September Catch up

I have been so busy working on holiday gifts...things that I can't post, it would give away the surprise that I forgot to post some of the fun swaps and Repeat Impressions pieces that I finished in September. So here is a quick recap.

For starters this Gothic Arch covers a slew of challenges from this past week starting with the open Theme Gothic Arches let us play with.

Theme Thursday challenged us with: This week’s theme is “road trip”! Use images that make you think of a “road trip” in your creation this week!

One Powerful Hour wanted us to focus on: This weeks theme is fun and flirty, or down and dirty, it's shoes!
I love a pretty pair of dainty high heals, and I love the comfort of an old ratty tennis shoe. Create a piece of art using any style shoe. They can be the focal point or in the background, maybe the shape of your card, the possibilities are endless.

I think this arch does an okay job with all those things. Not so sure that Theme Thursday will consider a walk around Paris as a road trip...but it would be a big one for me...considering I live an ocean away!

The background paper is an old map of Paris. I then poked random holes at some fun looking locations and strung shimmery DMC Floss from one hole to the next. I stamped a high heal shoe using Versa Mark ink and covered that with Pearl Ex Powder, after sealing that I attached the sight seeing woman and then all around the edge I added sequins filling the center with pink seed beads.


These Fabulous Pennants are for a swap with Alpha Stamps. The requirements were that we must use the Pennant shape and holiday themed collage sheets and or rubber stamps by Alpha Stamps.

I Selected New collage sheet called Old Fashioned Christmas. I attached it to the Pennant and then used Tim Holtz Crackle paints in weathered wood and old paper to cover the rest of the pennant. When that had dried I added the snowflakes which are stamped and glittered.



My finishing touches are the Dresden around the edges and a fabulous silver snowflake that I attached at the bottom.

You can see a lot of the crackle detail and the shimmery effect of the glittered snow flake in the close up picture.









































Last but certainly not least is this piece that I did for Repeat Impressions. A Haunted Mansion belonging to who else by Count Dracula himself.

The background is made using orange acrylic paint. I let it dry and then smeared on in lines petroleum jelly, over that I painted very carefully, a cream acrylic. When the cream paint was dry enough not to smear I wiped the paint off, it removed the clear over the petroleum jelly leaving the fabulous random streaked effect. I thought it was a little to bright and happy so I stippled black and grey ink over the entire house.

All Stamps are from Repeat Impressions, I used the Bats, Haunted Tree, Dracula, Spiders Web, swirls, and Legacy Alphabet.

The swirls are purple pearl ex powder, when I took the photo they showed up blue. Dracula is painted with Twinkeling H2O's and so is the Haunted Tree. The Spiders web and the words are covered in glitter.

As a finishing touch I added the cat and pumpkin trim boarder...

Hope you enjoy!

What makes a Gentleman

For those of you that do not know, The Challenge Site Gothic Arches has moved. Please click the link in my side bar to go to the new location and to sign up. It now requires membership. I am so glad that the site did not close entirely I love the shape of the Arches and the caliber work uploaded every week is just amazing.

So, this week:

Our hostess this week is Dawn Bryson who created this beautiful arch selecting the theme "Time" for this weeks challenge. You may see more of Dawn's beautiful art on her blog thechattystamper.blogspot.com

I had been working on an altered playing card for this past weeks Theme Thursday. I did not like what I had come up with so I set it aside. The card had the clocks already stamped on. When I saw the theme at Gothic Arches I cut the card to the right side and my problems seemed solved. I think the overly large size of the playing card is what was throwing me off.

So I glued my men on and computer generated the phrase. As A final touch I added some Dresden on the sides and some clock hand stickers.

Sometimes you just need to set something aside before turning it into what it was meant to be.
Hope you enjoy!

Let's Go Fly a Kite

The challenge this past Sunday over at Gothic Arches is:

This week our theme is “Handwriting” which was selected by our hostess Dymphie. Use your own handwriting on the arch, paint a few letters, calligraph a quote (i would looooove to see that). I don’t like my own handwriting very much, but i like to use it in my art-work, it seems more my own when i do so.

We want to see your handwriting on your arches this week!

You can see more of Dymphie’s beautiful artwork on her blog:http://papierenavonturen.blogspot.com/

At First I said "NO WAY" I use stamps I can't do that. But then after working on my Soul Journal I realized that I can and that adding my own touches, be them my handwriting or just some doodling, really makes me feel good.

So, here is my Gothic Arch with handwritin. I copied down the words to "Let's go Fly a Kite" Also, I made the kites without any stamps. This is my very first piece of art that dosn't have collage images or stamps used and I am very pleased with it.

Siren's Song

Over at Gothic Arches the theme is


Our hostess this week is Caryl Hoobler who created this beautiful Gothic arch using the theme “Mermaids” which she selected. What do you think of with this theme? Sea maidens? Sirens? Merpeople or Merfolk? Whatever the vision may be we wish to see it here in Gothic form!

A bit about our hostess:
I love the freedom of mixed media art and I love the tiny canvas of a Gothic Arch. I tend to throw unexpected elements into my pieces, but there is a thought process behind what items I use in a piece. I tend to draw upon life experiences when creating and look for items that may bring back a certain memory from any given time or place. I’ve chosen Mermaids as the theme this week as Mermaids are so magical and can live in wildly colorful settings! I can’t wait to see where your Mermaids live!

You may see more of Caryl’s beautiful work on her blog:
http://carylsrealm.blogspot.com/

I don't feel like my Arch is done...I just don't know what else to do, any suggestions???

Hope you enjoy and be sure to check out the newest Challenge Site One Powerful Hour

Thanks
Caro

No such thing as Trash

Today I made my first ever Gothic Arch…and let me say that I am now addicted. Not that I am not addicted to almost all the challenges but this particular one just seems to really grip me.

Today the challenge was to…

Our hostess this week is Klaartje who has a very creative challenge for all of you. She created this precious arch using “trash” - items you would normally throw away….think package labels, bubble wrap, a lid of a tincan and…..?

Well, there was absolutely no way I was rummaging through my trash can since the top item was a discarded banana peal…YUCK!! But lou and behold, my DH had not cleaned up his tea bag from the night before. As many of you know Tea is one of my favorite things, to drink and to use in my pieces. So that little tea bag and the wrapper came with me to the stamping room.

I don’t throw brown paper grocery bags away so I am not sure my background counts as trash. But it is a brown paper bag crumpled and then aged using Tim Holtz distressing ink. I then over stamped the definition of tea from Stampington & co. repeatedly and using colored pencils highlighted the tea leaves.

The image of the woman sitting with her tea is from an old magazine. I cut her out and placed her so. Next I disassembled the tea bag, saving the tea leaves and gold embossed two tea cup on the actual tea bag. After threading the tea bags string through the left hand side of the arch I glued the tea cups on. Last I glued on the Tea’s label at the top of the arch. To finish it all off I edged the arch with the tea leaves.

I think I did a pretty good job for my first arch! Any and all comments, critical or just plain love it are welcome.

Enjoy!
Caro