calendar 2016

My first post of 2016, so first of all I want to wish you all a very happy new year loaded with creativity.

Last year I participated in the monthly Craft Barn calendar challenge, these were the pages I created

But I still needed to create the cover.

I started with one of my favourite background techniques, which is tearing and collaging booktext.

Next I used a technique I learned in another Craft Barn challenge, the retiform stamping technique. You create blocks, mask them off with some post-its and stamp inside of these blocks, I used the themes of the pages: trees, butterflies, snowmen, flowers, owls, dragonflies, hearts. I had a little oops as I started out stamping in blue and wasn't liking it, so switched to brown, but the already present blue was standing out too much

So I colored the other blocks with inktense pencils hoping the blue stamping would blend in more, but this wasn't the case, so I covered the blue stamping with some patterned paper. Better.

I created a stencil with the months of the year with the Silhouette Cameo, don't know what I did wrong as it took me like 5 goes before it cut correctly. Just had to show the stencil with all that wonderful color on it.

Finally I added the numbers 1 to 31.

I've added the months with some washi tape, this way I will be able to change them easily next year so I can enjoy my calendar for years to come.

Now this is completed I can get a start on my planner for this year and be totally organized (as you may notice something I'm rather not otherwise these would already have been finished before the beginning of the new year)

a little break

Hello,
Finally I managed to squeeze in some crafting time, the last week and a half I have been busy with installing my new craft room in the attic. I'm nowhere finished but it is progressing and was in need of a break so I made my calender page for December where the prompt is tree and the color to use silver and/or gold.(all details can be found here)

I cut a new stencil with the Cameo and sprayed it with green and turquoise Dylusions. Added some gold and silver words related to Christmas (naughty or nice; checking it twice; Santa Claus) and added the black stylish tree also cut with the Cameo, only need to figure out how to easily glue these intricate designs.

Coincidentally the last weekly challenge of 2015 asks for tree so I will be entering this page also for that.
I also will be linking up to let's play, because this was just the play I needed to get me going again with moving.

grey and owl

I believe this is my quickest entry for the calendar challenge so far. This month the prompts are grey and owl.
I mixed up some grey paint and scraped it on my page with a card.

Next I stencilled a black forest

Totally how I imagined it, my winter forrest at night.
I stamped a doodled owl on white paper and colored him in and stamped 3 other owls on some gelli prints. These give color to the page, but I decided it needed some more bling, so I added some gold and silver embossing.

My son Kasper (next week turning 6) sat next to me and also colored the owl and even fuzzy cut him, this is his result:

Halloween

This weekend I finally sat down to execute my plan for this month’s calendar challenge (orange and pumpkin) which I had already drown out  in the beginning of the month but I just didn’t got around making it, but maybe that was faith, because now I can also post it for the weekly challenge (Halloween). 

I used orange DI on a craftmat, sprayed some water on top and dragged my paper through it until it was completely covered. It was a bit too light to my likings, so I grabbed my applicator and made some swirls with the same DI which made it much better.

Then I warmed up my heat tool to cut my haunted house and cemetery stencil.

The haunted house actually consists of 2 stencils, the outline and an overlay for the windows and door.

After some stencilling, stamping and adding some details this is how the finished page looks like.

pink and butterflies

I am currently in the process of reorganizing my clear stamps. Because the system with a ringband and laminated sheets of paper on to which the stamps cling to isn't working for me, due to the fact that the stamps don't always cling anymore so they fall out of the folder. That's the reason why I didn't continue organizing this way and just put my stamps in a drawer, disasterious.
Now I'm going to try using CD cases instead. I am also making a catalogue of my stamps, so it is easy to browse and see what I have. After stamping I used a piece of paper to clean of my stamps, it is this scrap paper I used as basis for my calendar page for August. 

As the 2 prompts from the Craft Barn are pink and butterflies, I sprayed the page with a pink Dylusions ink spray (I need to restock as I'm running low)

Next I added some fern stencilling and completed it with some beautiful butterflies.

yes, I managed to finish this month way in time.

