Is it summer yet?

I know we are only in the middle of winter. But its too cold out! I did this little art journal page of wishing it was a bit warmer (and sunny) outside in Chicago.

The background is from a calender that I got in the $1 spot in Target. I cut it and glued it on the page with modge podge. After it dried I took some yellow paint that was inside the cap and with a somewhat dry baby wipe just rubbed the pain on the page in spots. The orange circles you see are a stack of mini cup cake liners. I just took the group of them and dabbed them in orange paint and stamped them on the page in spots.

The swirl you see is a chipboard piece that was just laying on my desk. I painted it the same yellow I used earlier  I stamped the Harlequin stamp in clear embossing ink pad, and sprinkled some heat and stick embossing powder that I had for YEARS that I got a a local rubber stamp store that is now closed. It is very similar to the Ranger stuff. After embossing, it was very tacky, I sprinkled some yellow glitter from the Art Institute Glitter. Glued it on the page with Aileen's tacky.

The bottom of the page I used this sand type stuff that is made by MuddPuddles(I got it in a RAK a while back and thought this was a great page to use it on to try it out). The color I used is called Lemonade, it also has a little bit of glitter in it.

I stamped  the Beach lady on Kromecote with black Memento ink pad. Frst I tried coloring her with my Neo color II's but wasn't liking it. Luckily it came off with no problem, with maybe a little tint of the peach. I went back to coloring her with the Artist's Loft water colors. I glossy accented the sunglasses on her and on the little birdie. Glued her on with glossy accents. Finally I used little sticker alpha letters by Kaiser Kraft (love these little letter stickers) and spelled out "is it summer yet?"

Stamp used
Beach Lady

items used
Kromecote
Straphmore Visual Journal 3 1/2 by 5
calender page
craft paints
cupcake liners
modge podge
water colors
PuddlePuddle
chipboard piece
heat and stick embossing powder
glitter
alphabet stickers
Aileen's tack glue
glossy accents

ARC book club read for Feburary

This month I read Big Hair and Flying Cows by Delores J. Wilson. I bought this book at my library sidewalk sale. I picked it up because of the title. LOL

It takes place in Georgia where the Title character works at the family Garage. Well her 2 brothers didn't want to join in the family business so they left home when they could. She drives a tow truck getting people out of jams, or to pick them something at the grocery store, or pick them up to take them somewhere. She rents a house from the son who's father now lives in a nursing home. The old mad escapes from the nursing home and comes in he house since he knows where he hid the key to get in. lol

It really didn't have plot to it the book. More like the month in the life of Bertie Byrd. It was just one funny thing after another. Even though there was no big plot it all gelled.

My art for this month is another journal page.

The background I did with some Ditto spray and some Lindy's stamp gang starburst sprays and some water. and dropped and dragged the paper through the ink. I stamped the brick background stamp by Viva Las VegaStamps! with a rainbow pad. To represent the garage. I printed a picture of Mater for the tow truck  The frame was from the Recollection's The Create Collection. I cut a frame out of the paper, and wrote Byrd and Son's" (the father hoped one or both of his sons got in the family business). I then stamped out on white card stock the title of the book with cow alphabet letters that I got a while back from Viva Las VegaStamps! way before I got on the Design team. :) I had never used them yet so I thought it was a good time to use them. :)

My next book to read in March will be Scoop to kill. See ya next month! 

Buzz agent report on Cafe Escapes

So now I tried all the flavors of the Cafe Escapes that was in my Buzz kit. None were grounds like coffee, Like I thought. Well I knew the hot chocolate were powders, but I didn't know the other flavors were powders too.

My favorite was the Cafe Caramel. I love caramel, and it this had great flavor to it. The Cafe Vanilla was good too, my Least favorite was the Cage Mocha. I love chocolate, this was too much for me. The Chai was good and so were the hot chocolates. But I like the Milk chocolate more than the dark, but that was my preference. I did find though that these drinks did not perk me up like regular coffee does. But it taste very yummy.

I most defiantly will be getting the Cafe Caramel.

Be loved

So I had fun aking the last backgrounds, I did another timed backgrounds, but this time not timed. they turned out pretty cool.

