Halloween Mixed Media Canvas

This is an 8 x 8 canvas that I made for Halloween.  I picked up the canvas at a flea market and it had a bad quote with ugly paint so, I just painted over it using an orange base.  The next layer was a milk chocolate brown which I applied unevenly and even picked some back up with a tissue to give it a blotchy appearance.  The next layer is spray inks using a pewter, slate grey and a black.  For the final background, I put some tissue paper with a sheet music print behind the doll.  I also used a wing stamp on tissue paper and applied that where her back was going to be.

The doll is a Julie Nutting stamp.  I added the hat which is just hand drawn and cut out.  The dog is a stamp by Stampotique and he is attached using a jewelry chain and hot glue.  The lettering is a combination of glitter foam letters and letter tiles from a Scrabble game.  The final touch is a ribbon at the top which you actually cannot see very well in this picture.

Just some more Halloween fun!

The before and after!

Finding treasures at garage sales and flea markets is such a fun hunt.  We recently moved a large distance and sold many of our furniture pieces to avoid shipping costs.  Now that I'm settled into a new home, I am enjoying the hunt for "new" things and have the advantage of learning from some of my past furniture find fails.  Here are a couple of things I completed this month:

The first one is an old dresser but, its very shallow and the drawers would hold a very small amount of clothing so, I elected to turn it into a console piece instead.  I have two or three places I could use this and I have not settled on its final spot.  Right now, it's sitting in one of the rooms we need to update and are using as a temporary spot for painting etc.

I started by removing the top four drawers along with the drawer runners plus, all of the drawer knobs.  In the area where the top four drawers were, I used a piece of 3/8 inch furniture grade plywood.  My husband helped cut it to the size I needed.  The whole dresser was sanded, painted, wood filled in some spots and then distressed with sand paper after drying.  New drawer knobs finished it off.  Total cost:  $20.00 for the dresser at a garage sale, $3.49 for 2 new knobs and 21.00 for a sheet of plywood.  I already had the paint so, I don't count that!!

The next project was a shelf unit that someone else used for knick knacks.  This was also a garage sale find at $5.00.  I didn't do to much to this piece except spray paint it, replace one set of hinges and as soon as I find new little door knobs, I will buy those.  Its a little harder to find due to its small size.  Total cost in addition to the 5.00 for the cabinet was 6.99 for spray paint and 3.99 for mini hinges.

I'm always on the hunt !

Halloween ATC's  (Artist Trading Cards)

I still love to do ATC cards and enjoy trading them across the world.  Since I'm a bit of a Halloween nut, Halloween cards are my favorite to make and receive.  Here are four that I made.  All of them begin with the same base paper

I used a gelli plate to make the paper.  I load up the jelly plate with orange color and threw in some brown and green, added stencils etc.  The great thing about gelli plates is that if you don't like the first layer, or its too plain, just add another until you like it!  Once the paper was completed and dried, I cut it to ATC size and adhered it to cardstock.   Here are close up pictures of the four cards.  They all have in common, the background, lettering using a Dymo label maker and some element of fabric pulled from my stash of Halloween fabrics.  By the way, the Dymo label maker is my new favorite crafting supply.  I have been wanted one for awhile but had trouble finding this old fashion type.  The new ones are all electronic and use a different type of tape.  I finally ran across one at "The Container Store" and it was cheap!  I grabbed it up along with a extra set of label tape for future use.

"Frightful" - Gelli plate background, boo! stamp, vintage image with an hand cut witch hat on top, fabric skeleton and dots of acrylic paint with a dot of gel pen on top.

"Trick or Treat" Gelli plate background, Dymo label maker lettering, fabric skulls, 3D pumpkin sticker from the craft store, ghost stamp by Darci (colored in with makers - I use a light gray around the edge of the ghost)

"Things that go Bump in the Night" - gelli plate background, orange and black Washi tape embellishment, monster man cut out using a cricut,, fabric skull, Dymo label maker words, moon stamp

"Are you my Mummy" - gelli plate background, dymo label maker for the words (for some reason they do not include a question mark", fabric candy corn, Mummy stamp by Darci, Acrylic paint dots with a yellow base and another orange dot on top, bat cardstock sticker with clear coating on top and embellished with gel pen.

I hope you enjoyed my cards.  These are also the same size you would use for pocket letters so, they would be fun for something like that also.

