Infusions Mini-Album–Working on the Tags

The second of two posts for today.

I actually managed to do some art today – for the first time for goodness knows how long. I managed to extricate myself from the kittens and spent a couple of hours in the studio, working on the tags for the Infusions mini-album.

I began with the title tag for the “Various Effects” section, listing the three techniques on the front of the tag.

The background was created using Black Knight and Are You Cerise Infusions from Set 1, sprinkling on the Infusions and then spritzing with water, and I repeated this for the reverse of the tag.

It was so long since I’d done any of this project that I’d forgotten that I was going to use Distress Inks and a minimum of Infusions on the tags! Having done it, I didn’t want to waste the tag, so proceeded with it, using the white Uniball Signo pen for the text, which matches the tag holder.

The next one was for “Drips,” on the front of the tag.

I inked the background for both sides using Spun Sugar, Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry and Victorian Velvet Distress Inks, applied with Inkylicious Ink Dusters. I sprinkled on a small quantity of Are You Cerise and Black Knight Infusions (both from Set 1) and spritzed it with water, and then dried the tag with the heat gun. I spattered this with water and blotted it off for a bit of texture, and dried the tag before adding the text with my white Uniball Signo marker pen. As I am doing for all the tags, I distressed the edges with Black Soot Distress Ink, using a home-made ink blending tool (just visible on the far left of the above picture).

The “Kissing” tag. This was done on the reverse of the “Drips” one.

I chose colours of Distress Inks to match as far as possible the two “kissing” pages. These were Tumbled Glass, Stormy Sky and Faded Jeans, all blue Distress Inks, and then Crushed Olive, Peeled Paint and Forest Moss in green, and finally a little Fossilised Amber. The Infusions I used were Royal Blood and Golden Sands from Set 1. I wrote the text using a black permanent archival pen and the white Uniball pen.

The “Infusions with Glimmer Mists” tag was made by inking Scattered Straw Distress Ink over the entire surface of both sides of the tag, using an Inkylicious Ink Duster. On the front, I sprinkled some Lemoncello Infusions from Set 1, sparingly, on two of the corners and dried it with my heat gun, and repeated the process on the back, using a bit more Infusions to cover the surface.

I spritzed both sides with my DIY Glimmer Mist made from Chipped Sapphire Distress Ink re-inker in water, with some Perfect Pearls added. The blue of the Glimmer Mist mixed nicely with the yellow of the Scattered Straw Distress Ink to create bits of green. Those little spray bottles don’t give a really fine spray, unfortunately, so I think in future I need to use my mini-misters instead. The text was done with a black archival pen.

These are the little mop-up pieces so far – for each tag I am creating a new one of these, to clean up the non-stick craft sheet and provide a resource for future projects. Each one is edged with Black Soot Distress Ink.

I’ve finished the “Miscellaneous Techniques” section and the next section to be done will be the “Painting” section.

Brushos–First Experiments

Today I finally got around to testing my recently acquired Brushos. These crystalline waterclour pigments with their intense, vibrant colours proved a lot more difficult to use than I expected! I am sure I will get the hang of them eventually, and as you will see, my final results today were an improvement on my first attempts!

I began by cutting five pieces of card measuring 5 1/2 x 6 1/2 inches – these will matt and layer nicely onto an A5-sized card. I stamped them with two stamps from the Inkylicious “Simply Trees” clear stamp set that I got recently.

For my first attempt, I stamped the trees using sepia archival ink, but this proved to be not dark enough, so for the rest of the samples, I used black. The stamping didn’t come out terribly well, but I think this would be improved by using better-quality card. I had to touch up some of it with my permanent black drawing pens.

The colours of Brushos I chose were Dark Brown, Leaf Green, Scarlet, Yellow and Orange, to give an autumnal effect to my trees. I added the brushos by using a soft dry brush to pick up a few of the crystals from the pot, and tapped them onto the card. After this I spritzed it with water.

My first attempt was definitely underwhelming! I think I put on too much Brusho powder, and it didn’t really go where I wanted it! This stuff is really hard to control, but then that’s part of its attraction!

Attempt 2: This was definitely an improvement. With Brushos, less is definitely more! This girl definitely needs more practice!

For my third attempt, I used less again.

Fourth attempt: We’re definitely getting somewhere now. You really do need the absolute minimum of Brushos to get a good effect. Once I had dried the samples, I put a small quantity of the Leaf Green and Dark Brown brusho crystals onto my craft mat and mixed them with some water, using a fine brush, and then painted on some foreground.

