue picture as well. So knowing I would have a fair amount of time in the evenings I did take a photo of my desk before I left on Sunday.

I was working on the new Tim Hotlz Assemblage Clock for an upcoming class. As usual there is an eclectic assortment of goodies from Tim's new French Industrial paper - which I LOVE - to old favorites like Distress Inks and gears. Working with the clock was actually really fun. I found that cosmetic sponges with black and silver paint gave it the best "old" skin. I tried of a lot of application methods and you just can't beat cosmetic sponges some times.  

It was a busy week so I don't have any other goodies for you. I did bring my small art journal with me, so here's a couple of pix of those pages. 

Both of the pages started as odd bits of color left over from other pieces. On the left I just went with the shapes and saw hearts. One the right I topped all that color with a new stencil I had just gotten and all of a sudden I was transported to Belize where we saw the HUGEST bamboo ... art; it can literally transport you. Gotta love it.

This page was based on France Papillion's Journal on Monday Series. Some of the same techniques, but a very different page. I just love her blog and her journal videos. Her voice is so melodious, and her work is pretty fearless.

These pages are just pretty colors. Love pretty colors.

May there be many pretty colors in your life this week!! Thanks for stopping by the traveling Fun Room.

WOYWW #203

I am TOTALLY into WOYWW lately! So. Much. Fun.

Every Wednesday (in the UK) the lovely Ms.Dunnit, she of the Stamping Ground Blog, hosts a peak at desks around the globe. And before you know it, your checking in on your buddies in Australia, North Carolina, US, a whole bunch of places in the UK, South Africa, California....it's just a hoot. But to play, you have to show your work desk.

Since I live in Alaska, which is way earlier than the UK, I usually take my photo on Tuesday night. Tonight I worked late, sent my sweetie to the airport on a business trip, and didn't get home until after 8:00 pm. So I thought i'd take a picture of my desk and that would be it.

The stuff right in the front of the picture is blogged elsewhere, but I had to move it to take photos so there it sits. The red package is photos I actually had developed to make into an album for a friend. The rest of the desk is just paint, brushes, stuff I haven't gotten around to putting away. But as often happens in the Fun Room, once I'm in there, I want to do more. In this case journal. Fortunately I had a page with LOTS of color on it ready for me. Sadly, another wonderful example of my not stopping in time...oh well. It served a purpose tonight. 

Last week I showed a close up of a Mariner's Compass quilted wall hanging, which I did not make. Below is little split nine-patch which I did make. It's was an exercise in value and blending --- and was a blast to make. Quilting is what I did before I got involved of all of THIS. 

There is something like 45 different fabrics in this 15" by 15"piece! One of the reasons I like Mixed Media is I actually finish stuff!

May you have a wonderful week creating - whether you finish it or not!!

It All Started with the Background

I, like so many others, am having a real difficult time knowing how to feel about the events in Boston over the last week. Not only about that - but my surprising reactions to the events Connie Ozvicka over at Dirty Footprints Studio posted a great lesson Fearless Painting. Connie also the hostess of 21 Secrets which is a FABULOUS series of workshops. Any any rate I used her technique to process some of my feelings about the tragedy in Boston. 

I wanted it to look like graffiti. It was pretty therapeutic. 

I love art. I wanted to do something for this week's  Simon Says Stamp background challenge, but this piece seemed a bit dark. So I tried again. 

I finished the background and lo and behold it reminded me of water lilies. AH HA! I had just gotten a new Crafter's Workshop stencil - yep, you guessed  - in water lilies. So I painted me up some lily pads and went about apply the stencils. 

In case you were wondering. That's not the correct order of doing things. Stencil first, then deep black outline would have been better. At any rate, I didn't like the way the lilies turned out, so this morning I tried again.

Not quite as happy with the background, but I think the lilies are much improved. 

Sometimes I can't even believe the stuff I am doing. Does that sound strange? My sister was always the artistic one (and that she is) but I am now friends with paint and it no longer scares me. I am really enjoyed the Distress Paints...they are so fluid, and yet the color is intense. I have a lot to learn, but I am so enjoying the process. So this morning, thank you to Connie and to Simon's challenge, for helping me go someplace new. 

WOYWW #202

Ms. Dunnitt or Julia as her followers of What's on Your Work Desk Wednesday, WOYWW for short, is on vacation, and STILL she hosts folks from around the world so we can check in and snoop about. Thank heavens.