Boo Mason Jar Votive holder

Here is another fun quick Halloween project.  I happen to already have on hand a bunch of Mason jars so, it was a perfect project for me with most of the materials already in my home.

 

Here is how I did it.

1)  Using purple, orange and white acrylic craft paint, I squirted one color in each of the jars and swirled it around until the jar was completely coated.  On my first one I used a thicker artist quality paint and it didn't work that great because it did not want to move around the jar, even with water added.  I switched to a cheaper quality craft paint and it worked perfect.  After the jar is completely coated, leave the top off until the paint is dry (drain off any excess first).

2)  Spray paint the lids black

3)  For the middle decoration I first used black card stock cut to 3 inches wide and the length was the width of the jar.  I adhered it to the jar with tape.  For the next layer, I used an orange burlap ribbon with wire and wrapped that around with a tie and the front (not a bow, just a simple wrap tie).

4)  The next layer was made using my Cricut cutter and the Ribbons and Rosettes cartridge.  If you don't have that, I think an big Halloween colored flat silk flower would also be very cute.  I hot glued that on top of the ribbon.  The letters are made from wood that I purchased at Hobby Lobby.  They were already black and I used a white gel pen to try to make them pop better.

5)  The last step was skeletons cut from some skeleton garland purchased at the dollar store.  I cut 3 off the garland and hot glued them in place.

That's it!  It's all ready for my shelf or mantle this Halloween.

Potion bottles for Halloween decorations etc

I try to save interesting bottles during the year to alter for other uses.  My daughter gave me these tins because she and her husband enjoy this particular brand of loose tea.  They are tins with a flat top.

Here is how I altered them:

1)  I sanded the tins to create a rougher surface for the paint to adhere to.
2)  I used Adirondack alcohol inks to color the tins.  I used a combination of drops and smears to create an aged "Halloween, spooky" look
3)  I downloaded free images from the Graphic Fairy internet site including the witch girl and the potion labels.  I printed these out for the size of my tins
4)  Using matte medium, I adhered the images to the tin
5)  On the top, I used beads on one and an old ornate earring clip I had on the other.  I also used a little bit of fiber.

That's it!  It's a fairly simple project ready to stuff with candy corn or whatever other Halloween fun thing I can think of.  Altoid tins would also be perfect for this.   I included a couple more pictures which are zoomed in for you.

Halloween quilted wall hanging

This quilt is made from a design by Janet Wecker Frisch.  I bought a kit to do the project which takes away all the issues of matching fabrics etc.  All of that is done for you in a kit.  This one came with the yardage I needed except for the backing and filling.

The front goes together very quickly.  I was able to cut and sew it together in one day.  In another session, I did the pendants and the Halloween swag sign.  For the filling, I bought 100% cotton which is what I usually work with.  I recently bought a package of 80% cotton and 20% poly because that particular store didn't have the 100% cotton.  I really disliked working with it and was very surprised at how much different it worked.  I had issues with it wrinkling which made the quilting process more challenging.  So, I will never buy that again!

The fabrics on this quilt are so cute and you can order the pattern using the link below.  I have completed similar projects using a fabric panel as the center.  They are great to work with and I think they are perfect for holiday quilts.

This wall hanging could be used as a small lap quilt.  I thought I might do that someday and elected to use a little gold safety pin to attach the Halloween sign versus sewing it on.  I also think that will make storage easier because I can remove the sign to make sure it does not get wrinkled in storage.  Another variation I made is with the Halloween letter swag.  It originally suggests sewing on all sides with a small opening and then turning it.  I decided to place the backing and front side back to back, sew around all edges twice and then fray it.

More views:

Link to retailer:
http://www.equilter.com/pattern/625/sew-scary-halloween

61 days until Halloween

On my crafting journey to Halloween, I came across this cute MDF/chipboard kit made by Sa Crafters.  You get the boards and decorate and glue them together.  Here is the final result.  I found this wonderful lady this summer when I attended the Arlington Scrapbook convention.  She had a whole booth full of these kits and I bought 4 of them.  I'm half way done with a drawer holder for Washi tape which I will post at a later date.  I put a link to her website (which I have saved as a favorite on my computer)

http://www.sacrafters.com/

Halloween mixed media picture

"Scary" - Mixed media canvas created by Debbie Granfors

This picture was so much fun to create.  I started by using the reverse side of a canvas picture.  This particular one I bought at 90% off because it had an ugly print of something on the front that nobody wanted.  I simply painted over that with black.  On the reverse side, I started by preparing the surface.  I first put a layer of gesso over the canvas material.  After that dried, I used a modeling paste and applied it around some of the nicks in the frame but mostly to help cover the staples.  Once that was dry I layered the sides of the canvas (on the top, inside and outside) with paints, spray, and stencils until I got an old creepy type finish to them.  I used brown, black, the white of the the modeling paste and some bright green colors.

