Rose Parrakeet

My uncle owns and flies a restored Rose Parrakeet: a "single-seat sporting biplane produced in small numbers in the United States during the 1930s. It was a conventional design with staggered single-bay wings of equal span braced by N-struts." -Wikipedia

(As someone who commits typos largely as a matter of technological laziness, I must say that "parrakeet" is the proper spelling of this plane!)

Anywho, his birthday is coming up and my mom commissioned a card to send to him.  This is what I came up with:

Notice the party hat and the "Birthday 1951" plane number?  :)

I sketched it from this picture:

This is Uncle Howard flying the 'keet in Maryland, or somewhere nearby...

Supplies:

• Ticonderoga #2 sketcher
• Loew Cornell watercolor for the red and the splatters, and also for the sentiment
• Yasutomo pearl watercolors for the silver wings
• Thermoweb dimensional tape

Just for fun, if any of you like wine and live back east, Uncle Howard and Aunt Sue own and operate a vineyard in Maryland... check it out: New Market Plains Vineyards...  Mmmmm...

I'd like to share this at the following challenges:

• Seize the Birthday : "Bold and bright"... the red body is bold and the silver wings are bright!
• A Blog Named Hero: Masculine... well, girls love planes,  too, but this *is* for my uncle...

Throwdowns and Sharing Joy... a day in the life...

Here is a card (well, actually two) made for Color Throwdown #401:

Initially I was really afraid of the palette, but necessity is the mother of creation, and I needed to make cards for the local bookstore, so I threw myself right in!  Here's that palette:

Supplies and notes:

• Aged Mahogany, Tea Dye, Seedless Preserves, and Worn Lipstick DIs
  
• I tore a paper in half and taped them down over the card(s) to define the area to be inked
• I did a little spritzing, and a little drippy-drop of extra ink (DI on the craft mat with water)
• I also added some Aged Bronze Distress Spray, sprayed on the mat first, then flicked with a paintbrush
• Stamps are from Invoke Arts (Catrina) and 100 Proof Press (dancers)
• I hand-lettered the sentiment with a Tombow brush marker... I'm getting better... This one,  I kinda scrawled out...

These cards also qualify for the single layer challenge at Tuesday Throwdown.

They are also stretched versions of the current Share Joy Challenge sketch, plus they are CAS!  Boom!  (I was the lucky random winner at Share Joy a few challenges ago, and after visiting the Taylored Expressions shop again I need to scrape up all kinds of $$$... I want many, many stamp sets, and NEED at least 3...)

Olive Juice

"Olive juice" translates to "I love you"... I can't remember where that came from, but it's been in my vocabulary since high school, and my sis just said it to me the other day.  So I made her a card!

Supplies and notes:

• Did some inky soaking with Shabby Shutters and Forest Moss DIs
• Wrote "olive juice" with a Tombow brush pen
• Inked an Inkadinkado martini stamp with Ranger Archival in Jet Black
• Added Glossy Accents to the glasses

Ta-da!  Sister will love this.  She is going to my BFF's bachelorette as well-- think about it: Sarah's been my best friend since 5th grade... Kiki, being my twin, has been right there with us for the last 25+ years.  Whoa, trippy... Anyway, Kiki has done lots of the work for the bachelorette (I'm the MOH, but I'm busy as hell, and my twin is, like, totally fun and cool and got way into planning this thing!)  So I owe her a thank you.  Well, I owe her about 20 martinis, but this card will do until the party weekend!

Sorry for that life story.  Now you know.  

Anyway, I plan to enter this adorable card into the following challenges:

• Sisterhoood of Snarky Stampers #63:

  

  Vodka in my cup, please.

• Tuesday Throwdown #302: One Layer
• CAS Mix-up in July: Stamp + Markers + Your Choice

  

  Inkadinkado stamp, Tombow marker, inky background, and Glossy Accents

Using my scrap tags...

I have little index card file boxes packed full of library cards that I've played with-- they are my go-to substrate.  I guess I use them like an efficient art journal: they are useful for using up extra media... like when I get too much texture paste out, or when I've over-inked a stamp...

Anyway, I have a lot.  And some of them are pretty cool!  This one spoke to me this morning.  It said, "Don't put me back in the box!"  "Okay," said I, and slapped him on a card!

Here is the sketch I used, courtesy of Jen at Freshly Made Sketches:

Supplies and notes:

• The library catalog card base was initially inked by monoprinting a Heidi Swapp stencil that had been used with Dylusions in Vibrant Turquoise... looks like this was a 2nd-gen monoprint with lotsa water
• Last night, while doing another project, I had extra Clear Rock Candy Distress Crackle on my card (I use cards, like hotel room keys and gift cards,cut at an angleas my usual palette knife), so I used the excess through a stencil made from one of Tim's Mixed Media dies

  

  This is how I cut my plastic cards to use as palette knives.  Ummm, does anyone see why this is so funny?  Read the card.  It's like the hotel knew I'd use it for paste!

