The 6th (Wo)man

I'm playing along with the sketch challenge at My Creative Sketches.  They have such fun sketches and the prizes are amazing!  I hope one day I'll win one of their packages.  Check our their challenge site here.

Here's the sketch:


And here's my finished layout:

Close up of the embellies!

Mom and Dad

 I love the layers and layers of paper.  I think layering patterned paper is my favorite thing right now. I know you're thinking, strange choice of patterned papers since it's not Halloween, but my parents' school colors were orange and black.  They both attended the California School for the Deaf in Berkeley, CA in the 50's.  These photos were in 1958.  I love that my dad was such a jock and mom was his biggest fan!  So cute!

Papers:  K & Company, Spooky Designer Paper Pad
Love Paper:  DCWV; A Type of Art Stack
Embellies:  Made by me for a "candy" swap a few years back.  I finally had the opportunity to use the orange masculine candy.
Striped Tickets:  I received in an embellished ticket swap
Orange Paper Flower:  Paper Whimsies via air mail by Sassafras
Black/white polka dot washi tape; some orange gems and an assortment of alphabet stickers from my stash
Punched Orange Hearts:  Triple Heart punch by Stampin' Up!

Key to My Heart

Can you believe I made another canvas print for my coworker?  Although the general design is the same, I changed this one up with the color choices and added some fun accents.

This one is 8x10:

I started off with a yellow background but decided it looked too much like something that belonged in a baby's room so I painted it pink.  I think it looks very shabby chic.  I started off making it on a mat board but then my sister bought the canvas for me.  So I glued the mat board onto the covered canvas.  I added a little doily on one corner and a little bit of black ink.

I'm honestly getting a little tired of the heart on canvas but it was fun making them.

Pink and yellow scrap papers
White and pink acrylic paints
blue spray ink
black ink
silver paint pen
natural twine
key and lock chipboard pieces
French script background stamp
Doily

Loads of Love Valentine

Last year we spent Valentine's Day at the funeral  home for the services for my dad.  At the time, we felt it was a good time to spent with the one we love and lost.  I can't believe it's been a year already.  Each day I think of my dad whether it's something specific that happened & provoked a memory or just thinking about him in general.  This Valentine's Day and every other one after will always be better than Valentine's Day 2013. 

I remember last year I told myself I wanted to decorate the house and make cards but of course things changed.  This year, I am hoping to hang the banner I made last year and I've already got a start of making Valentine's Day cards.  I made these eight over the weekend.  I think I want to make smaller cards for my coworkers with a little chocolate.  I know I still have time, so I'm not worried about it.  I was inspired by a sketch on Let's Scrap when I made these cards.  (Check out their website to see lots of great challenge sketches for cards and layouts.)
:

The background paper on these cards were in a Trash/Treasure pile from our Scrappin' in Patterson group.  I love the collage look of these papers and they are two sided.  The contrasting strips are from the same patterned papers except the newsprint pieces.  They are from my scrap pile.  Each card has a black/white piece of washi tape and a ticket punched from heart patterned paper.  The truck and sentiment stamps are from Stampin' Up.  I love that truck!  Oh, they each have two strips of washi tape on the left hand corners as well and of course some kind of heart on the ticket.

In Love With Today

I finished the mixed media canvas that I started a week (or so) ago.  Here's the final photo:

I love this quote and knew I wanted to do something with it.  I decided to put hearts in the canvas because this quote made me think of marriage.  More specifically, my  marriage.  Yesterday was pretty good, today is amazing and tomorrow can only get better.

I don't know where I'm putting it, but for now it's in the Command Center.  Overall size is 9x7.  I used lots of paper, paint, ink, stencils, washi tape, stamps, and other random materials.  If you look closely, you can see the layered hearts are sewn together.  The hearts are 3D.

One More Mural!

Honestly this will be the last one for awhile.  I actually finished what I wanted to in this room.  HA HA!  I cannot believe it!

This one was easier than the other since the 49er logo is so big and pretty basic.  This one still took two days because I had to wait for paint to dry before moving onto the next color and next coat.

More:

There's still a lot of work to do in the room, but at least I can finally say, the wall murals are done.  LOL

Paint Mural...Check

I allowed myself three days but it only took two.  Here are some photos of the progress...

Some Gold and Black and now the complete photos:

Wall Mural Day One

For the 3-day weekend, I am finally going to paint the mural I've been talking about for awhile.  Here are some photos:

Plain Wall

Kevin moving the bed so I have room to work

Step One:  GET STARTED!  No turning back now.

After painting the white letters, I realized that the F and N to start Farewell Season are supposed to be even with each other, but obviously the pattern was not quite level...dang it!  I'll figure something out so I'm not too worried, but I wish I would have noticed that before I painted...

Mixed Media Frenzy!

I'm on a mixed media frenzy!  I finished the canvas for my coworker and she loved it.  Now she wants me to make another one.  Woo Hoo!  More moola for me and I love making these canvases.  Well, you know how I keep everything????  I have these old BINGO cards and mats that I've been holding on to for, well, forever.  I "arted" up one of each and I love how fun they are to create.  The BINGO card is finished, but the mat, well, I'm just not sure how to complete it.  I love this quote:

Which I found in some old book I bought at a yard sale (yup a few years back) called "Old Age is not for Sissies; A Witty Look At Aging".  There are all kinds of old age quotes.  Here's what the BINGO card and the incomplete mat/canvas look like (plus a peek at my work table):

So I pretty much used everything but the kitchen sink.  Acrylic paint, ink refills, ink pads, assorted stamps, letter stickers, glimmer mist, washi tape, torn pieces of scrap paper, black marker, colored markers (green), bubble wrap, plastic (something) for a stencil, book paper, round lids and a credit card for the straight black lines, water spritz and modge podge.

I'll take another picture once I finally complete this.  The BINGO card is the size of a BINGO card (hee hee) and the mat/canvas is 6x8.

The next heart canvas that I will be working on next was requested to be on a 10x10 canvas. 

FUN FUN FUN

Mixed Media Canvas

One of my coworkers commissioned me to make a smaller version of an art piece I made for the 2012 Apricot Fiesta's art contest.  I have it hanging in my cubicle at work and she just fell in love with it.  Since then, I've looked more closely and practiced more with mixed media and art exploration with different mediums.  The canvas looks very similar but with lots of small details.

You can see my original art piece here:

 

 And here's the one I just completed:

On the first one I made, I adhered scraps of green papers. On those scraps, I inked edges, stamped images, tore edges, or just left them as is.  On the newest one, I adhered scraps of light tan/off white papers and then covered it with a watered down green paint and some random ink splotches.  I also dabbed some white circles, black lines, random background stamps (French script).  What else?  I also smudged some silver paint, red & green glitter mist and drops of blue paint.  I painted the heart base with a purple heart and stamped "LOVE" in the center.  Outlined it with a silver paint pen and a black sharpie.  Then I glued all the shades of red (again using scrap papers) to fill the heart.

The original is 16x20 and the newest one is 12x16.  They are basically the same thing but slightly different. 

All I know is my next mixed media project is going to have even more layers!  I think that's the key...layers, layers, and more layers!