Soap Bubble - O - Rama Backgrounds

Okay, so here's a new technic I've read about, in art books and online, but never tried before, until today. Today, our local book arts group met, which we do once a month, and this was the technic taught and tried. It was loads of fun, and actually quite addictive. We met for four hours of art fun and play, and when the four hours were up, I didn't want to stop playing and making cool backgrounds.

Actually, these pieces could be framed as they are, and be great art. Or several framed as a set, and be great art. And like, who knew??? I sure didn't....until today. And am so glad I was introduced to this technic -- a very easy, simple, and cheap technic. Thank you so very much Laurie, for introducing me to this technic.

It involved a recipe of water, dish soap, and tempera paint. We used wide mouth plastic cups for the paint, and basic straws with which to blow the bubbles. And then, once the bubbles are blown, you take your paper and touch it to them, and this is the amazing result. Not terribly difficult, eh? And loads of FUN, that harkens back to childhood play. It's no more difficult or involved than that.

So, here is the recipe, as I'm sure you'd like to know it.
Materials:

1–2 tbsps. Tempera Paint

1 tbsp. Dishwashing Liquid

½ cup Water

So, you mix it all up, and then insert the straw, and start blowing bubbles. What we found was as time went by today, the result kind of changed, to where there were tiny bubbles around the rim of the the plastic cups, and the paint on the background papers got darker. Also, it seemed to me the bubbles got larger, except for around the rim, the longer we used the paint/mixture.

I'm very happy with how these turned out. It was really great, and fun, trying a new technic. I can see me using these backgrounds in various ways. If you're inspired to try this, good for you. I love being a source of inspiration to other artists, as I appreciate being inspired myself by other artists. So go to it, and try this out yourself. You'll be happy you did.

(Scroll down to my last post on Nature Art with a Twist to see how I used caulk and a real leaf. I posted that yesterday.)

Nature Art with a Twist

I finished this piece today. Yippee, I finally got some new art done I can post. I used my usual for the base - frozen pizza cardboard, of course. Then for the background, I used crumpled, then uncrumpled, glossy magazine page. I can't remember if I glued it down, or used double sided tape, because I did that part about a month ago. I think it could be done either way. It's the first time I've ever tried this technic, using magazine page. It gives really great texture.

Although I can't take credit for this technic, I didn't come up with it myself. I found it online at the Trish Bee Design Studio website. Here's the link to her website: http://www.trishbee.co.uk/techniqueszone/ . It's a wonderful website with a wealth of tutorials for many different technics. I was thrilled when I found it. Thank you Trish for your wonderful site and all the great tutorials. I'm sure I can learn a lot from your site. It's oh so inspiring!!!

Now, back to my piece. I punched the shapes out of entree cardboard, then frosted them with caulk (the poor man's modeling paste). On the larger circle, I stamped into it for the design. I used the underside of a vinyl carpet runner for the stamp, which has a swirl pattern.
On the other shapes, I frosted the texture onto them. For the painting, I used black acrylic paint, and then rubbed Lumiere gold over the textured parts with my finger. I love the look of black and gold, it looks so elegant and rich to to me.

Now for the leaf. It's a real leaf from my yard. I preserved it with gel medium on both sides and let that dry. Then I used a paint brush to paint caulk onto it. After it set up a few minutes, I used a toothpick to make the leaf veins. After it was dry, I painted with Lumiere gold, let that dry, then rubbed on Lumiere rust with my finger over the textured parts. After that, I used my finger to rub on some black, to get more contrast. To finish it, I sealed the whole piece with Future Floor Finish (FFF).

I had all the shapes done and ready to glue on, when the idea came to me to use the leaf. I've used real leaves before in some of my art, and love them. And gee, they are free from my yard and so accessible, now that spring is finally here. But this is the first time it occurred to me to use caulk on the leaf, to give it more texture. That's why this is titled Nature Art with a Twist. The leaf is totally natural, but putting caulk on it isn't. But even so, I like the way it turned out. I keep sayin' I LOVE that caulk!!!

