Watercolour fun - a first try

As someone who has never done an art course before I have been very intimidated by the traditional art mediums.

As I grow older and more confident in my craft room, I've decided to dive into watercolours and see what I can come up with. I have no training in perspective etc, so please forgive wonkiness (is that even a word?), imbalances and general not-perfectness. I wasn't trying to for perfection, I was simply giving it a shot ;)

I decided to play with ATC size canvasses (2.5" x 3.5") to have some familiar ground to start from. I found this great tutorial series online that gets you to think outside the box. It's called the 10-minute ATC's series by Art Trader magazine and I went for the Watercolour faces one.

Once I got going, I just played around to see where this little experiment would take me. I would highly recommend not only the tutorials from them, but having a look at their (free!) magazine. Your inner artist will sing.

This is the result of the experiment. Seven ATC's of random things done in my favourite colour combinations.

The whole collection

Here is the faces experiment ATC's. I swished paint around, saturating here and subtracting there until I could make out a general face shape. I then used a black fine art pen to fill in the details. I'm sure years from now I'll have a good giggle at the attempt, but for now I am glad I gave it a try. I'll certainly try it again in the future.

Watercolour faces ATC's

For the hot air balloon ATC I had an image to reference from and although the balance is all wrong, I do like the feathery and light feel of the final ATC. 

Hot air balloon ATC

The floral one was done after seeing the 10-minute ATC: Acrylic Impressionism tutorial and wanting to see if I could emulate it with watercolours. I blobbed paint around and roughly formed the flowers and then added the details with a black fine tipped pen. I think it's quite dreamlike.

Impressionism watercolour flower ATC

The next ATC is a good example of the end result being very far from the idea in mind. I was trying to do a cupcake, but as the painting went along, it formed more of a bowl with something in it, so that's what I ended concentrating on. Sometimes you just have to go with the flow (haha). I think the pink stuff could be candy floss. Or strawberry ice cream.

A bowl full of pink stuff watercolour ATC

This ATC was a fun experiment in seeing the shapes in a standard mess of colour. I took some paint and just dragged it along the page in random patterns. As I looked at it, I kept seeing a map emerge. So who was I to deny it from coming out? The coastline was pretty much set, so I just  played with how watercolours can be lightened and darkened. Looking at it now I would probably have done less roads and let the watercolour take the main stage, but these are the lessons we learn right?

Map in watercolour ATC

The flowers one is a clear indication that I am very far off with balance, relationships and perspective in this journey. For now though, I am happy that it does somehow look like flowers, if you squint and twist your head just right ;)

Watercolour flower ATC - wonky and all

Here are some of the final ATC's that I made up with the imagery. I sent them along on Swap Bot, my favourite place to swap.

The hot air balloon got a trim and was stuck to some harder carton. The watercolour paper is not sturdy enough to travel safely in the mail. Distressing the edges gave it a nice vintage feel and made the colours pop. The bird ATC is a separate project. Watch the blog for a Silhouette update coming soon (wink, wink).

Sender's choice ATC's for a Swap Bot swap

The flowers and map also got a trim and was mounted on some sturdier card for mailing. I distressed the decorative edges in complementing colours.

Watercolour ATC's

I hope you are inspired to try something new today.



Hugs
Mar

Snowflake ATC's

I have the pleasure of dealing with snow in my imagination far more than dealing with the reality of it. I've had minimal contact with snow and only made one snowman in all my life. I think there might have been a snow-angel in there somewhere, but the memory is vague.

When I saw a swap on Swap-bot for some snowflake ATC's I could not resist the temptation and as one does, I wondered what a snow flurry would look like in slow motion.

Snowy ATC fun

I started with making watercolour backgrounds in shades of blue. Then I did some embossing and stamping. I love how the distress ink images seeped into the watercolour paper making fuzzy snowflakes. I added some silver snowflake stickers and tiny gemdots to give the ATC some interest.

Here the days are getting colder. My kind of weather :)

Hugs
Mar

Pollen-free flowers in the mail

I have a love-hate relationship with flowers. They are gorgeous, but oh boy, my sinuses go haywire in Spring. I have found a great in-between in my craft room and flowers are one of my go-to imagery when I make projects.

I participated in a mailart swap that had a flowers theme. I opted to make an envelope with as much flowers as I could fit onto it.

Mail art envelope front (with address blurred out)

Mail art envelope back (with address blurred out)

I gesso'd the envelope and just went nuts with collage and stamping. I also took the opportunity to slip in one of my favourite quotes of all time. Anais Nin surely knew how to turn a phrase.

Happy day darlings
Mar

Emergency gift bag

I needed a big gift bag recently for my Father in law's birthday gift and low and behold, we had none at the house. It was time for some emergency crafting. I got to repurpose in the process as well ;)

I had a lovely brown paper bag, but the problem was the big logo on the sides. I recently discovered the magic of gesso, so after painting both sides with it, I basically had a clean canvas to work with.

Repurposed gift bag side 1

 

Repurposed gift bag side 2

I grabbed some stencils and spray inks and just had fun. I love how quickly the spray inks dry, so this took no time at all. I tried to stick to a more male feel for the bag so that it could be used again.

So there you go. No need to throw out the branded gift packets.

Cheers lovelies
Mar

Fairy keepsake matchbox - a mini adventure

Hello everyone,

A while back I happened upon a post by Pixie Hill where she did a tutorial on how to make altered keepsake boxes out of matchboxes. I was enthralled and decided to give it a go.