My fifth attempt I was pretty much satisfied with. I quite like the foreground on this one, too.

In each case, I had to use a bit of judicious blotting with kitchen paper to remove excess water and Brushos, in an attempt to control where most of the colour ended up.

Here are attempts 2-5 as a group, the only ones I feel I could actually use, although #2 is debateable. #1 is definitely a reject and not included.

I thought that the addition of a little distressing around the edges might improve things further, and provide a little cohesion to the designs. Using a home-made ink blender, I applied Forest Moss distress ink for the bottom half of each one, and Vintage Photo distress ink for the top halves.

Here are the completed pieces in order. First: sample #2. I am still not sure about this one. I shall matt and layer it and see how it looks, but it may join #1 as a reject.

Sample #3.

Sample #4.

Finally, sample #5.

Watch this space to see these pieces matted and layered, and made up into cards.

My New Brushos

The first of two posts for today.

Today my friend Lucy called round with the Brushos she bought recently. We’d agreed to go halves on these because you get plenty in each pot, which would probably last more than a lifetime because you use so little. I had bought some little pots in readiness for transferring my share over, and a few days ago, I proceeded to label them so that they were ready – in their dry form the colours are not easy to distinguish from one another.

Brushos are water-based pigments in crystal form. You can use them in a variety of ways which makes them extremely versatile. Their main feature is the intensity of the colour. You can sprinkle a few crystals onto dry paper and then spritz it with water, and from the rather dull looking crystals, the colour explodes like fireworks! Alternatively, you can spritz the paper first, and then sprinkle on the crystals. Using the sprinkle and spritz method, some of the colours break down into their component colours – for example, the black one gives quite an array of subtle shades, which is very exciting – from a single colour, you can get many colours! You can also sprinkle a little onto a craft sheet or palette and add water with a brush, and use them like ordinary watercolours. Because they are dry, you can also use them to colour moulding paste without altering the consistency, and because you can mix them, you can make custom colours of any shade you like. The possibilities are endless.

Using the sprinkle and sptitz method combined with a simple stamped image in archival black, you can make simple cards very quickly – cards that have real impact, and no two the same, as the results with the Brushos are somewhat unpredictable and random. You can add as much or as little water as you want, for a less, or more, blended effect according to your preference. They make great backgrounds.

Watch this space to see what I do with my Brushos! I have got some nice stamps to use with them, and need to get on with a Card Factory in the near future as my stash is, as usual, pretty empty of ready-made cards and I hate having to make them to a short deadline.

Here are the little pots that I bought, ready to be labelled.

Having measured the tops of the pots and found that they were 1 1/4 inches in diameter, I chose my 1 inch circle punch, and began to punch out circular labels from a roll of self-adhesive address labels. Epic fail. On the first one, the punch jammed! I had to go online to discover how to unjam it, and one suggestion was to put it in the freezer to shrink the metal! I didn’t want to hang around, so I tried their second suggestion – to spray the punch with WD40 penetrating oil. After a few minutes, the punch released itself, and I managed to pull out quite a bit of gunk from inside – sticky label, backing sheet – and then had to wipe the punch clean of oil.

The best path to trouble-free punching of sticky labels is to punch them along with a piece of scrap paper. No trouble after this. Lots of nice circular labels ready to apply.

I wrote the names of the colours on each one – again, gleaning this info from online. I was assuming Lucy had bought the standard set of 12 Brushos. The darker colours would obscure the writing somewhat, but I had my white marker pen ready to re-name those.

Then another problem – boy was it hard to peel the labels off their backing sheets! Even with pretty decent fingernails this was an absolute pain. Got there in the end, though, and stuck the labels on the pots.

I decided to labels the pots in two ways. For the lids, to mix up a small quantity of each Brusho and paint it on like a regular watercolour, and for the labels on the sides of the pots, to sprinkle and spritz them, so that I would get an accurate representation of what the colours looked like in both forms.

Here are the pots after I’d transferred my share of the Brushos, with the completed labels. You can see how intense the colours are. In each case I sprinkled a very few crystals onto my craft sheet and mixed them with a wet brush, and painted them on – in each case I had to wipe up what was left. A tiny amount goes a very long way indeed. You can also see the labels for the sides of the pots in the making – I used four self-adhesive address labels each divided into three to give the total of twelve.