Using paper casts in art

This is a spread I did in my first Altered Book, back in the spring of 2004. The main reason I'm posting it now is because I'm entering a blog give-away on GPP Network Street Team, having to do with paper casts in art, and so I need to post this piece on my blog. And also because I haven't been making much new art lately, due to increased work days and hours. I did create a spread in the AB of a friend from my local book arts group this week, but I haven't taken a digital picture of it yet, so I can't post that. And I haven't been posting much on my blog lately, so I figure at least posting something is better than not posting at all.

Thank you, Michelle Ward, for your great tutorial on paper casts on your blog, and for the give-away you are having. You have a great blog! I didn't know about it until recently, when an art friend pointed me to it. I'm so glad she did.

Okay, so now a bit about this particular piece. I was a total "newbie" to altered books and altered art, when I made this. However, I like it -- although my art today is different and not what it was four years ago. And that's a good thing, because hopefully, as artists, we are constantly learning and growing, right?

On this piece, I used a sheet of my handmade paper that I made on the left page. I used purple copy paper and coffee filters for this handmade paper. I made the paper pulp in a blender, and didn't blend it very long, so the white coffee filters would show up in the paper sheet. I used the border of a woven table place mat, and yarn unraveled from a sweater, on that page also, along with a button and some flowers cut from a necklace.

On the right page, the main background is a piece of sheer fabric from a fabric sample book, and of course the painted strips of corrugated cardboard. Those are more buttons at the bottom of the page. The women's faces are the paper casts, painted with metallic purple paint. I lucked out and found the plaster mold for these at a thrift store. I've never seen another mold like it, and I really like these faces.

So that's how I made this piece, a conglomeration of "things" I had on hand. I still have the plaster mold, as well as two others I bought that day, and I'm thinking maybe I should get busy and make some more paper casts. I have lots of different molds, some I've never used. Most are the plastic candy molds, but I also have some flexible molds for polymer clay, and some terra cotta cookie molds. And I have lots of unmounted stamps that would work for paper casting, as shown on the blog mentioned above.

I wouldn't say this piece ranks in the best art I've ever done, I know it doesn't, but I think it's not bad for when I was a total newbie to altered art. And it does speak well to using what I had on hand when I made this piece. And lately, I've been thinking about using paper pulp in my art, or at least experimenting with that. I haven't made handmade paper in years, mostly because I still have piles of it left over from several major marathon paper-making sessions I did years ago. I haven't used my handmade paper much in my art, and I think I need to do that too.

So in closing, if this post encourages any of you to make handmade paper or paper casts, that's great. I hope it does. I know it has caused me to reconsider using them more in my own art. Whether or not that actually happens, I'll let you know.

Regarding my beeswax collage (posted below)

I thought I would mention what I used for the base in this piece. (And no, it's wasn't frozen pizza cardboard, amazingly enough -- since I use that so often as a base for my work. I doubt that would've worked well for this kind of collage.) I used a flat piece of styrofoam, which was packing material for something I bought. I think it was a half inch thick, or maybe 3/4 inch thick. I cut it to the size I wanted, and then frosted wallboard joint compound over the top and let that completely dry. I tried to make it as smooth as I could, but it did have some minimal texture to it. That's what I took to our group meeting for this project.

I wasn't totally sure it would work, but I thought, why wouldn't it work?, and took a chance. I think all the other members who made collages that day used either stretched canvas or canvas board. But I know no one else used what I used for a base.

Thankfully, it worked just fine. The technic we used is featured in one of Claudine Hellmuth's books, I think her first book. We used melted beeswax, melted in potpourri pots, and then quilting mini irons (with the long handles) to keep melting the wax when we needed to, after it was painted onto the base and over what we put on our collages. Basically, it was a simple technic, not too difficult, and a great technic. Thank you, Claudine!

I was very happy with how my collage turned out, but as I said before, I got some much needed help from other group members. Had I been left alone to do this, I doubt it would've turned out as well. That's why working in a group can be advantageous, and also lots of fun, and I love my local group.

