2019 #13 Mushrooms: Melancholy Moments with ESC {by Jennie Atkinson}

2019 Topic 13: Mushrooms

Jennie's projects always have a serene, calm to them. I guess her colour palette is very soothing! But when you read through this post and the steps of each layer, it makes you realise the creative details are more in depth than would first appear! ~Leandra

Hi everyone, it's Jennie (Live the Dream) with you today sharing a small panel for our new theme. 

Mushrooms always remind me of sleepy, hazy, autumnal days so I have used Scrapcosy's wonderful mushroom stamp as a centrepiece for this small textured hanging. After my very colourful retro project I am now back in my normal comfort zone of the browns! but they are very good for creating a more ethereal dreamy feel.

I really love this autumn set from Raquel and along with the accompanying stencil are my go to autumn set. The mushrooms have always been fabulous for layering and are easy to cut out, but for this hanging I wanted to stamp on text paper. I have also used another stencil from Raquel along with  a small mini numbers stamp to create the interest behind the main features of the hanging.

ESC05

PS065

PS074

Mini 23

I find the easiest way of creating a blended background on grey board is to use the brayer. I coated the board with gesso first and used just two colours of Fresco Finish Acrylics - Chalk and Toffee - working the brayer across the board to get this faux fresco finish.

Once dry more interest was added by using the texture paste through the Harlequinn stencil and adding some stamping with Potting Soil Archival Ink (second generation stamping - ie stamping off first before stamping onto the project). You can see that I first always stamp a little spot which will later be hidden to check the colour ..... which was a good idea as the stamp was upside down!

A technique I learnt from Lynne Moncrieff (Adorn) when using text paper is to give it a light wash with Fresco paint which has been watered down a little. I used Chalk.  This provides a good background for the stamp both in terms of visual quality and to stop the ink bleeding into the paper. Despite being stamped on old text book-paper I have not lost the beautiful detail of the mushroom.

For the collage elements I have used little pieces of textiles and cardboard which have been highlighted with a little stamping from Alison's Autumn Edition Sayings.

EAB04

I love being able to find a small word from one of the phrases which I then stamp onto old book paper (the edges around the page) and then tear around the phrase very carefully.

Finally I used more texture paste through the stencil to provide an unobtrusive title. I wasn't too sure whether it would sit well over the text paper which hadn't been glued to the edges but it worked very well and a note for the future that the paste is another way of holding elements onto a project!

A small autumnal hanging which could hang anywhere given it's subtle colours. However I think the design and techniques would also work well with orange/red/yellow paints, inks and textiles for a more colourful hanging.

As always thank you so much for joining me and I hope you love using these stamps as much as I do.

Jennie x

Blog: Live the Dream