The next photo shows the Brusho crystals being sprinkled onto the first label using a dry brush.

Spritzing with water. With this first one, I used a bit too much water and it spread quite a lot.

Here are all the side labels complete. I think they look great with the spritzed effect.

The pots of Brushos complete, with all their labels. You can see that I have re-written the colour name on the black and purple ones because the black pen was obscured by the dark colour.

A selection of colours, showing that when you spritz some of them, the pigment breaks down into its component colours, giving an interesting range of colours from one Brusho. I think my favourite of all is the black one – just look at those gorgeous colours you get! The leaf green one breaks down into green and yellow, and the emerald green into green and turquoise. Some interesting effects.

I think my pots of Brushos look a lot nicer than the original packaging! They are fun and colourful.

When you buy Brushos, they are labelled only on the sides of the pots which is a bit of a pain because they tend to be stored up against each other in the box, and you have to lift them out to see what colour they are! A lot of people make labels for the tops, which saves a lot of time and aggro. They also make a hole in the top, which they plug with a paper tack or a cocktail stick – the general consensus is “DON’T open the pot!!” but I have seen some interesting videos online where the person definitely does open the pot, and picks up a few crystals on a soft brush, and taps this over the paper to release the crystals – I think I prefer this method as one does have a little more control. I also think that having a hole in the top is going to prevent the pot being air tight, and if you live in a damp area, as we do, the crystals could start to get damp and clump together in time. It’s a matter of preference, really.

Opening Lucy’s pots so that I could transfer half over into my pots, I found the original pots very difficult to open. I suppose that’s a good thing if you aren’t supposed to open them, but as I shall be using a brush, I’d rather have my pots with the screw tops which are easy peasy to open, and give a good airtight seal when closed.

Now all I need to do is have some fun with them!

Dylusions Mixed Media Get Well Card

THE BIG REVEAL, PART 9.

This is the final thing that I made for Shaz before she went into hospital – until I had heard from her hubby that she had received it, it had to remain under wraps! I now know that I can share it with you.

I made her a get well card using a combination of Dylusions sprays and my new Dylusions paints. The colours of the two types of media match beautifully.

I began with a scrap piece of card which I had used for mopping up Peacock Feathers distress ink and Vibrant Turquoise Dylusions spray. It ended up pretty crinkled and distorted but I thought it would flatten out OK.

This is my honeycomb stencil laid over the top of the background piece.

Stencilling with Polyfilla One Fill (what our US cousins call joint compound) – a lot cheaper than artists’ moulding paste! I spread a little in random patches, using a palette knife, and scraped off any bits that looked messy, and then dried it with my heat gun.

The piece with the stencilled Polyfilla.

Lemon Zest Dylusions spray. A couple of quick bursts at the top, then spritzed with water and held up so it dripped down through the stencilling. Love the lime green it produces with the turquoise.

Repeating the process with Crushed Grape Dylusions spray. In each case I spritzed it with water to help it blend.

Coarse sea salt added, and re-spritzed with water. I left this for a few minutes to react, and then dried it with my heat gun.

The piece with the salt crystals removed. It creates gorgeous swirls and spots as the salt draws the wet ink towards itself.

The piece along with a couple of other pieces used to mop up inks from my craft mat. Fabulous backgrounds!

The addition of Treasure Gold gilding wax to the raised stencilled areas. I put on the barest minimum so that the colours would still show through.

Working on the base card, I began by coating it with a thin layer of gesso, using a foam brush, and then dried with my heat gun. The surface of the card is fairly absorbent, and the gesso prevents the paints sinking in, and helps them blend better.

The Dylusions paints, in Lemon Zest, Vibrant Turquoise and Crushed Grape. I used the Ranger mini-blending tools to apply them and blend them together, and after the first coat was dry, I applied another, and after each one, blended the colours using a baby wipe.

The finished base card. The colours do blend well together, creating new colours.

The stencilled piece stuck down onto the base card.

I found this amusing quote online and printed it out on the computer, cut out the pieces and coloured them with Antique Linen distress stain because the white card I printed them on looked a bit stark. I stuck them down with Scotch Quick Dry Adhesive and outlined each one with rough lines with a gold gel pen. (After I had stuck them down I realised I should have used gel medium… dratted chemo brain!)