Memorial Day Remembrance

Memorial Day is coming up soon. An important day to me....one that honors those who have served in our fine Military, over years and decades and even centuries, and have risked their lives, even sacrificed their lives, the absolute ultimate one can give, to protect us and our freedom and our country. This is dear to my heart, because I'm an American Patriot, and am proud of my country and the military that has fought for our freedom. I thank God, often and sincerely, that I was blessed to be born in this country, blessed to be a citizen of this fine country, blessed to be an American. Because the fact is, millions and even billions of people out there were not blessed in this same way. And I did nothing to deserve this amazing blessing, but I'm grateful to my very core for it.

This artwork is not something recent, but was done 3 1/2 years ago at my local art group meeting. It's a collage done with beeswax, the first and only time I've used this technic. It just came together rather easily, surprising me a lot. But I happened to have the right supplies and items at the right time, and some help and input from other group members also. So in the span of four hours, this is what I created.

I gave it to a dear friend of mine, Donna, as a gift. She's in the Navy Reserve, and I felt she would appreciate this and relate to it, on a level maybe other people wouldn't or couldn't. I didn't start out making this for her, but once it was completed, I knew I wanted to give it to her, and was meant to be hers. She then took it to be framed, and it's hanging in her livingroom. So even though I no longer own it, I do get to see it when I visit her, and that makes me feel good.

I'm grateful and proud to be an American, to my very core, and my heartfelt and sincere thanks go out to all members of the military and their families, for the honorable and incredible sacrifices they make for my country, and for me personally. God bless America and please keep us safe, and God bless our troops and please keep them safe. Amen, and amen.

Doodle-a-Shape

Sheesh, where does the time go??? My goal, related to my blog, was to post at least twice a week, on Sundays and Thursdays. And I did that consistently -- for a while -- but.....then I slacked off. Well, life doesn't always go as planned. I've had to work more days and hours in the past five weeks, because my work schedule suddenly changed. And I'm not sure how long I'll have to work this new schedule. But one thing I do know is that it has limited my time, for making art and posting to my blog, and doing other things as well. Grrrrr! Oh well, such is life, I guess.

Regarding this Doodle Page, it's my first real attempt at doodling, from start to finish. I've never had the urge to doodle, quite honestly. But I had a few very slow days at work, and I was getting bored out of my gourd. Normally, I do paperwork when it's slow. When I finish that, I generally read, mostly non-fiction. I love perusing art books, for ideas and inspiration, that I mostly check out from the library. And I did that, looked through five art books, and still had time on my hands. So I grabbed a piece of green cardstock, a black ink gel pen, and just started doodling, mostly out of boredom and frustration that it was so slow at work.

However, once I started this page, and it started to take "shape", (pun intended), I kind of got "into" it, and it helped relieve the boredom and frustration. I would estimate that it took me at least 10 hours to make this page, probably more. Which hardly seems worth that amount of time, but since I was bored, and it gave me something creative to do, in that sense, maybe it was worth the time. I would've preferred to invest that time in the kind of art I normally do, but that wouldn't be possible at work.

So anyway, I tried my hand at doodling, in a serious way here. And I must admit, I'm happy with the end result. Although I have no idea what I'll do with this piece. I did scan it, and could always use it as a background for other art pieces. Whether or not I'll attempt to do any more doodling during slow times at work remains to be seen. I don't know about that, I'm hoping I'll be busier at work so I won't have to make that choice. For all you serious doodlers out there, who love to doodle, I can now appreciate just how much time it takes!

I have been working on some new art lately, at home, of course. But I can't post it on my blog, because it's a collaborative project that will be submitted for publishing. I've never had my art published, nor submitted any of it for publishing, so I'm excited about this project. Hopefully, it will be accepted for publishing -- I'd really love that. There's no guarantee, of course, but the other two artists I'm collaborating with do great art work, so hopefully our work will be accepted for publishing.

Meanwhile, it's a beautiful spring day here in the Denver metro (CO) area. And yet, it snowed here Thursday, and was very cold and windy yesterday. I'm loving the weather today!!! And debating with myself about making a run to Hobby Lobby and to Joann's with some coupons in hand. Like yeah right, I need more "art stuff".

