Take a closer look

Hello All,

At the weekend I had a few hours with my eldest daughter and she decided she would like to do some art work with me. We set up on the kitchen table and I taught her how to use the geli plate. Many many prints later we moved on to working in our journals. I decided to use one the prints as a starting point for a background but after adding a few layers it just wasn't working. At that point my husband and youngest arrived back and our art session was abandoned.

Last night I went back to it and after adding many more layers I am finally happy with it.

You can't see much of the geli print anymore though it still inspired the colour choices.

I love getting those moments to share creativity with my daughters and I hope they will grow up loving it as much as I do. One things for sure though, I will be getting her her own geli plate!

Bye for now! xx

Lovely Jubley Colour

Hello All,

Having a play with texture and colour this week. I do love colour :)

This is glass bead texture gel with acrylics, brushos and ink. I am enjoying playing which these three mediums at the moment. They create lovely vivid, touchy feeling backgrounds. For me they require very little else to finish them so I am trying to keep the pieces simple and not too busy.

I have also started to experiment in this way on a larger scale, creating an abstract canvas piece. I will post some pictures of my progress this week,

Bye for now! xx

Stuck or Finished?

Hello All,

This weekend I managed to do some journaling and was really enjoying my backgrounds and playing with the different mediums. The problem was I liked the backgrounds so much I didn't want to cover them or add anything which led to me feeling rather stuck. I wanted to finish the pieces off, did they need anything or was I finished? Keep them simple or carry on?!?

It took me ages to decide and in the end I added images from an old vintage annual and some simple text. So you can decide, was I right to add these or were the backgrounds strong enough to carry themselves?

Either way I enjoyed making these two and it felt good to be covered in paint and glue again. It keeps me happy anyway :)

Bye for now! xxx

From experiments to finished pieces

Hello All,

Last night I decided to take my experiments with glass bead texture gel (from the other day) and make something of them.

I didn't want to do too much to this one cause I loved the colours already so I added the text and a little wire and flat bead embellishment.

To this one I added more brushos and some irredescent ink to add depth and shine. Then I added the pom pom, a slide casing with old maps and the text.

This spread is in my altered book and I love the background so much I decided the only thing to add was the word 'simple'.

I am really pleased with them all :) loving the glass bead gel! 

Bye for now! xxx

Experiments

Hello All!,

This weekend the family and I went on a shopping trip to Manchester. This was part of my Christmas present from my lovely husband. There is a little dance shop there and since I have been learning to jive he bought me my first proper dance shoes! (can't wait to try them out)
We also found a fantastic art supply shop called Fred aldous. It was huge! I could have spent all day in there, it was heaven! I bought some new brusho colours and some glass bead texture gel, which I have wanted to have a play with for ages.

As soon as we got home I couldn't wait to start experimenting and here is a little of what I created:

For this one I spread the gel out first and let it dry, then added gesso and acrylic paint over the top. I love the texture you get from the beads but you loose some of the shine from them.

Next I tried using the gel through a stencil and leaving it to dry and then adding brusho pigment powders over the top. I like this as you get the colour and the shine.

Finally I added the gel through a stencil on to a pre painted background. The photo doesn't really do this justice, you get fantastic colour, shine and texture with this technique. 

I really like all three and am really happy with the texture gel! It will definitely be making a frequent appearence. I think I will try mixing some colours directly into the gel next and see how that turns out.

Bye for now! xx

First ICAD of the year

Hello All,

Last night I sat down with a cuppa and had a play with my new stencil which is a crafters workshop, Rebekah Meier design  I really like this series of stencils, they produce some lovely results. I decided to do a quick ICAD (index card) with it:

It has a cheery feel to it but with the image of a wasp (I hate wasps, having stood in a nest at the age of 8!) I decided on the text "There is no need to be afraid" and overall it feels like it's a card to remind me to look at the bright side of things and not to worry too much! As well as the stencil I used acrylic paint, silver texture paste, irredescent blue ink, washi tape, patterned tissue paper, collage and text stamps.

I am going to try and do lots of ICADs this year and bind them into little journals. They are a great little format to work on.

Bye for now! xxxx

Mum's Painting

Hello All!

Happy new year! Hope you all had a fab holiday period. Mine was good but very very hectic. I am feeling an odd mixture of relief that it is all over and sad that it's all back to normal.

I gave my mum a painting for Christmas that I had turned into a wall light by adding battery powered LEDS at the back and a switch on the side. I was a little worried about giving it to her, Art is so subjective, it is always hard to make something like that for someone as a surprise. I know my Mum very well obviously and chose colours I knew she would like but the image was one she would either love or hate...... luckily she loved it! :)

The image is actually taken from a top that didn't fit me anymore. I was going to use it as inspiration for a painting but ran out of time so instead, once the background was complete, I cut the image out of the top and adhered it down. A bit of a cheat I surpose but it worked well.

Here it is lit up.

Now on to 2016! New years resolutions for this year are to give blood, to try new recipes (and be more organised with lunches) and to find more time to run workshops and to be creative. I didn't have a single moment over the hols to do any art but I got some great books about bookbinding and a new stencil so looking forward to experimenting with those. :)
My main resolution however is to make the most out of the time I have with my youngest before she goes to school in September. I am dreading it really cause I don't plan on having any more and it feels like the end of an era. It has gone so quickly it has rushed past me, leaving me grasping at moments to hold on to. I know I have a lot to look forward to once she goes to school too, many happy moments to cherish (as well as precious time to myself) but I will never have those baby years again.

So lets make the most out of 2016 and hope it turns out to be a good one for us all!

Bye for now! xxx