Friday, August 31, 2007

White on White fat book






This is the completed white on white fat book, hosted by Mary-Beth on the byhandartists group. I bound it with my new zutter binder using 1 inch silver coils.
The cover is embossed paper with tiny flowers. The artists did fantastic art for this swap. I liked my page, but it paled in comparison to the ones I received.

Today's atcs


I am finally onto another color today. I was crazy about this paper when I saw it and thought it would make some pretty atcs for the byhandartists September swap. I have some stickers my daughter brought me from Japan that I thought would go well with it. Here are the results.

Sunday, August 26, 2007

More atcs!





More fun with Asian art. I love this iris stamp- it looks Asian to me and I like it every time I pull it out to use. I also like the coin stamp on the dragonfly atc. I embossed it with black ep. It is stamped on a scrap of my yellow paste paper. I used about every inch of that paper. The little girls are cut out of some paper Amy brought me from Japan. The shoes are stamped with black and embossed. I filled in the top of the sandal with glaze pen.
Oh and ignore the purple spots, they were on the glass of the scanner. I was too lazy to go downstairs for the windex and rescan. If I get to it, I'll switch the photos.

Asian atc


The themes for the byhandartists group atc swap for September are the color blue and anything Asian. This is my first atc for the swap. Hum, I see I am in a green, yellow and red phase currently.

Saturday, August 25, 2007

Zutter bookbinding


Today I made my first little book using my new Zutter binding machine. I am still perfecting the hole positioning, but like my results.
I used 3 recipe dividers made of chipboard made by We R Memory Keepers " Raw Goods". I liked these from the moment I spotted them and wanted to make a mini book. They are 4x6.
I painted the chipboard with a pumpkin colored paint by Making Memories. I cut some of my paste paper for the front, the back paper didn't line up after being punched, so I used paper from www.quietfiredesign.com which is a heavy textured mulberry paper in a dark pumpkin color. I had stamped the quote, also from Quietfire Design, on some of my paste paper. I cut it out with my Coluzzle and backed it with the textured mulberry paper. The little bird is from Impress Rubber Stamps and is stamped with Chalk ink.
The 15 pages are 3 7/8 x 6 and are Acquarello 140 lb cold-pressed watercolor paper. Black coils are what I had on hand. I like the contrast to the yellow paste paper.
Maybe this will end up being a Music Deco!

Wednesday, August 08, 2007

RED



I like this background done with Krylon resist so I added a quote and a golden fairy. She will go off to Frankfort KY tomorrow with my other atcs for the swap at Memories Ala Mode. I am sending the Travelin' Man below, a Deep Sea Cowboy, the little girl and her dog with the number 6, one of the magpie "wings", and the asian one seen here. I guess Green and Red have been my theme this month!

Sunday, August 05, 2007

The man has a seat


One of my friends wanted to draw a line under the man to give him something to sit on, so I added some tape when I couldn't find a suitcase! Here he is-all settled in.

alcohol ink



Today I wanted to make more alcohol ink backgrounds for the nautilus stamp. I have had several comment on the byhandartists group that they hope one is coming to them, so I did 4 more. Since I liked my amoeba yesterday, after doing the more traditional marble-look background, I did two more with my additional paper-this time glossy and not plastic. Here are the results. I used lettuce, butterscotch, and oregano along with Krylon gold leaf and blending solution.

Saturday, August 04, 2007

I'm finding it easy to be green




Another day of play-my friend, Yogi, says you make time for what you want to do. I am still having fun with green.
After a miserable start of alcohol inks on photo paper instead of glossy cardstock, I used the ink still on the felt to dab two sheets of plastic in my precut atc stack. On one I added an artchix image and stamping with stazon jet black. To the other I added three big drops of blue alcohol ink which spread and then three drops of eggplant in the middle. Love the cellular look so I stamped the question marks and the word "life".
The mermaid is the same acrylic background as the deep sea cowboy with an artchix tranparancy, artchix woman and a hand-drawn tail done with glaze pens. I added a flower to her bodice and some swirls. I like her a lot!

Thursday, August 02, 2007

Deep Sea Cowboy


I'm on a roll this month. A scrapbook store about an hour away is having an atc contest and swap this month. So, some of my atcs will be mailed there and some to my byhandartists swap. This is an image I got off Flicker that I have been wanting to use. I did one of my favorite background techniques that I learned from Nettonya, on the byhandartists group. Apply gesso, then light wash with a light acrylic paint, I used a pale yellow,dry, apply another darker color over the yellow but leave some of the yellow showing, dry, apply a third darkest color but don't allow to dry and spritz with water. In a few minutes I dab or swipe the darkest color off, some will stay. It leaves an intersting pattern and layers of color. This time I wiped it with a somewhat dry baby wipe. I stamped the swirl with gesso. I stamped various stamps with shades of green ink. My "cowboy" image was printed on transparancy, but I wanted him to show up more so I mounted him on white cardstock and cut him out. I typed the words and printed them on white cardstock, too, cut out and pasted. Isn't he a cute little guy?

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

Green ATCs






I was on a green kick today. I should have been on a laundry kick! Posting this and then off to do some necessary chores. Sorry my scans are terrible! My scanner is misbehaving badly.
The theme for the atc swap this month on the byhandartists yahoogroup is green and sealife. Yogi is our organizer and swapper.
The five bird atcs are done on cardstock. Applied Dark Moss chalk ink DTP. Stamped the nautilus stamp with Yellow Ochre chalk ink. I'm on a magpie kick since I did my research for the Chinese Valentine's Day 4x4. The birds are a copyright free image I printed on tranparancy. Some have a background word stamp also stamped in Dark Moss. Some have ribbon- I really like the clean look of this black and white ribbon, some have decorative corners that I cut out with my cuttlebug.
The man and little girl and dog with a quote are on scrapbook patterned paper. The man is from an old photo I had in my stash. The stamp was in my postage stash and the "how much farther?" is a cardstock sticker. The girl and quote are from a free image sheet I got from www.Pennywisearts.com. Don't recall how I came across it, but there are several people/animal pics and some quotes. The corner is cut from scrapbook paper, too.
The little girl and dog (also Pennywisearts)with the black and white ribbon are on a background of twinkling H2O. The flower stamp and number are stamped in black dye ink. The asian woman is on the same background with an asian background stamped with black dye ink and a pink petal.