I cut them into 2 postcards size. I then stamped on white cardstock the Be Adorable stamp and Man and woman symbol stamp from Viva Las VegaStamps! with Black Menento ink pad. I distress the edges with Picked Raspberry Distress ink pad. I cut out a heard and colored it with a magenta sharpie marker edged it with a black Bic Mark it marker. I put 2 sets of 3 strips of homemade washi tape from the washi tape backgrounds VLVS! has. Taped everything down with Miracle Tape.

Entering this in the Simon Says stamp and show Messy Challenge.

Postcards and ATCs

So the other day I did a blog post on backgrounds I did on Sunday. Well they are no all cut up to postcard and atc sizes. I worked on them the last couple of days and they are now finished. The postcard I used brochure from the DR. Seuss exhibit a couple years ago at the Museum of Science and Industry. and one is from a old book that I had when I was a kid and was falling apart.

The ATC's are from a Precious Moments catalog well 3 of the 4. One is from a magazine.

timed layers

Last Night on Paula, Journal Artista Ustream show she did an exercise from the book Kaleidoscope by Suzanne Simanaitis. It was doing things on a time limit. From 5 or 10 minutes. Painting, writing, scribbling, stamping, gluing, spraying. I didn't follow along last night, But I wrote everything down and did it today. I had fun. :)  I took a frozen food box and used one side only. This was my results. 

Lots of Layers and Texture. You can't see the first 2 layers which were ink pads stamping, and writing. I used 4 VLVS! Stamps in layer 8. You can some what see them still in bits, but I wanted so see more of the stamps, So I did go back and stamp some more. And that looks like this. They will eventually be cut into either ATC's or postcards. :)

Now for some close ups! :D

Buzz Campaign: Cafe Escapes

Yesterday I got a package from Buzzagent.com with my latest campaign for Cafe Escapes. Inside there were coupons for a box of 12 kcups, and 2 boxes. Each box held 4 k cups. One box had each of their hot chocolates(milk and Dark), chai Latte, and Cafe Mocha. The second box had  their 2 new flavors Cafe Vanilla, and Cafe Caramel(two of each flavor).

This morning I had the Cafe Caramel and the Cafe Vanilla. I enjoyed both of them. You can taste the caramel flavor and the vanilla flavor in them.Something I don't usually taste in flavor coffee's. I can't wait to try the Chai Latte and the Cafe Mocha. The Hot chocolate (the milk chocolate) I have tried and its okay. Its better than Swiss miss k cups.

Finn inpsired canvas...VLVS! style!

I been wanting to do a Finn inspired canvas with VLVS! since I did a little 4x4 with a coaster to get my feet wet. So that's what I did in December. I did it so far in advance because I wanted to give it to my parents to take with them to Las Vegas. They will be there for the whole month of February(So they are bond to go to the VLVS! store for me sometime in the month!).... leaving me in cold snowy Chicago! Sigh!

The canvas is a 5x7 flat board canvas by Artist Loft.I started of stamping on white cardstock Couture by Brian Kesinger in black memento ink and colored her in Prisma color pencils. I then glued her down the canvas.  I glued on white lace from my stash and the white rosette trim by May Arts with gel medium. I then put some molding paste on the canvas and took the Harlequin Diamond background stamp in the molding paste. The I went to the sink and washed the stamp off. After I let the molding paste dried. I then went to town and glued all kinds of things down to the canvas. I dud use molding paste as a glue for the stuff (do you spy a pink Flamingo. lol), because I was very low of gel medium.

When done this is what it looks like before the magic happens.

Now the after!

Before spraying I did put a few post it notes over the stamped image on the canvas to protect it.

I used Dylusion Pink Bubble gum spray, Lindy stamp gang Dark Chocolate Truffle, starbusrt spray, Phantom Fushia moon shadow mist, and Screaming Banchee Black Starburst spray. I then went over some parts with Luminere pearl Magenta paint. Some more spraying. and then i went over some parts with bronze, and silver craft paints. 

