Paperartsy topic 16 - Circles

Morning (oops, afternoon...) all.  Just loving, once again, the topic at Paperartsy for the next fortnight - well only a week left (been busy doing something else that I can't share!)

Gabrielle's journal page with her circles floating across the page, really grabbed me, and I finally had time to interpret it..

I used a leftover Paua shell piece from the gels and mediums challenge - this is what it looked like

 Whilst the stencil I'd used had lots of circles in it, I didn't want to use it whole, so punched lots of circles from it. I only have 2 circle punches (that I could find)

 I matched a Fresco colour as closely as I could to the colours in the Paua piece - Marlin, with a bit of Old Gold and a tiny scrape of Antarctic to lighten it just a bit..

Stencilled some white circles across the page, and used some mini sequin waste to add a few more Marlin circles in some of them.  Went to town with more circles - two Sara Naumann stamps,  andthe Lin Brown flower centre dots

 It was looking a bit overkill, especially when I laid out my punched circles, but in for a penny... I scribbled some circles round some of the stencilled ones - using a black micro pen and a white sharpie..

and finally, used some of the final punched circles and stamped the letters on them.

Had fun with this, despite it not really coming out how it looked in my head... may be back with another one later!

Entering the Paperartsy circles challenge, here

WOYWW 325 - secrets!

Hi, and welcome to week 325 of WOYWW the desk sharing fun-fest.

Going to be a bit of a tease this week (sorry!).... let me show you the floor first..

it shows some work in progress for something I can't tell you about yet... exciting but scary at the same time.... all will be revealed in about 10 days.. (the top tag is a decoy, another WIP for something else!!)

there should be a shot of some new stash too, but I can't find it on the computer...the eagle eyed among you may notice the tower of gels has grown again..
oh hang on, here it is...

and the stamps on show may have something to do with the aforementioned secret!
tee hee!

that's all from me today, see you at Julia's to find some more crafty spaces to explore!

Float like a butterfly

This will probably (because of the drying time!!) be my last entry for the Paperartsy Gels and Mediums challenge - I've really loved this one.
I actually started it last weekend, after Leandra's masterclass, prepping the journal page and got side tracked with other stuff.

grunge paste and gel of some type.. have forgotten now!

 also later on added some Deco Art crackle paste, and spritzed with Deco Art Media sprays - yellow green and primary cyan, wiped it back from some of the gel

added some glass bead gel

 for my stamping centrepiece I used the butterflies from HP1506, stamped on tissue and painted front and back with Beach Hut and Limelight Frescos, mixed with Fresco gloss gel

Also did 2 of the separate single butterflies, painted with Glass Blue Fresco but before I fixed them to the page I added some Gloss Gel (regular) with the back of a spatula, thinly, randomly - just wanted a bit more gloss!

 and some more glass bead gel - this is it drying (sped that up with a heat gun, I was surprised how effective it was using the heat gun)

the saying from the same stamp plate.










to finish, I added some tar gel, which I also heat dried.

Entering the Paperartsy challenge here

couldn't resist including this tag, it's from my immediate play after the challenge was announced, gel mixed with purple brusho, stencilled.. several days later I used the damp babywipe I'd used in the page above, covered in the yellow green spray, to lightly wipe over the tag.
the light was poor, so I was pleased the next morning to see a little of the colour had come off onto the tag.
Mixed some Eggplant Fresco with tar gel, and dripped it on the tag.
Painted a little Moonlight Fresco in the gaps.. will "do" something with this tag later but I love it!

Tar and gloss gel journal page - for Paperartsy

So, as you know Paperartsy's Gels and Mediums fortnight is rapidly passing... I got some clear tar gel the other day and had to play!

On Sunday night after Leandra's inspiring videos were posted on the blog, I mixed up some of the heavy gloss gel I'd bought on Saturday, with some polished pigments (black cherry) and stencilled it onto a couple of journal pages, and a tag - you can see them here, drying on Sunday night on top of my Fresco boxes..

(there's also some of Finn's Prima light paste, mixed with purple brusho, through the Lin Brown circles stencil, on another journal page and another tag.. still WIP those!)

just love the shimmer that shows through the gloss gel, from the polished pigments!

 I loved Sue's drippage canvas with the clear tar gel, and knew I wanted to try dripping the tar gel onto something!   Sadly, I don't have a picture of the step with the gel before I added the next layer - Claret Fresco, knocked back with a baby wipe to leave the dry gel, showing the cream of the journal page behind..

 but you an see where the gel dripped and ran as I tipped the page whilst it was still very runny.. love this stuff!!

I also added the JoFY circles from JoFY37 (the one with the caterpillar!) which I painted with a mixture of white Sharpie marker and Chalk Fresco, and dots of Plum Fresco in the centres.
still think maybe it needs some more words, but for now "do more of what makes you happy"  (JoFY38) stamped on tissue and cut to fit some of the gaps in all the luscious glossy magnificence, will do...  it made ME happy!

