GD: Lelainia Lloyd Project #3 Hope

"Hello everyone, Lelainia back with my last project this month ... WOW what a quick week that was! I decided to make a small piece of art". 

It was my first time working with Grunge Paste and I can honestly say I am now a fan. I LOVE the way it came out looking like a very old piece of stone. I can’t wait to play with it some more! I would highly recommend watching Leandra’s how-to stamp into Grunge Paste. It was super helpful, especially if you’re new to using Grunge Paste like me.

I began by applying a thin layer of Grunge Paste to the Hanging Chunky Board Small, using my pallet knife. I was careful not to have it covering the sides. When I got any spilling over, I just scraped it away with the palette knife.

Next I took the cursive stamp from Eclectica ESN10 and spritzed it lightly with water. I rubbed my fingers over the stamp to help the water work its way down into the grooves of the stamp. This helps keep the Grunge Paste from sticking to the stamp.

ESN10

I stamped down into the Grunge Paste. It took a couple of impressions to make sure the entire surface had the cursive writing covering it. If you don’t like how it looks, you can always smooth it over with your palette knife and try again. Just make sure you re-wet your stamp before trying again. (I stamped mine twice before I was satisfied.) While it was waiting for my chunky board to dry, I washed my stamp to get any remnants of Grunge Paste off before it dried.

Once the Grunge Paste was dry, I painted over it with Pewter. I also painted the sides of the chunky board the same colour.

Next I chose a found feather from some I had lying around my studio. I cut a 3 inch length of Prima Trim and applied double sided tape to the back. 

I centred the feather and used the trim to attach it to the chunky board by laying it across stem of the father and wrapping it around the back on both sides.

I masked off the “Hope is a waking dream” stamp so that I could single out the word “Hope” and stamped it on a scrap of Smoothy White Stamping Card. I cut the word out as a rectangle and then ever so slightly rounded off the corners with my scissors.

I used a charcoal pencil and outlined the edges of the paper, smudging it with my fingers as I went. I like to do this to give some definition to the word and also to help the paper blend into the piece better. I applied some double sided tape to the back and added it to the chunky board, just below the feather.

Lastly, I added a metal number “4” from the Prima Vintage Trinkets collection, gluing it to the left of the bottom of the feather, using Aileen’s Tacky Glue.

That’s it! I thought this made a sweet little reminder that there is always hope. I’m going to hang it in my studio.

~Lelainia~

A huge thanks to Lelainia from PaperArtsy HQ for creating this little gem. Grunge Paste is such an awesome medium to work with as you have shown here from the detailed image of the stamp. A lovely home decor piece. Thanks Lelainia for sharing your artwork with us once again. Good to have you back.

We would love you to join in with our monthly challenge. If you are inspired by any of this month's guests who have blogged between Sept 1st 2014 and Sept  30th 2014 then join in and link up your creativity HERE. You will go in the draw to win a voucher to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. You need to add your link by 19:00 (London time)  Sept 30th 2014

GD: Lelainia Lloyd Project #2 Journey Tag Book

"Hello everyone, Lelainia here with my next project as Guest Designer. I’ve learned that if I don’t write things down, I won’t remember them! What better way to help keep organised than by creating a small tag book to jot down all those important thoughts, ideas and dates"?

 These giant #10 size Manila Tags (8 ½ x 4 1/8) lend themselves perfectly to this!

I started by laying a thin coat of Turquoise paint down on a piece of ephemera. I just squirted the paint right onto the paper and used my brayer to spread it out.

I let it dry completely and then applied a layer of the London Bus paint the same way.

This is where I worked quickly because once the paint was spread out, I used a very soft bristled brush and flicked large drops of water all over the paper. I wasn’t very careful about it-I just kept dipping the brush in water and flicking it over the paper. Now came the hard part: just letting it sit for 5-10 minutes. The water will pull up the top layer of paint as it sits, revealing the layer below in a very splotchy, painterly way.

Once it had a chance to sit, I used a sheet of paper towel to dab at the watermarks. You want to be sure to dab, rather than wipe, to have the effect work properly. 

This technique works best using two paints that are high contrast to one another so you can really see the reveal. I gave the paper a quick blast with the heat gun to make sure it was dry.

Next I took the tag and using a stylus and my ruler, scored the folds to turn it into a book. I lay the tag so that the side with the hole was on the left. I measure from that edge, inwards ¾ of an inch and scored. Measuring ½ inch further in from that score line, I scored another line.

From the right side, I measured inwards, 3 ¼ inches and scored a line. From that line, I measured another ½ inch inwards and scored it. Using my bone folder, I folded and creased all the lines.

