"Walking in the Rain" tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
This is a tag I created a few days ago for the watercolour challenge at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  For those of you who don't know what this is, it is a Facebook group created by Jenny Barnett Rohs of Craft Test Dummies.  The focus of the group is to encourage everyone to try and be creative every day, or as often as you can.  The theory being that by taking just a few minutes and doing a small tag, nothing elaborate, every day could keep the creative juices flowing. I enjoy making the tags, so I tend to spend a little more time on them.  I don't get to them every day, but I would say I do something creative most days.  I usually go to our art club twice a week and if I'm not being creative, I am often thinking about what I will do the next time I am!  So whether you spend 10 minutes or 2 hours on a tag, you are staying inspired!  It is also a good opportunity to do some experimenting without making a big commitment.  So if there are any of you that are looking for some inspiration or encouragement and would like to share some of your art, or just see what other are up to and to gain some inspiration, I would encourage you to check it out.  It is no longer just tags, anything you create can be posted, cards, art journals, drawings etc.  there is a weekly prompt, that is completely optional.  There are also random draws for giveaways.  A lot of fun and a good group of people.  Anyways, back to my tag, lol

Watercolour is not my medium.  I like to paint, but I paint in acrylics and I just don't have the knack of watercolour.  I suppose some lessons would help.  I do like to play around and drop paint onto a wet paper and let it blend organically, and play around.  I did a landscape, or attempted one, that I have to admit I scrapped.  But I was determined to do at least one scene.  So this is quite simple, but I don't mind how it turned out.  I used Winsor Newton watercolours, and Crayola brush pens on the stamp of the girl with the umbrella.  I struggled with watercolours this week.  But I also had a lot of fun with my "Purple Girl".  I stepped out of my comfort zone, which was the most important thing, more important than the result.  I hope everyone does that once in a while, it helps us discover new things.  I wonder how many things I would have missed had I never strayed from my comfort zone.

Well, lots of words tonight, I usually try and keep things short and sweet.  Thanks so much for taking the time to read and for letting me, once again, share my little pieces of art with you.

Kim  xo

A new "Purple Girl" watercolor tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
Well, this has been another busy week (some of it involving plumbers!) and I haven't had a change to finish a tag until today!  The challenge this week at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge is water colour.  I had a bit of a head-start with this tag as I created this purple-haired beauty for last weeks purple challenge, but didn't get a chance to use her.  Well, I just happened to use water colours to create her, so guess what...!  She was created using a Penny Black stamp.  I used some Jane Davenport water colours and pencil crayons..  I created a couple of water colour background sheets for her dress and the tag background.  I had fin with those!  I dropped in all kinds of different water colours, including some metallic and just let them basically do as they pleased.  And now I have a few extra tag backgrounds left over as well!

I stamped her dress onto the paper I created and cut it out.  I stamped my favourite flourish stamp in gold ink onto the background.  It is so hard to pick up in photos, but there is a lot of shimmer on this card.  There is metallic watercolour in her dress and in the background, as well as the gold s metallic inked stamp.  I had some fin embellishing her dress and   giving her a choker.  I usually like to add a word or phrase to my tags, but there wasn't anything that popped into my head for this tag.  I may leave her a she is, or add something later if I am inspired.

I hope you enjoyed todays tag, I enjoyed creating it.  Thanks so much for stopping by!

Kim xo 

An Elegant Purple and Gold Card #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I am a little behind in posting, but this is a card I made for the purple challenge last week on The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.   I just love the combination of purple and gold.  If you are following along, you may have noticed that.  Most of my purple themed cards or tags are using that combination.

