Gelli Plate Prints Video

Hi!  It has been busy and stressful around here.  My new Gelli Plate has been a great way to relax and have fun.  After making some new prints with a dollar store find, I decided to do a video.

Watch at YouTube:


TrueStamp is coming up soon!  If you are a stamper, here is more information on the event.  Through March 20 use code POTOFGOLD  and click here...  TrueStamp 15

I'm also working on a two part video for a pocket page layout from Christmas.  One of the pocket pages will use some gelli prints.  Stay tuned...

Thanks for watching!

Gelli Plate Papercrafting

I'm a bit obsessed with my new Gelli Plate. Somehow I found Gelli Arts through Facebook. I'm not a big fan of Facebook but they posted such beautiful projects I started following them.  I didn't know what a Gelli Plate was, envisioning a machine of some type.  It was several weeks before I started watching YouTube videos on how to create prints with the Gelli Plate.  I was quickly hooked and had to have my own.

The Gelli Plate is a gel pad.  It is a flexible surface that isn't mechanical in the least.  You apply paint, use various tools to make impressions in the paint or remove some of it and then press down paper on top. When you lift up the paper you have a design.  You can stop there or repeat with more layers.  Sometimes, oftentimes, you get surprises.  I am keeping a drawer full of my prints and flip through it when I start a page or project to see what I can use.  Sometimes I use the Gelli plate to print for a specific project.

For these cards, I did some prints specifically for them and others were part of the stash.

I'd like to do some videos on this fun tool.  I've started with a 2 part-er to show what kind of prints you get on what mediums and what you can do with them besides art journaling. I think many people use their Gelli plate for art journaling but I am using it for cards, scrapbook pages and mixed media canvases.

The 2nd video is more on technique.  I labeled it a Do's and Don't's video as there were several things I discovered in these early days of using the plate.  There are a lot of great how to videos out there as well.

Here is Part 1 on YouTube:



And Part 2:



There is much more to learn with this fun tool.  I've certainly had my $30 worth of fun already and look forward to more.  Look for more videos and gelli prints on future projects.

Thanks for visiting!

Wedding card and gift

I went to a cousin's wedding a couple of weeks ago.  I could tell from the invitation they were going for a country theme.  There was an image of a mason jar with a daisy in it so I lifted the idea for her card.  The jar is an image from the Silhouette store and I put the inside in vellum.

The wedding was a perfect blend of theme and tradition.  The bride wore a traditional but not fussy ivory gown. The bridesmaids wore red satin knee length dresses paired with cowboy boots.  They carried a mason jar with a lit candle inside and a sprig of greenery and a pine cone on the outside.  The groomsmen had on red shirts, ties and black pants and probably boots though I didn't notice.  The Christmas tree covered with Chrismons and one altar arrangement were her flowers.  The programs were printed on kraft paper and reminded me of a placard for a old country store with each item typed into a box in varying fonts. We didn't go to the reception as it was quite a drive away but I'm sure it was also tasteful and fun.  I do love a unique take on a traditional wedding.

Using the colors from the invitation as a cue, I did this canvas for them as a gift.

They can add their own wedding photo.

Congratulations, Samantha and Dustin!  We wish you much happiness.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Photo Canvases

I've been playing with using photos on canvases.  I did these for friends.  (The girls are adorable but they are not mine to share photos of.)  The photos are regular prints from Walmart that I painted over with Mod Podge.


I added lots of lace, flowers and gems.

The book paper is from a 1950's sewing book.  It is filled with illustrations and just a couple with little girls.

I struggled more with the small canvas than the larger one.  I had this idea of what I wanted to do but I put the photo a little too far in the corner for it to work so I used more flowers and buttons.  The children's mother was very pleased with it.

Light modeling paste is one of my favorite mediums.  It is like marshmallow fluff in consistency.  I usually color it with ink refills or sometimes highly pigmented paint.  Sometimes I leave it white as I did with the alpha stencil design.  I snuck in a few Studio Calico butterflies as well on the large canvas.

These were such fun to do.  I have another one on my table in process.  It is a commission and I've been asked to cover the entire back base rather than leave the white areas.  Just a different look.