When I was done and took off the tape and post it notes that was on the image. ad i did get some of the pink spray on it. I tried to fix it, but it looked awful! So I covered it with the sprays and paints. I re stamped the image and colored her and fussy cut her out. I used foam tape to pop her up on the canvas. 

It needed something so I stamped Dream Big and Make a Wish on white card stock cut the words apart and then painted them with the Dylusion bubblegum pink and then Phantom Fushia with a brush. klet them dry and put them on the canvas with foam tape. Love how it turned out!

Stamped used

Harlequin Diamond background 

Couture by Brian Kesinger

Make a wish

Dream Big

Items used

5x7 canvas

Gel Medium

Molding Paste

May Arts rosette trim

Lace

junk from my stash

Moon Shadow Mist and starburst sprays by Lindy's Stamp Gang

Luminare magenta paint

bronze and silver craft paint

white cardstock

prisma color pencils

black menento ink ad

foam tape

Happy birthday mom

Tomorrow is my mom's birthday. Here is a quick little card I made for her using VLVS! stamps and Pure Glitz(pre-stickles)

Dont forget about the superbowl sale Viva Las VegaStamps! is having through Feb. 18. 47% off stamps and Miracle tape! code "super47" go stock up!!!

And tomorrow is my blog post over at the VLVS! blog! 

Make Something as cute as a bug!

Last page for now. I have a lot of pages in stages, and all a hot mess I think. :P This one is another napkin. I used yellow and green craft paints. I added a bird stencil using a greener green (greener green? is that a word? LOL). I tried to fade it into the page the greener green. Oh! I also used the Harlequin stencil(both the bird and the harlequin stencils were given to me from Fiona) I was looking through my collage fodder and saw this add from Fruity/Cocoa Pebbles. Cut the pictures out and glued them on the page. I even used the words on that was on the ad. The I did something I hardly ever do. I doodled on the page. I made dots behind the bees, like they were flying. I doodled some flowers(badly). I even outlined the bird, gave him a wing and an eye.

Now is time

This page is from The Julie Fei-Fan Balzer lesson from Creative Jumpstart. She showed us how to use stencils with ink pad, sprays and paint. 

The first layer I used the number mask that my friend Julia sent me with Black Soot Distress Ink pad. The second layer I used the brick stencil that my freind Jean sent me with Autumn Maple Crimson Starburst Stain from Lindy's Stamp Gang. The last Layer I used the same Number mask with black craft paint.

The girl is from an ad in a Guitar Magazine. The Now is Time is from an ad in a magazine I had for a while. Went over the squares in back and white neo 2's 

more pages

Some of you may know my dad was in  the hospital(twice. They released him too early the first time at the first hospital. he's been out for about a week now. Doing pretty good. I did this page on and off during the first time he was in there. The lung are a transfer i did with matte medium and something I printed online.Then went over with with Neo 2's. Everything I learn something new I do something on it.

The next page I did during the same time period. The background i dragged the paper through some sprays, that I did a while ago. The I drew a face and colored it in with Neo 2's.

one hot mess

one day i was gluing a bunch of napkins in my art journal. one page i used 3 different butterfly napkins. I then painted some yellow craft paint around the napkins. then I used a tree mask 2 times and blue craft paint.I took my punchenllia and some yellow craft paint. I then added some yellow drips. It was starting to look like a mess. I found a house and glued that down the page. I did clear packing tape transfer with a magazine image. glued that to the page. still looked like one ho mess. so that's what I titled the page. I used stickers that I got from Target. I did add some tacky glue to the sticker letters.

animal pages

Okay so its been a while since I posted any art Journal pages, since the NANOJOUMO happened.  So here are a couple of them. The pictures I used were from a calender I had gotten at Target at their $1 spot in Dec. I think. 

This one nothing special. Just spread some red and orange pant. The quote I wrote in Neo Color II's.

After I used a purple craft paint I then took a stencil that my Friend Fiona sent me and used a darker purple. The quote again I wrote in Neo color II's. "One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in mu pajamas I'll never know." Gracho Marx

TThis page and a lot of texture in the background thanks to some molding paste that I wiped off from a stencil on the page. Also has some other stuff on the page. painted the page with neon purple. and wrote the quote in white Neo 2's