My latest paintings, submissions to The 50th OAA Juried Art Show

"Tracks in Time"  24 x 36 acrylic on canvas

Hello my friends!  Well, I thought I would share some of the things that I have been up to lately.  Thursday evening was the opening Gala to the 50th Oshawa Art Association Juried Art Show, on display at The Robert McLaughlin Gallery.  We submitted our paintings the previous Thursday.  There were around 300 paintings submitted and room for 150 paintings in the show.  This is my first time entering this juried show.  It's just in the last year that I have decided that my skin is thick enough to attempt some juried shows.  It was crazy busy when we brought in our paintings, and I cannot tell how beautiful the artwork coming through the door.  On the way over, I was semi-confident, and thought I might get one or two in the show.  When we arrived, and I was surrounded by all those gorgeous pieces, I thought I might be out of my league!  We had to wait until Saturday evening to find out if we were in.  You could submit from 1 - 3 paintings.  I figured if I submitted three, I'd increase my odds of getting one in, lol.  How it works is that you get a phone call to let you know that you have a painting accepted into the show.  If your painting is declined, you do not get a call, and must pick it back up the next day.  I was on pins and needles waiting until Saturday evening.
Well, the call actually came Saturday afternoon and I was stunned (and I am not just saying that out of false modesty) to discover that all three of my submissions had been accepted!

"Identity:  mixed media on canvas
Some of you may already be familiar with this one!

 "RAW"  24 x 36 mixed media on canvas

Three completely different works, in three different categories.
I am thrilled to report that "Tracks in Time" has found a loving new home to go to at the end of the show.   That is another story that I will share if it is okay with my paintings new owner.  But I can say this, sometimes things happen for a reason and I think this painting was meant to find it's way to this person.
I want to thank you for taking the time to stop by and have a look at my latest paintings.  I hope you have enjoyed this latest post and I will be back soon to share some of  the other things I've been up to lately.
Have an awesome day!  xo

New "Tags" page and up-dated "Paintings" and "Cards" pages

Hello my friends!
I don;t have a post for today, but I did want to let you know, for those who may be interested, I have added a new page to my blog, "Tags".  I did many tags last year for the One Little Tag Craft Challenge, all of which are posted on my blog.  I thought I would do a page of tags so that it could easily be scrolled through for anyone who likes tags or is looking for some tag or card inspiration.
I have also added some photos to my "Cards" page and my "Paintings" page.
Please have a look if those are of interest to you.
Have an amazing day everyone!  xo

A closer look at "Inner Workings" My latest mixed media painting

Hello all!  Thanks for joining me.  While I was at the reception of our show at Art Square last night, I took the opportunity to do a closeer look at my painting, "Inner Workings".  I know that some of you have already seen this painting on a previous post, but if you are interested, this is a little more true to life.  It is also, my very first post on my YouTube channel!  Yay!
For thos of you that  are interested in some close up shots and a look at the process and you haven't already seen my previous post, you can find it here.
Thanks so much for stopping by and having a look!

Here is a quick tour of our Art Show at Art Square, Toronto.

Hello my friends!  I thought I would share a quick little tour I recorded of our Art Show at Art Square in DT Toronto.  This is the artwork of Ajax Creative Arts and the show is in  collaboration with Artists Network.
It was a great reception, with a lot of people and I was happy to be a part of it.  Once the crowd died down, I thought I would take the opportunity to do a little video.  I am very armature, and this was impulsive,  so please forgive the shaky video!

Thank you so much for stopping by my blog and letting me share our artwork with you!

Autumn - A Painting

Hello my friends!

Today I am featuring another painting from my blog gallery.  This painting is 48" x 36" on gallery style canvas.  It is painted in acrylics and is very dimensional.  The trunk of the tree has been created with modelling pastes and impasto gel.  I have a love of metallics and have used a lot of metallic paint on this canvas.  The leaves were made by creating acrylic "skins" with metallic paint cut into rough leaf shapes and adhered with acrylic medium.

Thank you for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed my painting today.  Have an awesome and artful day!

The Caterpillar - A mixed media painting

Hello my friends!
Today I am featuring another painting from my gallery.  is called "The Caterpillar" and I am fond of this creation.  I wish I had a better photo of it to share with you. The sentiment struck a chord with me and was the inspiration for the painting.
This was done on a 12" x 24" gallery style canvas.  I used a variety of different brands of acrylic paint.  I first painted the background blue, and then, keeping in mind where I was planning on putting the butterflies, added in some more colour.  I also did some mark making,  drips, used some stencils and stamps with archival ink.  Then I created a mask for the large buttterfly using a die I had and some low-tac shelf liner.  I added the black into the background, fading it out somewhat at the edges with another stencil.  I used the same colours that I used to create the large butterfly to stencil in the parade of winged beauties travelling up the canvas.  I used a white paint pen to loosely outline the butterflies.  After adding a few more details, I added my sentiment, mounting each line onto black card and finished it off with a spray varnish.
Thanks for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed todays post!  You can see a few more of my paintings in my gallery if you are interested.  Have an awesome an artful day!