Two More Attempts with Gesso

Well okay, I don't give up easily. I wasn't happy with my first try (the post below), so I tried again. I like these better. And once I pretty much accepted that I wouldn't get much, if any, dimensional texture with the brand of gesso I used, I was reluctantly okay with that. On these I sponged the gesso onto the stamps, and stamped onto the surface. Which I had also gessoed, and let dry, before I stamped. I think one reason my first piece, Doodle Bird Haunting, seemed so washed out was because I stamped onto the brown side of the pizza cardboard, then painted over it. It didn't allow for much contrast with the paints, I think. I'm glad I learned from that.

I did use straight caulk sponged onto stamps, then stamped onto another piece. That gave me the dimensional texture I wanted and expected. I love that stuff!!! However, it didn't show up well at all in the scan. But I like that piece, and will most likely use it for the postcard swap.

So, I guess all is well that ends well, and I learned some things along the way about gesso. Thanks for all the info about gesso people gave me, in comments, and also in yahoo groups.

Doodle Bird Haunting

What a strange title for this art piece, no? I agree. After all, doodle birds are supposed to be whimsical and cute, not haunting at all. So why did I name this piece that? Well, first of all, because it just popped into my head, second of all I'm not very good at naming my art, and thirdly, I named it that because this piece seems rather washed out to me, and nothing like my idea of what I wanted it to look like when I started.

This was supposed to be for a postcard swap using gesso as the technic. Using gesso for the texture. And I'm a big texture nut, as some of you know, so I was excited to use gesso for great texture. So I sponged the gesso on the stamps I used for this, and gee, it didn't produce texture at all, it was like using white acrylic paint. And I used wooden mounted stamps, so I couldn't re-stamp over what I'd stamped. The gesso is supposed to work as a resist and for texture.

Well, it worked pretty well as a resist, but not well at all for texture. After I stamped, I sponged glazes in violet, yellow, and blue, and then rubbed them partially off with a paper towel. Oh, and I also used gold glaze on the very top, the last glaze I used. Then I sealed with Future Floor Finish, which gives a glossy effect and makes colors pop. Which it did. But I was very disappointed in the texture, or lack thereof. So I brushed gel medium over it, in different directions, to get some real texture. And that worked, but then it was so glossy, it was glaring with reflective light. So I tried to tone down the gloss and glare by sealing with Acrylic Floor Finish (Family Dollar Brand), which gives a satin effect.

So that's what I did with this piece, but I'm not very happy with it. I don't intend to use it for the swap, I plan to make a new postcard for that. I may, however, use this piece in another piece of art, in some way. I'm also considering using diluted caulk, instead of gesso, for the stamping and texture on my swap piece, because the gesso I used just didn't do the job for creating texture. Or maybe not even diluted caulk, but just caulk, to get the kind of texture I'd like to get.

So, this is a piece I'm not thrilled with at all, but I thought I'd post it anyway. Just to show that I sometimes make art that I'm not satisfied with. However, I learn from that, which is a good thing.

I've been tagged

by my online friend, Darlene. Here's her blog. Thanks Darlene.

Here are the rules:
1. Link to the person that tagged you.
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Share six non-important things/habits/quirks about yourself.
4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
5. Let each random person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.

These are the things/habits/quirks about me.
1. I've completed only two altered books in four years. I have four that I started on, but are still works in progress, and not completed. It took me four months to start and finish my first one.
2. I love doing altered/mixed media art, but the downside is all the STUFF I've accumulated to use in my art. I have pack-rat tendencies anyway, (it's in my genes thanks to my father), and getting into altered/mixed media art has only escalated my pack-rat tendencies and made them far worse. That part doesn't thrill me!
3. My computer room/work room/studio is a total mess, and that bothers me a lot. It's a rather small bedroom, and it's overflowing with STUFF!!! I yearn for and long for a real, decent room for a studio, where things are organized and can be easily found.
4. I have oodles and oodles of rubber stamps, (although not nearly as many as Karen Campbell), and yet I'm sure that more than half of them I haven't even used yet. What's up with that???
5. I have lots of ink pads in different colors, and yet more often than not, when I do stamping, I use acrylic paint rather than ink pads. I'm even guilty of ink pads drying up before I ever get around to using them, grrrrrr! Again, what's up with that???
6. I feel honored and humbled by the people who visit my blog, and by those who leave comments, and by what you say about my art and blog. A huge thanks to all of you!

