Christmas Sardine Tin Finale

The Christmas sardine tin swap with Lou and Sherry has finished and I enjoyed it so much. It was really inspirational and I have already thought of more ideas for more tins. These are the final layers for Sherry's tin which is now home. Apologies for the photos but the light is just rubbish just now. It rained all last weekend. I added a flying angel to the back of the scene Lou had created. I used my other deer for the front of the tin. I coated it with Distress Rock Candy and then rubbed silver Adirondack paint into it for the effect.

I made a hanger from beading wire and some snowflake brads I found in my stash. I also coated the wings with white microbeads left over from cross stitch projects. The blue beads were wired and then glued to the edge as they were a bit fiddly.

I also deepened the colour of back the tin using some Liquetex paint I had and then edged it with some sticky lace tape I have for the final tweek. I hope Sherry liked it and I love how the tins are all so different in style. Roll on the next swap.

My tin arrived home from Lou and it's just stunning. I borrowed her photo as it is so much better than mine. It's like a little shrine to Christmas and a great start to the season. Thank you both ladies for your fabulous work.

Desert Island Discs, and Attitude

Two updates in one, how lucky can you get :)

First up, the latest pages in Sian's Attitude journal. The pages arrived pre-coloured, and with the quote stamped on. Considering that Plebgate was still in the news, there was only one way to go.

Secondly there's my page in Sonja's Desert Island Discs. It was a toss-up which page to go for, and the Waterboys won. Not the greatest photograph I've ever taken, there's a layer of shimmer which goes invisible when I take the pic.
I've not included the reverse of the page as it shows the sentiments behind the song.

DESERT ISLAND DISKS - SIAN'S JOURNAL

Evening all, I've been on a roll this week and received Sian's journal which I should have from the 1 December from Pat as it was more timely for her to send it early.  Another gorgeous journal, this one in separate pieces, I had a difficult job picking the track as there was such a good selection and Sian's journal is so heartfelt and honest, I felt incredibly privileged to take part in the journal.

I chose Snow White Queen by Evanescence as it was one of my favourite tracks from the selection and this is what I did.

A 'typical' art journal layout from me, including some of the lyrics, using acrylic paints to finger paint.  Since photographing I've also added  three small (tiny) red hearts to the shield and a little bit of inking through a mask. I did think about putting words inside the shield but wasn't sure which ones and this is off to Donna next so thought I'd leave it in case someone else can come up with something thus adding to the artwork in our collaborative way.

In line with the idea that this circle journal is a collaborative affair I decided to add some elements to the inner pages of the two previous pages, in keeping with the layout's already completed.  I hope this 'addition' is OK.

These colourful hearts I add to Pat's layout next to the lyrics

and the butterflies to Sian's pages.

 I'm going to send this journal to Donna, together with Pat's in the next day or so along with my pairs journal, that way Donna can work on them when she's ready.

DESERT ISLAND DISKS - PAT'S BOOK

Evening all, just completed the first entry into Pat's book and what a beautiful book it is too.  Thankfully the book is removable from it's gorgeous covers.  I looked through Pat's selection of songs and had a listen and decided on Whitney's Where do Broken Hearts go as the song track.  Here is my take on the track

I've intentionally left the papers going over the edge of the pages, as the cover is somewhat bigger than the inner pages.  I've painted and inked, used black tissue paper to create the crack down the centre and hand stitched the stitches with grey embroidery thread.

Pat I hope you like it.

PAIRS JOURNAL DONNA & VIRGINIA

Well it's a while since I've posted, but on the grounds I'm sending Donna the Desert Island Disks journals I thought I'd post my pairs journal at the same time, it feels 'almost done' but Donna assures me that we're nowhere near finished LOL!

So here is a page I doodled on and Donna start colouring in and I've continued with.

Then I've added a half image, I've painted the left hand side, I've added a flappy tag and some canvas

Up close a cog that I've made added to some baker's twine

Some tickets from our visit to Crich Tramway Museum

 I've colour in the image a bit more and add the word select

 So there you have it, it's off to Donna's shortly to see what else she wants to add!

Psychodiva's Altered Sardine Can

This is how it arrived, with the crow unattached so I could add it wherever.

And the finished piece:

I must confess I was a little stumped, but thanks for Google!!  I clicked on Crow Animal Spirit, and all results referred to the Crow being "The Guardian of the Void", so the key seemed appropriate.  As I researched the Crow in the Animal Spirit World, the North American Indians refer to Crow Magik & Medicine, I'll not give too much away you can do your own googling, but these results lead to symbols for medicine  hence the staff with entwined serpents and wings aka The Caduceas, which was placed behind the Crow.  I added a painted plastic bottle top as the stand.

I love these kind of projects, you learn so much when you do the research for them and I become quite attached to the finished results.

Apologises for the photos, I just couldn't get the lighting right..

Sonja's Altered Christmas Sardine Tin

This is how it was looking when it first arrived waiting for layer3:

I added the big swirly star at the top and a small garden of star flowers and the words "Scatter Joy".   I toyed with the idea of adding bigger wings to the outside of tin but decided against it.  

The garden of stars looks like this:

I've really enjoyed playing with these little cans, hopefully we'll do a few more in 2013.

Heads Up: I've had lots of problems with blogger rotating my pics, but by renaming them to .PNG seems to have resolved it.

Desert Island Discs Hair

When Sarah's CJ arrived I dismissed some songs and gravitated to others when I read the playlist. However when I played the CD in the car one of the dismissed songs actually jumped to the top of the list. I had originally thought I would do Pink Floyd "Comfortably Numb" but I actually ended up with "Hair" from the musical of the same name. I'm not a huge musical fan and this one was a little before my time so I was surprised it ended up being the song I chose. Just goes to show.

