Watercolour for A Vintage Journey

Hello Friends!

It is time for a new challenge at A Vintage Journey and our talented Amanda is hosting a Watercolour Wonder Challenge.  Here is what Amanda has to say:

'There is so much versatility in Watercolour, making it possible to create art that can be gentle, washy and light, or bold, full of colour with definite lines, and it comes in a variety of guises; pens, tubes, sticks, inks, markers.  So for the challenge we would like your project to include some form of watercolouring or watercolour techniques and be in keeping with our favoured styles; vintage, shabby, mixed media, art journalling, industrial, timeworn or steampunk'

Amanda's challenge gave me a much needed push to get out my watercolour inks, my new watery wash stamps, Oxide inks and used lots of painty washes to create a colourful scene inside an inexpensive recessed frame.

The frame looks much darker in real life but it was difficult to photograph with the glass front!

The frame was painted with DecoArt Cobalt Teal Hue before adding a coat of DecoArt Crackle Paint.

Once the crackle was dry, a very watery wash of DecoArt Phthalo Blue, mixed with Titanium White was applied to the frame.  Once dry, the frame was lightly sanded to give a more 'distressed' look.  I later applied a little Quin Gold paint to add to the aged look.

The background was stamped using my Darkroom Door Watery Washes stamp set.  Distress Oxide and Distress Ink were applied to my craft sheet and watered down slightly.  The ink was picked up and applied to watercolour paper.

Some chippies (a gift from my lovely friend Sandy) were painted in hues of green and blue.  The seahorse and starfish were hand drawn onto watercolour paper.  I applied drawing gum where the 'spines' of the seahorse would be and then Ecoline inks were diluted with water and then applied the seahorse.

A view of the finished picture before I added it to the frame.  I gave the seahorse a coat of  Clear Rock Candy Distress Paint, it reacted with the inks as you can see, but I was happy with the result. Real sand and a few glass pebbles were added along with some clay elements.

While I had my inks out, I used the drawing gum to draw some freehand flowers and used the Tanzanite colour to watercolour them....

I was quite pleased with the way they turned out and I added a quote from our hugely talented DT member Alison's wonderful new stamp set, stamped with Wilted Violet Distress Oxide.

We hope you will join in Amanda's challenge at A Vintage Journey where our Sponsor for the month is Craft Obsessions who are offering a £20 voucher to spend in their wonderful on-line store!

Do please go over to visit A Vintage Journey, if you can, to see the amazing projects created by the Design Team.  Thanks so much for your visit, I always appreciate your comments!

I was really pleased to see that Country View Crafts blog challenge is 'Blues and Greens' for August so I would like to enter their challenge with my sealife frame.

I would also like to join in That's Crafty challenge which is Anything But Cards, with my sealife frame.

Keep on Crafting!

Hugs,  Anne xxx

Mixed Media May-hem with DecoArt Media

Welcome all my lovely blog friends, thanks so much for your visit.  I am actually away from my computer for a couple of weeks, so I apologise in advance if I don't comment on your posts, I will do my best to catch up once I am online again.  I have a couple of scheduled posts set up, of which this is one - I wouldn't want you to forget me entirely!!

We are all having great fun over at Eileen Hull's Art With Heart Challenge - which this month is:

Mixed Media May-hem with DecoArt Media

We are so fortunate as a design team to have received some fabulous products from DecoArt to use and what amazing products they are (my own personal opinion).  I am also proud to be a member of the DecoArt Blogger Outreach Program (details on my sidebar).

If you saw my last post you will know how much I love seahorses and all things to do with water and the sea/ocean so I am following along on that theme and I have used Eileen's fantastic Artist Trading Block die to create a treasure chest which, in my rather vivid imagination, was brought up from the depths of the ocean....

It is hard even for me to believe now, that this started out as plain cream coloured mat board  (mount board in the UK), as you can see below!

I cut two of the large Artist Trading Blocks (ATBs) from die No. 658984, using the largest ATB on the die  (2.1/2" square) and I joined the two together to make a rectangular shape.

