Challenge: Color-bright, vibrant and cheerful

Hi All!

I have been having fun playing with alcohol inks over the last few weeks.  When I saw Craft Stampers, challenge this month was about color-bright, vibrant and cheerful I wanted to jump right in!  Here is a link to the challenge details. Take It Make It Challenge : April!

Exploring my forest

I recently took a class to learn to how to a make a hand stitch journal. I plan to use this piece as the cover for a new journal.  The base is a strong watercolor paper. The background is created by blowing alcohol inks one color at a time across the glossy paper. It took considerable time to learn some minimal control over the results. I enjoy looking at the depth of all the layers of ink and the interesting blend of colors. I added to the forest story with a stamped bird and tree branch. The feather is embossed and die cut from a piece of alcohol inked paper and dots of heated embossing powder.  The feather was added with pop dots to the background. 

 

I appreciate you stopping by and leaving a comment!...Jan

April's Mixed Media Card Challenge!

Hello!

The Mixed Media Card Challenge theme this month is flowers and the optional element is a basket.

I frequently draw on my love of nature and gardening for inspiration for my art work. I enjoy building mixed media projects in layers to share my stories. For this month I share that living in the the far north means there is no spring season. And while I miss the beautiful, fragrant and colorful bursts of spring flowers for now I patiently wait and make art.

 

 

 

 

I wish I could put this card in your hands so you could twist and tilt it to capture the many different effects of the light bouncing off the different materials.

 I started creating the blue background with aluminum foil attached to cardstock and dry embossed . I colored the foil with several different hues of blue alcohol ink.  To create the look of cracked ice I used blending fluid to remove the blue edges to reveal the silver.

On an acetate overlay I painted the openings of STAMPlorations shutter stencil with white acrylic paint to represent the breaking-up of our snow pack.   I left a few shutters unpainted so it is easier to see the cracked ice underneath.

For the top layer I created a piece of alcohol inked glossy cardstock to represent the bright summer colors that will soon fill our world. And added embossing paste enhanced with color, glitter and texture to create symbols of our annual earth cycles in the far north including a fern and a leaf I dried last summer. The STAMPlorations daffodil was stamped on acetate and colored with sharpie markers.

So for now I am happy to enjoy many representations of flowers until our growing season arrives. And as they say "I'm just chillin"!

May you have a beautiful spring season!  Hope our design team's cards bring you inspiration for this month's Mixed Media Card Challenge. Be sure to stop by their blogs to see the details of their cards.

This is the link to the Mixed Media Card Challenge

Challenge Entry:  I am also entering this card into Virginia’s View Challenge- #14 Layers and Dimension

Layers-base is embossed foil colored with alcohol inks

Overlay-acetate layer with shutters stencil painted with acrylic paint

Top layer-alcohol ink painted glossy cardstock with stenciled highlights created with embossing paste, glitter and gel pens and stamping.  Daffodil is stamped on acetate and colored with markers.

 

Thanks for stopping in and of course every comment put a smile on my face and more inspiration in my heart!   Many thanks!...Jan