New direction

  I have been off the grid for a bit but it seems God still has more creative journey in me. Since my last post I have slowly been drawn back into the Art world. It seems the rest from teaching and painting may have been in his plan all along, for I feel excited and see beauty all around me now. I have also been preparing to retire from work which will allow for new and exciting journey for me.

Journey where, you say? Certainly not to the extent of where art and teaching took me before. But with a new title of “All Creation Lives to Testify to Gods Wonder and Power”. Where that leads only He knows. For now I have spent time observing this power and beauty from my School Bus window and put down some of the everyday views from my bus window. My route allows for some rustic scenic spots to daily watch through the season changes. I have a beautiful barn at the bottom of a large hill and decided to see if in pen and ink and charcoal could still bring out its charm. This was so much fun. Doing detail drawings and using only the pen and value to present an objects charm and in this case peaceful feel was a real joy.

I plan on doing this beautiful barn in watercolor and also posting additional bus route photos in the future. 

Gods beauty is any were and everywhere if we only take time to look.

 I got in a bit of trouble at work for helping direct other drivers in viewing clouds and have been called the Cloud Watcher. So this will be my new title. Go out and be present for sunrises and sunsets and until next time keep watching for beauty all around you.

Until next time
The Cloud Watcher

Palm trees or no Palm trees

This was a lot of fun between friends. We went to Nashville In. to one of my favorite Scrapbooking shop and bought a lot of Stampscape stamps. Was that the fun part, no, it was the fact that I hate Palm trees and refuse to buy or entertain the thoughts of Palm Trees.

You say well why is there a Palm tree in this new stampscape card. Yes, you are quite right. My friend Gloria who loves Florida and Palm trees has refused to accept this rejection of Palm trees so behind my back she bought this Palm tree stamp. What was I to do, be rude and refuse to use it. Oh what the heck, whats a Palm tree or two, If it makes my friend happy.

Fun with Mistakes

I have so much fun with some of these backgrounds but this one below I just didn't like. The color just seem to grab the paper and was to bold. But I have always told my students never let a piece of paper defeat you. So I was bound and determine to try and make this work. What I really didn't like about the background was the bright pink.

Ok so I was wrong the pink was hug parts of making this stampscape really have some drama. I tried to tear paper pieces that looked somewhat like Teton Mt. Well I'm not sure I got that part done, but was really happy with how this not so pretty background turned out. Never through away background pieces before you try and work with it. It just may turn into that surprise beauty.

                        Fun Backgrounds

  I am still investigating Stampscapes card scenes. I truly love this fun technique to creating  scenic landscapes.  After years of teaching landscape painting this is something anyone can learn to achieve. The snowy hills were done by using a piece of stick-em note paper that was torn and used as a stencil. Just plain fun and quick.

The dock scene was done by using children markers that were scribbled on a acrylic block, mist with water and then lay a piece of card stock on the block. This technique is just great. You are never sure what you will end up with. Both of these cards will make nice peaceful scenes for Sympathy or Thinking of you cards. They are also great for the more masculine  look.

I have spent years painting landscapes with oil and watercolors and this fall right in line with this love of for freezing nature on canvas or cards.

I plan to investigate different background effect, from alcohal ink, pastels, and anything else I can get my hands on.

Sometimes it is good to create for yourself a idealistic world were peace and beauty are the overwhelming factor to take a rest in before we jump back into the real world. 



Until next time
The Cloud Watcher

New Direction

If one will allow themselves to accept new direction or thoughts, life can be just down right exciting. I have not posted for awhile but here I am at it again. I have just discovered the love of Stampscap cards. It allows me to use my love of art, watercolors, stamping, and card making. Is that possible, it seems so. So we will just see were this go. Hopefully it will be so long before my next post.

Woooo Hooooo!!! I have a Secret. Spring is coming.

How am I so sure, with snow still on the ground, flower beds looking lifeless and ugly with debris, that spring is on its way. I mean the ground hog says, Oh, I don't care what the ground hog says. Let me show you what I found in my flower garden.

Surprise Lilies

 

Daffodils 

Crocus's

So Don't tell me Spring isn't on its way

My sister will scream Hallelujah

I will keep all of you updated on this breaking news and the search for spring. 

Now to my New Years Resolution and celebrating two months of keeping it  going.   Here is the fun part of this resolution. I made some rules to go by and they are my rules and I can change them if I want to and do feel the, want too, urge. 