• This morning, I scribbled a handful of Distress Crayons on the texture,and did a few rounds of wet-wipe-draw some more...
• Satisfied with the results, I stamped a Recollectons "Fantastic" with ColorBox Archival in Glacier Lake and meounted it dimensionally over some scrap green.

I think I'll also share this for the July Happy Little Stampers Mixed Media Challenge:

I used an old library catalog card, plus used up scraps, and also used the hotel room key as a palette knife!  Boom.

Happy Wednesday!!!  Hump Day!

Forever by the sea...

I'm par-hosting my best friend's bridal shower in August, and I'm in charge of sending invitations out.

I decided to go an artsy-route, though I was short on time. I had an idea and just went with it.  I hope everybody likes it-- especially the bride!:

Supplies and notes:

• Watercolor paper was cut for efficient use
• Sentiment written with a Zig Emboss Writer; anchor stamped in Tim's Distress Embossing ink 
• I then embossed with Recollections in white or Custer's Last Stamp in silver or Ranger in Princess Gold
• I carved the anchor stamp myself about a month ago
• Loew Cornell watercolors used over embossed design
• Some Stampendous frantage in gold.  This actually proved to be time-consuming, so I finished many with ink splatters-- I like the look of both. 
• I ran each finished panel through a pool of water, then after about 30 seconds I distressed the edges with my fingers and my distressing tool. (I use a tool by Making Memories. I had Tim's Tonic tool and didn't like it.)

I'll share this at CASology Week 206: Art, based on the fact that I felt like this was an artistic endeavor compared to how cookie-cutter and store-bought it could have been! (Yes, that would be easiest, but I'm a card maker-- I have a little pride!)

CASology!

I knew exactly what stamp set I was going to use for this challlenge!!!  Go check out Snapping Monsters, and after you are done "oohing" and "ahhing" over her stuff, click on the link to her Etsy shop.  Hope she still has some of her stamps in stock!

Anyway, here is the little card set I came up with for the current CASology challenge:

Warm.

Cool.

All together now...

This is the first card I made in this sitting.  I scribbled and I liked it, but then I added water to fill in the palette spots and actually don't like it as much as when the crayons just showed the texture of the paper.  

Here's the CASology graphic:

Supplies and notes:

• Andrea's stamps inked with Ranger Archival in Jet Black
• All Distress Crayons having color (i.e. not the Vintage pack)
• The paper is letterpress paper.  It feels like watercolor paper, but the fibers are not as bonded together-- it's a little softer, if you will.  Think about what letterpress paper would be like...
• The yarn on the two hemi-palette cards is from a purchase from Andrea's shop!  She was very generous with her wrapping, and I probably had 2/3 yard, but it is now gone.  Thanks!

Here are som efun pix of the process:

This is how I laid out my colors.  It looked so cool that I snapped a pic.

This image shows my first attempt prior to adding water.  I liked it like this, but imagine the possibilities!  Paints, pens, inks...

The stamp set itself is awesome... I've used it a lot, and it has provided much art-therapy!  Here are some cool pix of a cool play-date I had with them weeks ago:

Indescribably beautiful!

DI... mo' betterness...

Does anyone remember the first Batman movie with the Penguin (Danny DeVito), when he taped together all of those shredded documents?  I remember.  That's how I feel looking at this: like the little fat Penguin on Batman.

OMG, how cool is this???

If you'll notice the color wheel in mid-upper right, you'll see that I painted and individually cut the colors from the first picture, which is how I ended up with the stencil in the third picture... what a bonus bi-product!

SOS: inspired by bedding!

This week we have an interesting challenge for you over at Shopping Our Stash:

...we want you to get inspired by your bedding!

For many people, home decor is a hobby, and they're good at it. Not me. I swear, if it weren't for having kids and trying to be respectable, we'd still be using lawn chairs in the living room with milk crates for ottomans! That said,  we do have a really nice Pendleton on our bed, bought for me by my hubs when I was pregnant with our youngest.

Here's my card:

...inspired by this blanket:

Don't mind the feathers...

Supplies and notes:

• The blue paper comes from a pad my best friend gave me years ago.  It matches the down blanket we keep on our bed year-round... hence the feathers!
• I used an old (6 years old?) stitching punch by EK Success with some ancient wool embroidery thread
• I painted the blanket with Loew Cornell watercolors (had since college)

So, go make your bed, then go make something pretty and share it with us at Shopping Our Stash!

Remember: you can make anything inspired by the challenge... for this challenge, you can go my route and make a card, or what about being creative in a different way and making a canvas to hang in your room, or even making a pillow to match your bedding?  Ahhh, if only I had more hours in a day!

This was a tricky challenge for many of us on the DT, but it kind of inspired me to roll up my sleeves and jump right in... it's a challenge, right???  So, think like Tom Petty and don't back down!