Long Time No See, Sorry About That…..

I know it's been too long since my last post but getting pictures has become a challenge.  It appears that we are having an epidemic of camera suicides in this house.  Two down in less than a month.  I finally broke down and took the pictures with my iPhone 4… probably not the best pictures but it got the job done and at least I can post.

I will begin my posting frenzy with the remaining  "Truth Cards" from the  Soul RestorationI class.  The first card, which I call "brave", was my first attempt at using alphabet masks. I like the look of the word "brave" but the rest of the background sucks.  I embellished the card with little flowers I punched from a vintage book page and some flowers from Prima Marketing.  I love the little single layer flowers with the tiny rhinestone in the center.  Definitely one of my go-to embellishments.

The second card was made with a patterned paper-which I love- from Flora and Fauna.  This card I call "WTF" since on film I look at it and think "WTF".   Over the beautiful and perfect background paper,   I stamped some random crap and added a pretty floral border from the F and F collection.  I made the flower  using Tim Holtz Tattered Floral die by Sizzix -which I adore.  The papers that compose the flower are the coolest thing… EVER.  Like an onion and Shrek, the flower is made up of layers: text from a vintage book, the waxed tissue paper from the box I received with a gift from Anthropologie in December; and a piece of yardstick. The waxed tissue paper is the coolest stuff…. so cool in fact thatI made a bunch of flowers with it (I will post those later).  The waxed tissue was cut with Martha's fringing scissors.  The center of my little flower is embellished with a vintage glass button.  

I give you "Journey" and I give you more flowers.  The background is super cool in person but the 10 lbs the camera adds just took away all of the nuances of the piece.  The background was made with parchment ink and a circle stencil.  I randomly placed the circle stencil and filled it using gold pigment ink.  Then I took a charcoal pencil and roughly outlined the circles before rubbing the pencil lines with my finger to blur them.  

The "Brave Blue Butterfly" card is one hot mess.  Yes, it needs to be flattened, but I was in a hurry to get the pictures taken.  I glittered the butterfly with Martha's fabulous glitter and created the background with Distress ink in several colors of blue.  The silver was added with Adirondack paint.  The silver circles were made by dabbing the silver paint on to bubble wrap and using it as a stamp.  The flowers were made from a different flower stamp but same idea- book page and single rhinestone.

This loud pink and gold card was made with Golden Fluid Acrylics.  I'm not sure if it is anything but messy but I love the two colors.  It was my first try using Golden paints.  It is really loud and doesn't fit in at all with the rest of the cards…except maybe the blue card…. but I am so in love with the colors themselves I can't get rid of it.  I used some old Heidi Swapp circle stickers to embellish it but frankly it still sucks.  

"Trapped in a Book" was made with a piece of the patterned Flora card stock.  This piece was my favorite design so I used it as a base- a little bit of cheating.  I added the orange Distress ink over a bird mask.  The bird then found himself in my cage made from a Tim Holtz Sizzix die and a book page.  An 

"Authentic" stamp and a few pieces from the Flora and Fauna kit and it's a wrap!

Below we have "Exhibit A"- a much better use of the Golden Fluid Acrylics.  I tried using the cheap paint as recommended by the class teacher but I can't stand the way it feels on the page after it dries.  So rough and dried out.  I like the Golden acrylics because they are smooth on the page.  They are also very concentrated and come in bright colors… or at least the colors I can get in town.  So I had to do something more than just slap some color on.  Here I toned it down a little with white paint.  I think it is much better.  The top of the  card was cut with one of Tim Holtz "On the Edge" dies and the tree is also from his Sizzix line.  I used the blue rhinestones on the tree because I love rhinestones.  The flower was made like the other paper and waxed tissue  flowers (I promise I will show them later). 

The final card (at least up to this point) was made from more patterned paper and a few die cuts that came with the Floral and Fauna line.  The bird is a Maya Road chipboard board element and the acrylic wing was in my stash.  I added the black flower from Making Memories and more of my little single layer, text flowers.

So this brings me to he end of the "Truth Card Tour".  Please remain seated until we have come to a complete stop….Contents may have shifted during flight…. be careful already.

I have signed up for the second class in The Brave Girls Club's series "Soul Restoration II".  It starts which starts June 7th and I think it runs another 6 weeks.    If anybody out there in blogland is considering taking an online art class, I highly recommend the Soul Restoration classes.  Melody and Kathy have really done a lot of work and the class is well organized and easy to access all the components.  Questions are answered very quickly via email and the large community of Brave Girls attests to how wonderful the experience really is.

Currently I am in the middle of "Mouse Paper Scissors" learning to use Adobe Photoshop Elements.  I haven't been able to photograph my projects from this class but I will.  The class is fun and the items are very colorful and graphic.  I love doing things outside my comfort zone, don't you?

Parisian Anthology Album
Page Protectors

Oh, and don't forget that I am also taking "One Little Word" with Ali Edwards (through Big Picture Classes).  This is a year long class built around our "one little word" that we chose to represent the year.  I chose "conquer" thinking I was so cool… Picking a unique word…. Am I not the bomb?  Then we got to the February classwork… I have to take 9 pictures of my word.  How in the world will I take a photo of "Conquer"?  I keep picturing Godzilla marching through Lego City destroying everything in his wake.  Not exactly what I want in my chic, artsy album.   If I ever figure out what to photograph I will show you.  The classes is using the House of 3 album from their Parisian Anthology line.  The album has all sorts of cool page protectors.  I chose to use the Parisian Anthology paper line that goes with the album cuz I just LOVE it.  Teal, grey and cream baby…. it doesn't get much better than that.

I will be taking "She Art" by Christy Tomlison beginning in April.  It is a 3-week online course that I think everybody is taking right now.  My friend Mel is taking it and her art work has improved tremendously in just the first 2 weeks.  She must be so proud of the beautiful art she has made for the class.  I hope she has great words of wisdom for me.

That's it for now…. I still have a few pages from the SR workbook to share as well as my foray into art journaling.  Then I can show the "Mouse Paper Scissors" and "One Little Word" projects.  I am planning a cool banner for grandma, some kick ass jewelry, Easter/Spring colored flower pins, my Easter Eggs…. so much to do- so little time.

Laters...