Black and White with a splash of Blue

Good morning friends,

Im on the Lulupu blog today with my take on this very interesting challenge: 

Challenge #39

Black + White + a POP of one other colour

You can read the detailed post on the challenge here.  

At first I was wondering how to create an interesting layout using just 3 colours ; texture and layers came to my rescue. There is no pattern paper on this layout - just washi tape and lots of packaging material from all the texture stamps I buy :) Here is a close up 

 

No brownie points for guessing - the Pop colour is BLUE. Its amazing the tones of colour one can achieve from a single cake of watercolour - add water to get a subtle wash, create stains, add more colour to get av depth for splats. 

Now, include a few more items - 3d gel, stamps, gesso and washi tape and you can create this. I forgot to take pictures while creating, but here is a step by step of how gel medium was used.

 1. My base is watercolour paper. Randomly stamp Kaisercraft dictionary stamp or any other texture stamp. Lulupu has recently added some beautiful Kaisercraft texture stamps. Use Archival or Prima Resist chalk inks. These are permanent and wont react when painted over with watercolours. If however, you stamp with distress inks, it will react with the watercolour and change the original colour you are painting. (Now that gives a very cool effect too, but not what I wanted for this layout)

2. Place a stencil over the stamped area and apply 3d gel medium. Let dry completely.It dries transparent.

3. Paint over with watercolour. The gel medium will resist the paint and give a beautiful effect. The same techniques were used to create the blue tag tucked under the photos.

4. Outline some of the stenciled shapes, Stamp over the gel medium with a permanent ink or gesso.

There really isn't much more to my layout. Washi tape stuck on packaging material is the layer behind the photographs. All the die cuts have been cut out of packaging material on the Silhouette Cameo and painted with black gesso. Finally, black glass glitter and sequins added using matt multi medium. 

If you have never used watercolours before, do give it a go. I bought myself a Mr Huey's watercolour set from Lulupu a few months ago and until then was super scared of free style painting. But now Im hooked - if I can do it, so can you.

I hope to have sparked your creativity in some way today. You can link your projects for this challenge here.

 

The inspiration for the layout of this page comes from the sketch on Creative Scrappers. I discovered this site through Elina Stromberg's blog who is also a DT at creative scrappers and absolutely love the inspiration presented by their DT. 

Also joining the Rock the Technique : Simon Says Monday Challenge

Washi Tape Home Decor

Have you checked out the latest challenge at Lulupu - its a super fun and easy one - use at least 3 different washi tapes plus a shape/ readymade embellishment. Easy peasy isn't it.

 

Washi is my go to item to keep my toddler boy occupied whenever he starts 'why can't I use your stamps and embossing powders and sugar dots' So, top of my mind were the little washi makeovers around the house and I decided to give a plain white photo collage a new leash of life with washi tapes and the fab Heidi Swapp Dreamy collection.

 

 

I can't seem to get enough of the soft beautiful pastel shades in this collection. The ephemera pack is fantastic too - so many pretty shapes in vellum and clear acetate, plus the Prima sugar dots match this collection so well! Now all I have to do is print some pictures and find a place to hang it :)

 

One of the titles and labels have been cut using my silhouette cameo. So joining the 'tell me dies, tell me sweet little dies' at Paper Issues

 

 

Confessions of an art lover - Blog hop with a difference

Hello creative people,

A good few weeks ago, a very sweet scrappy pal and fellow DT Lulu Pooh Hussena Calcuttawala tagged me to join the 'Getting to know you better' blog hop. I promised to join but was unable to post on time. Then few weeks later, two more very dear friends asked me again - Karuna Chauhan and Bipasha K and this time I couldn't refuse. I admire each one of these three artists and their encouragement means a lot me.

Hussena is my go to expert when it comes to creating flower clusters. I love her shabby, elegant style of creating - I always go wow! she has tons of techniques up her sleeve to create that special effect which leaves everyone wanting yet another look at her project.

Karuna Chauhan - I owe a lot to this girl! When I started blogging in December last year, I was very new to scrapbooking, yet she trusted me and offered me a place in her very talented Design Team. Im very proud to be a Lulu Pooh and the love and encouragement from you and the other Lulu Poohs makes me flex my creative muscles and explore new techniques and medium. Thank you Karuna :)

And finally Bipasha - we all now call her the Prima flower girl. She makes magic with flowers! I came across her work through a Lulupu challenge and my jaws dropped - she had made an explosion house; valentine themed. Hopped onto her blog and was blown away by this girls creativity and amazing 3d projects.

My life in blogland has been very enjoyable thanks not only to these three friends but also all of you readers who regularly drop by and leave me sweet words of encouragement. Now onto some tit bits about me.

1.What am I working on right now?
I almost always have a dozen more ideas in my head than I have the time for. Right now, Im working on completing my DT assignments for this month and next. I can never work on one project at a time - that's the way my brain works :P plus mixed media work involves gesso, paints, texture paste etc that always take ages to dry (sp in winter) so while one is drying I hop onto the next project. I usually sneak in an art journal page or two and am also working on a glass painting. Here is a pic of what I worked on today....