These are people I now tag.
Heather Robinson at Creative Solace
Jenny at Craft Test Dummies
Kim at Ruined Art
Debbie Mihalick at Senses Engaged
Lori Roberts at Altered Art Expression
Stacie Williams at Creative Junque

Pink Silk

The title Pink Silk may seem strange for this piece, but let me explain. This is a 5x5 for a book project, In the Pink, by Jo Anne Owens. So that's why this piece is pink, pink, pink. Hot pink as a matter of fact. I titled it Pink Silk, because this is actually made from approximately one inch strips of silk fabric. Yes indeed, I pulled out an old silk blouse that didn't fit me anymore, and cut it up to use in my art. This blouse was made out of teal smooth silk. After I cut the strips, I frayed the edges, then Mod Podged them down onto my usual -- frozen pizza cardboard -- in different directions, with some overlapping going on. I tried to glue them on with lots of wrinkling for good texture. I let it dry overnight, and when dry, the surface almost felt like plastic.

Then I did the painting with Anita's Acrylic Paint, first fuschia, then baby pink rubbed over the elevated parts. After painting, I glued down pink cheese cloth, dyed in beet juice, on the right side. (Although it's kind of hard to tell it's cheese cloth in this photo, but up close it's easy to tell.) The vertical pieces on the cheese cloth are painted large, flat toothpicks, and the horizontal pieces are seeds from my yard, painted with the baby pink. The heart was punched out of a paint sample, then painted fuschia. Underneath it is a pink feather, that got rather segmented when I applied gel medium, but I decided to leave it that way.

The most amazing part to me about this piece is how using the silk came out, and provided such great, different looking texture. This is with using one inch strips. Next time I think I'll cut one large piece, and scrunch it up as I glue it on, and see what that looks like. It might look very similar to this piece....or maybe not. Maybe it will have a different effect. Well, one thing is for sure. Experimentation is FUN!

I was given the the Arte Y Pico Award

by a wonderful artist in Canada, Heather Robinson. Many thanks, Heather. It's an honor to receive this award, and I really appreciate it. Arte Y Pico

There are 5 rules attached to this and they are :
1. You have to pick 5 blogs that you consider deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and that also contribute to the blogging community, no matter what language.
2. Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his/her blog to be visited by everyone.
3. Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her/him the award itself.
4. The Award winner and the one who has given the prize have to show the link of "Arte Y Pico" blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award.
5. To show these rules.

I choose these five blogs to now receive this award.

Elis Cooke - Into the Blystic
Seth Apter - The Altered Page
Karen Campbell - Karen's Altered Dreamz
Darlene Wilkinson - Art-ticulation
Gail Pierce - Expression Studio

I greatly admire these artists and their work is a source of inspiration to me. They also have great blogs, so take a look.

Floating Through Grunge

Thanks to Diane on the clothpaperstudio yahoo group, I can post the whole picture of my collage. She was able to rejoin the three scans I took of it. You can view her blog here. Thanks so much Diane.

So anyway, here is what it looks like as one cohesive piece. Better than the three separate pieces I think. I came up with the title of FLOATING THROUGH GRUNGE kind of off the top of my head. I didn't want to over-think it. I must admit, I've gotten quite attached to this piece. Thank goodness I didn't make it for a swap, and then have to part with it. That would be very difficult. Thanks to all who left comments about this collage, or emailed me about it.

