Hurt

Last week I ordered some supplies at The Craft Bran with my gift voucher which I received for being selected first place with my up page

Friday the postman came to deliver the package but as I was at work he left a note that I could pick it up after the weekend, aaaarghh.

So yesterday I went and got my package and was as happy as a little kid on their birthday, I got a white pen from Rangers, white embossing powder, baroque stencil from Andy Skinner, black gesso, a craft mat and a speedball brayer.

Of course I needed to test everything right away and what better way then making a spread for this forthnights’ Q&L challenge , check out what other fantastic art is made with these words here.

The background I already made last week using a blue watercolor and a border with a stencil and some black acrylic paint.

The  woman’s face on Andy Skinners’ stencil  was just perfect for the quote:

nobody can hurt me without my permission.

I embossed the corners with the ornament on the stencil and the white embossing powder and painted in some gold detail.

I love the stencil, not that happy with the pen, I would like it to be more opaque, finding a good white pen is turning out to be hard, if anyone has a suggestion/recommandation, always welcome.

gelliclopedia part1

It has been a while since I played around with my gelli plate, shame on me, urgently got to change that.

In Carolyne Dube’s community A colorful playground over on google+  there are so many talented gelli printers, I am not wowed by my own results so decided to start experimenting some more to improve myself. I want to put together kind of a manual for myself ( a gelliclopedia) with what works and what doesn’t.

I started with exploring colors, color combo’s, paint types…

My key learning's thus far are:

1.      I prefer the more translucent paints
2.     A print gets more interesting by adding different elements to one      print ( I tend to make prints with only one stencil, one texture, but when combining several together suddenly it becomes more intriguing)
3.  Layering (best to start with the darkest color, when you use shades of the same color you create a nice shadow effect)

Here are some examples of my first run

first play with this homemade stencil, LOVING it!

2 prints with the other 2 stencils

flower coasters as stencil, combo of warm colors

fern as mask

detail of a print where I used
 an embossed paper as texture,
love the different shades of green

there is also something like too much layering

.

junk journal page #14

YES, page #14 is finished (I think) J

It all started out with some randomly glued leftover letters on a cereal box

Then some stenciling (the pink is actually a fluo pink but this doesn't scan at all)

And then I was stuck,I liked what I had with the circles but it definitely needed something more.

BUT WHAT???
I started by adding some chunky journaling (something I've never done before and must say I'm not overwhelmed with my result aka handwriting, probably need some practice), 
Added a silhouette, still not quite there yet however.
Added another silhoutte, getting there.
But the silhouettes didn't really pop because of all of the color, so I wanted to mute that a bit down, first sprayed some black through a stencil but for whatever reason it didn't stick to the page, so I decided to stencil it with white acrylic paint.
Then some final finishing touches: the leave die cuts, some masking tape and some magical fibres.

This page was definitely a case of keep on layering until I was satisfied. Normally I like each step and am afraid of adding but not in this case, so I kept on going until something half decent came up.

junk used: cereal box, leftover letters, die cuts and magical fibres.

change

It’s so inspiring each time to see all the other great designs in the Q&L Challenge over at the Craft Barn (click here to see for yourself) and to receive honest and motivating comments.

Thanks to all who take the time to visit my blogspot and leave a comment, truly appreciated.

For challenge #7 we were given the words change and/or truth, I came across this quote: "if nothing changes there would be no butterflies"
No doubt possible that that was the quote for me.

Recently I bought these coasters

I didn't buy them to put glasses on however, but to use them as stencils.
And this works very well indeed.

I added some stamping, also using the coasters this time as a stamp. 

Last week me and my 4-year old son did some stamping with corks, and I discovered I liked the texture, so I made these acrylic flowers with them.

Added a flock of butterflies and then I just needed to add the quote, I had cleaned of the coasters after spraying on a piece of scrap and believe it or not but the petals were just the right amount for the words of the quote. As finishing touch a button in the centre  of the flower and done.

Trust your instinct

Yesterday I showed 2 pages on which I was stuck.
Well, I followed some of the advice that I got (so thank you to everyone) and put them aside and started on something totally different.
I made these stencils: 

Can't wait to give them a try ( the last one my son already had some fun with on the gelliplate as you can see)
But first I wanted to finish of one of the pages because suddenly it struck me what to do next.
But first the start.
I used a piece of my tear-off palette which already had some paint on it from another page which I smeared with a sponge.