For this card I used a Spellbinders die and cut out some gold foil board.  FYI, I get my gold foil board  at the dollar store.  Both Dollaramma and the Dollar Tree have the same foil board.  It comes in a package of 6 sheets 0 gold, silver, red, green and blue.  It's very handy at Christmas time!  I just wanted to mention this because I really like the foil card that I get there and it die cuts beautifully.  Sometimes a cheaper price doesn't necessarily mean an inferior product.   Anyways, I die cut my foil card and adhered it to some purple glitter paper, which I then adhered to a black card base.  It is sometimes difficult to stick to the glitter paper, so I ran it through my Cuttlebug just sandwiched between the plates to squish everything together in an attempt to make it adhere better, which it did. .  It almost made this look like a die cut inlay.  I really like the effect that created.  I added a few sparkly embellishments and left it as it is.  I will keep this in my stash and when an occasion comes up that this card will be suitable for, I will add a sentiment.  I think this is quite elegant with the gold foil details.
I hope you have enjoyed my latest card.  Thanks so much for stopping by to have a look!
Havve a great day everyone!
Kim xo

"Hugs" tag for "purple " challenge at #onelittletag

Hello again , my friends
Here is another tag I made for the "purple" theme this week at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  I used the negative space created whenn I punched out the "heart-shaped moon" for a tag I did last week.  I'm glad I didn't throw the scrap  away!  I backed the heart area with some purple glitter paper.  The background was made from some of the "spray play" papers I created previously.  I used a small punch to cut the little hearts out of gold foil card and a Recollections die for the word "hugs", I cut it again from black card that I used as a drop-shadow..  I mounted to a gold mat and a black mat to finish it off.  I am having fun with purple!
I hope you enjoyed my tag and that it will inspire you to make use of some of the scraps that you might normally throw away.
Have an awesome day, overtone!
Kim  xo

New "Dream" tag for "purple" t challenge at #onelittletag

Hello friends,
This weeks theme at The One Little Tag Craft Challenge  was purple inspired by the new pantone colour of the year.  We are doing any purple for the challenge, though.  I had a bit of a crazy week, so I didn't actually finish any tags until Friday night, but I did work on them, in bits and pieces, throughout the week.  Purple is okay.  It is not my favourite, nor my least favourite colour.  I didn't find it overly inspiring, or so I thought!  I thought I would look around for some patterned paper (of which I have reams and reams, lol) but not much in the way of purple.  It's just not a "go-to" colour for me.  Then I thought I would look through my "spray play" backgrounds that I created previously.  I was completely surprised to see how much I actually used purple. That was the jumping off point, suddenly I was totally inspired.  I created several tags this week, and may still make a few more!

I created this tag using a background I made using a variety of spray inks and stencils, this one on shimmer card from Recollections.  I thought the background looked kind of "dreamy" so I used a Recollections die to cut out the word.  One combination I really like is purple and gold, so since I am using purple, there is going to be a lot of gold in the cards and tags that I make!  It's hard to tell in the photo, but there is a lot of shimmer and veins of gold running through this background.  I liked how this tag turned out.

I hope you enjoyed today's tag, and thanks so much for stopping by.  If you did, I have made several tags for the purple themed week, so please come back and check them out!
Have a great day everyone!
Kim xo

Live Love Laugh tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I am back with another tag for The One Little Tag Craft Challenge I have to tell you, Ii have been taking pictures with my Samsung tablet and I am not very happy with the quality.   I apologize and I am going to be looking at alternative devices.  I hope you can bear with me in the meantime!

For this tag I used one of the backgrounds I created at the beginning of January using sprays and stencils.  I used a few different card stocks to work on, this was a shimmer card.  I couldn't capture that with the photo.  TBH, it's a pretty subtle effect , but I like it..

I used a Recollections die to cut the words out of some scrap copper metallic card and some black card as a drop shadow.  I used a butterfly embellishment that I rediscovered as I was going through my stash.  I'm not sure where I got it from, possibly a dollar store.  Then I mounted to a glitter paper and black card, all 1/4" larger than each other, to give my tag a double mat.

Thanks so much for stopping by.  Ii hope you enjoyed this tag and will be back to see the next one.  Have an awesome, art-filled day!
Cheers
Kim  xo

A new Love tag for #onelittletag

Hello!
Here is today's tag.  Still based on the "Love" challenge on tthe One Little Tag Craft Challenge FB group.  This tag was inspired by the Tim Holtz "Clippings Sticker".  I used a Recollections heart punch to punch a mask.  I use low-tac shelving vinyl as masking.  I positioned it on my tag, used some washi tape to create a horizon line and used a few different distress inks to create my background, blending in from the sides to leave a lighter area in the centre as the reflection of the moon.  I punched the moon out of some papers I had sprayed the first week in January to create some backgrounds.  I used my Spectrum Noir to add some shimmer. I added some shimmer to the water as well and to add a halo around the moon.  That didn't work out exactly as I would have liked, but I continued on.