2.Why do I create what I do ?

I have been creating art journal pages for many years now - back in my school days though I didn't know they were called art journals and I didn't have access to so many different mediums either - primarily worked with oil pastels and sketch pens (sharpies). 

At one time (15 years ago) my collection of sketch pens exceeded 100 - used to especially save the nearly dry ones as they are d best to shade :P Who knew a few years later someone would make copics and distress markers. Im sure there are many more products out there that I havent even heard of. This one below is all sketchpens except the yellow sky which is oil pastel.

I've also tried my hand at glass, tile painting, pottery, embroidery, mosaics and now scrapbooking. Sewing is next on my list ;)

I create because its my way of expressing and processing life, analyzing my feelings, internalizing the events that's happened around me and also my safe haven to face bitter truths.I just love using my hands to make stuff. 

 Click here to see how I created this layout

For a few years in between, I had stopped creating and when I wanted to start back again in 2013, I wanted to try something new and that's how I discovered scrapbooking.

Go here to see all the pages of this album. 



3.How does my creating process work?

For my scrapbook layouts I always pick a photograph first - usually my kids. Then I think of when the photo was taken and the story behind it. I choose my papers, colour scheme, embellies based on that. I can never use a background paper without altering it in some way. 

 

Click here to read how I made the background on a plain cardstock

Many times with my art journal pages and cards, I don't have a final image in mind - I take my favorite mediums and just have fun and invariably what I create will reflect whats going on in my head {..........there, I shared a secret :)}

Click here to see a pictorial for this card

When Im not doing any of these, I love experimenting and trying different techniques on tags or creating backgrounds. Sometimes Ill just fussy cut paper and an idea is born.

 4. What is my Signature style?

Hmmm...... mixed media..... but beyond that I'm not sure. I took out my last few projects and had a look - whats common is they all have gesso, texture paste, stamps, paints and decoupage (tissue paper)

Close ups here

Beyond that I dont know if I prefer shabby / vintage or modern. I believe that the more I create, the more Ill discover my style - just wish could find more time :)



Close ups of the layout here.

Thank you dear reader, for making it this far down my post. Now, I have two super talented crafters whose creations are a feast to the eye. I promise, you wont be disappointed, so take a few minutes more and check the links below 

Pritesh Dagur - She was our goto person for mehndi during college days - her designs were not only intricate but very unique. She was and still is a perfectionist. Little did I know she had a such a wonderful hidden talent and interest in quiling. Apart from her creative side, I admire Pritesh for her confidence and passion to excel at everything she sets her heart on. Did you know she holds a world record for quilling!

The second artist I want you all to meet is Divya Thallap of Yelling Yellow. Divya is a graphic designer, illustrator and mixed media artist. Each decoupage project she creates is a work of art. I found Divya on one of my FB art trail discoveries and instantly fell in love with her work. Although Divya doesn't blog, Im sure many of you would want to read more about what goes on inside her creative brain as an FB post.

I thank each one of you for visiting me today and really appreciate your comments - they make my day :) Hugs.

One of my all time favourite creations

Its finally Spring time here......... Scrapping4fun challenge #25

Yay! Finally its finally spring time in my side of the Earth. Although, its still around 12degrees outside now, but I know warm (and maybe even very hot) weather is just around the corner. And when I saw the inspiration picture that Rachelle has for challenge #25, I know you'll be thinking spring too....

Create a project inspired by this photograph and remember to mention what inspired you too. This is my last assignment for Scrapping4fun challenges and was also the one I enjoyed creating the most because the colours I chose from the picture happen to be my favorite combination. Doesn't the girl in the pic look like shez having a vacation in paradise and thoroughly enjoying herself. Well, I cant take a vacation anytime soon so I did the next best thing - created a canvas for my desk using my favorite techniques & stamps - decoupage, texture paste, stenciling, paints and the stitches stamp.

Also joining Simon Says Wednesday Stamptember challenge - Use a stamp - Prima script and stitches stamp. sentiment is stamped too cant remember the name of the font stamps

Mixed Media Card Challenge - September

Autumn Colours + Leaves or metal (Optional)

While the rest of the world welcomes Autumn, we are in the middle of a really wet and rainy spell waiting for the arrival for spring. But I had no problem at all coming up with cards for this months Mixed Media Card Challenge theme. We had 62 gorgeous cards last month and each was a piece of art.

Instantly I thought of Canberra in Autumn - wide quiet roads lined with trees, each a beautiful bright shade of red, orange, yellow and brown.  For those you who want to have a glimpse of what I mean, here is a photo .

For my card the base is watercolour paper with grainy paste + gesso through a stencil. The edges have been done using a blue mist. For the centre panel I used the Andy Skinner: Water Splash Technique.

Finally to finish off the cards, the leaves are Silhouette cut from metal sheets. One of them has a little pale yellow paint pounced on it.
 

This month we also have a sponsor - Add a little Dazzle. They are giving away a $15 gift voucher. Head over to the MMCC blog to read about how you can be in the running for this prize and also the lovely pieces by the DT. Hope to see your card in the link up this time around too.