Next I covered the tag using the painted paper I’d made. I generously applied UHU glue stick and lay the tag on the wrong side of the painted paper. I just let the pattern fall where it may-I like things wabi sabi. I smoothed the paper with my bone folder to make sure everything was adhered properly and then trimmed the excess paper away. I did the same thing to cover the inside of the tag as well.

I used EEV06 and ESN10 with Black StazOn Ink and Martha Stewart Snowflake Ink to add some extra yummy layers {Of course you could use Snowflake Fresco Paint to create the same effect} .

 EEV06

ESN10

I took the "Journey" metal tag from the Prima Mechanicals Plate and Label Set and using my finger applied a bit of Turquoise paint. I used a paper towel to wipe most of it away and then applied some Snowflake and Hey Pesto paint and wiped it away too. The idea was to make the metal plate look antiqued.

Next I cut some 6 ½ x 4 inch pages for inside the book and folded them in half, making a good crease with my bone folder. I did 3 signatures of 8 pages each. I used a simple 3 hole stitch to sew them in. There are some instructions for that here which you can print off and follow.

I finished the cover by gluing the Journey plate to the front, being careful to make sure it didn’t end up under the little fold over on the cover. 

I looped a 12 inch piece of pretty fibre through the hole to hold the book closed. I like books that have a flap and a fibre loop because as I fill them up, the can get quite stuffed. The flap and the fibre loop helps to keep it all together. Another option would be to use a thin piece of elastic cording.

These little tag books are so easy to make, you could create a few extra and stash them away for little gifts to give any time. I think they’d be really fun done up in all kinds of colour combinations.

Try pairing these combination of Fresco Paints for around the year seasons/themes.

-London Bus and Snowflake (Valentine’s)

-Spanish Mulberry and Yellow Submarine (Easter)

-Beach Hut and Limelight (Summer)

-Tango and Little Black Dress (Hallowe’en)

-Orchid and Little Black Dress (Paris)

What other colour combinations can you envision? I would love to hear what you all come up with.

~Lelainia~

A huge thanks from all at PaperArtsy HQ. This book is the perfect size for jotting down important info/life stuff, I don't think you are alone with this Lelainia hehe. Again you have chosen a striking colour combo to work with and the added layers of the bold background stamping makes everything else "pop". Liking your train of thought on the colour combinations i.e Spanish Mulberry and Yellow Submarine.

We would love you to join in with our monthly challenge. If you are inspired by any of this month's guests who have blogged between Sept 1st 2014 and Sept  30th 2014 then join in and link up your creativity HERE. You will go in the draw to win a voucher to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. You need to add your link by 19:00 (London time)  Sept 30th 2014

Welcome Semester 3 GD: Lelainia Lloyd Project #1 Mixed Media Bunting

"Hello from the west coast of Canada! I’m Lelainia Lloyd (that’s pronounced “le LANE ya” in case you were wondering) and I live just outside of Vancouver, British Columbia. I have been very happily married for 24 years this October and we have a 23 year old son who has left the nest. I am also mum to a beautiful 6 ½ year old black Lab named Indiana Jones. When I am not making art, I am busy doing advocacy work, volunteering, writing and mentoring.

I discovered mixed media art in 2001, after a serious knee injury forced me to spend a lot of time sitting with my leg propped up to recover. I started poking around on the internet and eventually joined a mixed media/altered art swap group. By chance, one of my swap partners happened to be Leandra who it turned out, liked what I was doing. She surprised me with an invitation to join PaperArtsys design team when the company was first launching back in 2004. I accepted and the rest, as they say, is history. Last fall when she invited me to do some design work for Paper Artsy again, how could I say no? I enjoy working with her products and she has always been so good to me. I am very happy to be back"!

Hello September! I always look forward to Autumn. When I was thinking about what project I would lead off with, I was inspired by the idea of the first day of school where you’d walk into your new classroom for the first time and it would be all fresh and clean and decorated by the teacher. Seeing that always made me excited about the possibilities of everything I would be learning. I thought it might be nice to freshen up our art spaces with a pretty mixed media bunting, in the spirit of September’s new beginnings.

I began by cutting a triangle template from a piece of laminated cardstock that measured 4 x 6 inches. You could use cardboard scrap to do this. I traced 7 triangles on Smoothy White Stamping Card and cut them out.

Next, I used my brayer to apply Tango paint to half the triangles and Beach Hut to the other half, leaving some white space for a second colour. Once the paint dried, I added Yellow Submarine to the ones I’d painted with Tango and Limelight to the ones painted with Beach Hut. I worked the paint to minimize any obvious brayer lines. The idea was to have it look almost tie dyed.