Thanks for stopping by!  Visit me at my Etsy shop at https://www.etsy.com/shop/LovelyLayersArt

Stamping on Ribbon

Archival Ink by Ranger is just amazing.  It stamps so beautifully on all kinds of surfaces and is permanent.  I first bought it for mixed media so I could mist over or go over with Mod Podge but now I use it on almost everything.  For these cards, I stamped the ribbons with black Archival Ink.

For the background, I cut a stencil on the Silhouette and then went over it with metallic white craft paint.  After it dried, I used watercolors for the blue and purple tones. Easy and so inexpensive.

Creating your own stencils on the Silhouette and many more techniques for using stencils are in

Scrapbooking with Stencils class.

All of these techniques can be used on cards as well. This self-paced class has over 4 hours of video instruction and is only $20 US.  Click on the class name for more info.

Thanks for visiting today!

Buttons and Pearls

When my friend Karen visited over Labor Day, she was on the hunt for small items to go on mixed media canvases.  I watched one of the videos she had seen and was also bitten by this bug.  I doubt if I'll ever do an all over canvas the way the presenter - Einat Kessler - did but I wanted to give the technique a try.  Here is her video.

My impression at first was this was awfully tedious. While I was making good progress with an overflowing button stash and using some pearls that have been around probably since before my scrapbooking days, it was just taking a long time to get my design down.

When I started putting on color, I started having more fun.  In the video, Einat uses mists.  I have no permanent mists and wanted to be able to go back over this with Mod Podge so I used gelatos on top of my gesso.  They give great color and the metallics add some shine.

After this experiment, I can definitely see adding this techinque in small quantities to canvases.  You can use all kinds of small trinkets even things that would normally be trash so it feels good to repurpose and get something beautiful.

Thanks for stopping by!

Faith versus Fear

A light bulb went off the other day while I was on my walk.  I had been thinking about summer and fun things I wanted to do.  I was tempted to make a list but reluctant.  I just knew if I made a list something would come along to kill my plans.  I'm often like that in my personal life, not planning things anymore because someone will get sick, or something else will happen that keeps me from doing what I said I would do.

My revelation was that I never did that with my work and I still don't.  I committed to doing the Scrapinar on June 30.  Oh it crossed my mind that my father who was having some health issues in May could be having surgery (he isn't and is doing better) but I knew I could still prep for the Scrapinar.  I didn't worry about all kinds of other things that could come up.

I made a work commitment and I intend to keep it if at all possible.  I've always been that way about work.  I never took window treatment jobs with the idea I might not get them done.  I have taught training classes when I should have been in home in bed with a bad cold or when I was dead tired or when someone probably needed me somewhere else.  I learned early that when you make a commitment to a customer you honor it.

So why are I so shy about making commitments to myself?  Sure it is far more important to take my Dad to the doctor if he needs to go than to go to a movie. But I have a whole summer.  I can do more than one thing.  Just because something might happen doesn't mean it will.  And so the sentiment on this canvas is one I really need to work on.

And I came home from my walk and made that list of fun summer activities. So onto the project.

I started this canvas one day in April with no idea what I wanted to do.  I just wanted to play.

The background came out a bit busy so I turned to Pinterest for ideas on the foreground.  This piece by Jill Foster has been pinned in my Mixed Media board for a long time.  She used white for the leaves but you know how I like color so I did mine in a kiwi green.  It was bit bright so I went over it with some Peeled Paint ink mixed into Mod Podge.

The butterflies are cut on the Silhouette from some October Afternoon book paper printed pattern paper.  It had more stability than regular book paper and held up to several coats of Mod Podge after being stamped and having some white rubons.

The phrase is also from Pinterest.  I see this often as it hangs just outside the bathroom door.

This is one of those that the more I look at it, the more I like it.

And I really need to take this sentiment to heart.

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Star Struck

My stepdaughter Jaime teaches 5th and 6th grade.  She had 4th graders for years. The children's book author, Christopher Paul Curtis, is one of her favorite authors and she finally got to meet him and get a book autographed.

The "don't forget" sticker is particularly symbolic here because there is a post it note in the photo with her name on it the way she spells it.  He still misspelled it.  Oh well, she was still happy with the meeting and a bit star struck.

