Little Tree Fairy ATC

Another Byhand Artists friend, Mary-Beth posted some photos of flowering trees on her blog and invited us to download them for use in our own projects. I did some digital editing with one tree photo and inserted an image of a little girl which was a freebie from another site. The first has a faded edge, the second a soft edge and the last is left straight. I added on some little glitter stickers, these look purple in the scan, but they are pink.

More ATC Play Time

These are the rest of the ATCs I made last night. The first used a piece I made a few days ago playing with a dollar store paint spinner. I glued the piece onto black cardstock, stamped and embossed the word Play with an alphabet stamp set. I embellished with a puzzle piece, dice beads and a mini domino. This one is the most fun and playful. The next 2 use wallpaper samples for the background. The second one has a Quietfire Design collage image, the word cherish from the Quietfire Design mini compilation and a slide mount rubber stamped with Stazon ink. The last is another sticker from the dollar store sheet and a fish charm.

ATC Play For May

I took time to play with some different stuff last night and made 6 ATCs. These are the first 3, all done on cream cardstock. The backgrounds are rubber stamped with flourish stamps and a background stamp. The first one has a sticker from a dollar store find and the other 2 have my faux postage stamps.

More May ATCs

I worked on these ATCs back on about May 6 so now I'm just getting them posted. I started with unused flower gift cards and re-purposed them for the background. The "Boy" one has a collage image from Quientfire Design and the lettering is purple cardstock run through a Dymo labler and highlighted with white stamp pad ink. The red button was glued on. The "Girl" uses another Quietfire Design collage image and the word sweet stamped with an alphabet set in metallic pink ink then a pink button was glued on.

May Fat Book Page

This is the Fat Book Page I made for the Byhand Artists Yalpha Mingle. I started the same as the journal page in this previous post. I assembled the front and back leaving the edge open to form a pocket for the tag. The tag is a digital scrapbook paper resized to fit the tag dimensions and my "L" quote and info on the back. The front of the tag is a Quietfire Design stamp with pigment ink and embossed with Peidot embossing powder. I punched holes along the edge and added tons of fibres.

Take Time For May ATCs

I have been doing more work on the danglies for The Byhand Artists Danglie Swap, but on Saturday I took play time for some ATCs. The first "Take Time 1" is a quote stamp on parchment cardstock. The whole stamp was too long for an ATC so I just used the quote part and did a torn edge at the bottom, rubbed with Antique Linen Distress Ink. This was layered on light purple cardstock cut with decorative scissors and then layered on dark purple cardstock. I added a small paper flower with a silver brad. The second one "Take Time 2" was done the same way but with a green flower snap added to the bottom corner.
The third and fourth ATC are done on natural coloured chipboard. The third has a quote stamp " Precious Friend" from Kolette Hall, heart and cherish stamps from Quietfire Design in brown Stazon ink, drain plugs used to stamp circles in forest pigment ink and flourishes in cocoa pigment ink. And the last "Altered Art Journey 1" is all done with stamps from Quietfire Design in brown Stazon ink. Now I'm going to do a little work in the yard and then go string beads on more danglies.

Background Swap Bound

Well it took me all day, but I got the Byhand Artists Background Swap pages bound yesterday, and I did it all myself. I was going to ask for help, but I slowly cut my way through the chipboard covers. I had an extra piece of my background technique set aside with the metal letters just waiting for the rest to arrive. I chose the cover paper from a Glorious Glitter package of handmade scrapbook paper and covered the front and back covers with the same paper. I glued the letters on my swap sample with No More Nails glue. This was then glued to the cover. For a design detail, the small piece of black and silver paper from the Dark Shadows handmade paper pack was added to create a little glamour. I fastened all the instructions to their respective pages and created a title page, dedication and table of contents.Another design detail of a torn paper on the inside back cover was added for a bit of a rustic touch. I like glamour and rustic together. Now came the big challenge, could I use my wonderful Zutter Bind-It-All, available from Quietfire Design, with my left hand? I love the Zutter, it was a breeze to use even left handed. That is except for one little glitch, all the layers of decorative paper and the corrugated made the covers too thick to go into the Bind-It-All. I couldn't waste all that effort and materials, so I cut a small piece of the corrugated and pealed a layer of paper off the two cover pieces. Success, it went in and the holes were punched like going through butter. So here come the design details, otherwise known as cover up your big mistakes and end up with a finished book that is, in my opinion, even better than planned. For binding I used 1 inch silver wires. I am very pleased with my book and thanks to all the artists who contributed it will be a valuable resource and inspiration. I think it will live near my creative space in the attic.

