April 2009 IT girl for Debbie

April was Debbie's IT girl month in our Art Venture group. She had seen an Envelope book I made for Carol Sweeney in another swap & commented that she would like something like that for her IT month. :-) I Loved making that envelope book & was Thrilled to make another. I do hope she likes it.

I really Enjoy working with Lutradur. It uses a LOT of paint......it seems to suck it up, then leave an interesting pattern of extra paint underneath. Next time I want to pick that up with some blank paper as a new type of background. I want to try some of the other things that can be done with Lutradur such as burn holes for additional texture. I'm really just getting started playing with it.

IT girl for Karen Wright - Shrines

This is the first time I've been able to update my blog in quite some time. Tax season sidetracked me with work. As well as ending up being Very Late with this IT girl book for Karen Wright who was quite understanding when I emailed her. I appreciated that!

Karen's topic was "Shrines". Staying with my book direction, I embedded a shrine in the cover of the book. I glued pages together until the front cover was thick enough to hold the metal box I used for the shrine. Then I traced around the box & with a mat knife, cut out a niche to hold the box. I wanted to use the lid of the box since it just was part of it, so I made a hidden shrine. The lid slides off to reveal the ???? angel girl?? inside. I thought she fit in a shrine.

Now off to work on 3 ATC swaps due April 30 along with a chunky book page due in Florida on April 30. Lot's of artwork ahead of me now that my busy Job season is over. :-)

February 2009 IT Girl book for Pea

This is the book I made for Pea who's topic for February was Black & White & Bold. Not sure how Bold it got, but the metal Is Shiny. Is Shiny Bold? ;-) I did a black & white ATC swap in February also and this bird image with the checkerboard around it just wouldn't leave my brain. There are 9 ATC's out there similar to this cover. It was fun to take it a little further with the back, then play with the metal! I Love Ten Seconds molds & metals. Although..........this turquoise color I got somewhere else online. And I can't remember where now...... I Loved the color though!

I got behind on my IT girl swaps over the holidays but Finally caught up through January.
This book was for Pauline who's topic was womens faces. I Attempted to draw a Kelly Rae Roberts style face on the front. It was fun giving it a try, although I am certainly not great at it! Maybe with practice. :-)

This is the inside of the front & back covers.

This book was for Jessie who's topic was Time.

And this book was for Fiona who's topic was Inspiration.

I finally finished the back of my book to Carol and it is in the mail. :-)

CC Swaps Envelope book for Carol S

This is a book I made for an Envelope Book swap in CC Swaps. The only requirement was that we include at least 8 envelopes. I made 8 envelopes out of painted Lutradur, sewed them together, decorated them and added velcro as a closure.
A couple of weeks ago I joined several ladies in Brentwood for a local art group meeting. Diane Bouchard taught a technique for painting on freezer paper. I used this method on the Lutradur & really loved the results.
The technique is basically spreading paints on the background with a credit card, then rubbing a Golden metallic glaze over the colors. On the Lutradur particularly, the glaze seemed to pull the colors all together & make them feel really rich.
From there I used my typical painty techniques of using Stewart Gill paints & sequin waste to add color & texture. I overstamped with Golden tubed iridescent bronze fine and with Golden heavy bodied Titan Buff.
And I can only Hope Carol likes flowers because I find I have kind of caved in to the flowers that have massively shown up in scrapbook stores lately! I used little ones a bit in the past, but I found I love the layered ones....different colors, sizes, textures. I seem to have used quite a few of them on this. LOL

Holiday Hideaway December 2008 - Other Projects

It's nearly the end of February already (although I started this on January 18 as the date says! LOL) and I am Finally getting a chance to post pix of my other projects from Holiday Hideaway in December. The Christmas hangers are made with Ranger "Fragments". Tim's sample actually had crystals hanging from the hanger also...........I Still haven't gotten a chance to put mine on. But if I don't post these pix pretty soon, it will be Next December!!! ;-)

The Doors were a Lot of fun! These plug in & light up and the faux snow looks so realistic.

And The Birds!!! This I think was my Favorite Project! What FUN these were! And how many Different styles everyone did! This is my bird. I bought the metal iron in an atique store in Prescott & have attached my bird. I also went online & have ordered 5 more birds to Hopefully someday alter! I just Love this little guy!

And I Must Thank Tim for his input along the way. I didn't think I had painted it well enough. And I didn't like that orange showing through when we sanded. Tim said it would end up being my favorite part. And Yep......it Is! It makes it look the most distressed. I won't be so Finicky next time. LOL

Ahh, and these pictures have gotten all out of order from the way we did them. This was actually one of the first projects. I really Loved this project also! Tim's sample had doorknobs as feet to stand on and a door handle on the top. I Bought some.............just haven't had time to put them on yet. This was all made with Grungeboard alphabets and distress inks.

All I can say about the Holiday Hideaway is it is one of the most special events I've ever been fortunate to attend and I Thank Tim for welcoming me into the fold, Mario for all he does for us. And Always thanks to Michelle, Karen & Sharon who help make this all possible. I can't wait for next year! :-)