My desk is a mess this week. I was making a piece for two challenges I thought, but missed the deadline on one. Oh well. I got to play with a lot of metal flowers, gears, etc., etc. (see the previous post for Sara's version of Finnebair's amazing work). So on the left side you can see piles of goodies from both Tim Holtz and the  Frilly and Funky Boutique.

Along with ribbons, paint adhesives, "kitchen rolls", you'll see lots and lots of Dylusions Calypso Teal spray ink on a bunch of stuff. The piece I made is the previous post, and the metal came out so much darker than I had envisioned. So it was one of those nights last night, that my mind kept working "the problem" and now I want to go mix up some liquid gesso with some water in a mister and start with that...at any rate, there's lots of room for experimenting!! Which is good. But messy.

In the center of the table is a small little bottle called ZAP glue with a black cap. I first came across this adhesive which is essentially super glue with a brush in a steampunk jewelry class. And it is the brush that makes all the difference! Originally I had to order from a fly fishing shop - last time I was in Michaels' I saw it there. If you are looking for something new to glue metal bits together this stuff works great!

Last week I showed a different angle of my desk and several people commented on this wall hanging.

This quilted piece is made from batik fabrics in the mariner's compass pattern. I just love the colors...

Hope everyone has a great week ahead. Enjoy!!

Paris is My Dream City

My mother loved Paris, and took me there for the first time when I was in early twenties. The second time I went to Paris was after my mother was gone, but shortly after I met my sweetie. We went as my Mother would have...so we stayed in a really nice hotel and did tons of fun things. We went everywhere and saw if not everything, well, we saw a lot in the 11 days we were there. So when I saw that Frilly and Funkie was hosting an April in Paris challenge, I knew it was time to break out all those old calendars I had been saving!!

There are so many amazing things to look at in Paris, the architecture, the street lights, the people, the cars. We went everything on the Metro, and of course we had to go see the famous Art Deco Metro stations.  As I said this picture is from a calendar because my photos from Paris are not digital...it was a while ago that we went...lol.

Over on Alison's Words and Pictures blog I saw THE most fantastic piece of steampunk fairy tales that  she had made (you really should go check this out) and she mentioned she was entering it into a Snazzy's Inspired by Anna Dawbrowska. Well, I missed that deadline, but I'm a huge fan of her work, so I thought I would have a go at it.

I started with an 8 x 10 inch canvas, covered it with paper, painted that with a few coats and then layered the photo on a couple of black mats. I glued all most of the metal pieces together and then misted them with Tattered Angels White Chalk Board spray. Once that was dry, I used the new Dylusions Calypso Teal spray. Once everything was dry i glued it onto the background which had been same products. 

I REALLY need a lesson in how the colors are achieved, but it was fun to layer all those cool bits and bobs from Frilly and Funky. I like how it looks, but it's not how I thought it would come out. But then I also thought I would use red and that looked -- let's just say -- not so hot. 

It is my dream to go live in Paris for 6 months at this point. This year, I'll just thank Linda for hosting the challenge.

AHH, A Color Break

I did something I never thought was possible. I overloaded on color! I think it was when I filled the  journal page aside the doodling project in the last post with twinkling H2O's. So I decided to take a break this morning and make some ATC's for the ladies I will be seeing shortly in my monthly class at the Stamp Cache.

The one below was the first of the series and set the theme of "time". The other part of the challenge I set for myself was to use stuff that was either hanging around my desk or in the embellishment bin...some of which have been there for a very, very, long time. 

I had just gotten the new smaller size of the London and Paris stamps; they were lots of fun to play with!

Below are the Working Smaller class samples, loaded with lots of wooden goodies from Helga at Artchix Studio.

I might be ready to work larger for a while!! Enjoy.

21 Secrets Has Started

Woo-Hoo. 21 Secrets has begun! If you aren't familiar with 21 Secrets it's an online workshop open from now through the end of the year with you guessed it, 21 different classes and teachers for $59 US. It's tons of fun. And since this is my year to learn new things, techniques, etc. I have embraced it. Here's my first piece.

It's from a class taught by Cathy Bluteau, called Doodling Our Way. Definitely in the "more is more" category, but I have to admit once I got started it was pretty dang fun. My favorite section was the little flowers. They reminded me of wall paper. 