Byhand Artists Newsletter Anniversary

Now that I am sure that Suzanne of Quietfire Design has received my entry for the Byhand Artists Newsletter anniversary contest I can show you what I sent to her. I reworked a previous piece I made about knitting on the porch next to the lilacs. I tried to word this piece to more closely reflect Suzanne's interest and I sure hope I succeeded. The words are: "The gentle curve of a wrist. The flash of a pen. The letters flowing from the nib to the paper. The words building on the page. The shade of the front porch. The scent of lilacs on the gentle breeze in June. This is paradise. This is were I am at." I started with coffee stained watercolour paper and printed the lilacs and words on. I then stamped the flourishes with cocoa pigment ink and the Quietfire Design rubber stamp quote with green ink. This was backed with purple cardstock and clipped to the altered clipboard which is in an earlier post.

ATC Behind The Pink Curtain

ATC Behind The Pink Curtain
Originally uploaded by okanagan_spirit

I haven't posted for a few days, but I got 1 more danglie made on Sunday. I won't show you that, it's pretty much like the others but has a different photo. I also got 3 ATCs done. This is for the April 2008 swap and the themes are pink and time. The girl is a digital image found on the internet and I printed on a shaded pink to lilac background. I added the pink cheesecloth with matt medium then glued the pink seed beads on.

Three More Danglies

I am quite pleased with my progress on the danglies today. I have completed these 3 and have 2 more ready just waiting for the beads. These are done the same way as the first one, just the image and selection of beads have changed. I really like the pansy one on the left in the photo. These are so much fun despite the challenge of picking up the beading needle with fingers that are reluctant to bend.

Danglie

Our Byhand Artists Yahoo group is having a danglie swap so here is my first ever danglie which I decided to try out before I sign up to the swap. Since my right hand still has limited use I wanted to be sure I could complete the swap and now I am sure I can. I used a wooden piece which measues .75 in. X 1.5 in. and has 2 holes drilled from top to bottom. I have about 8 to 10 different photos sized to fit and for the first one I used the single red pear image, some assorted biege and redish beads on heavy cotton thread in coffee colour. The image is applied with matt medium and is finished with a coat of craft varnish in gloss.

Altered Clipboard

I finally got back to some creating today and altered a small clipboard (6X9). Since my right hand is still not fully functioning, this is still mostly done left-handed. I lightly sanded the front of the clipboard, then brushed on a coat of gesso. Next I applied matt medium and pressed white tissue paper on, allowing it to crinkle. I applied more matt medium on the tissue and folded the excess overhang back on top and allowed more crinkles to form. More matt medium was brushed over and acrylic paint was sponged on while the matt medium was still wet. I used African Violet, Lavender, Antique white and Maple craft acrylics. When that was dry I sponged on Spun Gold and Morning Silver. When this was dry I used brown Stazon to stamp most of the images from the Mini Compilation collection rubber stamps from Quietfire Design. Three sizes of paper flowers were assembled with a brad and glued to the clip along with several fibres. For the back I cut 2 pieces of paper from Memory Stor Handmade Paper collections, one from Deep Shadows and one from Natural Neutrals. I stacked the 2 together and tore them, then used 1 of each torn piece glued to the back.

ATCs Girl in Pink

Here are some more ATCs I've been working on today. I used a pink cardstock and stamped a background text stamp with cocoa pigment ink. For the first ATC I stamped the same text stamp with Stayzon ink on a white plastic slide mount, inserted the photo and used foam mounting tape to fasten it to the ATC. The bottom is trimmed with ribbon and a pink button. The second ATC uses a cardboard frame held in place with brads, the same ribbon and a metal ribbon slide.

