Practice makes perfect... well I hope so at least

Hello friends and welcome! A special welcome also to all my new followers, thanks so much for joining me on my journey!
Today I have a project to share that I was actually not sure I would post here..... But not every project can always be good, right?

Let me start by telling you what it is: A really simple set of tags that I made for fun and two reasons: 1) To play with my Oxides inks and try out different colour combos.
2) To practise my brushpen calligraphy ( and that is the bit I am really embarrassed to share)...

With my new interest in Midori sized travel and junk journals, I thought it was essential to work on my hand writing and learn brushpen calligraphy, - but boy, I have a long way to go as you will see.

But enough of the waffle and on to the project:

I forced myself to only use two colours of the Oxides on each tag, so this is what I used:
1: Vintage Photo & Iced Spruce
2: Vintage Photo & Peeled Paint
3. Peeled Paint & Faded Jeans
4. Broken China & Wilted Violet
5. Fossilized Amber and Fired Brick
Here are close ups of just a couple of them:

This is number 3, I was amazed just how many colour variations you get by just layering up two colours only and then spritzing, layering and spritzing again. (I did edge each tag with just normal DI in Ground Espresso)

Same thing, this is number 2, - again at least 3 or 4 layers with drying in between, - I just love these inks so much.
Anyway, onto the finished tags, each with a quote in very imperfect brush lettering. I have down loaded several so called "drill sheets" to practise each day, so hopefully I will get better in time. Oh for those of you who are interested, I used Tombow Markers.

For this and the next one I outlined in white, not sure whether that was a good idea or not...

As you probably gathered, I kept embellishments very simple, just using a few little things to add a bit more interest.

Well there you are, I'll keep going with the drill sheets and probably turn these tags eventually into a little booklet to chart my progress, - I'll keep you posted....

Hope the sun shines where you are and thanks for your visit today

xxxxx

Oxides and Shimmerz, - a journal spread

Hello friends and welcome.
Just another preview today, the main project can be found on the Shimmerz blog HERE

I wanted to explore how the new Oxide Distress Inks would play together with Shimmerz products. If you want to find out more, all you need to do is hop over

Have a wonderful creative week, hopefully enjoying some sunshine and creativity....

xxxxx

Mixed Media Monthly - Show us your super power

Hello all and happy April!! This moth at Mixed Media Monthly we want you to show us your super power.....
Well to be honest, I did not find this an easy topic, so I decided I would let myself be inspired by nature, for to me, there is nothing more powerful then the magic Nature can display, especially at this time of the year.

Our sponsor this month is Stampers Anonymous, the winner will get a set of Bret Wedele stamps and he is our guest designer too this month.

Here is our grapic for this month's challenge, - be sure to include it if you are going to play along.

I decided to make a butterfly the central feature of my project, for butterflies certainly display super power when they emerge from their chrysalis at this time of year. Below a few step by step photos:

I started by putting down some texture through a couple of stencils, the one on the left is by Tim Holtz, the one on the right by Paper Artsy.

Next I added colour with my Oxide Distress Inks, pressing colour down on my craft mat, spritzing with water and then dipping and drying until I was happy with the results. Those inks certainly display super powers too, I just love them and they inspire me to step right out of my colour comfort zone...

I added some background stamping, using a couple of Wendy Vecchi background stamps, stamped in white acrylic paint. Raised bit were highlighted with normal Distress Ink.

I cut my butterfly from card coloured with Oxides, using a Spellbinder die.

I gathered some further embellishments and then put it all together. Below a few close ups:

A flower cluster,coloured with Victorian Velver Distress Ink and for the leaves using a variety of dies  cut from scraps of the same card the butterfly was cut from.

The word highlighted with some chipped sapphire distress ink.

And here at last, the finished card. The sentiment is one of the new Tim Holtz quote chips.

Well that's it for now. Hope you will decide to play along with our challenge and be sure to hop over, get all the details of the challenge and see what my awesome teamies have created to inspire you! All you need to do is click HERE

Thanks for your visit here today, always much appreciated because I realise how busy everyone is...

xxxxx