Aprils Showers Brings May Flowers

Welcome to the monthly Artistic Outpost Design Team Blog Hop!  Today's hop features flowers or women.  I decided that since we are having a week full of rain that I should celebrate spring flower which are the benefit of all the rain we are receive.

I started with a  Memory Box die cut butterfly and stamped the lovely flowers from the Bloom & Grow Plate using black ink. I colored the flowers with STAEDTLER  watercolor pencils and watercolor markers.  I distressed the edges with brown dye ink.

I used the Prima - Hope Chest paper for my tag.  I stamped the butterflies from the Flower Market plate in the background along with a few of the words.  I colored the butterflies with the watercolor pencils and waterbrush.  I added a few highlights with a white gel pen.  I die cut a clock (Sizzix) and sponged it with brown dye ink.  I stamped the ledger from Ephemera Backgrounds over the clock.   I added one of my many favorite sentiments to the tag from Quote & Quotables.

Hop along to see all the fabulous projects by the DT:

Gerrie Johhnic 

Lisa Somerville

Suzanne Czosek (me) 

Tracy Evans

Linda Coughlin

Alison Bomber

Terry Horrall

Kate Yetter

Thanks for stopping by!

Suzz

I Believe

Awhile ago I was playing with inks and messy backgrounds and created a art journal page:

I started with Dylusions sprays in pink and purple. My hands were pink and purple for a few days! 

 I sprayed the two colors onto the paper overlapping until it was covered.   I applied white paint across the surface. I added a layer of water spritzes and let it  dry.  I sprayed the entire surface with water.I threw a bunch of sea salt on the surface and let that dry.  I scraped off the salt and attached the butterflies.

I stamped the sentiment from the Artistic Outpost - Quote and Quotables  in versamark and heat embossed in white embossing powder.  I also added the Hero Arts Flourish around the edges using the same method. The edges were distressed with a distressing tool.

I love this quote from Audrey Hepburn. I ended up using this for my blog header.

Thanks for stopping by...

Suzz

Leaves are Falling

Happy Fall! Welcome to the Artistic Outpost Monthly Blog Hop!  This month the Design Team created Fall themed projects to share.

I really like when the weather is crisp and the sun is shining.  That is perfect fall weather for me!  The leaves start to change and there are so many beautiful trees in varying shades of colors.  I started with those beautiful leaves as the inspiration for my project:

I stamped the beautiful leaf from The Outpost plate. I inked it up with a variety of colors from the distress inks.  I used yellow, orange, red and brown dye ink  to create the leaves. I inked up from lightest to darkest colors on the stamp.   After the leaves were stamped I hand cut them. (This took time but I like to do this busy work while watching TV)  After they were cut I sponged the edges with brown dye ink.  To finish them off I added a layer of Distress Crackle Paint.  I stamped the house and tree using black ink and added color with distress inks to the tree.  I stamped in the background the ledger from the Ephemera Backgrounds. I finished off the scene with several layers of clear embossing powder.

The sentiment is from the Flower Market.

When I finished my first project I had some of the beautiful leaves left and decided to create a tag.

 My inspiration was a nest of leaves for a bird.  I decided he needed a tree in the background and stamped the tree from The outpost along with the ledger.  I added the sentiment from the Kudzu Kafe. 

Products: Artistic Outpost Birds of A Feather, The Outpost, Ephemera Backgrounds, Kudzu Kafe

For more inspiration hop along to the rest of the design team:

Linda Coughlin

Tracy Evans

 Lisa Somerville

Have a wonderful day!

Suzz

Hope

Sentiments, verses, and quotes are all favorites of mine.  I love searching through my stamps looking for just the right quote or verse to use on my project.  I was thrilled to see the challenge this week for Simon Says Stamp and Show is  "What do you Say"..  The hardest part was picking out which sentiment to use on my project!

I finally selected the quote from Emily Dickinson about hope.  I loved reading Emily Dickinson when I was younger and this is a beautiful bit of her poetry.   

It inspired me to create a piece of home decor:

I started with this really cool Tryptich Arc Window set from 7 Gypsies.  I painted two of the pieces with white paint and added touches of purple.  I also had read about a technique of mixing gesso with baking soda to create a paste which you can than stamp into and get texture.  My paste wasn't setting so I ended up just leaving it and adding a layer of glimmer mist and white acrylic paint to the edges.  I then  added on layers of tissue tape and more paint and distressing.

That was just the arches. :)  

I glimmer misted a sheet of white cardstock to match the background.  I stamped the quote using versamark and heat embossed using white embossing powder.   Stamp the bird using black ink.  Add a touch of brown to the breast of the bird.

To create my home for my bird I layered in a crocheted doily. I spritzed seam binding with glimmer mist to create a coordinating ribbon for the nest and to tie along the bottom.  I also took some beautiful Prima flowers and glimmer misted them to match.

Pop dot the open arch  onto the background arch and start layering in the doily, flowers, bird, nest and finish off with the sentiment.

I was really pleased with the effect and how my home decor turned out.

Products: Artistic Outpost Quote and Quotables, Crafty Secrets - Fairyland, Glimmer Mist, Prima Flowers, 7 Gypsies Tryptich Arc Window, Seam Binding, 7 Gypsies Gaffer Tape, Gesso

Don't forget that you can play along too and have an opportunity to win the 50.00 gift certificate for Simon Says Stamp.


Have a lovely week!

Suzz

Artistic Outpost - March Release

Today is March release day for Artistic Outpost!  I was thrilled to receive the new plates!  I have been happily playing with the new plates.  The release includes: Quote and Quotables, Flower Market, and  Secretary Pool.

The Quote and Quotables includes quotes from a variety of women.  Including J.K. Rowling, Audrey Hepburn, Lucille Ball... So many wonderful quotes to play with.  The Flower Market is a combination of butterflies, flowers and French elements. (All of my favorite things!)  The Secretary Pool provides a vintage blend of all your office tools and so fun to ink up!

My first project took me over a day to create but I enjoyed the exploration of trying something new and different:

 Click to Enlarge

I started with an old book which I spent some time burrowing into on the one half to create a little space for my fairy and lavender.

I am not going to share all the details on the book as it would take awhile.  If you have questions, please feel free to email me.  Products used: Artistic Outpost - Flower Market, Neverland, Paris Exposition,  Watercolor pencils, Glimmer Mist - Purple, White Acrylic Paint, Vintage Photo - Ranger Distress Inks, Pearls, Doily, Recollections Flower Trim, Sizzix Rose Blooms Die Cut, Ranger Archival Ink .

My next project uses one of the new quotable stamps:

 I love this quote and it works so beautifully with the Birds of a Feather plate.  I stamped the script from the new Secretary Pool on muslin in the background with a little smears of white acrylic paint.  The quote from Emily Dickinson is stamped on tissue paper using Versafine green ink.  I added burlap, feather, statice and buttons as accents.

My final card mixes in the Secretary Pool plate with the Steampunk plate:

 

The background of everything is glimmer misted green and yellow.  Then the images are stamped using Ranger Archival Black ink.  Then a layer of white acrylic paint is smeared onto the surfaces to soften the color.

The images are stamped from the new Secretary Pool and the Steampunk plate.  The edges are distressed with the distressing tool and sponged around the cardbase with Vintage Photo. The edges are stapled and accented with snaps.

For more inspiration and fabulous creations take a peek at what the rest of the DT has created!

Anita Houston  

Gerrie Johnnic

Lisa Somerville  

Linda Coughlin 

Tracy Evans 

Yvonne Garner

Thanks for stopping by! 

Suzz