Time Theme ATCs

This is another background piece I did at the same time I did the one from the previous post. I used the same colours and this time stamped "ART" with black dye ink and misted with water. After scanning the sheet, I added a digital clock image and cut 6 ATCs from the original background. These are 2 of the ATCs and one has a watch face fastened on with a brad. The last 2 ATCs are from the scanned background printed at 80% tint. All of them are then hand stamped and embossed.

Left Hand Art

I started with a watercolour wash on wet watercolour paper, stamped the letters L E F T with black dye ink while still wet, then misted to let the letters blead. This larger piece was cut to 4X4.5 inches. I then stamped the words hand, art and my name from the quietfire design "Love where you're at" stamp and embossed with Perridot and copper detail embossing powder. This is tipped into my journal on a small tab of card stock. The back of this page is a digital image of my cast with digital journaling. The digital signatures on my cast were gathered by my friend Yogi from members of the Byhand Artists Group on Yahoo. The Fat Book page was done from a scan of the background paper, printed at 80% tint, cut to size then stamped and embossed the same as the journal page.

Another Round of Lovely Mail

Lucky me, I've received two more cards wishing me speedy healing from my broken wrist. The first to arrive is from Beth, one of my byhandartists Yahoo group friends. She must surround herself with creative friends because she says she didn't have time to make a card before leaving on a trip, so she traded handmade soap for this wonderful card made by her friends Pat.
The next card is a lovely stamped inchie with a puffy heart from Suzanne and lots of encouragement for me working left-handed. Gee, I might just have to continue with left-handed art. Maybe not, working with two hands is way easier.
Thanks Beth and Suzanne

Byhand Challenge Buttons

This weeks challenge is to use buttons, so I made an ATC using my rose photo with a canvas filter, mounted on black cardstock and glued 3 buttons on. This time I did the whole card myself, even to getting the back on a little crocked. Can't blame anyone else, but maybe it will be my left handed art signature.

Playing With Some Floral ATC

Well here I am with more left handed creations, this time I'm using my digital photos and filters in editing software. The first ATC is a pink rose, cropped and stamped with a Quietfire Design quote stamp. The second 2 are photos of lilacs using several filters and digital effects and my poems. I finished off with purple and pewter foil. Some of these will go to the Grind swap tomorrow and some I hope to mail in time for the Byhand Artists monthly swap.

ATC From My Junk

I've been having fun doing more one handed art. I'm using all the bits left over from the backgrounds I made for the byhand artists background swap (see earlier post) and turning them into ATCs. I used the small pieces and cut some with my paper trimmer into triangular shapes, smushed lots of glue stick onto black cardstock ATC blank and arranged the pieces. I then sprinkled gold embossing powder and heat set it. I used computer generated text and rubber stamped the angel image on separate cardstock, cut with my paper trimmer and glued them on. Since this is some of my limited production left handed art I created a special back for these and attaching the back was the only help I needed. I love my junk(lol).

Spritzes, Sprays and Splashes

The Created Byhand Tuesday Challenge for this week is to use spritzes, sprays, splashes or colour washes. My entry is a 5.25 in.X7.5 in. journal page "Paradise". I sprayed coffee onto watercolour paper, printed my edited digital photo of lilacs and journal writing on the paper, stamped the Quietfire Design quote stamp and some flourish stamps in Timber Green Stayzon and Cocoa pigment inks. I finished by spritzing more coffee with gold Perfect Pearls mixed in.

More Lovely Mail

Well, lucky me, I received 2 more lovely cards this week from Byhand Artists friends. The first is a very pretty bouquet of flowers wrapped is music from Anne. Isn't this just a very pretty card? I love those colours.

The second card is a beautiful kaleidoscope from Therese. This card opens in the centre and tucks under a brad with a lovely flower. Since I'm having a little trouble tucking it back under the brad, I'll just have to show it like this.
Thanks very much Anne and Therese.