Little Details

When I do a craft fair or teach a class I always ask people who visit to sign my book, since the majority of my work for the boutique I am attending the end of this week is centered around chalkboards, I wanted my sign in book to reflect that.  So using chipboard and acetate as my substrate for the chalkboard, I made one.  I have used Pan Pastels to create the rose and butterfly and just plain chalk to write the words.  I also enhanced the edges of the book with metal photo corners.

This is the book standing, I did a small plate for the spine.  

The ruled pages slip into the book and can be removed when the craft boutique is completed, the cover and spine may be erased and repurposed. fun fun fun.  Hugs

Simply Pears

This morning as I was cleaning some in the kitchen after my coffee, my eye was caught by 3 pears I have in a basket on the counter.  I love the shape of pears and the rhym of them together, as if they are nodding and bending in greeting to each other. I grabbed my "Inktense" pencils, my fingers and imagination setting in those luscious yellows, greens and blushes and then my common sense told me that I do not have time to play with color today, so next week maybe.  I took a photo of them, turned them into elements with my Cameo and did a fab damask fill from a Silhouette Library background.  There are also some blanks waiting for color on my table.  The word "Thanksgiving" is also from the SL, added some lining to the letters with a 005 micron pen.  I distressed the pears with Tim Holtz "Brushed Sage" and added some ribbon to my black back ground and tied some raffia on the center pear.  I have so much to be Thankful for this week, hope you do also, hugs

Raven - Spirit Guide

Oh what a wonderful few days I have had, I have caught up on my sleep, I backed up my computer, sent all of my images for the Craft Boutique to my external hard drive - it took 3.5 hours, lol, I was a busy girl.  I have played, done some reading.  I have researched some classes online that I am looking at for 2014, cleared off my studio table, did some laundry.  Today, I will go find my suit cases and start packing for my departure on Thursday.  Yesterday I was in SketchBook Pro and not sure what I was doing, just getting more familiar with it, testing some of the brushes and playing with the Copic Colors.  I was not sure what this face was as I was in the midst of drawing it and then suddenly I realized it was a Spirit Guide for the Raven. Let me explain a little about my Spirit Guides, for many years I have created one or another as they come to me.  I am always amazed at the appropriateness of their arrival.  The Raven caught me totally by surprise and I have been joyous with its arrival, it is definitely something I will embrace.  The Raven really has a bad wrap, a lot of it due to one of my favorite authors Edgar Allen Poe, dark, ominous, evil but there are other sides that have light and merriment attached.  In American Indian Folk Lore, the Raven is know as a trickster, the bearer of light (he is credited with releasing the sun from imprisonment in a wonderful story), I will always choose the positive side of my Spirit Guides to embrace because I have the choice and because I believe that we are all energy and that we get back what we give out and I so much enjoy living in the positive spectrum.

I wanted to color with the Copic Markers by hand on this piece.  I wanted the background to be a gessoed book page and the gesso will not take the Copic Ink, so I took my book page, gessoed it and then distressed with Tim Holtz "Wild Honey" and "Vintage Photo" and scanned that in and printed it out, I then took my drawing and printed it on my background and then hand colored with the Copic Markers.  The feather is from the Silhouette Store, I did an under base if purple and lavendars and then did the feathering with a .001 micron pen, I did the highlights with gesso and tiny tiny water color brush.  The Raven is from my Halloween images.

Hope you enjoy your Sunday and go safely and happily into the new week, hugs

Morning Exercise

Since the moment I downloaded this "Music Sheet" sketch from the Silhouette Store it has called to me for an angel, so this morning during my Exercise time I made it my goal to get one done.  SketchBook Pro was my primary tool, you may check it out by clicking on SketchBook Pro.  You may also download a free trail if you would like to play around with it for a while, but you will not receive access to the Copic Colors unless you purchase the software.

I am so in love with the Copic Color panel in this software and I must admit it was a determining factor in my purchasing it.  So what is so great about it?  I am a hands on person, I love what I have been learning in the "Digi World" but I would never be able to convert 100% to digi, I need my hands in the mud so to speak.  But I realized right off what a great tool the Copic Palette could be.  I am using my own line drawings but if you do not draw, you can load your digi stamps to the Sketchbook Pro.

I begin with my cut image, at my table I did a light fill of color with my Copic Markers, I then scanned that in and opened my partial colored image in SP and began to blend with my Copic Palette, the magic begins when you make a mistake or do not like the color you are using, you just erase it and begin again, even if you do not like your hand colored portion that too can be erased.  When I am satisfied with the color, I save it in PSD format, take it to PhotoShop and turn the image into a "PNG" image (you can save the image directly in SP as a PNG, (I am so used to doing my crop and clean up in PhotoShop it is just automatic for me)so that my Silhouette Cameo can cut it as a Print and Cut.  At this time you can refine with your markers if need be, I added highlights to the angels halo with gesso, just to pop it out a bit.  Although it seems like there are many steps, this process knocks a lot of time from start to finish.