Here is the thought behind my need to alter my plans. I read something the other day that said " Knowing more and having more can at times stiffly creativity". I thought on this for a while and decide it may be true.  If you only have a few things to work with and must create several scrapbook pages and cards you would begin to think of more creative ways to use them. OK I'm game for it. I picked several stamps, 4 by 5 paper stakes, cutters and two tinplate's and decided I would use these for a month. I'm not sure how I feel using other odds and ends but I'm ready to give this a try. 

Right off the bat I feel like I have had my arm tied behind my back. Two or three stamp sets, What Was I Thinking. Get over it Kathy and just start thinking out of the box. Here is the pleasant side of this new choice. The last two month when I found a hidden treasure I had forgotten about, used it  and then moved on to my next hidden treasure and I felt unready to put this new tool or cutter away. 

 

 I am determined to use all the stamps on this set even the ones that seem unusual.

My first attempt was using a tinplate I had used some but didn't quite get the feel for some of its designs. Well, it was not to bad.

I had used this part of the template before but only this design. One of the blogs I follow had a challenge of embossing so I put the two together and embossed the background.

 

I use the design on the bottom left and the next card I used the one on the upper  right but I was not thrilled with the look of the second when done but went ahead and used it on a card and it was OK. You will see more of the use of this tinplate this month. 

 

While we are still waiting on spring go out and look for a few signs for yourself. It is very uplifting.

Have a Great Day

Kat

2nd Addition for my "Close to Your Heart" friends

Winter seems to still be enjoying its visit so I will just keep playing in my workshop. I decide to try something a little different. You know me I get easily bored with the same technique or same approach to something. So I remember the complete thrill I got taking marbles and some reinker to accent paper and just need another real kick. Now that I have a bit more of the coordinating reinkers, paper and stamp pads I got one of my "Close to My Heart" ideal books and at random pick one of their cards and color choices and said lets run with it (I wanted to use the latest book but spent an hour looking for it and it must be in my very active black whole. I hate it that I seem to spend way to much time hunting for just what I want. I must be a little more flexible and just go with something else and maybe that may end up being better anyway).  The colors this card used was Goldrush (this looked rather orange to me when placed next to the Hollyhock), Hollyhock, and Olive.

 

OK, if you forgot my overly exciting experience of making pattern paper with marbles then you need to go back to January 4, 2010. But a short reminder is to put some reinker and marbles in a plastic container and add a scrap of paper to the top of the box, now shake for all its worth. I was so thrilled with this that I put it to music, no I did not include a video of the experience, but a picture will have to work. 

 

No one can say I don't incorporate exercise in my work experience. 

When this was finished I seem to like the colors on the small cards, but it was not until I pulled out the matching papers that I seem to have a problem. The basic problem began with the fact I rarely use pink or orange for that matter but together, well this could be a problem. Well, you ask why in the world did you choose them in the first place. The answer is very simple, if you will remember I said I went to the "Close to MY Heart" ideal book and  RANDOMLY choose a card and its suggested colors. 

 

OK, so this must be part of the creative process, learn to work with what you have and maybe my creative genes will grow, probably not but maybe Hee Hee!   I went to drive my bus and came back, pull out my thinker statue (Isn't he cute) and  looked at it for a while and said, its the orange paper I'm really struggling with, so I will just us a very small amount of it. The pink paper, I'll just soften by having some fun with soft white background print on it. 

Woo Hoo! I think I like this so lets keep going with it. I found a cute picture of my daughter at 2 yrs old (why you say because she had a pink dress on). I went to some of my sketch layouts and found one I thought would work. The green was easy to use and yes I even found a place for the orange. My marble paper just became a nice accent on the side of the picture. Because all the colors of the ink, paper and stamp pads coordinated the marble pages seem to just tie everything together.I even used the orange to add Pam's name, the orange seem to help draw attention to it even thought the letters were small.

 

I used some of the marble paper to make the flower's. Then the corners and top and bottom frame I used the olive and a heart punch. I seem to have this obsession with the items that are left when I punch these things out and this time they left these tiny hearts. Oh my goodness I can't throw them in the trash so I retrieve them put them in my little glue machine and you see in the close up how cute them turned out. Thrifty, Thrifty, Thrifty ladies, waste not want not.

The letters were chip board and I didn't have an "i" so I used my marble paper to make one. 

OK what is the moral of this story, well so what "Close to My Heart"s color choices were rather good after all. I even like the spark that the orange gave the whole thing. No I will not be using a lot of this combination in the future but it was fun all the same. 

It goes to show how important it is to get out of your comfort zone at times.

Have a wonderful Saturday