My Own Grunge Painted Collage (done on upholstery fabric sample)

This is a piece I worked on over several days, since last Saturday after our local book arts group meeting. Doing the grunge painting on fabric there must've really inspired me. (Scroll down to see a post and photos on that project). I really enjoyed doing the grunge painting, and love the results of it....and started thinking hmmmmm, can I produce similar results all by myself, as just one artist? Because the painting we did at the meeting involved the whole group, 13 artists.

At our meetings, oftentimes members will bring things to share with the group. At our last meeting, some people brought fabric remnants and wallpaper sample books to share. So, I brought home an upholstery fabric sample. It's dimensions are 17 x 12 inches, and it's quite thick and somewhat textured. I didn't care for the color, it was kind of an orange/tan, and I didn't know what I planned to do with it. Then it occurred to me I could just use it as a "practice" piece for grunge painting, that it would be perfect for that. And since I considered it a practice piece, and just for fun, I lost all fear of ruining it.

Now you have to know something about me. I am fearful about the "C" word. Doing "collage" scares me, for some strange or stupid reason. Anytime I think I'm doing a "collage", I get fearful and anxious and tense about my art and what I'm doing. Because I feel like I DON'T know what I'm doing. I start to over-think what I'm doing, or should be doing, and start second guessing myself, and get all concerned about placement and composition. I also get that way about layering. I have a really hard time with much layering at all, because I find it hard to paint over or cover up something I've already done, especially if I like the way it looks.

That being said, I really wanted to see if I could cut loose on this "practice" piece, and do a layered collage -- spontaneously, and with abandon. And see if, and to what degree, I could overcome my fear of collage and layering. That was my main goal with this piece, much more than being concerned with how it turned out.

I really, really got into working on this piece bigtime, and everytime I thought, okay it's done, more ideas would come to mind on what more I could do, what more I could add. Although I must say, in the beginning, I really didn't care about what I painted over or covered up. But the further along I got, the more attached I became to the piece, and the more concerned I was about what got covered up, and where to paint and stamp and glue down. I felt much more free about that in the beginning than later on. So in that sense, I didn't totally achieve my original goal, but only to a certain point.

So anyway, I think it's finally done. That is if I don't add something else. I couldn't scan the whole piece because of its size, so I had to do three scans. It would look better and more cohesive to see it as one piece, but this will have to do. The bird was one of the last things I added, and is embroidered on denim. I embroidered it on a pair of bell-bottom jeans in the 1970's!!! How "groovy" is that? So gee, it's over 30 years old! I cut it off the jeans many, many years ago, and held onto it all this time. I'm amazed I still have it, and more amazed that I actually found it and thought to use it on this piece. I think this is the exact piece it was meant to be on, and was waiting in a drawer for all these years. I was also able to use three of my caulk inchies on the right edge of the piece, and I added those last too.

So, that's my story and I'm sticking to it!!! In comparing this to the grunge painted fabrics posted below, I think the results I achieved are somewhat similar, but also different, because this turned into a collage, and I used other elements in addition to just paint, such as glued on crumpled tissue paper, yarn, cheesecloth, ric-rac, fabric, silk leaf, and of course the embroidered bird.

So, what do you think? I'm almost afraid to ask.

More Grunge Painted Fabric (muslin)

More Grunge Painted Fabric (muslin)

More Grunge Painted Fabric (muslin)

Grunge Painted Fabric (muslin)

These six photos are of muslin painted by my local group, the Mile High Book Arts group here in the Denver metro area. We had our monthly meeting yesterday, and this was the art project we did. Karen Campbell, our talented and fearless leader, spread out yards of muslin fabric across several tables, and then each member picked a section to start painting on. After several minutes of painting that spot, we all moved to the left, and started painting on that section, on top of what had already been painted. And so, we went around the table that way and kept moving to the left until all of us had painted on every section of the muslin. Then when it was dry, Karen cut it into many pieces and we each got to take home two pieces.

Of course no two sections on the fabric were the same. We used brushes, stamps, and stencils for the painting, as you can see. Some people used unconventional items for stamping, such as a toilet paper tube for the black circles. Some people used stamps they had carved themselves. The point was to fill up the whole fabric piece with paint, layering paint on top of paint. I guess that's why it's called Grunge Painting.