The inside of the card was inked with a selection of distress inks, using Inkylicious Ink Dusters, to echo the colours on the front of the card. Starting at the top left corner and working around clockwise, Seedless Preserves, Peacock Feathers, Peeled Paint and Squeezed Lemonade, Spiced Marmalade and Aged Mahogany. The centre of the card still looked rather white and stark, so I added some Antique Linen distress ink to tone it down.

I unscrewed the lid of my water spritzing bottle and flicked the tube over the surface of the card to spatter it with water droplets. I left it to soak in for a few minutes and then blotted it off with kitchen paper to leave the white spots, to create a bit of texture.

The final step was to add the sentiment, which was printed from the computer, coloured with Antique Linen distress stain, stuck down and outlined as before.

The backs of my cards usually seem to get a bit messy (I’m sure other people manage to keep the backs of theirs nice and pristine and clean, but I’ve never worked out how to do this!) and we are told that if you make a mistake, make a feature of it, so I did!

I inked the envelope to echo the colours of the card and its inside, and added the water spattering for a bit of texture.

I hope this card cheers her up in hospital, and at least raises a smile, if not a laugh! She loves very loud heavy rock music and I was delighted when I found that quote on Pinterest, and knew I had to use it for this card!!

Many of us on WOYWW have been following Shaz’s amazing progress in hospital as her hubby writes a daily diary on his blog. We continue to wish her well, and so look forward to the time when she is well enough to join us again. Meantime, take care, Shaz, and get well soon! We miss you.

Purple Stuff

For the first time for ages, I felt well enough to spend a little while in my ARTHaven doing something creative! This morning I actually managed to tidy up in there, and it really needed it, as it had become a dumping ground again. After that I was too tired to do any more, and had a visitor this afternoon, but this evening I decided to make a start on a project I’d had in mind for a while.

Our neighbour had an accident a few weeks ago and when she first came home, I wasn’t well enough to make her a get-well card but decided better late than never! I wanted to make her one of my lavender sachets in a little box, as I did for my fellow chemo-ites when I first started my treatment. This is what I have made.

As well as making her a get-well card, I also have a couple of other cards to make, and decided to do it all as one project. Ages ago I was given some stash by somebody, which included this rather uninteresting pink and purple paper with flowers and butterflies on it – it’s fairly heavy paper but not quite thick enough to be called card, and in my opinion extremely dull, which is why I haven’t yet used it! I thought now was the time to get it out of my stash and on the move, so with a bit of alteration I was sure it could be improved.

I sprayed the first sheet with Crushed Grape and Bubblegum Pink Dylusions spray inks.

Blotting off with the second sheet.

Both sheets blotted and dried.

Preparing to spray the third sheet, this time with Crushed Grape and London Blue Dylusions spray inks.

The sheet sprayed.

After spritzing and blotting off, it joined the first two sheets, dried and completed. The pale pink one (which had had flowers punched out of it) was also spattered with water droplets and blotted off.

I took the darker sheet with butterflies on it (which had been so covered up with ink that they were now extremely subtle! – i.e. virtually invisible!) and stuck it down onto a sheet of plain white card with spray adhesive to thicken it up a bit and make it substantial enough to make a box. I used my box template to draw around, and cut out the shape.

Here is the reverse side ready for inking with distress inks.

I used the two paler colours (Shaded Lilac and Salty Ocean) to go all over it first, using Inkylicious Ink Dusters. I wasn’t too bothered about getting a very smoothly blended finish because it would be covered up later.

Preparing to stamp with Versamark and heat emboss with clear embossing powder to act as a resist.

After the butterflies were stamped, and preparing for the second inking.

After the second inking with the darker shades, and buffed to clean the ink off the embossed butterflies, which now revealed the lighter shades of the first inking.

Preparing to gold-emboss the outside of the box. This stamp set is Tim Holtz’s Bitty Grunge set of background stamps – unfortunately the corner of the box is across the name of the set!

After gold embossing. I wanted a nice random, mottled effect.

The final step was to go around the outline with my gold Uniball Signo pen.

The completed box, closed.

Partially open.

Unfortunately with all the heating involved during the embossing process front and back, the layers started to come apart a bit, which wasn’t helped by the flexing of the flaps to close up the box, and you can see a slight crease on the flap that is open in the above photograph. Before finally assembling the box I ran over it vigorously with my brayer again, and I hope it’s going to stay stuck together!

Here is the box fully opened.

I shall use the rest of the paper to make some cards, which will be part of this ongoing “Purple Stuff” project. Watch this space!