Oh Baby!

Last week I shared some shots of one of the pairs of loons on our lake.  Today I have a series of shots showcasing the baby.  Have I mentioned how lucky we are to be able to enjoy these incredible moments!

 

An ATC Develops...

I'm participating in an ATC swap via Facebook, and yesterday I got the art supplies out for a bit of play time.  The August theme is 'Things With Wings".

I started with a scrap bit of cardboard which I roughed up a bit with sandpaper and then applied a thin coat of gesso to both sides.  The text that shows through just gives a bit of extra texture.

 Next I used spray inks and distress stain to add colour.  I used a couple of my StencilGirl stencils too.

This is Terri Stegmiller's 'Blades' stencil.  I flip the stencil over onto a page of text to use up the excess ink.

I also used Jane LeFazio's 'Eucalyptus'. 

I added various elements by tearing pieces of previously embellished papers I had lying around. I tore a branch from the text page used to 'clean' my stencils and then I cut out and coloured a bird that was lightly stamped on scrap paper one da when I was cleaning that stamp.  I spritzed it with the blue spray ink, but if you srr it in person, you can see the black ink from the original ink show through.

 Using the tube in the spray ink bottle, I 'draw' a thin border around the edge on both front and back.

I then added some finishing touches with black and white pens, some letters cut out of the newspaper, and a few stickers and it was done.

And here's the finished ATC...

front

back

Art Journal Calendar...

Here are my Art Journal Calendar spreads for July (completed) and August (blank).  If you're interested, I did a tutorial the other day on how I made the August spread.  You can see that here.

The Bees Are Truly Busy...

While out walking Casey this morning, we noticed that the bees are really busy gathering pollen from the many flowering plants that line the cottage road.

I especially love this shot of a bee inside one of the hollyhock blossoms in our friend's cottage garden.

We also saw this Monarch butterfly, but it wouldn't cooperate and let me get a shot with wings spread.

I hope you are enjoying the many beautiful sights of summer where you are too!

Loons On Our Lake...

We are so lucky to be able to enjoy these beautiful birds!

Did you notice the baby on momma's back?

And a ruby throated humming bird.  

The Snail Came Through!

Dee and I were starting to worry because her June ATC from our Joanne Sharpe Facebook alumni swap group, The Queen's Sharpies, had not arrived (via snail mail) and it was nearing the end of July.  Well, I was thrilled when I found this treasure in my mailbox yesterday!

I guess that poor little snail was struggling under the added weight of that wonderful crown charm.   I so glad the little guy persevered!  The photo just doesn't do it justice...the wonderful texture and all of the meaningful layers.  Awesome job Dee!

StencilGirl Blog Hop and Giveaway

I'm so glad you've stopped by today for our StencilGirl Blog Hop and Giveaway!


Today I'm going to create my August art journal calendar page using a couple of my StencilGirl stencils, including this feature stencil called Crossed Rounds & Squares by Andrew Borloz .  I love this stencil because it's really six stencils in one!

I'm also using Rafters by Mary Beth Shaw.



I started out by using a pencil and ruler to create a grid on the page spread and then used random shapes from the Rafter's stencil to trace shapes with a permanent black pen which will be used as my journalling spaces.






You're probably noticing something very wrong right about now...sadly I didn't clue in until much later in the process.

I threw some colour on the spread using  turquoise and yellow acrylic paint.  When I do this I tend to just paint random patches of colour, overlapping and mixing the colours where they meet.

Using Andrew's stencil and a make-up sponge, I added some solid red circles here and there, followed by some of the crossed circles in a softer pink. I painted circles in varying sizes to bring out more of the turquoise and yellow. And then I added a few darker blue solid circles.

While the paint on the journal page was drying I grabbed a page of the newspaper and used a different part of Andrew's stencil to get some colour and texture over top of the newspaper text.

See what I mean...I've already used five of the six patterns available on this one stencil!

I liked the crossed square pattern on the newsprint so I added some of that to the journal page too.

Using a small paint brush I added yellow or red dots inside the crossed circles to create the centre of a flower.

I love re-purposing things, and this little spray bottle (originally a body spray) makes a great paint sprayer.  I diluted some liquid acrylic (in the darker blue I used earlier) to a milking consistency so that I could spray it through the nozzle (start with approx. equal parts paint/water and add water as needed until it sprays easily).  This was then generously sprayed onto the stenciled newspaper and left to dry.

While the newspaper dried, I picked up my black waterproof pen and started doodling on the page, creating flowers out of those crossed circles. Other lines and swirls were added to represent vines from which the flowers grew.

I added some Golden Acrylic Glazing Liquid to white paint to make it even more  transparent and started to paint in the shapes I had traced from the Rafters stencil.

Yes, this is when I finally clued in to the fact that I had way too many days in August.  Honestly, I don't know what I was thinking when I created the initial grid, but obviously I was far to focussed on playing with paint and stencils to pay attention!

Fortunately I was able to wipe off the extra white from that one shape that I shouldn't have painted!

Up until this month, I have always put the name of the month in that space in the top left of the page.  However, I decided I was going to have to make the letters bigger and put them in that huge extra space at the bottom (created by my silly mistake).

I first drew and cut out the letters from a plain piece of the newspaper to ensure they'd fit.  I then used those as my tracers when making the letters on the coloured newsprint text.

I painted matted gel medium onto the journal page, and the back of the newspaper letters to glue them to the page.







And here's the finished spread:

Have fun visiting all the other creative team members to see what they've done and for more chances to win in the giveaway!  Good Luck!

StencilGirl Talk

Marjie Kemper 

Kirsten Reed 

Leslie Jenison

Sami Harding

Corrine Gilman

Janet Joehlin

Linda Kittmer

Carolyn Dube 

Paula Phillips

Mary C. Nasser

Maria McGuire