Foxglove's Mixed Media

Hello again, everyone!   Man, it’s been a while since I last posted.   It’s a challenge to juggle work, home life, make and edit video, write blog posts AND have fun creating, but I hope to do a better job with it. So much (artsy-wise) has happened – more swaps, more cards and look!    I bought a 2-lb grab bag of stamps from Viva Las Vegas Stamps (their online store is here .)     This is a bit out of character for me, as I am wary of grab bag and random bulk buys.   In my head (and I know this isn’t always the case), I associated “grab bag” with “things that didn’t sell.”   I did some research online, and I didn’t see where other people had recently posted their grab bag hauls – I was worried about getting a bunch of political, religious, or super-basic stamps, but in the end, I am glad that I took the leap and ordered them. So can you guess how many stamps is in a 2-lb grab bag?   152 stamps!   Wow…that’s a l...

Hello, everyone!  I am back with a couple of more artist trading coins for you.  If you're new to "coins", these are 2.5" circles that you art up and trade, just like the artist trading cards.  These two were quick to create and uses mostly Tim Holtz products. To start off with, I mushed various Distress Ink colors into my craft mat and spritzed it with water. For the tree/sunset, I laid the ink down in rows: first a yellow, then pink one, and last a red one. (Forgive me - I made these weeks ago, and I don't remember the exact colors I used.)  I spritz with water and moved the mixed media paper through it with one smooth, slow swipe.  For the blue on the right, I laid down colors in various blues and blue-greens. I dried everything with my heat tool, and then pulled out some background stamps by Seth Apter and Bo Bunny and stamped randomly with archival inks. From here, I pulled out stamps that I felt would make a nice silhouette.  The red/ora...

Hello, everyone!  Sorry - I couldn't resist the urge to throw in a Wizard of Oz reference.  :-) Today, I have an artist trading coin, four inchies and four twinchies to show you.  For those who don't know what these are, the "coin" is a 2.5" circle (you may also hear the term "artist trading circle", the inchies are 1" square, and twinchies are 2" square.  I do want to apologize in advance - I don't have has many in-between photos today.  I use my phone to take pictures of my projects in progress, but for some reason, the phone doesn't always save the pictures.  They just disappear.  I don't know what's going on with that, but it's getting pretty frustrating.  Anyhow...moving on... I will start with the coin - I used my 2.5" circle punch to create the circle from Canson mixed media paper. I pulled out my Distress Inks in Iced Spruce and Peacock Feathers and mushed them onto my craft mat.  I spritzed them ligh...

Hello again!  I am back, this time to show how I made the Artist Trading Coins pictured below.  The Coins continue to be all the rage amongst the mail art traders, and I personally really enjoy working on a round shape. Aren't they cool?  I love how they turned out! (I say that because most of the time, I don't know where I'm going when I start a project, so sometimes there's no telling how something will turn out!) Anyhow, I started with a 5x7 sheet of Canson mixed media paper and Ranger's Tim Holtz Distress Inks in various colors of blue and the Iced Spruce color.  I mushed one, two or three colors onto my craft mat, spritzed lightly with water, and dragged the paper through the wet colors.  By dragging the papers, I get a nice smooth blend of colors.  Because I had so much ink left over, I pulled out some blank Artist Trading Card mixed media paper to sop up the extra inks.  I dried the papers between each layer, did another drag-through w...

I first heard about Artist Trading Coins (or circles) from the trading site ATCs For All.  A wonderful crafty artist Craftyhodges first posted about it on her YouTube channel here . She explains it, but for the purposes of this blog, it's a 2.5-inch circle that you art up, exactly like Artist Trading Cards (ATCs). I am in the midst of creating some more, so I will eventually share some pictures of the process, but in the meantime, here's a photo of what I submitted to the trading forums. Top Left: I stamped the bird onto Japanese text paper and colored it with Tim Holtz Distress Inks. covered paper with a layer of Mod Podge and set it aside to dry.  I then re-stamped the bird onto plain paper so I could mask the bird.  I then stamped the cherry blossoms and colored them in with Faber-Castelle brush markers. I glued it to a cardboard base to give it some thickness (formerly known as a Mt Dew box) and drew sketchy lines around the outer edge. Top Right:  I do...