To build up the layers, I added the Mini Well Rounded Stencil 6x6 Crafters Workshop Stencil. I used Cherry Red on the yellow/orange triangles and Orchid on the blue/green ones. I used a small stiff stencil brush which worked really well. I found that it’s better to use a minimal amount of paint on the brush as you work to get a cleaner result.

I added additional layers with stamps from Ellen Vargo EEV06 and the circles from Sara Naumann ESN10 with Black StazOn Ink. 

 EEV06

ESN10

Sometimes I blotted a bit of the ink of the stamp so the imprint was less intense. I wanted the stamping to look more organic and less “perfect”-I think it’s more interesting that way. I also want to mention this was my first time working with the Smoothy card and I LOVED how it took the paint and inks-everything stayed crisp and bright. I’m sold!

Once all the layers were done, I used my sewing machine to zig zag stitch around each triangle to essentially outline it. I love sewing paper-it’s fun and kind of meditative.

In order to string the bunting together, I needed to have some sort of “string”. I could have used some pretty fibers, but I decided it would be more festive to use torn fabric. I had some lime coloured fabric that I thought was fun. I tore a strip about 1 inch wide x the width of the fabric and stamped it again with Black StazOn Ink.

I lay the fabric strip out on my desk and laid out the triangles, alternating the two colours. I left a bit of space at each end of the bunting for hanging. When I felt I had them spaced evenly, I folded the fabric in half lengthwise and sandwiched the tops of the triangles in between, pinning them with straight pins. I sewed down the length of the bunting, using a zig zag stitch and backtacking at the start and end, to secure everything. I snipped each end of the fabric and tore it a little ways up just to finish the ends off nicely.

At this point, I was happy with how it looked, but I want to point out that you could easily add letters-either stamped ones, stickers or rub-ons to spell out a word, a name or a message if you wanted to. There are also so many delicious Fresco Finish paint colours, your options for colourways are endless. 

If you wanted to make a longer bunting, you could always tear several strips of fabric and then sew or tie them together. I also think it would be fun to get together with a group of friends and create a bunch of triangles together in different colours and then swap so everyone had a nice variety to string together. 

If you have other ideas about how you would adapt this project, I’d love to hear them! Better yet-show me! 

~Lelainia~

A huge thanks to Lelainia from all at PaperArtsy HQ ... It is a real pleasure to have you back in the PA family and we are all looking forward (old and new followers alike) to being inspired by your art once again. The bright zesty colour palette looks so fresh and uplifting, Smoothy is the ideal medium to keep colours true. The addition of the trim and stitching adds that extra dimension to this project.

We would love you to join in with our monthly challenge. If you are inspired by any of this month's guests who have blogged between Sept 1st 2014 and Sept  30th 2014 then join in and link up your creativity HERE. You will go in the draw to win a voucher to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. You need to add your link by 19:00 (London time)  Sept 30th 2014

September Challenge {2014}

September Challenge {2014}

From this point forward, our weekly challenges is now a monthly one. 

We would love you to join in. We know our designers come up with utterly fabulous ideas, and often this makes you want to have a go and play along too. So go and make something, blog about it and share the link so we can see what you've been inspired by!

If you are prompted to creative-action by any of this month's guests who blog between Sept 1st and Sept 30th 2014 then join in and link up your creativity to this post.

You will go in the draw to win £50 (this includes VAT and postage) to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. (Think of it as £40 prize with £10 to cover the VAT and postage costs, worldwide) 

You need to add your link by 19:00 (London time) Sept 30th 2014. Please ensure you are familiar with our guidelines below

Challenge Etiquette:

1. The challenge is to show how you have been inspired by our designer(s) to try a particular technique. Your entry should contain:

- a mention of which designer inspired you and why, and 
- a link in your blog post to that designer's original post on the PA blog.
The whole concept of this challenge is 'play along with us'. You are encouraged to put your own twist on ideas you see on our blog, don't feel obliged to copy an idea exactly.

2. The link must come directly from the specific post on your blog where you have explored the technique/ idea mentioned in point 1 above. You cannot link to the home page of your blog, or we will be unable to find the post to leave you comments. (NB. Linking to your home page also looks like you are spamming us to drive traffic to your blog)

3. Spam links will be deleted. We did have someone who linked to a competitor's product launch/ website, so it does happen.

4. We prefer your post is created exclusive to our challenge. Multiple challenge links in one blog post is poor etiquette and generally makes you look like a blog-candy grabber. We know you have busy lives, and it's easier to do multiple links, but from our point it can result in a conflict of interest. 