I decided to keep to be inspired by Pixie Hill and wondered what a fairy would keep in her keepsake box. Here is the result. This is all a little matchbox, so a little fiddly, but I loved the challenge.

 

A fairy's keepsake box

I'll give you a little breakdown on how I made everything.

Teeny tiny sewing caddy

 I thought that a sewing caddy would be just perfect for this project.


The basket is a jewellery making titbit, the threads are made from cutting up a matchstick and winding sewing thread aroud them, the ball is embroidery thread and the pins are little cut up jewellery-making connectors.

Fairy pets captured in a tiny jar

 Off course fairies will have pets. Here you can see a transparent butterfly and a rocklet.

The butterfly was made by stamping acetate with Stayz-on ink and fussy cutting it out, the rocklet is made from a tiny bead with craft gems as eyes. The moss at the bottom is miniatures grass.

Fairy journal - open

 

Fairy journal - closed

 Off course a fairy would keep a little notebook or journal.

I took a tiny bit of red cardstock, punched a mini tag out of it, distressed it and stuck on some alphabet lettering. This formed the cover. I made the pages out of distressed white pages roughly torn to the size of the journal. The binding is embroidery thread and some jewellery making titbits. The journal is held together by a stapler.

Tiny treasures for the matchbox

 Here are 3 out of the 4 treasures in the mailbox. I forgot to photograph the tiny necklace I made as well. Note to self - photograph at the end of the project and not midway where you can get distracted ;)

The empty matchbox

I lined the base with distressed music sheets and used think mounting card to make the compartments. Remember the moss in the pet bottle? I used some to line the matchbox to look like moss.

All the treasures neatly tucked into their spaces

All snug and ready to be discovered by my partner. Can you see the necklace pendant? It's a jewellery bit with a craft gem on it. The chain was made from the finest chain I had in my collection.

The finished matchbox

Here is the finished keepsake box. The drawer's outside is lined with travel themed washi tape. Can you see the little butterfly on the button?

The titbits on the lid include torn green texture paper, distressed scrap lace, distressed buttons, embroidery thread, craft gems, a scissor pendant and a tiny watch hand on the black button.

All packed up and ready for shipping

Opening up a treasure is half the fun, so I packed this up in a plastic container with some texture paper as the cushioning. Some washi tape and a watercolour butterfly adorned the lid.

Want to see what some of the other participants did for the swap? Here you go.

DuhBe did a steampunk themed box that was absolutely amazing. See her blog post here.
My partner sent me a Marie Antoinette themed box which I adore. See a pic here.

Hugs
Mar

Happy Heart Day!

V-day card with matching envelope

 Sometimes more is more when it comes to love :)

Supplies used:

Plain white cardstock and white envelope

Heart punch

1.5" circle punch

Baker's twine

Decorative button

Decorative heart pin

Gems

Variety of washi tape

Trimmings from a local haberdashery

White and red pens for the faux stitches

Corner rounder

Happy Valentine's Day everyone. Hope yours is a good one.

Hugs
Mar

Stashbuster - In a loving kinda mood

I love how Pinterest and the Kingdom of Blogland just explodes with creativity around this time of the year. I love crafting with love on the brain. That's quite a silly sentence, but I'm giddy, so forgive me. I think love is the universal language that everyone understands. A little red heart goes a long way in a craft room :)

So here is a little party pack I made in celebration. It's a banner and matching cupcake toppers. I'll probably use this in a little private party with my hubby to celebrate our 10th Valentine's together. That's worth 6 cupcakes right ;)
 

Love Banner

Love banner full shot

  

Love banner close up - see the double layer pop-out heart?

 Supplies:

variety of card and scrapbooking paper (this is a great offcuts project)

1" circle punch (used for halfmoon flags)

1.5" circle punch (used for the tag bases)

heart punch

hole punch (used to make holes in the tags)

red spray ink

white self-adhesive pearl gems

variety of red washi tapes

red decorative baker's twine

standard toolkit (glue stick, scissors, ruler etc)

Method:

This one is a little technical and although it might seem that you can wing it, 

it does help to have rough measurements to go with. 

Once you have those down, you can let the creativity loose again.

I started by doing a rough layout of all the disks and fillers. 

I assembled them before I adhered them to the twine.

Measure out a one meter piece of twine. 

Determine the middle by folding it in half (or mark off the 50cm mark). 

Adhere your centre piece in the middle.

 Work your way from the inside out and adhere the pieces and fillers 

in roughly equal spaces apart. I did all the big pieces at about 10cm intervals,

then filled in the spaces with the rest.

Cupcake Toppers:

6-pack of cupcake toppers - ready for some red velvet yummies

Experiment with the different combinations. 

It's really fun to see what works

and what doesn't.

Supplies:

variety of card and scrapbooking paper (this is a great offcuts project)

1" circle punch (used for halfmoon flags)

1.5" circle punch (used for the tag bases)

heart punch

red spray ink

white self-adhesive pearl gems

variety of red washi tapes

red decorative baker's twine

standard toolkit (glue stick, scissors, ruler etc)

toothpicks

Method:

I decided on a look that could be interchangable with the different elements.

I used the same basic method fo all the toothpicks,

but by changing the paper and location of the elements,

they all came out differently, but similar enough

to belong to the same look.

I started with adhering the 1"circle around the toothpick.

Then I put some washi tape on and cut it at an angle.

Next I adhered the heart punchie 

and finished it off with a pearl gem.

Glue the whole little ensemble to the big disk.

I'll be popping some more how to's on here. I'm new at this, so pointers will be welcomed :)

I hope this inspires you to get some of that stash out and getting in the mood for love.

Hugs

Mar