Bird journal / Lintubongausta

Simon Says Monday challenge is for all things paste. This is a page in my bird journal, background made with thick gesso, wet stamped without color with forest twigs stamp (I carved it). Then painted, stamped, glued on the bird and (stamped) letters, finally adhered a feather just for fun.

 Here you see the texture closeup:

Ihana Aino meni ja järjesti Lintubongauksen täksi kesäksi. Ilmoittauduin tikkana (!!) mukaan, mutta aloittamisen kanssa venyi. Materiaalit oli kyllä odottamassa kun kotiuduin matkaltani, ja runsaita materiaaleja olivatkin. Kiitos Aino tosi paljon!
Matkalla ostin jännän neliskanttisen vihon, johon ajattelin tehdä lintumatkan journalin tapaan. En ole koskaan tehnyt journalia, niin tässä oli minulla rima tosi korkealla.
Nyt on onneksi ensimmäinen lintukuvani valmis: Anser fabalis eli Metsähanhi. Se viihtyy kesät Lapissa tunturisoiden lähistöllä, syö ruohoa ja apilaa.

Kun sivupalkissani on monta kymmentä linkkiä haasteblogeihin, ajattelin silloin tällöin ottaa niistä ideoita. Nyt tuli sopivasti kehotus käyttää kohoainetta taustassa. Siinä on siis gessoa, jonka leimasin  itseveistämälläni oksaleimasimella sen ollessa vielä märkää. Näin siihen tuli teksturoitu pinta. Kuivana maalasin taustan vesiväreillä ja leimasin kasvien kuvilla. Linnun nimen kitjaimet leimasin ja kiinnitin, alkukirjain on ostokamaa. Linnun nimen alle kirjoitin pikkutietoa, ja koska siinä mainitaan sana sulkasato, kiinnitin myös turkoosin höyhenen kuvaan. Tämä taiteellinen näkemys sallittakoon :-)

Vintage Garden

There's a new challenge blog on the block - Anything But Cute. How happy was I to find it! It's their first challenge, themed Vintage Garden, It has to be vintage, but it cannot be cute. For me this is quite a conundrum as I feel anything vintage is automatically cute. But perhaps not?

Hopefully this works. On the surface it may appear sweet, but it has some sinister traits. I made two atc cards.
Little Ella, why are you mowing your lawn all by yourself, watch out!

Vintage Garden 1. (Ella)

 Mommy thinks that Baby William will be guarded by their trusty Bello. Oh no, not so!

Vintage Garden 2.  (Little William and Bello)

 For the first one I used watercolor paper as background. I sprayed it with glimmer mist (Tattered Angels ) through a stencil, then stamped with a self carved background stamp with brown Stencil Gel. I then stamped the flowers with Ranger Distress Ink (stamps by Stampendous, Stampington). Pictures are from a sheet by Tuscan Rose, aptly named "Vintage Garden". The fly is from my private collection.

The latter has background from a cereal package that has been sanded down, then smeared and painted with several different shades of gel paints and acrylics. Stamping and pictures as above.

This was a fun challenge. Be sure to watch out for their monthly cues.

purple holes and mulberry papers

DCM has a fun challenge: tearing purple holes for Christmas. Very cryptic, it means your card should have a hole, the color purple, torn paper and a Christmas motive. Add to this Wednesday Stamper's prompt us to use mulberry or hand made papers - you know, those pretty ones that we keep in the stash pile! Well, I knew I just had to make a holiday tag card.
Mulberry papers, all of it torn, some silver and red stamping, dried fir, silver paper, yarns - a merry hodgepodge for a Merry card! This was fun!

before and after, and some stamps

There was a lot of positive feedback on the backgrounds done for this week's TMTA, so I thought I'd share the technique. Actually, it's nothing very new, I've already shared it a while back, - it is curiosity prompt #2 -technique by ArtsyMama.

This is what I started with for those atc's. A sheet of watercolor paper (one corner already cut out for a previous atc).
And here is the finished sheet. The commands are listed top to bottom.
Notice the first two! It is hard to start with scratch followed by sand - thank goodness I had a background to start working with!

And here is what I cut out for cards. (You're right, one is still waiting for an image...)


Last night I carved some simple, basic stamps. Unfortunately my rubber stamp material is very soft and I can't get any thin shapes made, they'd break. I'd love to have finer scrolls, for one. Or dainty damselflies... Has any of you tried carving their own? If you have a tip on tools, I'd be very pleased! I'm thinking some kind of dentist tools would work, small round carvind heads and the like. Lino tools are just very rough.