Red, White, and Blue Bird

It's time for another art challenge on the Paper Traders blog!  The theme this time is "Red, White, and Blue Bird" and I decided to go with a decidedly patriotic theme in honor of Flag Day this week.  I actually made the background a long time ago when I was practicing some new techniques.  This one was done by using clear embossing powder to stamp the framed words onto blank card stock to create a resist for the watercolor.  After painting, I then reheated the embossing until it soaked into the paper to create a batik effect.  The eagle image was trimmed from an old birdwatching book I found at the thrift store  =)

These challenges are so much fun!  And they're open to all art bloggers so check them out and come play along: http://papertraders-art.blogspot.com/search/label/Challenges

Participate in our art challenge

Our Paper Traders online art group has a group blog where we are hosting our first art challenge.  These challenges are open to the art blogging community, whether you are a Paper Traders member or not.

Check us out here for more details: Paper Traders Art Blog

My entry for this "Celebration" themed challenge is this bookmark:

Saturday Swap Meet

It was time for another scavenging trip to find more steampunk playthings.  Above is a photo of what I found today.  Stay tuned to (hopefully) see these items featured in some new art soon!

Round One

It's been a few years since we did a round robin journal project in our Paper Traders group.  They are a lot of fun but it can be heartbreaking when a book goes missing half way around the world  =(

After much demand, and setting some very specific rules and guidelines, we finally decided to give it another go.  We have two rounds going, each with five artists participating.  My journal theme is "Trees"...

front cover

ideas page (written on leaves inside the envelope)

sign-in page

The following spread was made by creating a background using a method loosely based on Jill Geraghty-Groves' "decaying background" technique as shown in the Mar/Apr 2011 issue of Somerset Studio:

first spread - left side

first spread - right side

I made this second spread completely from scratch...  the background was painted by scraping acrylic paints over the paper with a credit card and then sponging inks and paints over that using various stencils and punchinella (sequin scrap).  The circles were added by dipping my bottle lids in leftover paint and stamping them on the page.  The leaves took me DAYS AND DAYS to cut out!  I used japanese washi paper and cut all the tiny sections of leaves out by hand then layered them onto my tree branches.  Then I dabbed glue around haphazardly and sprinkled with several colors of Martha Stewart's vintage leaf glitter (love this stuff!).  I think it turned out awesome and looks sooooo much better in person than in this scan (you'll just have to trust me on that  =)

second spread - left side

second spread - right side

By the Seaside

For May, I hosted an ATC swap on our Paper Traders group with a "By the Seaside" theme.  I left it pretty open and there was a wide variety of creative art from our participants.

For my card, I used a version of Tim Holtz' "rusted enamel" background technique, as described in his book A Compendium of Curiosities.  It's hard to tell from the photo but the entire background is heat embossed.

My Stuff, Your Stuff

 We held a really fun swap on Paper Traders this month.  It was a "stuff" swap and we sent our swapping partner an envelope full of random ephemera; then their challenge was to make one ATC using some of the items, sending the finished card back to the person who's stuff they used and keeping the extra ephemera for themselves.

Well, I was having so much fun, I couldn't stop... and I ended up making THREE ATCs from the stuff I received.  I forwarded the top two shown here back to my swap partner and am entering the card shown below in this month's winner-take-all ATC lottery.  (For this last card, I added the picture from my own stash.)

Not Quite Summer

Another fun banner for a swap on Paper Traders.  This one is for Summer using half circles which were the perfect shape for some fresh watermelon slices!  It's difficult to tell from the photo but these are very sparkly - with glitter accents and generously spritzed with glimmer mist  =)