Art Journal
Art Journal Page: Dylusions and Chrome

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I’ve done two art journal pages today… but I’m only going to share this one! I’ve not played in my Dylusions journal for a while and thought I’d get out my Dylusions paints and have a play. The shiny silver bits are not foiled, rather where I used Molotow’s Liquid Chrome pens to trace over elements from the stencil. I’m still stunned by the shininess the pens create. It’s nice enough as it is, but I’m not sure it’s finished.

Side note: I had to resurrect one of my paint colours – a quick tip is to use a couple of drops of ammonia in your water when trying to thin a gloopy semi-dried paint. I really must use up paint before it dries up!

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Arts in Worship
Bible Journaling 9: I am a new creation

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The observant may notice that Bible Journaling 8 is missing – never fear, it’s coming soon. It’s just that I did the prep for that one before this one, so we’re out of order… The theme for this month’s Bible Journaling session (tomorrow night, 13th January) is ‘I am a new creation’ – it’s the new year, so it seemed suitable. I thought it would be interesting to do five different illustrations for the same verse as a test of design skills and came up with these:

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ProMarker Projects
ProMarker Challenge: Retirement card

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Over at ‘Passion for ProMarkers’ this week, the challenge is to create something ‘for grandparents or older people’. I don’t have any witty sayings or almost-insulting pictures to colour in, so I went for the traditional retirement card for gardeners. So here’s my challenge entry, coloured with ProMarkers:

I’ve left it as a topper for now, until such time as I find someone to send it to! I’ve used my aged stash of Art Impression stamps for the images. I stamped either with ProMarkers for direct colour (be quick else the ink dries) or inking with Memento Tuxedo Black and colouring in if there were outlines required. Extra lines (fence and watering can handle) and the text are drawn with permanent pigment pens (either Sakura or Unipin). Much of the colouring is tone-on-tone with the same colour ink layered to give texture and shading.

Card Craft
LIM #410: Coral and Blue

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Happy New Year! After a break for Christmas, and some online classes taking up some time, I’ve been crafting. I’m working on a dragon sculpture, currently curing in the pond, and I’ve been learning 3D modelling software – part of which included animation of a lamp model you may spot in the blog header from time to time.

Anyhoo, today’s bit of crafting was the latest ‘Less is More’ challenge – a project with minimal layers, minimal embellishments with lots of white space and this time using the Pantone colour of the year 2019 and 2020.

They’re not two colours I would immediately choose to put together, so initially, I had a mental block. I ended up with two cards, one of which I don’t like, and one that I do!

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3D Projects
Altered Art: Mini Scrapbook Tin

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I have a penchant for sugar-free mints, especially when they are on show at the till in an Aldi. Their ‘complimints’ come in a small lidded tin, and I have often thought how suited to altered art it would be. So, this weekend I got on with altering one, upcycling it to enclose two mini-albums.

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Art Journal
Brusho Art Journal Page

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Tonight’s art journal session features Brusho colour crystals. Last time I had the Brushos out, some of the highly concentrated watercolour crystals fell into my stack of distress inks. Inappropriate streaks of colour appeared in carefully blended ink for months and months, despite fastidious wiping down of every single ink pad. This time I’m wiser, and the inks have a full cover over them!

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Card Craft
Another Challenge Card: Less Is More

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Another challenge blog I used to go to regularly is ‘Less is More‘. It’s another challenge blog that’s still going some 6 years later! The concept behind their challenges is to have plenty of white space on the card, with minimal fuss and minimal layers (ideally just the one). It’s more my style than cards with lots of die cuts and layers of matting and ribbon. So, being on a little bit of a roll, I have followed their recipe #409 – pick a triangle.

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Card Craft
Sparkling Tatty Teddy

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I last entered a ProMarker challenge in July 2013 and thought it was high time I had another go. This afternoon I coloured in a wooden stamp that predates even my last challenge attempt – it’s from 2011. This week’s challenge at Passion for ProMarkers is ‘sparkle and shine’. I’ve used ProMarkers to colour the image and added sparkle with Stickles and a wee bit of shine on the nose with Glossy Accents.

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3D Projects
Altered Art: Dark Hedges Shadowbox

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On a recent trip to Co. Antrim (Northern Ireland), I visited the Dark Hedges. Now made famous by ‘Game of Thrones’ using it as the King’s Road, Dark Hedges is an avenue of ancient beech trees. As a memento of the visit, I’ve created this layered shadowbox using a photo I took. The card is 300gsm to maintain the stiffness of each layer, particularly of the branches which are too slim for glue/foam pads.

Dark Hedges shadowbox

I cheated a little by duplicating a couple of the trees, tweaking their branches rather than creating five trees from scratch. I think with the intermingling of the branches, there is sufficient distraction for me to get away with it 🙂

I found it tricky to get the depth of field and wonder if the left-hand side needs a third tree. Overall, the 3D effect seems to be effective – which is just as well as it took ages to achieve! There are seven layers front to back, with the road slanted front to back to emphasise the depth of field.