I used some Penny Black stamps to create the foliage silhouette. Using some black glitter paper, I used  a punch from my stash for the dragonflies and a memory box die for the fairy (I love fairies!).  I added the Tim Holtz sticker and then mounted the tag to a black glitter paper backing.

Thanks for taking the time to have a look, I hope you enjoyed todays tag.  I have a few more ides, so there may be another tag today, so pop back if you are interested.

Cheers!
Kim  xo

"Love Tag for #onelittletag

Hello my friends!
I was gone for so long, and now here I am, back again so quickly after my last post!  Feast or famine! The theme for the One  this week was "Love"  I was really pleased with the outcome of this tag.  I would love to be able to take credit for the design, but I can't, it was totally inspired by a couple of different cards that I saw on Pinterest.  I thought the design was simple but so effective.  I really liked it and wanted to give it a try. I'm not 100% sure how those were created, but I did what I thought would recreate a similar look.  I used distress inks in worn lipstick and Barn Door as watercolours.  I "smooshed" them (very technical term!) on my craft mat and used an aqua brush to paint with them.  I didn't use watercolour paper, I used Strathmore Bristol, and it held up well.  I wet the card fist and added the colour..  Then I used a brush pen to write a long script "love".  Then I die cut a heart from a Spellbinders die in my stash to create a stencil.  I used the Barn Door ink to stencil the heart.  I flicked a little water around, as distress inks are water reactive.  Then I "Smooshed" some more ink on my craft ma, spritzed it with a little water and used my brush to splatter it on my tag (I just love splatter!)  Then I scribbled some black ink from my brush pen on the mat and did the same thing..  I mounted it to some heavy black card and called it a day.  Although I am considering mounting it to some red card as well to give it another slim border all around.  Hmmm...

This is the other tag I created this week.  I used some patterned paper from my stash that had the word "love" all over it.  I used some Spellbinders Celebrations Hearst die to cut some hearts out of some of the other patterned papers in the same pad.  I also cut the heaty out of the background and inlayed all the hearts. I used a Tim Holtz stencil with some Barn Door distress ink over the entire background.  I tried to use white ink first with the stencil, but it really didn't show up very well. Then added some white splatters with some watered down white copic ink.  I die cut the "Love" using a Recollections die out of Recollections card.  I used the same red card as a backer to my tag.

I hope you liked my tags.  I have some more ideas for the "love" theme, so I will be back soon with some more tags!
Thanks so much for stopping by
Kim  xo

"Noel" A new Christmas card, a Shaker card

Hello All!  Today's card is a shaker card, which is something I am fairly new at.  I have only made one before.  I started off with my distress ink blended background.  I splattered the water reactive ink with a water/ perfect pearls mixture.

I stamped my image with a Tim Holtz set from a couple of years ago, using Versafine Black Onyx ink in my home-made stamp positioner so that I could repeat stamp a few times to get a good, solid and dark impression.

I used my new Tim Holtz die again, along with an Elizabeth Crafts die and a Tim Holtz punch.  I knew this die would be versatile!  I die cut the globe from fun foam as well which I sandwiched between the layers to give dimension and create the space for my shaker elements.  I used some mylar to cover the front of my shaker element and under the top two layers.

Once my card was assembled, I embellished it with the globe "stand", the Noel sentiment, a few pine boughs punched out of gold card and a purchased snowflake embellishment (from Michaels)

Thank you so much for visiting my blog and checking out my latest Christmas card.  I hope you enjoyed it!
Have an amazing day everyone!

My latest Christmas card using a Tim Holtz die

Hello my friends!  Thank you for visiting and having a look at my latest Christmas card. 

I created this card using my new Tim Holtz die.  I have a feeling that this is going to be one of my favourite and most versatile die sets in my collection.

