CCC Week 16...

  

Over at Studio L3 this week we are up to Week 16 of the
Compendium of Curiosities challenge. This week's technique
is a lot of fun as it really seems to come out different than
planned. I used the Distress Ink colours of Crushed Olive,
Chipped Sapphire and Brushed Corduroy for my background.

I also got to use the new Rosette die, which if you haven't
tried it yet, is just so much fun to do. I used a Wendy Vecchi
stamp for the middle of the rosette, just love that eye!
I added a strip of some really cool clear deco tape and
stamped some random circles, attached my saying with

my favourite tool - the tiny attacher :) - if you do not own
this you need to, it is the best stapler ever!

Now back to that Rosette Die from Sizzix. I have seen quite a
few people using it and even though I barely use flowers on
anything I could see the possibilities of this die. It is hard to
find and there is nowhere local to me that has it, I found it
on e-bay, it shipped pretty quickly and arrived on my
doorstep this Saturday. I was so excited to try it out and once
I opened it I realised that you need to have an extended
platform and cutting plates to run it through the Big Kick,
argghh! so disappointed.
I tried to do it just using the regular ones and moving it along
after cutting half of it, well it really did not work that well.
After quite a few attempts at it I knew I would have to get
the extended plates, the next day I was able to find them

at my local Jo-Anns. Well it worked so much better and now
I can make rosettes in one run through the machine and no fudging them!!

Bird revamp...

So some of you may remember a few months ago that I was

doing a project that gave me lots of grief. No real reason for
it, it just was not going how I had envisioned it. I left it for a
while and finally went back and finished it, that was in May.
I still really wasn't happy with it but I left it alone as I just
did not want to deal with it any more.

This week I had an idea to change the "bird" to a completely
different theme. I got the shadowbox on my desk and
completely dismantled it, totally destroyed the whole thing
apart from the box and the bird. I used an embossing folder
with the spider web and used some coredinations black magic
card stock. After running it through my Sizzix I sanded off
the top layer to reveal the orange colour underneath. I
applied some gesso to my bird and re-painted it. I re-covered
the inside of the box and added a cute little dimensional spider
to the middle of the spider web.

Trying to keep in a similar colour scheme I used some alcohol
inks to re-colour the metal corners on the outside of the box.
I kept this much simpler and added a couple of mirrors on
the inside which makes this very hard to photograph.

Having a glass panel on the front is bad enough but adding
the mirrors to the inside made it almost impossible so I know
these pictures aren't the best but hopefully you can see
enough of it to see the difference.

I am much happier with this version and hopefully can say
that it is done and I will not be re-doing it again!!

CCC Week 15...

Here we are at week 15 already! time flies when you are having fun :)
Go to Linda's blog to get details of this weeks challenge and
while youhaare there look at all of the great entries that have
already been posted for this week.
I enjoyed the technique but found that I could not stamp on
top of the alcohol inks very well, perhaps I was using the
wrong inks for that?

Anyway I used grunge board as the base, followed by the
technique (it's a secret, if you want to know go and buy
the book). I used some of Tim Holtz tissue tape along the
bottom and then used something new, a Tattered Angels
Foil chip. This has a foil resist on it which when you spray
a mist over it resists the colour, kind of a cool effect.

It is really fun trying all these techniques every week, some I
have done before but I have found more of them that are
new things for me. Thanks to everyone for all the kind
comments along the way and also for the great suggestions
I had on how to display my pieces of art.

Art Happenings...

Today I received my confirmation packet for Artfest 2011, I
was lucky to get into my first choice of classes, yay!!

I had heard about Artfest quite a long time ago but always
thought that it was too high a level for me. Well after
meeting lots of art friends through online classes, blogs,
Yahoo groups and the Tim Holtz cruise to Mexico, I realised
that this was something that I could and should do. This
year I attended for the first time with my cabin mate from
the cruise, we have become good friends and art event buddies!
So I am encouraging anyone out there who is interested but
maybe nervous about it, you can do it, go and look at the
website to see the diverse classes that are available.For some reason I am more excited about next year's event
but I am sure that is because now I know what to expect.
I am even pushing myself to learn something new this time.

Another art happening that I decided to join in is
The Sketchbook Project 2011. When I heard about this
project it sounded like a great thing to be involved with and
got really excited about it, so signed up to do it. I was
looking forward to the day my sketchbook arrived, and it
did, about 3 weeks ago. Now that I have it I am at a total
loss as how to start. I have been scouring the internet
looking for some help, I have connected with a couple of
ladies through one of my Yahoo groups who also have not
started theirs yet. The theme of my book is "In 5 Minutes..".

My problem is I don't know how to interpret the theme and
fill a sketchbook about it. I have a couple of ideas but am
not sure if I am going in the right direction, so if anyone

has any insight, suggestions etc on how to approach it

I would love to hear them, pretty please :)

CCC Week 14...