For the inside, I cut a piece of Halloween scrapbook paper the exact size of the back and used medium gel to apply it to the canvas.  The decorations are bits of paper tidbits I collected, some wide washi tape, a spider sticker and for the main focal point, a skeleton stamped onto some beige print card stock and inked arount the edges.  The finishing touches are done with a banner I made using Halloween card stock cut into a triangle shape, lace ribbon glued to the edges, lettering from Hobby Lobby, and orange yard to string it all together.

On the bottom, I used some straw like material I picked up awhile back at a scrapbook convention.  At the time, I had no idea what I would use it for but for $1.00 I knew it would come in handy someday.  I tore off a piece and sprayed it with brown ink the used hot glue to place it on the canvas.  The skeleton piece at the bottom came from Michaels.   They have a whole collection of cute Halloween minatures.

This is what the "straw" looks like before I applied it.  I think you could also use cheese cloth and that would work well also.

 I hope you enjoyed looking at my Halloween canvas and hope you give this type of mixed media art a try.  Thanks for visiting my blog

I am back to creating after being away for a long period of time.  We moved across the country and our new home was a bit of a fixer upper so, I have been very busy with that.  It still involves painting but not the fun kind!!  I am lucky enough to have a space which already came with built in cabinets so, I will be using this room for my art space/guest room.  I thought I would show you the before and after pictures of my new space.

Before - left side

Before - right side

After

The cabinets "before" were already nice but the finish was worn away in spots, especially by the window seat.  I used the original drawer pulls but did update them slightly with some black spray paint.  I may replace them someday but will wait until I find something I fall in love with.

Now with my new space, I can create even more!!  I have already been working on some Halloween things.  Halloween crafts and arts is my favorite thing to do so, you will see more postings from me in the next few weeks.  Upcoming posts will be multiple things for Halloween including ATC's, mixed media wall hanging, a quilt and I may be able to squeeze in a skeleton doll before the big day!   Keep an eye out for my postings.

Dylusions art journal

I am loving my new Dylusions art journal.  The size is perfect and the weight of the paper holds up to everything I have used on it.  Here is my latest page.  On this one, I had no plan in mind and just picked up a pencil and started drawing the face.  As she developed, I thought she seemed to be saying "hello" so, that inspired the quote on the opposite page.  The paint was black on one side and white on the other.  On the black side, I used a gelato crayon and streaked the black paint a little with my finger.  The numbers on the white side of the page is an acrylic stamp.  I was able to bend it a little to fit into the various areas of the page.

Art Journal page

On this page, I drew the picture on a piece of mixed media paper and colored it in with colored pencils.  I then cut it out and placed it on the already completed background pages in my journal.

The background is created by starting with a base of pink/yellow and white acrylic paints.  Once that was dried, I used a Tim Holtz stencil and modeling paste to create texture.  In between the stencil designs, I drew a vine and leaf doodle pattern then colored it it with distress markers.

3 x 5 weekly art piece challenge

So far, I've been keeping up with making a small piece of art each week.  These are pieces I'm going to keep for myself and put into some sort of book at the end of the year.  For this weeks challenge, I did a mixed media background using tissue paper in black and white then spraying it with Ranger Inks.  For the girl, I drew her on another piece of paper, colored her face with colored pencils, her hair and dress with markers then used some white gel pen as accents.  After drawing her, I cut her out and placed her on the background.

Postcard size owl art

This is a 3 x 5 piece that I made.  I really like the quote "Storms make trees take deeper roots".  I thought the quote went well with the cards design.  To make this, I applied a patterned tissue paper to the background.  I then sprayed it with pink, yellow and orange inks.  When that was dry, I used a tree stencil and modeling paste.  Once it was dry, I colored it with distress inks.  The final touch was the owl which is a stamp by Stampotique.  This was colored with copic markers.