A Mixed media Birch painting

Hello my friends!

Today I decided to highlight some of the paintings that are hidden away in my gallery.  This is a mixed media painting I did a couple of years back.  I used acrylic ink in the background and acrylic paint to create the birch trees.  I love the vibrancy of the inks against the birch trees.  I used water in a spray bottle to move the inks and let them dry thoroughly before painting the tress.  I did this in layers, inks, trees, then some more ink and some more trees to create the depth of the painting.

Thanks for looking!  I hope you enjoyed. Have an awesome and artful day.

Glue Resist Technique MMM #4 #onelittletag

Hello my friends!

Today Ii am doing a glue resist technique which will become (eventually) a background to some of my tags and my take on MMM #4.  Cat Hand, of Mixed Media Morsels used a regular school glue  to draw some designs on her page.  She let it dry and used it as a resist. She watered  down some paint, painted over the glue and could just wipe the paint off of her design. She also ran her ink pad over the top (once dry, the glue had some dimension) to highlight it, and it looked pretty cool.   It reminded me of a similar technique I had been wanting to try.

I used rubber cement as my glue, drizzling it all over my page (watercolour paper).  Once dry, which didn't take long, I also watered down some craft acrylic paint and painted my page

Once the paint dried, I rubbed the rubber cement away, leaving the white paper underneath

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed my technique today!

Tag 5-13 "Hello" #onelittletag

Helloo my friends.  This is another paper napkin tag that I am doing for the FB groups that I belong to (One Little Tag Craft Challenge and Mixed Media Morsels).  As I mentioned in my last post, I am keeping it brief, this is about sharing the tag because you have been bombarded with the process all week!  However, if you are new and would like to know the process, please look at my previous posts this week.  I hope you give it a try and have some fun!

I've had a lot of fun with these paper napkin tags this week, I hope you enjoyed them!  I still have some backgrounds I made that I haven't used, so you can expect to see a few more at some point.

ALSO, for those of you that enjoyed the foiling techniques I have shared, there will be another one this week, so stay tuned!

Thank you for stopping by and having a look!  Have an awesome and artful day!

Tag 5-12 "From New York to Paris" #onelittletag

Welcome to my blog!  I am still doing the paper napkin prompt for my tags,  so I am going to keep the next few posts brief because you've been hearing about the process all week!  So these are just about sharing the tags.  However, if you are new to my blog and are interested in knowing the process, please look back at my previous posts this week.  I have been enjoying myself and liking the results.  I hope some of you give it a try!

Thanks for stopping by!

Tag 5-15 "Buongiorno!" #onelittletag Napkin tag

Hello, my friends.  One more napkin tag today for the FB groups,  One Little Tag Craft Challenge and Mixed Media Morsels

As before, I first peeled away the extra layers, them mod podged to card and trimmed to size, then played with some distress paint, stamped a sentiment, did some inking of the edges and finally, mounted the finished tag to a black cardstock..  Phew!, that was a mouthful!  I am trying to keep it short because if you have been following along, you have been seeing the same description all week.  But, for anyone new, I want to give a brief "how-to".  If you are new and you like this technique,, I have been making napkin tags all week so you can check out my previous posts if you are interested.  I have been having fun!

Thanks so much for stopping by!  Have an awesome and artful day!

Tag 5-14 "Bonjour" #onelittletag Another napkin tag

Welcome to my blog!  Another one of my tags for the paper napkin prompt in both the One Little Tag Craft Challenge and the Mixed Media Morsels group on FB.

I was very surprised at the great selection of napkins at Dollarama.  I've never really noticed napkins before, but I like how these tags have been turning out, so I will be on the lookout for some interesting ones now!

As I mentioned in my previous post, I first peeled away the extra layers of the 3 ply napkin and then mod podged it to card and trimmed to 3.5" x 8"

Then I added the splatter that I love so much and I used a Prima stamp for my sentiment, tearing it to size and inking the edges with distress ink.  I edged the tag with black archival ink and mounted to a black card.

Thank you for stopping by and have an awesome day!

Tag 5-11 "Create" #onelittletag #mixedmediamorsels

Hello and welcome to my blog!

This tag is  the third in a series of tags I am doing using a paper napkin prompt for a FB challenge I am participating in.