Added a ground plan of a city with a stamp, an embossed medieval cellar and a border, this is the stage where I got stuck

But after making the stencils I knew I wanted to add some acetate.
So I used some that come with stamps and stamped the text "trust your instinct" on it. Because that is exactly what you should do, whether it is in art or in your everyday life.

Help

Last week I started  these 2 pages for my junk journal.

I was on a roll, but...
I got stuck.
Why do I always stumble upon this invisible wall?
I start a page and am satisfied on the progress and how it is looking but then suddenly I get afraid to add anything more to it, afraid of ruing what I already have.
Anyone any suggestions on how to overcome this issue or suggestions of what to do next with the pages, feel free to leave me a comment below.

dragonfly (junk journal page #12 )

Last weekend I found this medaillon on a parking lot

Libelle is a magazine and literally means dragonfly. So this was my inspiration and junk for this piece:

I started with a piece of cardboard on which I added crunched up pieces of masking tape, applied a layer of gesso over it and sprayed 2 different shades of blue.
I found a box with magical fibres in one of my drawers, where it has been laying way too long, and thought the time was there to finally actually use it. 
What a fun product: it gives a nice texture and has a fantastic shimmer to it.
Dragonflies represent something mystical to me, so I added some elfs to top it all off.
This week I read an articled about a British professor who claims to have photographed elfs in the Rossendale Valley in Lancashire:

Probably there is a completely rational explanation for this but every now and then we just need a little bit of magic in our life, don't you think?

junk journal page #11

And here is page #11

On my desk there is always a large piece of paper on which I clean off my brushes, stencils, stamps...
I cut a piece out of one of those sheets and this was the base for my page.

Last week it was 2 years ago since my younger brother past away, when he was still alive we sometimes wrote letters to each other. So on the lines I wrote once again to my brother about my everyday life.
On top of the writing I put a piece of delipaper on which I stenciled a scene with mushrooms (my brothers nickname was paddo, an abbreviation for mushroom in dutch) and added a border with a stamp.

junk journal page #10

We are already week 15 and I only finished 9 pages in my junk journal, so time to do some catching up.

Yesterdaymorning while clearing my desk in my studio (which took quite some timeL), I found these strips of patterned paper which I had used in the gardenbook.

So these were my starting point for this page.

I painted a piece of cereal box with heavy body pearl green using a palette knife to create some texture.

Glued the pieces of scrap to it, originally I was going to do a lanscape page, but when I turned it to portrait it suddenly was clear to me that that was the way it should be.

Added some random stamping with a harlequin stamp, an other stamped image from kaiserkraft in the upper corner which I embossed, some faux stitching and then added a quote about life.

On to page 11...

Flower

Just in time to make the deadline of this challenge.
I choose the word flower.
Normally I first find a quote where I make my page up around but this time I just started with the flower theme and added the quote at the end.
When I read this quote with flower and butterfly in it I knew this one was the perfect quote.

The background is sprayed with Dylusions.
To create a subtile effect I laid a flower stencil by crafters workshop and sprayed some water through it which then reacts with the Dylusions.
I also added some texture paint through the same stencil on some spots, this apparently also reacted with the Dylusions because it took over the color but with a nice shimmer to it. 
Then some flower stamps which some of them were heat embossed with blue embossing powder.
The tag was made in the same way.

Kaspers gardenbook

For this book I started out by selecting some scrapbookpaper, I went with greens as this will be a gardenbook (to document the progress in the vegetable/fruit garden of my 4-year old son)

I also added the gelli prints which I made with the wax resist technique

The pages were cut to the size 19.5x13.5cm.
The cover is made out of a piece of cardboard wich measured 20x14cm, on the inside I made a mark at 13.75 and 16.25cm and made a scoring mark along this line. Folded the piece in 2 and made the punching holes with the bind-it-all.

This is how the finished book looks like

On the inside flaps I made pockets

the scrapbookpaper was folded and glued togeteher to create large pockets

My son really loves his book, he can't stop browsing through it.

Birthday calendar - April

It's already the first again, so time for this months birthday calendar

This is the step-by-step:

• take a random piece of scrapbookpaper (pattern/color doesn't really matter because most of it will be covered up anyway)

• apply a layer of gesso and add some dimension with texture paste and a stencil:

• then for the really fun part some drippage with dylusions spray ink

• add some stamping and some more stenciling, this time with some acrylic paint

I really like the page and don't want to cover any of it up with all the dates, so I'm thinking I will write the birthdays randomly on the page.

Thanks for stopping by and hopefully you got through the day without being fooled or tricked.