July - turquoise and beach huts

This month's calendar challenge at the Craft Barn asks for turquoise and beach huts. So I started with a 12x12 turquoise paper, cut it in half and stamped 2 designs all over on each half. Fishes on the one and sea horses on the other, just wright for a beach theme, no? 

On one of the halfs I added some walnut DI to create another tone.
Then I cut strips of 2 cm wide and glued them alternating on a piece of paper. 

Again I cut strips of 2 cm wide (now cut in the other direction, so in the width) and glued them on my final page, this way I created a mosaic, the easy way.

Then the beach huts, that needed some thought as I do not own anything with an image of a beach hut.
So I thought about carving a stamp or making a stencil, but while searching images I came across a pattern of a beaded beach hut, so I took that design and created a beach hut with iron beads from my son. 

Now I only needed a fitting quote which I found after some searching:
A little sand between your toes helps to take away your woes.
Wrote it with the help of a lettering stencil, outlined it with a black marker and filled it with some white correction fluid.

Hopefully I manage to create the August page much quicker than this one.

May

I finally finished my May page for the Craft Barn calendar challenge where the 2 prompts are magenta and flowers.

I started by pulling out my gelli plate and making a print using magenta acrylic paint and a flower mat.

Next I stamped different sizes of flowers on patterned paper, cut them out and attached them with eyelets to the page.

This stage was done a while ago but I just couldn’t decide on what to add in the center. Until yesterday, suddenly it dawned to me, why not just add the word May, simple, no?

So I wrote the word May, gave it an outline and added a glittery butterfly. All done.

What we see depends on what we look for

Umbrellas and blue are the 2 prompts for April’s calendar challenge.

A couple of weeks ago I was so lucky to have won the weekly challenge (the flower one), with my winnings I ordered the starter kit of brushos.

I used them to create the background, just sprinkled some on a sheet of watercolor and spritzed it with some water.

Just fabulous, don't you think?

Next I stamped my umbrella girl on a piece of cardstock and colored her with Derwent Inktense pencils. Then came a bit of fuzy cutting and gluing her to the page.

On another sheet of watercolor paper I used leafgreen brusho in the same way (so shaking and spritzing) and stamped this fab tree. Glued some funky birds out of a napkin and created a dome around them.

Who is watching who? 

March

The 2 prompts for this month’s calendar challenge over at The Craft Barn are: yellow and rabbit.

I came to the strange observation that although I adore rabbits I apparently don't have anything in my stash, except for a small rubber stamp and some napkins.

I started out with this paper collage which I cut from a larger sheet I’ve been working on this past week.

  

 I’ve been clearing out my scrap papers, I keep them in boxes like this 

For when the right project comes along, but it just keeps growing instead of used so I decided to use all those bobs and pieces and glue them down on a large sheet of paper.

I just used a large sheet of drawing paper, nothing fancy and not that thick, I thought all those layers of paper would add strength anyway.

Here are some pictures of the collage in progress

 It was so much fun doing, just grabbing, gluing and no thinking.

After I cut my piece I painted half in yellow and the other half green with an old credit card.In the grass I stamped some wire (like a fence for the rabbit’s cage) and in the yellow sky some circles.On the bottom I added a border of paws.

I stamped the doodled sun on a piece of the collagesheet and cut it out, isn’t it amazing.

All I needed to do now was cut out my rabbit out of the napkin, glue him down and I added some Fun Flock from Stampendous in the color cinemon toast. I have had this for years in my stash but never seem to have used it before.

Queen Of Hearts

This month’s prompts for the Craft Barn’s calendar challenge are red and hearts, all details about this challenge can be found here.

I didn’t want to make a typical Valentine’s page so I needed to get my thinking cap on: after some brainstorming I came up with the queen of hearts in a card deck which led me to Alice in Wonderland. 