I started off with a pink polka-dotted napkin I got at the dollar store

The first hing you need to do is peel away the layers.  Most napkins are 2 or 3 ply and you want to use only the one printed ply.  Then I mod podged it to some card and cut it to the size I prefer (usually I do my tags 3.5" x 8")

Then I used a Heidi Swapp stamp to add some script here and there with archival ink.  I used my distress paint to splatter and marks my tag.  I used a Tim Holtz stamp to stamp my sentiment on card and also on the tag.  I then cut it out of the card and glued it in place on the tag.  The reason I did this is because I wanted the letters to be white and there were areas of the stamp that would be impossible to cut out and I wanted to maintain them, so this way I achieved both.  Finally, I edged the tag with black archival ink and mounted it to black card.

I hope you enjoyed my tag. I also hope that maybe some of these posts will inspire some of you to try some things that you may not have tried before, or rediscover some of the things you have tried in the past.  Have an awesome and artful day!

Tag 5-10 "Delightful" Another Napkin Tag #onelittletag

Hello my friends! Welcome to my blog. I have a few more tags to post, continuing with the napkin prompt on the One Little Tag Craft Challenge.  For those of you that are new to my blog, this is a Facebook challenge, hosted by Jenny Barnett Rohrs of Craft Test Dummies.  The idea is to do just one little tag a day (or every few days, or a week or whatever you can manage) and the objective is to be creative very day and keep inspired.  Jenny provides a prompt every week to help keep everyone motivated because let's face it, it's hard coming up with a new idea every day.  It is just a suggestion, in no way compulsory.  However, I am finding that I am getting a little hung up on these challenges sometimes, feeling that I should be doing them when sometimes I just want to do my own thing.  Doing my own thing is perfectly fine and sometimes I need to remind myself of that.  Using napkins in your art happens to also be a prompt in another FB challenge I am participating in, Mixed Media Morsels.  It is MMM #17.  Having said all that, I am surprised. I am really enjoying this challenge and I didn't expect it would be this fun.  So it goes to show you, it pays to at least give something a shot, even when you don't have high expectations!

I started off with my dollar store napkin find.  First I peeled away the extra layers (usually napkins are 2 or 3 ply) as I mentioned in my previous post.  I them glued it to some card with mod podge and trimmed it to the size I wanted

Then the fun begins with mark making and finishing touches.  I used distress paint in white, black and bronze to splatter and make marks with plastic caps.  I edged the tag with black archival ink.  I used a Fiskars stamp on card, trimmed it out and punched the corners.  I then edged it with distress ink before adding it to my tag.  And, as I usually do, I mounted it to black card.

Thank you for stopping by, I hope you enjoyed this tag.  I have another coming right up!

"Adventure" Tag 5-9 #onelittletag

I still have some tags to catch up on, which I will eventually, but I decided I wanted to do the challenge for this week.  We were challenged to use napkins to create our tags this week.  I am not a collector of napkins, and quite honestly, haven't really paid them much attentiom.  S. off I went to the dollar store to see what I could find.  I was surprised to find that they had some pretty cool napkins!

The first thing I did was peel apart the layers.  Most napkins have 2 or 3 layers.

Then I glued the napkin to some card with mod podge.

Then I had some fun doing some splatters and mark making with distress paint.  I inked the edges with archival ink and used a Tim Holtz stamp  for my sentiment.  And as usual, I mounted the tag to some black card.

Thanks for stopping by my blog!

"Artist" Gelli print collage Tag 5-8 MMM#2 #onelittletag

Welcome to my blog!

I created this tag using some of the Gelli Deli prints I did the other day.  I collaged the background using various prints

I had some fun with mark making using distress paint, archival ink, a Heidi Swapp stamp and my white Posca pen.  I used a Tim Holtz stamp to Stamp "Artist" on another piece of Gelli print that I collage on and the outlined.

I hope you enjoyed my tag!  I have been busy tonight, so I will be posting a few more tags shortly.

Thanks for stopping by!

Deli Gelli prints Some Gelli printed collage papers

Hello my friends!

I am so excited!  I FINALLY got some deli paper.  I didn't know where to get it, or really exactly what I was looking for.  I finally ordered it on-line and hoped I would be getting what I wanted.  And I did!

So I had some fun yesterday at the art club (Ajax Creative Arts) and took in my Gelli plate, my paints and some deli paper.

I have a hard time getting the camera to do justice, sometimes.  Some of these turned out really pretty and I hope you can see them well enough..  They all are somewhat muted. That must have just been how I was feeling, because it wasn't a conscious thing.  I think next time I will use some bolder colours as well.

Now what will I do with these? You may ask.  I will use them as collage papers for my tags and mixed media artwork.  So you can look forward to seeing in the background of some new art!

Thank you for stopping by!