5. You are welcome to use stamps/ products/ substrates you have to hand from a variety of companies, we do not expect you to exclusively use PA products - but of course it's lovely when you do! Try to be sensitive to these things :)

6. You can enter as many times as you like. We don't want to restrict your creativity or participation!

6. Entries can be inspired by any post on our blog for the duration of that same calendar month.

7. The winner of the random draw will receive a £50 credit to be redeemed on the PaperArtsy Website. We request that one of your purchases is an A5 rubber stamp. You can add any other items to your basket, but the final total (including VAT and postage) must not exceed £50 The voucher can only be used once, so you must redeem it in a single transaction.

8. The first day of every month (in this, the Challenge post) is when the winner of the month will be announced, also, in the same post, the link for the new month is posted. It's your responsibility to claim your prize coupon from Darcy: email her darcydotneedles@hotmail.com

9. Good Luck! If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!

Welcome to Semester 3 {2014}

The Times They Are A-Changing!

We love sharing with you through this blog, and all the wonderful people whose work we are able to showcase through it. We always try each semester to make it that little bit better. Darcy, Gillian and Leandra are always chatting about new ways to inspire people, so we like to use each new semester as an opportunity to make a few tweaks in our quest for PERFECTION! LOL Is there such a thing?

This post is a head's up of the tweaks for this, our final semester of 2014. Where did the year go?

1. Challenges

We are shifting from a weekly challenge to a CALENDAR MONTH challenge. The reason? Challenge admin on a weekly basis for Darcy, Gillian and PA HQ is pretty full on, so operating on a monthly basis is much easier for us to manage.

The challenge will open 7pm on the 1st day of month, and close at 7pm on the last day of the month. That's easy to remember right? There will be a post go live on the 1st of each month at 6:30pm (so that it doesn't interfere with the 7pm routine) called 'September Challenge', 'October Challenge' etc, so you can expect one of those in about 30 mins.

As with challenges in the past, you can link any new item you have created in direct response to a PA blog post you have seen during that calendar month. Just make sure to link your work to the exact night that inspired you, and explain why you were inspired by the designer that night, and how you made your item. Full guidelines are given on the challenge post itself, so just take a look to make sure you are aware.

The prize gets BIGGER (of course) so every month we are giving away £50 to spend in the PaperArtsy retail shop on items of your choice. NB the £50 includes VAT and postage, so think of it as a £40ish value prize and the remaining £10 should cover the VAT for UK/EU people and postage costs (no VAT applies to Rest of World people).  Obviously the postage value is affected by the weight of what you put in your basket, and where in the world you live, but I'm sure you'll figure it out!

If you are a challenge winner, just email Darcy (she is the challenge supervisor), and she will explain how you can claim your prize from our website! Awesome!

2. Weekly Line Up

Our semester runs for 4 months, as you know, and we have 4 Guest Designers (who you don't know *squeak*...I wonder who they could be...), we have tweaked the order of the nights their posts go out ... the monthly challenge means less pressure on the weekly line up (whew).

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we will feature our fabulous Guest Designers who rotate on a 4 week cycle. The 'Guest Designer' intro will be included in their first project post on the Monday evening.

The Guest weekly rotations follow on from each other, even when there is a 5 week month, and we always end up with a gap at the very end of the semester. The gap in the 3rd semester finishes earlier than usual...but that's good, as by the time Xmas is here we are all crazy busy anyway!

We also have other 'random' guests during the week, they might be past guest designers, special famous people, or very special #PAtwit people...whoever they might be,  this semester they will feature on Thursday and Friday evenings. (how exciting)

That leaves the weekends free to feature our very own Signature Stamp Designers, a rapidly growing crew!

We also have other things to fit in and around the few odd gaps we might have left; videos, retailer interviews, posts about shows we are attending, surprise competitions, new product launches and so on.

As usual, all post go live 7pm every night of the week (London Time).

3.The Week Ahead

• As today is the 1st of September, at 6:30 we will publish the 'September Challenge {2014}' post with information regarding the challenge guidelines and expected etiquette. We are not big on rules, and there isn't really any great change, but it is appropriate that we make it clear what we expect. This will be the post to which you link your blog to ours for the entire month of September.

• At 7pm tonight, the first Guest Designer of Semester 3 will be announced by Gillian (Gillibobs, as you know, is the Guest Designer boss/supervisor). Suffice to say tonight's guest is someone who we have worked with off and on for many, many, many years :) We love her! In an hour, you will find out who she is!

So all in all a busy night ahead! We hope these minor changes meet with your approval, and we'll catch you all again very soon!

~Leandra, Gillibobs and Darcibobs