Love Thy Brain

Yesterday morning, I loaded 4 large boxes into my car and took them to the post office and away went 3 months work and product for the Craft Boutique.  When I walked out the door of the post office, I walked out a changed woman, it was as if all the air in my body was propelled out and I was exhausted, I had a grocery list with me and could not imagine how I was going to negotiate the isles and checkout, but I went anyway. Our grocery serves a rather small community so it is rare that I don't see someone I know, a neighbor, a friend and sure enough a very good friend was standing at the deli counter, we engaged in a conversation and I realized after a couple of minutes that I had not heard a word she said, so I apologized, explained that I was not at the top of my game and I just needed to get done and home.  So I got the essentials, got home, put them away and flopped on my bed, a power nap mid day is not out of the norm for me, I am up at 3AM most mornings so by noon, I am ready for a wee nap, but yesterday it was 3 hours, I woke up groggy and disoriented and it took me an hour to really wake up.  I fixed dinner and was again asleep by 7PM.

So what does this have to do with my brain?  If our brain gets tired, then we had better listen, because if we don't then it will just shut down the body, I know this and try to treat it right, but some times I push and push and push.  Right before I go to sleep, I do some stretching exercises and breathing exercises, to let my brain know that I am getting ready to let it sleep and then right before I doze off I implore it to wake me with inspiration and color.  For 3months, I have been trying to get a line drawing of a holly sprig that I was happy with, I bet I have done a good 50 attempts, but nothing, nothing, nothing.  This morning when I woke, I was refreshed, renewed and all my stress was gone, no deadlines looming over my head, nothing on the calendar for today, wow!  First thing in the morning when I get to my studio table with wonderful coffee in hand is my morning exercise, I draw, play with color, nothing set, just go with flow so to speak, and lo and behold, a holly sprig, one that I liked, oh yah, the brain doesn't like stress or deadlines, well at least mine doesn't.  So love thy brain and it will love you back, hugs

White and red card stock embossed with Sizzix Holly Folder, Holly Sprigs from my table this morning, hand drawing and colors by Copic Markers, PS6 and Silhouette Cameo and some misc. ribbon and red raffia.  Hugs

The Last of my Projects

These are the last of my projects for the Craft Boutique, everything hopefully gets shipped out tomorrow and then it will be almost time to fly out to Sunny Southern California, oh boy.  These are my "gift bag hang outs", minature chalkboards that clip onto a gift bag with a small clothes pin attached to the back.  I used chalk markers "Bistro" on the chalkboards, so they would not rub off.  Have a happy Tuesday, hugs

She was proud to live outside the box

I am almost on track so took a little play time today, yesterday had lunch with my son and ran some errands, I had to run into Hobby Lobby and picked up the latest edition of "Cloth Paper Scissors" and saw a Mixed Media Face Challenge and went hmmmm.  So this afternoon watching Tim Burton's "The Corpse Bride", one of my all time favs, I was drawing and then I had an idea for the challenge, she was sketched with a 005 Micron Pen, colored with Copic Markers, one of my butterflies and 3 roses, the background is one of my gelli pulls printed on a magizine sheet and then cut into 1" squares and mounted to a 4X4" square.  Happy Sunday, again, lol, hugs

You are One of a Kind

When I print out my gelli pull backgrounds I normally do it with my Silhouette and I print out 2 to a page, so had one left over from my print out yesterday.  I also had on my table a Spellbinder's Oval I cut from one of my favorite coffee beans, I love love the packaging, they were sitting side by side and I loved how they looked together, so put this card together, the little stand for the coffee kick is a piece of the packaging and oval with a rub-on added.  Just a generic card that could be used a few different way, hugs

The Moon Sees You!

I know for a fact that some of my best ideas come when I am the busiest, when I don't have the time to sit and play with it, expand it.  I really did not have the time this morning, BUT, I needed a Halloween card for son and daughter in law, I am having lunch with son today and probably will not see him again until after Halloween.  When an idea hits me and I don't have time for it, I write it down, some times it comes to fruition and some times loses its momentum during the time span I had it and the time I actually worked it.  This has been on my list for a while and comes popping in and out at the weirdest times, the other day I found an old Making Memories Scrapbook Idea Book from 2006, I flipped through it and loved the texture of the paper and the size, it is about 8"X11" and I thought oh I bet this paper would work to print out some of my gelli pulls, which has been on my "what if" list, to print out the gelli pulls on book and/or heavy magazine pages, so I put the book on top of my stack for later.  So this morning under the wire and desperate for an original card for my two lovelies, I printed out one of my favorite gelli pulls on one of the pages.  This will most certainly be one of my favorite things in 2014, it really doesn't matter if you can read the background or even if it makes sense, just having that additional depth pops the gelli pull like crazy.  Happy Saturday, Hugs

A Tip from my Studio

A little tip from my studio this morning, I am getting ready to seal and give my little double butterflies some gloss, they are too small to hold, it would take forever, so I mount them to an old Cricut Cutting Sheet, if it has lost most of its stickieness just give it a spray with some stencil adhesive or Elmer's repositional glue sticks work also.  Then lay your items down and get busy.  I also use them to paint items I don't want to move around with my airbrush or spray can.  I never throw my cutting mats out, they are great for so many things, I love making embossing folders with them also, but that is another day. Have a great Friday and happy weekend, hugs