I made this for my personal challenge of creating 1 piece of art for 52 weeks.  So far, I'm on schedule!

Using charcoal pencils

I really enjoy doing graphite portraits but have an issue with making them too light.  I want to try to bring more contrast into my pictures so, I pulled out charcoal pencils to push myself to really bring in dark values.  Here are the results.  These are just practice pictures in my art journal.  Overall, it was a good exercise and I keep practicing, practicing, practicing!!!

Art Journals out of file folders

I saw another artist paint a great picture on a file folder.  She then bundles them up together and makes a journal.  When I heard about that, I got onto Youtube to see what else might be out there using file folders.  Of course, there are loads of great videos and people use them for a wide variety of creative uses.   I picked up a pack of 25 at Walmart for less than 3 dollars and am giving it a try.  I struggled with putting the album together so, I'm not going to show any steps on that.  Anyone who is interested would probably be better off checking out the Youtube videos.  I am posting my first page though.  The double pages are about 6 x 9 inches so, it makes a fun mini journal size.

I started by spraying the page with inks in blues, greens and yellows.  When that was dry, I used a seaweed stamp (from Dylusions stamps) and just stamped it repeatedly across the bottom.  I colored it in with Ranger Distress Markers.  The mermaid is a stamp by Stampotique.  I stamped her on white card stock, colored her in with markers and then fussy cut her out.  Before gluing her to my page, I stamped the album with the mermaid first and then laid the cut out version on top of that.  The reason I did that is because some of the fine detail was cut off but is easily added back in by stamping the page first.  For example, her earrings are a thin black line that would be impossible to cut out.   The fish are from the same stamp set as the seaweed.

I finished it off with some words and a stencil with modeling paste applied.  The ink bleeds through the paste which I like for this page since the colors all blend together nicely.

St. Patrick's day tag


Making tags is a fun way to decorate for different holidays.  I currently have some Valentines Day tags displayed and now I'm ready to work on St. Patrick's Day.

To complete this tag, I started with a base of heavy duty cardboard.  It was actually the back of a paper pack that I used up.  It is a heavy duty chipboard material.  I cut it to the size I wanted and painted the front with a base coat of off white/beige.   While it was still slightly damp, I added in some green at the bottom and pulled the color up into the tag about 1/3 of the way up.  The next layer is a flower stencil by Tim Holtz.  I used modeling paste and placed flowers at the upper left and the bottom right.  When that was dried, I used distress paint and slightly brushed it over the stencils.  I used a green color for that.  The last layer was a background type stamp shaped in small circles and randomly applied through some of the middle area of the tag.

Now, I was ready to decorate the tag. I glued on a small white lace doily in the middle, ribbon on the left and used a Julie Nutting doll as my center piece.  The doll is colored in with Copics and the hat and dress where stamped in different papers, fussy cut and applied to the doll.  She has a Shamrock charm attached to her hat.

The bottom left is a St. Patricks Day sprig from the craft store which is cut up and glued down.  I applied a bow over the glue blob to hide it and to add more ribbon.  The butterfly is a craft store item and it was on a thin wire so, it is simply hot glued into the sprig.  The last touch was ribbon at the top and a small Irish themed picture cut and glued under a glass flat square.  The back is covered with scrapbook paper cut to size.

Art Journal

I finished the last page of one of my art journals today.  I've been thinking a lot about what style I would like the next one to be.  I loved the paper in this current journal but, due to the way it was bound, the front and back pages did not stay flat.  That's a challenge when doing 2 page layouts.  I've seen some journals made out of file folders which I found very interesting so I'm looking into that more.  If I make one (instead of buying one), I'll be sure to post what I do.  Here are the last 2 pages.  The Star Wars one is inspired by youtube artist honeybunny.

Tags

There are a number of trading groups that exchange art tags.  The majority of them seem to be associated with paper dolls exchanges, especially the Julie Nutting stamps.  I have done them for a couple of years at Valentines time so, I have 2 in the collection with one on the way for this year.  Here is a of the tag I did:

The size is about 3.5 inches by 7.5 inches.  I started with a sturdy cardboard base cut to size and covered it (front and back) with Valentines papers.  This paper comes from Michaels and their Recollections line.  The doll is stamped separately on white card stock then colored in with Copic markers.  The dress is stamped on Valentines paper, cut and applied on the doll.  The tag is finished off with a wide ribbon at the bottom and a buckle type oval gem that the ribbon slides through, stamped saying, heart stickers, heart bling, "Love" banner (stamped with letters and cut out) and lots of ribbon at the top.  You can't see it to well in this picture but there are also a couple of charms attached to the ribbon.  One of the charms says "Happy Valentines Day".