In the remake with Johnny Depp I just love the Queen; the big head on her tiny body, the pursed lips, just love it. So I printed out a playing card with that image and that was my starting point/inspiration for the rest of the page. I sprayed the background with red Dylusions spray ink and stamped a diamond background stamp with Stazon inkjet black all over. I altered the card a bit by adding a sparkling crown and glossy accents to her lips. Past weekend, besides the metallic paint, the trellis die and butterfly stamps I also bought this cute doodled cat stamp (and even some more stuff J) which I colored black/purple with my inktense pencils,  just like the cat in Alice in wonderland.

In gold acrylic I stenciled the title Queen Of Hearts and the page was ready to be glued on my February page.

aqua snowflake

The Craft Barn is not hosting 1 but 2 challenges this year, the first one that started past Sunday is a monthly calendar challenge.

Each month we will receive 2 words:  a color and an object which we need to incorporate in that month’s page.

More info can be found here.

Step 1was to determine the size. I didn’t have to think too hard on that, because I enjoyed working on the 21 x 21 cm size last year during the Q&L challenge I choose that size.

I will be making a hanging wall calendar, with on the one page the art and on the other the calendar, that way I can re-use the calendar each year, either by rebinding or by gluing over the previous one.

I am also planning to use the artwork to  make a digital calendar for 2016, so I am already set for my gifts next year J

For the calendar part I found this neat printable over on www.botanicalpaperworks.com

I haven't made the whole structure yet, need to run out to get some more black paper.Here is what the first page looks like

On to the actual crafting now.

This month the color is aqua and snowflakes need to be somewhere on the page.

I started with a layer of gesso, followed by some aqua colored inktense pencils. I know this technique where you spray some Dylusions spray inks and  remove a pattern through a stencil with a babywipe and wanted to see if this also works with Inktense pencils, and it does! To add some more depth I added some blue DI through the same snowflake stencil and embossed different snowflakes with clear/ white and holographic embossing powder.

And then I constructed this cute snowman out of these parts

The shape was cut out of a cereal box and got a layer of texture paste.

The hat is stamped and so are the birdhouses. The birds are die-cut out of textbook and colored using inktense (what else)

The arms are made out of some copper wire and then all assembled and glued to the page.

It just needed a fitting quote and found just the perfect one: A Snowflake is winter’s butterfly.

A bit of DI around the edges and finished.

Don’t you feel the cold just by looking at it? I do.

birthday calendar - december

Merry Christmas to you all,

After being busy for a couple of weeks with making christmascards for charity I finally found some time for doing something else. I still needed to make this months birthdaycalendar.
Off course this has been inspired by the time of the year: christmas and presents.

I started out with this blue 12x12 paper

which I then painted with blue watercolorpaint and added salt to it, but it didn't create the effect that I had in mind, but non the less it toned down the graphics of the paper. 
After watching lesson 1 of Carolyne Dube's workshop UseYourWords I just had to give it a go.
I used the leftover piece of an alphabet die and created the word december, some letters aren't complete off course (D, B, R) but I fixed this with a marker.

Birthday calendar month Augustus

I didn't want a store bought birthday calendar, instead I started making my own original "artsy" calendar.

For the mont of august I was inspired by summer, so I used vibrant colors and flowers.

I started by spraying a 12x12 piece of white paper with water and Dylusions sprayink and dabbed it dry with kitchen towel. I then used a stencil and sprayed some more water; let it sit for a moment and dabbed it dry, this created a bleach effect.(technique by Dyan Reaveley)

The flowers were made using gelli prints. If you own a gelli plate you will already know that the stack of prints pile up quite rapidly. It is so addictive! This definitely was a good investment.

I just cut out the petals and glued them on the background and used a button for the centre.

Now I just have to punch a hole in the left top corner and hang it on the wall using a metal ring.

Next month I will reveil Septembers design.

Hope you enjoyed my first 'real' post and wish to see you back soon.

Bye for now.

I will be linking this post to August's colorful gelli print party from the very talented Carolyn Dube.