Old things and new thoughts

So I'm sitting around my house playing my Daniel Powter CD and relaxing. I've cleaned a bit, took a short bike ride to find my wands, put up my bird feeder, and now thinking about getting Arty for the rest of the day......

I've been looking over some of the Halloween related swaps on Swap-Bot and I am itching to join. There's a Nightmare Before Christmas one that sounds nifty. Reminds me of the shadow box I did for Lyssah awhile ago. Can't find the darn pic though! I am getting done with some of my first swaps. I sent the postcards. I really hope people like them. They took hours to do and I put so much work into them. I got one back so far and it's a painting. Kinda not my style or colors but it's neat and I can tell she took awhile to do it. I will finish up some swaps if I can get off my butt and send them out tomorrow. I really want to get some ratings in so I can join other stuff. Although I am afraid I won't be receving as nice projects I am sending but, that's always the risk in swapping isn't it? And the price of joining the easy swaps.

Well I think it's time to stop being lazy and get off the pc. Here's my last thought of the moment:

Those who wish to sing, always find a song.

Sigh....

I've been in kind of a funk. And it's worse today. Got bad news. The car that was to help me get to and from work just took a nose dive into impossible to fix waters.... And my blue baby still is lost in undetermined cause land. Sigh. Why do these things always seem to get so much worse when you have no money to fix them? Well on to the happier stuff.

I got 7 postcards done yesterday. Seven! 4 were for a swap on swapbot and 2 were for me and one was a present for a coworker. They came out so nice.

The first pic was the present for my coworker. I added some of the UTEE and Perfect Pearls to the frame to match the postcard inside.

The second one with the fortune cookie on it is one I made for me. I looooove it. Something about it just makes me happy.

The next one is an incomplete Bernie Berlin technique I used for the swap.(CORRECTION- I think it was a technique I saw on the Yahoo Group ART techniques) I added Lumiere paints but forgot the gesso! Sigh.... It still came out pretty.

Picture 4 was done with a transparency layered over a Lumiere painted background. Then I added the Paper towel background stripes I made a few weeks ago and added the magazine clippings and colored staples for strength. The transparency didn't seem keen on staying on. It was fine the way it was but not for mail handling.

Picture 5 is made with a vintage ad. I started with a texture paint and then added other colors. After that I stamped a crackle background over it, added more lumiere and then added then vintage ad with the kittens. Not my favorite but it took hours. Hopefully whoever gets it will appreciate all the time put into it!

Picture 6 is a painted lumiere background with a bit of embossing for texture. Then I added the clips with decoupage glue. They didn't seem to blend well so I traced them with pastels and rubbed it in and they look more flowing now.

The last one is a metallic black background with red/gold interference sponged on it. I stamped the moon and embossed it. The I glued the vintage photo on. After that I used my silver leaf pen to add the stars and the word Dream.

Everything came out so good. I got to make myself some stuff, pass some along for others and light up my coworkers day. Found out after she opened it that she loves butterflies! How perfect is that? So that it for today. Join me next time for more art and maybe a little less rant. ;)

Yay! A weekend off!

I finally have a whole weekend off. Of course it will be my only one until the store opens in about a week and a half, so I must take advantage of it artistically. I get Saturdays off but not Sundays... I will start my Wings(6 ATC's) swap tomorrow. I have lots of background ideas! Speaking of backgrounds, here are a few I did a couple weeks ago I forgot to post here. I just played with various types of paint on a gessoed ATC. As soon as I start building on these I will post more.

I joined Swapbot today! I am very excited about it. I trolled the Forums a bit after joining 3 swaps. A little scary since there is alot of 'beware' stuff in there. I will keep it simple for my first couple swaps. Two of them are the smae guidelines as most of the swaps in my Yahoo group and the other one is more complex. I wanted to make myself a wand though and this way I can put my effort into someone elses. (I told my honey I wanted to make myself a wand, LOVE harry potter, he cracked up-silly boys!) I think I enjoy making for others more than myself. I seem to have a hard time finding the stop point when it's for me, but it leaps out at me on others..... Sigh. As long as the stuff I send looks good, I guess that's all I need?

And seriously! Must make myself something this weekend. I've spent the last few days making some zip loc baggies of 'goodies' to send with my MMAN swaps so I can throw them in there when I'm ready. I think that will make preparing the packages super fast!

I'm out for the night.... Must get some rest so I can get up and CREATE!

Send away ART!

This piece is for my Mixed Media art group again.... I always seem to be posting stuff for it that I'm sending to others.... I swear one of these will be for me! Anyway, July's Random Lottery Theme winner chose Harmony. I made this piece from a 1x1 paper mache box, lumiere paints, buttons, a feather, moss, some twigs, fibers, a vintage flower button, ephemera, a rhinestone and assorted glues....

It took me about 2 hours to do. Now the glue around the button was cleaned up a bit after I took the pic. As you can see, it was still drying! But I removed the excess and it looks great now. If you look at the last photo, the colors on it really come through alot. The Lumieres are so awesome to work with and they come out so shimmery....

I really need to work on something for me. I still haven't finished my version of "Night". And I have lots of other ideas that I need to put into motion. So many people are doing the stamping classes in group that I think I need to join too. Maybe on Tuesday when I have a whole day off to devote to me. Well, that's it for tonight kids!

This weeks WU entry

I got my entry done today and got it posted. Such a relief to get it done. It's not that it was stressful but I wanted to finish it last night. But after the head injury incident, I was still not in good shape yesterday. The background I did for it was beautiful. I had this blue sparkly paint. Only thing is its washable. So after coating my surface and dropping more glitter in it, I heat treated it with my heat gun. Then I needed to finish it. Well thats where I got stuck. So today I went online searching for quotes about 'night'. I found one and it inspired the rest of it. All in all I like it. (top photo)

I copied the background technique onto another piece because while I do like trading these out, I am sad to see them go. (bottom photo) So this way I can keep my art by making another one very similar but not the same. I just need to find another tree!

Quote of the Day

'When my daughter was about seven years old, she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college - that my job was to teach people how to draw. She stared at me, incredulous, and said, "You mean they forget?" ~Howard Ikemoto'

That cracked me up! I always feel when I am working on my art that incredulous wonder. I play with child like abandon. And when I stop doing that, my art suffers. Life is small wonderful things that make you happy. It is not the big happy moments but the small ones that make life worth living. And my art is a succession of small happy moments of creative bliss.

Answers!

Thank you kindly for the wonderful comments! To answer your questions.... (since it won't let me do it on those posts....)

#1) Beeswax is awesome! I took the little pellets... natural yellow ones... and kind of pressed them down a little onto the paper so it would stay. They are sticky so it works well. This holds them down if you are using a heat gun. (you can also use a craft iron, but you can't watch it as easily) Once you have squished em', turn on your heat gun and keep it about 3 inches from the wax. Make sure you have your project on something to protect your work surface. The wax goes where it wants! You can try to direct it by tipping the card up and aiming the heat down. If you don't have enough wax, stick some more on and repeat. It takes a bit to get used to it. The piece under "Paris" is my first one. Travel was the second. Just experiment away and see what results you get~! I'm gonna try adding crayon wax shavings next! I'll post that when I do.

#2) The clock face is vellum. I bought it in a pack of assorted clock faces from Walmart. I wish they still had them.... I'd buy more! As soon as I get Challenge #4,I will post the next stage of my card.

If you haven't seen the book "ATC Workshop", I highly recommend it! This book has sooooo many ideas! Anyone interested in mixed media, altered art, or ATC's will LOVE it! It can be applied to almost anything! I finally really dove into it and can't put it down.