I created this page at Karen's over Easter.  We had a lot of fun playing with mixed media.  The background is composed of book paper (not his books) with stenciled designs using a variety of mists.  They layer over pages from the 24/7 Collection by Simple Stories.

The collection also gave me lots of stickers to work with here.

And the stars are made with gel medium and silver Perfect Pearls.  I cut a star shape from the Cricut to use a template.

Is your name one that people misspell?  My first name is easy of course but my last name is often spelled differently than I spell it even around here. There are at least 3 common spellings.

Thanks for stopping by today!

More Dots Wanted

We have a map in the house with little pins in it for all the places we have visited.  We haven't added a lot of points in recent years though we did go to Michigan last fall.  Both of us would like to change that so I did this page to celebrate a few of the places we have been and remind us to get out there and travel!

One of our habits is to take a long walk on our first day in a new place - and get lost.  Of course we don't plan to get lost but it has happened so many times it is expected.  Oh, that would make a good page, too.

I put dots on this map with a permanent marker and that inspired the title.

The map is created using Crafter's Workshop Mini US stencil and several different craft paints.  I matched the paint to October Afternoon's Travel Girl papers.  I match things close but not perfectly.  I think mixing paint is fun.  I love seeing what you can get.  This time I used a light tan rather than white to lighten colors and it dulled them just enough to match the papers closely.

Some Washi and a few stickers from the collection finish it off.

Here's the video on YouTube:


And here's the sketch:

Do you like to travel?  Where in the world do you most want to go?

Don't forget May Layout A Day starts in just a few weeks.  Get a lot of scrapping done.
 Click here to view more details

Thanks for stopping by!

BElieve in YOUrself

I got that sentiment from Pinterest.  I was going for a simpler background this time and I almost made it.  I just can't resist adding a bit more stamping and well, I got a color on there I didn't like in permanent ink and well, more paint was required...

Anyway, I'm still happy with this one.  The giant flower is hand cut out of 7 different 6x6  papers but stenciled over with the same stencil and a few different paints.  I used a thin layer of chipboard under each petal to hold them up.  The finished canvas is 12" square.

The purple is a mix of paint and modeling paste.  It still amazes me every time I use orange on a project that I used to think I didn't like orange.  One of the many wonderful things about our hobby is you get to do things on paper and canvas you might not put in your wardrobe or home.  It is just so fun to play!

ETA:  Here is a link to the Paper Issues blog.  They are doing a Tiptoe through the Tulips theme with lots of suggestions on how you can play.  Paper Issues Blog

Hope you have a crafty day!
_______________________

Classes available on using cardstock on layouts:  Creative Cardstock
doing two page layouts:  Two Page Terrific
and a PDF of all of 2013's sketches 

3 Panel Mixed Media

(Caution:  Photo heavy post.)

When I took Christy Tomlinson's wonderful Behind the Art workshop last April, I had in mind doing something for my guestroom/scraproom.  I've had several other things hanging over the bed.  The last was a wall quilt I made but I removed it when I changed the bedding about 3 or 4 years ago and it didn't match.  Since then, this wall has been bare with only nail holes to remind me that it was time I dressed it up.

So after making a few mixed media canvases, I dived into this project. The concept was inspired by NC Weekend's logo.  This is a show on our PBS channel and they have a simple line drawn logo with mountains, to the city to the sea.  I didn't use city buildings but opted for houses instead and a whole lot of paint and color!

 I took a few photos along the way.  As I got toward the final coats, I forgot to take pictures.  This took me weeks of doing a bit at a time.  I'd spread everything out on my worktable, do a layer or two and then set it aside and stare at it off and on over the next week.  Then I'd try again the next weekend.

The first layer of designer papers and fabric pattern tissue paper.  I used the lines in the multi-size patterns to create mountains.

Added some paint and stenciling.

The houses without any detail - just paper.  The trees at this point are fiber paste colored with brown stamping ink refill and some green pattern papers.

All the basics in place but no shading.  The sky is pretty busy here and there are some 'flowers' too near the beach house.