Cathy's premise is to start with a small collage of flowers and some text and move on from there. I used some flowers from some scrapbook paper and then painted in my own version of them to help pull the piece together. Because my flowers were kind of "painterly" anyway I just painted over them. 

I found it a really fun way to spend an evening. 

WOYWW #201

Ah yes, the Tuesday night ritual.

Whoops. Secret's out I guess. Yes it's still Tuesday night here in beautiful, SNOWY Palmer Alaska but it's already Wednesday in Julia's World where for some amazing reason I can not fathom she has been linking us up so we can peak into other crafty dens and see what's about. It's an amazing group of kind, generous souls and I really do look forward to seeing what folks are up to Great Britain, Oz, the US, South Africa and points beyond. And the kindest is our friend Julia, who organizes it every week - when she's not looking for little white squares.

I'm afraid I'm a tad bit boring this week. Had to  finish some class samples and a birthday present which you can check out here if you would like, and then horror of horrors, I actually spent most of Sunday cleaning (which tells you I do not spend most Sundays that way). I did tidy up a bit in the Fun Room and moved in a TV tray at the end of my desk which gives me a little bit of space.

See? At the other end of the desk, but the wall.

Well maybe not, but it is nice to have a bit more space on the desk. The baggie in front is a full of NEW paints - twinkling H2O's and Silk Acrylic Glazes for a class I'm taking from Dion Dior in 21 Secrets. I can't wait. I had forgotten how sparkly and luminescent they are. I have a totally crush on Dion right now. Her work is spectacular and she seems like such a nice, grounded person.

Back to my desk - my art journal is right where I left it with an unfinished 21 Secrets project called Doodling our Way which has been amazingly fun and restful. And then there is the usual this and thats.

I was actually pretty disciplined about the doodling project. I  pulled out a color range of Copic markers and then stuck to it...certainly helps the page flow better. When it's done next week, I'll show you. I'm posting this page because you can actually see the window sill....I thought it might be nice to have proof it was clean--once.

Hope you all have a lovely week and enjoy the people you love.

Anything Goes so Dream HUGE

A very dear friend of mine is celebrating a zero birthday this year and she has been so encouraging about my art adventures that I thought it was safe to try something new for her gift.  This corresponds very nicely with this week's challenge at Simon Says Stamp which is anything goes.

I signed up for Lifebook 2013 this year and one of the first weeks classes was this great class from Christy Tomlinson. Not only was the class fun, but it introduced me to Christy's work which I just love. It's joyful, colorful, and fairly intuitive. So with a big thanks to Christy as my inspiration for the background, this is the canvas I came up with.

I am really happy with how the background turned out. It was a blast to work on...I just kind of threw caution to the wind and here's the thing: when you buy a really, really, really small paint brush, you can do fairly decent detail work. Hmmm. Who would have guessed?

I was a little less happy with the words...love the saying, but it was hard to convey. 

I do however love the idea of sparkling, so I thought I would add this ticket that was floating around on my desk so I could use the paperclip!

And of course she needed a birthday card....

You can't really tell the size, but this is one of Tim Holtz's small blueprint stamps, colored with distress markers and a heart from Helga at Artchix Studio...I just love her cut outs!! I colored it up with a few Copic makers and added a chit-caht sticker. 

So hard to photograph, but there is sparkle on the flame and between the frosting and the cupcake with one of my new FAVORITE things - a glitter pen. 

There we have it - a birthday gift for a wonderful friend. Happy Birthday...because when you have a birthday with a zero in it, you get to celebrate all year long!!

Enjoy. 

Happy WOYWW 200 Julia!!!

For the last couple of years I have faded in and out of What's on Your Work Desk Wednesday hosted each and every week by Queen Julia of WOYWW land. She invites us to take a pix of our work space and share it with folks literally, around the world. This is what my desk looked like tonight:

She has steadfastedly (I think I might just have made up that word....) posted and let us just kind of hang out. I really appreciate her. When my life was kinda crazy last year and I was moving twice and didn't have any creative space she made sure I got an ATC during the swap even though I couldn't reciprocate. AND she even sent me a button which I proudly display on my desk. I appreciate her humor and style. So Thank You Ms. Dunnitt!

I've been experimenting, working on class items, finishing up a birthday present and working in my art journal over the last week....here's a sample.  

I was in a serious funk last week and I want to sincerely  thank the ladies who reached across the miles to commiserate and sympathize. It was like getting hugs. One of the many reasons I love WOYWW.