This week the challenge over at Linda's blog involved using
Tim Holtz masks. This is one of my favourite techniques
which I have used a lot in the past.
I decided to incorporate one of Heidi Swapp's masks
into this challenge. I wasn't really sure I liked how it looked,
and my original idea kind of went by the wayside. Anyway in
the end I decided that I was not going to re-do it. When I first
started the challenges I decided to use the same die cut shape
throughout, sometimes this can be limiting with it's small
size. I love the shape of this and am now wondering what I
will do with them when the challenge is over.

What is everyone else going to do with theirs ? I know most
people are doing tags, some cards, some book covers, and
some just do a different thing each week. I was originally
thinking I would just punch a hole in the corner of them all
and put them on a binding ring, not sure now what I
will do and am open to suggestions ???

Steampunk fun...

So what exactly is Steampunk? well according to
Mike Putman who's class I took yesterday this is
the definition :

a form of art that is Victorian, kind of Jules Verne science
fiction that incorporates the steam power of the time,
goggles, hot air balloons, gears, etc. Mike even said it
sometimes can be tied in with the punk era too.

Anyway this is what I made in class, well technically I made
all the parts in class and assembled it this afternoon at home.
This was yet another fun class given by Mike and Lesley
at Paper Vineyard, my nearest scrapbook store. We used
the new Graphic 45 Steampunk Debutante line, these papers
are fabulous if you like this style of art. I love the finished 

piece but my husband just doesn't get it, lol!

So the other thing that happened yesterday at the store is

that I finally got to meet someone who I have met in the

virtual world, aka blogging! We met whilst taking an online

class all about blogging and have kind of followed each other

and left comments back and forth on our blogs. We really 

do not live that far apart but have never got to meet yet.

Well we did yesterday, as Deb and her daughter came over
to the store, so I could pass on a book to her that I did not
need, from reading her blog I knew she was the
perfect person to give it to. The fun thing was that she had
made a little treat for me too, thank you Deb!

Week 13 of the Compendium challenge...

I am a little later than usual doing this weeks challenge, I
have to confess that when I saw what it was I did not want
to do it. The technique this week is all about grunge paper
flowers, shh! cannot say any more. Anyway I am not
someone who uses flowers and having seen all the lovely
flowers that people have made throughout all of these
challenges I felt intimidated to say the least. Anyway I
decided to "just do it" and this is the result.

I actually started with a different background paper and the
flower did not show up very well. I made the mistake of using
ink colours that were similar to the paper, lol! After I made
the flower I realised I had to find some other paper and
although I liked this paper it was very busy, adding the flower
on top of it made it worse. I added some of Tim Holtz's
tissue tape over the paper (sacrilege I know!) but it helped
a little. I am not sure why my flowers won't stay curled but
believe me I spent a long time curling the petals, so again if
anyone can tell me the best way to do it I would love to know. 

Hey Lori are you out there ??? you make lots of flowers so
share the secrets with me please :)

What I have been up to recently...

First of all I have terrible lighting in my house so have to

always change the colour and lighting in Picasa to get my
pictures to look almost the way they should be, lol! Also
this is the first time I tried the collage function as I did
not want to load photo after photo, obviously I need more
practice at it as it has cut off parts of one of my pictures.

Yesterday I spent the day with my friend Lisa taking a basic
then an advanced Zentangle class at
The Frenzy Stamper in Scottsdale, AZ. We had an hour break
for lunch and had a really delicious lunch at a place
recommended to us by Debbie the owner of Frenzy Stamper,
just cannot remember the name of it, sorry!
So the picture that got cut off is of some of the Zentangles
we learned yesterday. If you want to know more about this
art form then go here.

The other pictures are of the projects we made at Creative
Escape last weekend. These are the ones that I have now
finished, I still have 3 more to go, hoping to get some more
done tomorrow. As always if you have any questions about
these projects or anything else just ask.

CCC Week 12...

Well, hard to believe but we are one third of the way through
these challenges.

If you have not made it over to Linda's blog yet, what are you
waiting for? Everyone is having so much fun trying out new
techniques and sharing what they did, please come on over
and try it yourself.

My problem is not the technique but deciding the whole
theme of my card before I even start. That takes me so
long to do and then the technique is the quickest part. This
week's technique I had not tried before and again using
Distress Embossing powder is a challenge for me.

I only have 2 colours and, in fact the only reason I have 2 is
that I had to get a different colour for the previous technique
we did. I am still unsure on when the stuff is heated enough
or not so if anyone is an expert with these powders send me
some tips please.

Anyway I do like how it turned out and will be waiting
eagerly for next Monday to come around so I can do the next challenge.