I also used an Inkadinkadoo stamp set.

I used distress ink to blend a background.  I punched a circle out of some low-tac shelf liner to make a mask for the moon.   I just love how water reactive distress ink is, and I  splattered some water with some perfect pearls in it to give a snowy shimmery effect.  I edged the houses and the inside of the globe  I used my Wink of Stella clear to add some shimer to the moon and the roofs.

I had some gold trim with an adhesive back (that I got from Michaels) that I used to embellish the globe.

This was a fun card to make because I like to create little scenes.  It took a bit of time to assemble all the pieces, so it wouldn't be ideal to make multiple cards, but very nice for that special card.

Thanks again, so much for taking the time to visit my blog and I hope you enjoyed my latest card and that perhaps it has inspired you to create your own card.

Have an awesome day!

"Identity" The evolution of a mixed media painting

Hello my friends!  I have been MIA for a little while, I know.  I have been busy working on my latest mixed media creation, which I am excited to report, has made it into the Annual PRAC Juried Art Show!  My first real juried show! (I have done some juried events within our ACA group, but not an actual juried show).  

, I have been thinking of you all while I was working away and took several photos during my journey to the completion of this work, in order to share my process with you.

In this painting, my objective was to explore the female psyche.  We are strong, but fragile, real and complicated.  There are many other words I could have added into this painting if I had the room.  We are definitely a host of contradictions!  I did the eyes in blue, because my daughter has beautiful blue eyes and is just embarking on her journey as a woman, a time when I think our identities are the most complicated.  I wanted the juxtaposition of the flourishes and fanciful with the practicality and industriousness of the gears.  The mask represents our search for our own identity behind the veil of our other identities, mother, wife, daughter. My intention with this painting, was to embrace self-discovery.

I will give you a little insight into how my creative process works.  When I start a painting, any painting, whether mixed media, abstract or landscape, I have a general idea in my mind of composition and the elements i want to incorporate into my work, but I  don't know exactly what my finished work will look like.  All of my paintings evolve, as I'm sure they do with a lot of artists.  I am not a planner, I don't do detailed sketches or drawings, which I can't do anyways with my vision impairment.  I may know that I want a tree and wonderful clouds in a landscape, and I may know where I want the tree and an idea of the cloud formation, but I don't really know what those clouds are going to look like until I have reached a point where I feel they are done and I am pleased with them.  I don't even know what kind of tree my imagination is going to release at the end of my brush.  It amazes me how the creative process works.  Laying down one colour inspires me to lay down another..  I cannot stand back and take a look at my painting, because then I can't see it.  But, if I stand back just a bit, I can see a form and some colour and some contrast.  Some of my artist friends liken it to the artist's "squint", without actually squinting.  I think it actually helps me, in a way, to be able to just get an overall impression without being distracted by the details..

Now I will share the creation of "Identity" with you through photos and some of my thoughts, I hope you enjoy it.

An inspiration

I did a light layout in watercolour pencil on a 15 x 30" gallery style canvas

I did some stencilling

I painted in the eyes, fairly shadowed as they would be under the mask.  I also added some more texture with some impasto gel and some micro beads and crylstal beads

I added my words and built up a protective barrier with the impasto gel to protect the eyes from the ink

I painted over the entire canvas, except for the eyes, with a few different colours of acrylic paint

I used one of the gears that I created for my other painting "Inner Workings".  These gears have been "aged" but the one I used on this painting was not.

I adhered the mask and some other elements to the painting.  I really liked the way it was looking at this point, so it was difficult to start the next step because the inking is quite unpredictable.  You can control it to a certain extent by adding it where you want it and choosing what colours you want to use, but once you start moving it around it takes on a life of it's own and you don't really know what it will look like until it dries.

I added some more stencilling with gold paste and added more colour in layers, waiting for it to dry in between. Adding and fine-tuning values and contrasts. I also adjusted the "quiet space" to a level I was happy with.

And finally..."Identity"

Thank you so much for taking the time to let me share my art with you.  I would love to hear what you think.

Have an amazing and artful day!