For the top part I cut the same two ATBs again but cut them down height-wise and added a semi circle of card to each end to form the rounded section of the lid.  Some plain card was then scored at 1/4" intervals to form the 'wooden' elements of the chest.  I painted this with Quinacridone Gold Media Fluid and whilst still wet, I added a coat of Burnt Umber Media Fluid (I wanted a random appearance).  I did not take a photo of the next step (I got carried away!) but I added some black and gold Ultra Thick Embossing Crystals to the wet paint, to give a rough texture effect, painted here and there with Paynes Grey and Cobalt Teal to give an 'aged' appearance.

To finish off I then covered the piece completely with Andy Skinner's Dirty Wash recipe (70% Quinacridone Gold, 30% Paynes Grey mixed with Media Ultra Matte Varnish to make a glaze).

For the metal effect edges to the chest I cut some 1/2" strips of card, scored down the middle and painted these with Metallic Silver Media Fluid and then pounced on some Quinacridone Gold, Carbon Black, Cobalt Teal and Paynes Grey Media Fluids.

I gave the metal hinges (Tim Holtz) the same metal colour wash.

The lock at the front and the chain got the same 'metal' paint treatment.  You can see some of the texture in the wood in the pictures above and below.

A close-up of the lock and the 'netting' I added.  The netting (gauze) was sprayed with many different colours of the Media Fluid paints which I watered down and put in spritzer bottles to randomly spray the gauze.  You only need the tiniest amount to make up a spray and the colours stay true.

Apologies for the long post but I know that some of you like to see the detail.  Please do consider joining in Eileen's challenge HERE, it would be lovely to see you there - I cannot describe to you how much fun it is to use these DecoArt Media Fluid products!!

Chest : DecoArt Media Fluid : Quinacridone Gold, Burnt Umber, Paynes Grey, Metallic Silver, Cobalt Teal, Carbon Black

Faux Metal:  Metallic Silver, Quinacridone Gold, Cobalt Teal, Media Ultra Matte Varnish

Netting/Gauze : Cobalt Teal, Pyrrole Red, Green Gold, Quinacridone Red, Burnt Umber

Thanks for looking, I have another scheduled post in a few days with my latest Tim tag, I hope you will join me then.  Hugs, Anne xx

Finnabair style and DecoArt

After taking a Finnabair class a while back I started to create a canvas but I was not sure how I wanted to 'finish' it off, so it has been sitting for months waiting for me to feel inspired.... it is my first real attempt at a proper mixed media piece!

I was given a huge box of DecoArt paints, sprays and mediums last year, as part of Eileen Hull's DT and I have dabbled a little with them.  It did not take me long to discover that my two favourite colours were Quinacridone Gold and Cobalt Teal Hue (Media Fluid).  Here is the canvas I created.

I also used Titanium White Media Fluid Acrylic to coat all the elements I added to the canvas (which is 8" x 8") and left this to dry.  I did not take step by step photos because I was not sure where I wanted this to end up but I do like the way it turned out but the items I used are below.

I used a paint brush to apply the two main colours, I misted them with water and allowed the colours to run a little, this mixed the two colours together quite nicely.  Once dried I mixed Titanium White with some of the White Shimmer Mist and water and gently sprayed over the whole of the finished canvas.  It was difficult to photograph because of the sheen that the Shimmer Mist leaves.

I built up the base by using flowers, lace, cogs, buttons and charms from my stash.

The sentiment is from Tim Holtz's Small Talk phrases and says 'it's always the small pieces that make the big picture' which I felt was quite appropriate!

My lovely and very talented friend Neet of  Hickydorums has a challenge blog which many of you will know - Artful Times.  Sadly, Neet will be closing Artful Times and I wanted to show my support for this latest challenge which is 'A Little Bit of Finnabair' by entering this canvas.

Thanks for looking, I hope to be back on Wednesday with another Inspiration Journal DT make and then again on Friday when we we see a brand new challenge at A Vintage Journey.

Hugs, Anne xx