As I got close to done, I went ahead and hung it to get a better view and decide what was missing.  It wasn't what was missing, it was that there was too much. I had the flower bushes (I guess that was what I was going for).  I finally pulled those off altogether and added another tree.  Also, I had too much color change in the sky so I toned that down a bit. I did add another stencil and yellow paint for more focus on the sun. I love paint.  You an just keep going over things until you are happy.

Well, I'm OK with it.  I'm not overjoyed.  There is still something that doesn't quit sit right with me.  I like many of the components.  I'm especially happy with the 'grass' area, the wording and the beach house. It just isn't quite the sum of its parts to me.

However, it is done.  My wall isn't bare anymore. Yeah!

A close up of the grown with the large stencil areas and some of the fabric pattern 'mountains.'

The quote is "The World is but a Canvas to the Imagination."  Thoreau.  

The tree I added to replace those flowers.

Some house details.

A little calmer skies.

So I have something cheery over my guest bed.  And now I can finally film a scraproom tour video.  As soon as I clean up...

Using old product - 70's anyone?

(caution:  photo heavy post)

Today's challenge at Layout A Day has us digging into our stash for old scrapbook product, really old.  I still have scrapbook product and tools going back to 2001.  And if I can count the non-scrapbook specific crafting materials that I now repurpose for scrapbooking, I can go back to the 1970's.

That's right, the 70's.  That is when I did counted cross stitch and accumulated a lot of DMC embroidery floss.  In the '80's, I gave candlewicking a try and did one project.  But I still have the thread and it is in with my twines for scrapbooking.  So those went into this selection of old stuff.

The scrapbooking items here include stickers and large chipboard letters I bought at a scrapbook outlet about 2004.  There are Zig markers that I got when my husband took me scrapbook shopping for our first wedding anniversary in 2002.  There's mulberry paper, remember that?  The raw chipboard is the last of some I got from Oriental Trading so long ago they have finally stopped sending me catalogs.  I selected these things to use on my page:

Those huge letters on the left were bought about 2006, I think, and I've used two letters total, but there is only one of each letter of the alphabet so they are very limited.  What was I thinking?

I did not do a video today.  I took photos along the way so I'll go through a bit of my process for creating the page above with really old stuff.

For the background, I'm using something from my mulberry paper folder.  This is the weight of cardstock but has the textured look and feel front and back.  The backside is a chartreuse green and I have two pieces of it.  The letters are Oriental Trading.  I debated cutting my photo in a circle with my CM cutters (2001) that I still use all the time.  But I decided to keep something about this a bit more modern.

For the letters, I'm using a technique from Wilna Furstenberg's wonderful class heART class at Two Peas (the first one, haven't had time to take her 2nd one yet.)

I painted all the chipboard with a heavy layer of gesso.  She encouraged us 'glob' it on.  Then go over all of it with watercolors.  It really is a beautiful technique.  I also used this on some covered chipboard from K& Company that wasn't the right color for my project - but it is several years old too.  I outlined a few pieces with the old Zig markers.  The beauty of using old stuff is if you mess it up it doesn't matter.  It seemed to be hard on the pens - marking on the paint - but they recovered.

Just this morning I saw on Chantal Vanderburg's blog a layout where she used modeling paste on her chipboard 'waves.'  I decided to give it a try and used what was left of that Oriental Chipboard as a stencil. It turned out pretty but I thought a bit too white for the rest of my page so I gave it a coat of Heidi Swapp mint green mist with a paint brush leaving a little white showing through.

We're almost done!  I adhered the large "love" letters down and then glued all the other words over top.

To work in the DMC floss, I stitched around the photo very casually.  I didn't even use a punching template for this.  I'm getting brave here.

And here's the page again and the details:

There's no journaling.  I think this will be a title page for our 2013 album.

Worked in the candlewicking thread to hold together my tags.  I did have to sneak in a couple of wood veneer pieces.  The one on the bottom covers a seam in the yellow cardstock.

So that's my page!  The only products from this decade are modeling paste, mist, and the wood veneer hearts.

This was such a fun challenge.  I'm really glad I didn't have to time this one!  As you can tell, I save a lot of stuff.  Don't tell my husband that, OK?  I'm always after him to clean up.  :-)

Hope you have a lovely day and thanks for stopping by!