Perfect Pearls – demo board

Posted on 24th August 2011 by perfectly4med

Hi all – I’ve been feverishly working away the last two days getting ready for my next demo/workshop day at Kim’s Crafts (Hinckley Branch) on 10th September. In the morning, I’ll be demo’ing all things Perfect Pearls (from Ranger) and this is the demo board I’ve just finished.

I’ve just found it’s next to impossible to photograph pearlescent finishes! But the board shows the basics of applying perfect pearls to medium, then painting on a pearl finish to spritzing with distress inks, stamping over distress stains and inks, and bottom left, applying to UTEE and watching it ooze.

A pirate’s life for me!

Posted on 21st August 2011 by perfectly4med

After a four week break, my ProMarkers are out again. This week’s challenge over at Passion for Promarkers is ‘a pirate’s life for me!’ While searching for a suitable piratey greeting (I didn’t find one), I discovered that there is an international ‘talk like a pirate’ day each year on 14th September. Shiver me timbers!

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25,000 blog views – and unique giveaway #2

Posted on 20th August 2011 by perfectly4med

Ok, so I’m guessing it will be at some point while I’m asleep tonight, but I couldn’t wait a moment longer before sharing my celebratory prize with you! In recognition of a fantastic 25,000 views in less than six months, I have created my largest zentangle-inspired artwork (ZIA) to date. And it’s a giveaway!

Entitled ’71’, this A3-sized pen and pencil ZIA contains all seventy one tangle patterns I’ve published on this blog. This unique prize can be yours!

To have a chance of winning this one-of-a-kind prize, all you need to do is to create your own ZIA incorporating only patterns from my blog and share it with me by posting a link to your blog entry (preferred) or emailing a scan/photo of your creation via the link at the top of the sidebar (if you don’t have a blog). I don’t mind how many of my patterns you use, nor what size of ZIA you create. I hope to be able to create a gallery on my blog of all the entries to this challenge, celebrating your artistic exuberance. And to be fair to all-comers, I’ll select the winner by random draw of all entries. Entries close at 23:59 GMT on Saturday 10th September.

And thank you all for your interest, encouragement and for following my blog for the last five months 🙂

Travel Journal – journaling prompts for when your brain is on holiday

Posted on 19th August 2011 by perfectly4med

Just thought I’d share some of the journaling ideas I had whilst I was filling in my travel journal.

Numbers – decorate your page with relevant numbers and a brief comment – I used the flight number, the weight of my suitcase, how many miles it was to my destination, in-flight meal prices, taxi pick up time etc
Top Tips – list all the things you want to remember for next time you go on holiday or the things you would tell people coming to the same area
Menus – sketch your food for the day, then describe it: we had ‘brown’ several times during our stay – it was either coffee or chocolate mousse, but occasionally we’d be caught out with the hazelnut variety!
Guide Book – if you get stuck for ideas, raid your guide book and any handy tour leaflets for facts and pictures or maps and pop them into your journal
Logos – I drew the logo that was on the beer glass every evening, and stuck in a section of the honey rum bottle label… the things you want to remember!
Mini-maps – annotate a mini-map of your area, or the route to the beach, with the things that were memorable or significant landmarks along the way
Write larger – if you only do eating, sunbathing and swimming, it may not seem to be enough for a journal page entry… so write larger and decoratively, it soon fills the page!

Mini Travel Journal – Maspalomas 2011

Posted on 19th August 2011 by perfectly4med

As promised, here are pics of my handmade travel journal. I decided that I would take an art journal with me on holiday and I’d keep to a plan of drawing/writing daily – after all, I’d have the time! Well, that didn’t quite work out between sun and sangria and nights of cards and local honey rum, but I have finished it:

I’ll be showing the group at the Craft Club on Saturday how to make the journal, and there will probably be a tutorial coming on here later.

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Sharpie versatility – customising inflatables

Posted on 18th August 2011 by perfectly4med

So, what do you do when all the rings and inflatable dolphins are the same at the poolside? You ask your artistic uncle to customise yours for you. And so it was I was thankful for taking my collection of Sharpies with me on holiday! I created a dragon for Josh and tattooed eyebrows for Dan’s dolphin. I’m pleased to say that both stood up pretty well in use, and the black Sharpie was far more resilient than the colours. It helped that the surface was grainy on the ring and on the white printed areas of the dolphin.

Holiday angst!

Posted on 17th August 2011 by perfectly4med

I’ve just been to Gran Canaria for a fortnight’s break – and was brave enough to take my art journal with me. Almost a disaster… My art journal bag got stolen one night, and with it my first (and currently only) art journal. Happily it was found very shortly after having been discarded. Here is the resulting outpouring of artistic angst:

So there we are: back up your images… electronic or paper-based!

A little bit of history…

Posted on 17th August 2011 by perfectly4med

Whilst sorting out the dining room, I had to go under the floorboards and found sections of the Leicester Mail and a Daily Express from Wednesday, 5th May 1937. The country was gearing up for the coronation of King Edward VIII a week later, and it was the day before the Hindenburg disaster. Fascinating reading! And whilst changing the radiator, I scraped off several historical layers of wallpaper. I’ve incorporated both, and the new wallpaper, into three art pieces to adorn the newly painted walls:

Each canvas panel is 12×12 inches, with the centre area painted in the room colour (Dulux Barley White) and edged with quarter inch brass tape from Ranger. The ageing was done with brown Neocolor II wax soluble crayon. Each section of newspaper was scanned and stuck down with matte multi-medium. The same was done with the wallpaper samples. The flowers are cut from the new wallpaper, Sanderson’s ‘Sweet Bay’ (Pattern No. DPFWSW102).

Unique Giveaway #2 – spoiler alert ;)

Posted on 15th August 2011 by perfectly4med

Dear readers,

I’m about to reach 25,000 views of my blog

In honour of the phenomenal hit rate to my blog, I’m creating another unique zentangle-inspired artwork to give away. In less than six months since I started, I’m about to reach 25,000 views of my blog, with a current record of 624 views in a single day! Now in the grand scheme of things that’s not a lot of hits compared to say, Google, but it’s exciting to me!

So… the spoiler alert? I’m going to create my biggest tangle to date, incorporating all of my tangle patterns – and then I’m going to give it away. Watch out for the pictures, and I’ll launch the give away proper when the blog counter reaches 25,000 🙂

And hopefully by then I’ll have got the hang of actually handing on the give away!

Waterlily – tangle pattern

Posted on 7th August 2011 by perfectly4med

Day Seven: another Mehndi inspired pattern, this flower shape reminded me of the best waterlilies. Remind me to show you how to make 3D versions out of punched paper… Couple of guidelines for this: it doesn’t matter how many scollops you have in the outer border and the lines in step 5 curve to meet the base of the line starting two scollops before to make the coloured in segment.

That wraps up this week’s daily tangles, hope you’ve enjoyed them.