Entering the Paperartsy Gels and Mediums challenge, here 

Dragons Dream - Tag it On

Time for another tag challenge from the Dragons - this fortnight, it's the turn of Silvia, and she wants us to use the number 2. 

I decided to not only use the number 2, but to make 2 tags.. twins, you might say!

I took two size 8 tags and a couple of stencils - the mini Labrynth (crafters workshop) and the numbers (paperartsy) using just the number 2 from it.  Paints are Blueberry for the Labrynth, and Lavender for the numbers.

My main image is a Teesha Moore stamp, on another tag - painted Banana before stamping and cut out the images.  mounted them on the tags so they could stand side by side, and stamped the text on a spare bit of another tag (from a Paperartsy plate)

Painted some white satin ribbon with more Blueberry Fresco, as I didn't have a ribbon the right colour (how does that happen? about a million ribbons and never the right shade...) 

Hope you will join in the challenge this time, it would be great to see more of you playing along.  Check out the rest of my team-mates here

WOYWW 324

Hello again, Wednesday already!  Following yesterday's very sad news shared by Julia about our lovely Janet "Fairythoughts" it's a bit sombre round here...but I do have a desk (yes, yes I know it's not a proper desk) to share... it is WOYWW after all...

its gels and mediums fortnight at Paperartsy and I have some works in progress - waiting for some new gels to arrive (they should have got to me at work on Tuesday but didn't... sad face...!)

 Did get these locally on Saturday though..

oh, and Julia, they're not all gesso, I've turned them round so you can see them (if you zoom in!) clearly....short of getting down on the floor again!

so, that's  my desk..   floorspace... what's on yours?

Paperartsy Topic 15 - Gels and Mediums

Wow, the latest Paperartsy topic is a great one!!  Gels and Mediums - so many out there, so many effects!  There have already been loads that really inspired me, Sue's drippage with tar gel, was gorgeous, (but my local "art" shop didn't have tar gel yesterday; so that will have to wait)  and Lin Brown made a great video with gloss gel (which the shop DID have...yay!!)

 first stage, the gloss gel drying - like Lin I used the Paperartsy Crunchy and Smoothy papers

 first layer of spray - don't have the Lindy Stamp Gang sprays,so used some Glimmer Mists - been a while since these saw the light of day!

 and first layer on the Crunchy

 thank goodness for crafty stash that comes in pizza boxes!

 think this is enough spray layers!

 third or fourth layer - the Glimmers don't seem as vibrant as the Lindy's so needed more layers

 left them overnight mainly because the light had gone and I couldn't see well enough to carry on.. and wasn't sure what to do with them!

I've shown you quite a few of my step by step photos but do check out Lin's video!!

 decided to do a page in my big A4 journal -took some blue Frescos - brayered on Blue Oyster, China, Old Gold, added some Space Cadet and more Old Gold...

 then stencilled the cornflower in Antarctic

 and tore the two samples with the same stencil, and glued to the journal.

I added some script stamping on the journal page and onto the torn samples too.

and still have these to play with!


Lin and Leandra, this was such fun, and I love the effects. Entering the Paperartsy challenge here 

Going back to my gels now... got some coarse gel I've been working with too!  watch this space...

ATC and Tag swap

I'm a bit behind on sharing the tags and atcs for the swap group I'm in, these are from the July swap - theme stencils.

 did a double layer of stencilling on the tags and atcs, with and Old French Script stencil (Americana Decor)

 and added stamps from some of the new Paperartsy Hotpicks

stencilled some texture paste on the atc round the stamping, too.










so, whilst I'm here and so I don't forget, these are the next ones due by the end of this month - the new theme is texture.

covered the tags with torn book pages and scrunched up tissue wrap and painted the tags - can't remember which blue I used, but the green is Sage!

Added some of the fabric stamping we did on our James Sharp weekend

 covered the atcs with burlap and torn corrogated card (from a coffee cup wrapper)

Added tissue stamped images

 to the top of the blue tag I added some glass bead gel for added texture.

and some stencilled paste on the green one

close up of the top of the blue tag.

thanks for looking

WOYWW 323

Hi, and welcome to another Wednesday desk hopping.at Julia's Stamping-Ground 
I am glad that the angle I photographed my workspace gave you all such pleasure last week!

Not such a low angle this week - but there are a couple of late anniversary atcs to share!

took this from the sofa this time!

the atcs - on the left, from Bridget Larson, and on the right, from Christine Bedford  (Bishopsmate)
Christine's arrived a couple of weeks ago but I realised I hadn't shared it, Bridget's came the other day.

Thanks, ladies!


Short and sweet this week, Julia!!