It gets greener day by day....

Hi you all! It hardly seems possible that another week has passed and it's time for Paint Party Friday, hosted,  as always, by Eva and Kristin.

I published a photo on my blog yesterday that showed the first green leaves on the tree in front of my window. Today when I got up, everything was green - I could hardly believe my eyes. I am so glad that we have spring!

I am sharing a painting this week that I did a couple of weeks back, using an old canvas that I found in the paper recycling bin. It had different bits of paper and some cardboard circles clinging to it. I decided not to remove the bits, but just to paint over them. I used lots of layers of paint, scraping some of them off, stamping into them, heating and bubbling the paint in some parts -just experimenting to give a grungy look. I wanted it to look like old walls where frescoes are still visible under many layers of more modern stuff. It didn't turn out quite as I would have liked it, but this is the result.

I certainly had fun with it, especially as it was a canvas 'sent' to me for nothing, so to say. 

I also got some happy mail today - 2 postcards from 'Liberate Your Art', which I will blog when I have received them all, and some nice post from Katie and Debbie, which I will share tomorrow.

Till then, have a good day, take care and thanks a lot for visiting!

Can you see what I see?

Hi you all! Last week there were no leaves on the trees, which wasn't surprising considering how cold it was. But today I saw them - little green leaves shooting on the branches, a wonderful sight after such a long winter!

I have made some more journal pages. The background has been painted with blue and gold metallics, and then sprayed with some blue and green inks. When it was dry, I stamped the background using my fave script stamp in blue, and embossed it with perfect pearls gold. You need the light on it to see it, but it is there. It gives a lovely shimmery and rather floaty look to the background. I also used my diamond stamp to add some patterning along the sides.

Then I used a stencil to ink in the ivy leaves with forest moss. For the main image I chose a 'photo' of a little girl, stamped with a scrollswork image onto glossy, cream coloured paper to make it look like a real photo. I matted the photo with scraps of old book pages and hand-written pieces. I added some vintage floral scraps and some lace, and then some blue rub-ons to frame the image. The text has been written using a 'stencil' made from the waste of a sheet of alphas - I like this size. I used a grey-blue felt-tip and edged it with a gold gel-pen.

I am linking to the following challenges:

Fashionable stamping, (journalling) Simon Says Stamp and Show (background stamping)

and the Craftroom Challenge (text, sentiment) and  Artful Times (masks and stencils)

And here is another sneak-peek at my WIP....more to follow.

Nearly forgot - I was chosen for the Top 5 for the recycling challenge at TIOT - woohoo!

Have a great day, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!

Happy Mail and a sneaky sneak-peak

Hi you all. When I got home yesterday I had some happy mail waiting for me. The first packet was from Really Reasonable Ribbon. I won a voucher at Try it on Tuesday to spend, there, so ordered lots of ribbon. I now have a wonderful supply of different sorts of ribbon and jute band, seam binding and twine etc., so will be able to use them in my crafting soon. First I need a few days just to gloat over them.... Aren't they all pretty?

The second letter was from Carolyn, who makes beautiful digital and 'real' crafting, and she sent me some of her oriental stamps, which made me very happy. My 'oriental' department has always been rather non-existent, so I am looking forward to inking the stamps up and playing. Thanks a lot, Carolyn, your kindness is much appreciated. And the beautiful card is also made by her.

And this is a sneaky sneak-peek of what I have been working on the past couple of days. I will show more as it progresses!

Have a great day you all, take care, and thanks for visiting!

This and that and the neighbour's cat

Hi you all! Today I am sharing the altered paper-clips I made for the challenge over at Out of a Hat Creations. The typewriter is from crafty emblies, and the hearts are made from embossed die-cuts (thanks Carolyn!) and will make a nice book-mark for people who like romantic stories. The wooden floral heart is also from C.E. and has been treated with Inka gold; the bow is from a chocolate box. And of course, I needed to put an umbrella man in my collection - one side painted and stamped, the reverse plain white.

And as it's time for Tag Tuesday already, here my tags. Our letter this week is 'O', so I chose o for owl. The tag has been made from cardstock covered with craft paper. The owl is from LaBlanche, and the other bits and bobs from my stash.

The second tag shows a drawing I made of the Lesser Spotted Owl, (Strix Spottica Minor) a bird often seen here in Rhineland. There is also a Greater Spotted Owl, (Strix Spottica Major) which is, of course,  larger, and  has bigger spots. It also has a jazzy head feather, brown-white in males and pink-white with sparkles in females.

That's all for today! Have a good one, take care, and thanks for visiting!

PS: The neighbour hasn't got a cat, but it rhymed so nicely with 'this and that'

Moos on Mo(o)nday and other stuff

Hi you all! Over at Moo-Mania the theme is numbers. When I was standing in my bathroom this morning, I saw the little perfume bottles on the shelf - all empty, unfortunately - and decided to take my inspiration from Chanel, a perfume I love and which I would love to be able to buy again. I used some of the old advertisements, and my perfume bottles as props.  My printer is not behaving itself just now, and printing everything with stripes, sorry about that. 

Chanel No 19

Chanel No 5

Chanel Love Potion No 5

And sometimes Carolyn sends out an 'art-spark' - a little piece of a painting to play with. Here is what she sent out:

I turned it and doodled on it and this is what came out:

The colour difference is probably because of printing it out and taking a new photo.

Have a sweet-smelling day, take care, and thanks for coming by!

The face of the night

Hi you all! It's hard to believe, but today the temps soared to 15°, and we saw the sun. Tomorrow should be even better, so I am really hoping that the loooong winter is over and that spring is springing.

I have made another journal page today. I started this a couple of years back. I used half of the painted sheet then, and decided to finish the second half today. I did my usual dripology outlining, this time with a silver Edding pen, which I also used for my profile, the stars and to outline the silhouette.The black parts have been given some sparkle with soot black stickles, but you can't see it here.

I am linking to   Art Journal Journey, the landscape within me.

I baked a lemon cake yesterday, onto which I squeezed more juice while it was hot, so had to spend some time eating cake and drinking coffee. Sorry, it didn't survive long enough to have its picture taken!

I saw this beautiful rainbow yesterday evening and had to take a picture through the trees. I did my best to damage the table while diving to the balcony, but don't worry - no damage done; wish I could say the same for me toe!

Have a good weekend, take care, and thanks a lot for coming by!

Journal pages and a pink owl

Hi you all, hope the weekend will bring you time to rest and relax and have fun!

Here are some journal pages I am linking to the challenge at Fashionable Stamping. I started off by painting the background with some blue left over from another project. and then it got sprayed and dripped, as usual. When it was dry I added the second layer, using stencils from CWS - chicken wire, numbers and peacock feathers. Then I stamped in the stars and the sprays of leaves with clear embossing ink and embossed it with gold perfect pearls. The next step was to outline some of the drips and shapes with a gold gel-pen before adding the quote with a stencil. Here I wrote the words with gold and outlined them in black. The picture is a photo of my great Auntie Fanny, taken in 1918. I just added a small strip of lace and gave her a flower in her hair,  which was something she loved.

And this little piece is an owl bag topper. I found the instructions on the internet, it's quick to print out and colour. It should have been attached to a bag with a present that I want to give tomorrow, but I have mislaid it  - hope I find it on time! I coloured the eyes with pink and black glitter gel-pens, added an extra beak and some lace 'feathers'.

I am  linking to Manon's 'Paper Saturdays'

Have a good weekend, take care and thanks for coming by!