The page is designed to go into Sarah's handmade journal which is fab but you can lay it out and work on the two pages as one spread before you attach it to the book. I started with a pale yellow honeycomb paper from a Studio Calico kit. The there was a thin coating of Gesso and finally I used the Studio Calico starburst mask and the texture paste. I coloured the pages with some Neocolor II crayons and then stamped using SU inks in Basic Gray and More Mustard. The stamps are Kaisercraft, Studio Calico and Unity. The hair is some garden twine I keep on my desk that I use for lots of things. It's been on sardine cans and LOs of late and it comes from Tesco's garden section at a bargain price. I love the rough texture of it and here I wanted the springy quality to show and give texture to my "hair". The Studio Calico bee stamp is embossed in gold. I sketched the face using charcoal and deliberately left it blank. Faces are not my strong point. I have folded the page now and stuck it into the journal and it will be heading on it's way this week to Nigel for the next stage. TFL.x

Shirley's pair journal update.

Sorry it has been a while since I last posted here but I have at long last got around to doing so.

I have added a flower rubon to the corner of the page that Sarah painted this great lady on.

She really sang to me when I opened the page!

On the reflections page I placed a moon using various colours of Treasure Gold. 

I also added in the seahorses and water plant.

Sarah gave this page a lot of texture so I added more by using a texture paste for the word 'Home.'

Collaging on the houses and adding the flowers across the page.

Following on from Sarah's textured page I used a thick gesso and corrugated card stock to give my 'Love' page lots of depth.

Using a weathered wood technique that I learnt at an Andy Skinner class I created an icy looking background and added the baby angel image.

Finally I have produced this background using lovely warm colours.

I did intend to add some stencilling and stamping to it but having my right arm in sling slowed me down. I am sure Sarah will work her magic on the page and hopefully have some fun too.

I will be getting this into the post to you this week Sarah.

I have your journal sat on my desk ready to do but not sure exactly when that will be as the problem that required me to have a sling is still there. I am hoping to see a consultant this week and get things sorted!

Lou's Finished Altered Sardine Tin - Christmas theme.

Hi everyone, Sherry here.

This is how Lou's sardine tin arrived from Sonja.

It's lovely, the Father Christmas at the front really gave

the whole thing dimension.

 

 

I added three elements to the tin:

 

~ a string hanger at the top which can't 
really be seen in the photo.  Sonja had added

string / twine all around the tin, so the hanger 

seemed in keeping with that.

 

~ a star shaped bead hanging inside

 

~  Some foliage on the corner which extends

to the back of the tin too.  It's die cut from 

Tim Holtz' Tattered Pinecone Bigz die

from Kraft-Core paper stuck onto Grunge Board and 

distressed with sand paper. 

(The back foliage is just from the Kraft-Core Paper)

 

 

 I didn't know whether to add any more to the back

or the sides, but as it had a lovely finish already

decided to leave it as it was.

It's now on it's way to Lou - sent today by Recorded Delivery.

I really enjoyed this project and it'll be interesting seeing how

all the altered tins turned out.

 

MAIL ART FROM CLARE

Jez here:  I received Clare's Mail Art Postcard, with its embodiment of this year's Autumn:

It's just like the kind of autumn we've been having - lovely deep colours - and then when the sun shines on it, or I put on the light, it really sparkles like the odd sunshiny days we get now and then.

I'm really pleased with it, and it will go in the sketchbook I keep for cards and paintings I receive from other artists, so that I always know where it is.   Thank you Clare.      Jez

Introducing ... Rebecca

Hi everyone.

I'm Rebecca, sometimes known as Bex, and can be found on UKScrappers as scrap3d (although it's been a while now since I've done any scrapping!). I live in France with my soulmate and our daughters, although that may be changing to Switzerland next year. I know some of you already and I'm looking forward to getting to know everyone else.

A little bit about my background. I loved art as a kid (I passed my art A level at 16 as I couldn't wait until 18 to take it!) and briefly entertained the thought of going to art school. For various personal reasons it was not to be, I went to study psychology instead and didn't do anything artistic for many years.

In the last few years I have slowly eased myself back into arty endeavours. I've come to love altering things and I have just started to embrace art journaling, although I am still very new to it. I've also found that I love doing things for other people - the challenge of making something out of my normal comfort zone has, I think, improved my work a lot.

Here are some bits and bobs that I have made.

Shakespeare themed domino book

A Midsummer Night's Dream

Romeo and Juliet

Art Journal Pages

How do I feel today?

So much to do ...

Chunky ATCs

Frida Kahlo Shrine

Halloween Witches

Altered Matchbox

Steampunk Fairy Shrine

The Reverse

I hope that's given you a flavour of what I do and I look forward to working with such a fabulously talented group of people.

Cheers for now - Bex x

a Donna Disc Thing

Virginia sent me ( donna louise rodgers)  her desert island disc box and hoped that as well as selecting a track and doing a 'page, ' that I might also add to the cover/box.  So I masked off and sprayed.

 took out a piece of cardboard substrate,

listened to the tracks and had a good look at what Virginia had done:

Then I set to work on my contribution:

Gesso applied ( x3 layers)  sketched and shaded with Graphite a  life study of pregnant lady,
inked,
waxed,
 hole punched

 integrated style so it works alongside  Virginia's  own page

 I added my 'famous face' postcard as a signature piece - you can see it nestling in the lid

 on the back of the reclining nude - I wrote the lyrics and the reason for the choice of track, stamped and embossed my rapture stamp (available from the artistic stamper) -
then protected the work with  freezer paper and tissue

 it's a wrap

 details:  Santana Smooth

hope you like it V

dxxxx

I will mail onwards on Wednesday...and update the mailing list when it goes.

INCOMING MAIL ART

whoop whoop - thank you Sarah - how did you get the words so right??? uncanny