1 stamp, 3 different cards

I used the Julie Nutting Valentine doll stamp for these 3 cards.  Most of the paper comes from a valentine 6 x 6 pack made by Recollections.  For the dolls, I used my neocolor watercolor crayons.  I first rubbed the crayon on an acrylic block.  I then dipped a brush in water and applied the water to the color on the block.  I used this to paint the doll.  I used 2 shades of red for the dress.  The bottom shade is the basic red that comes with the colors.  After that was applied, I mixed in a little brown and used it to make highlights on the dress.  The final touch was a white gel pen (I love the Uni-ball Signo brand) for highlights.

For the different accents, I just pulled stuff out of my stash and applied it.  The heart stickers are from Walmart.

Using 3D elements on art

I have always enjoyed using 3 dimensional elements in the projects I have completed.  I even pushed the limits on my scrapbooks which made my scrapbooks difficult to close sometimes!  In this piece of mini art, I used a glittered bottle cap, some mini eye glasses, gems, word stickers by Tim Holtz and even a fancy paperclip.  It was enjoyable putting the elements together.  The body is a stamp by Lost Coast Designs and I added the wings which is also a stamp.

The background is made by using a piece of scrapbook paper that was a patterned red and beige design.  On top of that, I layered dark pink and brown stain.  The last layer was a spiderweb stencil which is filled in using a sponge dabber in black ink.  I think multi layered background designs add an interesting depth to a piece.  The finished size is 3 x 5.

Creating Valentine Background Paper

As you may have noticed from my postings, I often create background using paints, sprays, stencils, modeling paste and stamps.  I think it creates depth and interest to a piece.  I was watching a video by Jill Haglund where she creates a background piece using stamps with various ink.  She refers to it as a masterboard then uses the paper in multiple applications.  I just loved what she did and, I also love her stamps so, I gave it a whirl.  I also pasted the link to her youtube video so you can watch the "How to" on this.

Here is my background:

 The actual piece is larger than this but, I cut it down to use it in an altered canvas Valentines piece.  This is 12 x 12.

Using the back side of a 12 x 12 canvas, I covered the inside and the outer frame with the masterboard paper.  I then laid down a stencil and sprayed it with red ink.  The last step was using a black gelato crayon and coloring the edges then, softening it with a wet finger.

At this point, I have used a Julie Nutting stamp and cut out her clothes in pink printed papers, I applied her to a tag that a heart lace dolly, white torn mulberry paper, red card stock and the bottom layer is black card stock.  She is popped up with pop dots.  Another large lace dolly was cut and applied to the left edge.  In this picture, I'm starting to glue down some ruffled lace that I got at Walmart.

The "Love" word is cardboard that was precut.  I bought it at Michaels craft store.  It's painted red then covered with red glitter.  

The saying is from a paper pack by Recollections (from Michaels store)

Metal heart embellishments

Final picture

As you can see from the final project, a lot of the Masterboard that I originally started with is somewhat covered but, in my next use, you can see it clearly.  Here it's used in cards.

Here is the video on how to make the background paper.  Thanks to Jill for the inspiration:

Valentines with a twist

You know how I love the cute Julie Nutting doll stamps but, the other side of me loves the somewhat creepy zombie stamps!!  I recently discovered the art of Brett Weldele who does stamps for Stampers Anonymous.  The stamps are wonderful because they are deeply etched and create really nice images but, they are also so much fun to work with.  Here is a zombie card I did.

 I stamped the image on white paper then stamped it again on some junk paper.  I colored in the image with a water filled brush and watercolors.  For the skin, I used a combination of brown with a little red, the mouth is red and under the eyes are some green and yellow.  I then took the stamp I did on junk paper, cut it out, laid it over the original colored image then began splattering paint in browns and grays.  The final touch is the heart stamps in red and the phrase.  The finished picture was double matted on red and black cardstock then placed on white cardstock.  The finished card is 5 x 7.

The stamp set plus the image I did on junk paper and cut out for masking

I also did another Zombie card but this one is ATC size and was used for trading.  This stamp is made by Stampotique