As a group, we've done this before on paper, and we all love doing the Grunge Painting and then taking home the neat results. But this was the first time we did it on fabric, and of course the results are the same as on paper. But we plan to make a fabric book this year or next year in our group, so we're thinking of ways to create great fabric backgrounds at some of our meetings.

The neat thing about the process of this technic is that multiple artists paint the same section of fabric and do their own thing, and also the amount of layering done. We all painted quickly and spontaneously, without planning it out or thinking about it, or fear of covering something up that was already painted. So the result really does end up being spontaneous and serendipitous.

Obviously, to do this technic involves more than one person, and preferably many people. Although it could be done with just two people, I suppose. But if you're in a group, this is a very fun and easy project to do with great, and unique, results. Because no one else in the whole wide world has two painted fabric pieces exactly like mine!!! And these will make great backgrounds for my fabric book, when we work on that project.

So, is anyone game to try this? Do it with an art group, or invite a few art friends over for a painting party. Or, if you can't get another person, paint, go out of the room, come back in, and pretend you're someone else. Oh well, just a suggestion.

Thanks so much to all of you

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for your caring thoughts and prayers and condolences regarding the death of my mother on March 17th. It was only two weeks ago, but it seems much longer. Your condolences touched my heart, and helped me to deal with this sad and painful loss. They truly did. And I know the prayers helped a lot too. I'm doing better now. Life won't be the same with my mother gone, but it's a reality I must accept. I know that God will comfort and sustain me in my hour of need.

Thank you again for your love and caring. It meant, means a lot to me. Peace and love to all of you. And may God abundantly bless you.

Paper and fabric woven postcard

This postcard was made for a swap on a yahoo group. The theme was a technic theme, this month doing weaving. I've seen this type of weaving on art, but had never tried it myself. I chose to use my crumpled rusted (copy) paper and then some fabric for the weaving. It was not as difficult as I thought it might be, but also not as easy as I wished it to be. It took me an hour to weave this 4 x 6 inch postcard. I had the option to paint over the weaving, and do more layering, as some people did for this month's swap....but I liked the way it looked too much and didn't want to cover that up with paint or glaze. You see, I kind of have a fear of "layering" like that, because I have to cover things up, and that's hard for me to do. I think I need to get over that fear, because I love the look of layered art. And it takes guts to do!

The image of the woman was printed on transparency film in sepia ink, then tranferred onto a paint chip or sample. When it was totally dry, I rubbed brown shoe polish over the image. The hearts were punched out of the crumpled rusted paper. And in the center I stamped Lumiere metallic rust paint with some new swirl stamps that I like a lot.

I almost forgot to mention the piece the image is glued to. It too, was a sample I picked up at Lowe's, a sample for window shades. Something I hadn't seen at Lowe's before.

I think I'd like to try the weaving again, perhaps with two pieces of fabric. I like the way the weaving looks, but to be honest, actually doing the weaving is kind of a pain in the zorch. But that's just me.

Link to Lisa Vollrath's Countdown.

Great images to download. Take a look!

A very sad week indeed!

Hello everyone. I'm not posting any art today, because it's been a very sad week for me. I learned on Monday morning, St. Patrick's Day, that my 81 year old mother died in her sleep. At that age, death shouldn't be unexpected, or come as a shock, however, it did for me. My father is still with us, and 83, so I've never lost a parent before, and this is a totally new reality to me. I was a total basket case on Monday, but I'm doing somewhat better now. I realize this is a process, over time, to learn how to handle and deal with. And yes, it's very painful now, but I think in time the pain will lessen. I just thought I should share this with all of you.

I hope in time, to create an altered book as a memorial of my dear mother, Clare Foster. She has been cremated, so I will get a small urn of her ashes. I'm thinking there's no better place to keep the urn than in an altered book dedicated to her memory. There, it will be very safe, and displayed in an artful, respectful manner. (If anyone who reads this has done an altered book like that, please leave a comment or email me about it.)

Your prayers for me and my family would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.