SCACD New Rubber Stamps and Digital Releases Hop!!! :-)

Hi everyone!  I was asked by Susana from Susana's Custom Art and Card Design to create some mixed media art using some of her new stamps that are being released today!  I'm so excited to share these projects with you and to be a part of this blog hop with some other amazing artist. I will share their blog links below.  Be sure to visit their sites and if you get lost along the way just click here to return to the store blog for a complete list of the other participants.

Today Susana Loves Stamps is releasing another new round of these unique, fresh and edgy rubber stamps due to the response from the premier MechAnimals stamps.  Along with the new MechAnimals there are some fabulous new Far East and floral inspired rubber stamps being released today as well.

SCACD Digital is also releasing today a fun little gaggle of digital ghoulies that scream fun and sweetness!  You can check them out HERE! 

First up is this awesome, steampunk praying mantis....we've been seeing lots of praying mantis here, so I was really tickled to get to work with this new design.  

SCACD Stamps Used:

Eye on the Prize - Praying Mantis and Sentiment

Perfect Poppy Pods

This is an 8x10 inch canvas that I first covered with some wrinkled up deli paper to give it that good textured background.  The flowers were made by layering several pieces of book paper that I cut into different sizes of circles and sprayed with color spray.

My second project using SCACD items is an art journal page that I created on a piece of mixed media paper.

SCACD Stamps Used:

Sugar Zen Skull with Sentiment and embellishment for the eye sockets
~Please note that you must purchase both the
Sugar Zen Skull and the Sugar Floral Skull
in order to receive the "Remember When" Sentiment~

Other items available at SCACD:

 Dies by SCACD - Sun and Moon Statement Corner

 Crafters Workshop - Susana's Arrows Stencil

I colored the image in with Copic markers.  I created the background by first collaging on some old papers and then used the stencil with some modeling paste.  After it was dry, I sprayed it with several color sprays and some liquid watercolors.  I used the die cut on a piece of book paper that I then sprayed with color sprays before adhering it to my page.

Now, be sure to go visit the other artist that are participating in this blog hop:

You should have come from Kathi's Blog - Kat's Tales of Stamping & Scrapping

You are here ---> Dianne aka Packer Di of YouTube - Country Life in the Big City

Now head on over to Suzanne's Blog - Scrapbitz

Again, you can find all of the NEW rubber stamps- MechAnimls, Far East and Floral Stamps - HERE.  If you are looking for the latest Digi's, like Sweet Goulies and others, then check them out - HERE.  

 International friends can get these new rubber stamps at Quixotic Paperie-http://www.quixoticpaperie.co.uk/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=12_104  

Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you enjoy your ride along the SCACD Blog Hop!

Take care,

Dianne

see things my way - an art journal page

Well, I got my art area all rearranged (more on that in another post lol) and was able to do a journal page yesterday. Whoo hoo!  Felt great and I'm loving my new set up!  My journal is ALMOST full!  I think I have maybe 3 pages left.  I'm so excited!  

It's been a super crazy week here for us.  My girl GG started kindergarten on Monday.  Monday and Tuesday were half days and today is her first full day at school.  I'm still trying to get that to sink in. lol  The past two days have felt like she was just back in preschool, but now she's going to be gone all day.  Wow, is it ever quiet around here!  That girl can TALK! lol  But, I sure do miss her.  So does my little guy.... Plus, I have a senior. Where did the time go??? She has big dreams....she wants to go to Columbia College in Chicago or the Kansas City Art Institute.  Ugh. I'm not sure if I will be able to handle my baby girl leaving home, but so proud of her!  It's so crazy to have one in her first year of school and have one in her last year of school at the same time!  It really does put life into perspective though with my little ones.  I see first hand every day how fast time goes and how quickly they grow up each time I look at my big kids.....sigh.

So here is the page I created yesterday.  And, you can watch me create it on my YouTube channel. :-) Lots of yummy texture on this one.  Oh how I love color!

Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you have a wonderful day!

di

A Game Piece Tag

This weeks challenge in a group that I'm in is to use game pieces on a collaged tag.  Thank goodness I saved all of the pieces from games my kids have had in the past.  I have a large, plastic tub full of play money and cards from various games and I was finally able to use something from it.  I have it on a shelf in a different part of my basement and had honestly forgotten that it was there. lol  

You can watch me create this tag on my YouTube channel

The silliest thing that I did for this tag was to use dried globs of acrylic paint.  The other night I peeled of a big smear of paint off of my non-stick craft mat and thought, hey I wonder if I made some of these if they would work in a collage!  So, I grabbed a few colors of craft paints that were already sitting on my desk, squirted a blob on my craft mat, smeared them around a bit, and the left them there to dry.  When dry, they easily peeled off and I used my mat medium to adhere them to my tag.  I will say that after they were covered with the mat medium, the paint started to get really soft and gooey and when I did try to move them, they wanted to stretch and tear.  So, it's best to figure out where you want them, glue them down and then leave them be. ;-) 

Thanks so much for stopping by!

di

ramblings and an art journal page

I have another crazy, crazy week going on here!  I'm back to trying to blog daily with Effy and her August Blogalong! ;-)  I am desperately trying to get into Back-to-School mode, but it's not going too well.  I LOVE summer vacation, because we have no schedule....then again, I LOVE school days, because we have a schedule.  Makes a lot of sense, huh? lol  I guess what I mean is that by the time we finish up the school year, I'm very ready for the freedom of summer vacation and by the time we finish up summer vacation, I'm really ready for the set schedule of school days.  I am afraid I've passed on being night owls to most of my children, so summer vacation means a lot of late nights around here.  Now we all have to try to start going to be earlier, so that we can function in the morning as soon as school starts.  Staying up late is a nasty habit and I wish my kids weren't so much like me. lol  

My to-do list is pretty long this week.  I HAVE to can up some corn salsa (my FAVE!!!!) no matter what.  I have 12 ears of organic sweet corn waiting for me and they aren't going to wait forever.  A dear friend of mine came up with a somewhat copy-cat recipe for Trader Joe's corn salsa and it's divine.  I can eat a jar of TJ's corn salsa in one sitting, so making my own is very helpful to our food budget!  My 17 year old daughter starts her senior year on Thursday. I'm really not sure how that happened. lol  She has always been my little girl and now she's an amazing and talented young adult with dreams of going to college to major in Art.  Little Miss GG, she's all grown up now remember because she's 6, she gets to meet her teacher on Thursday night and then starts kindergarten on Monday.  Wow, that's going to be crazy, too.  She's my shadow and DOES NOT stop talking.  EVER.  She even talks in her sleep sometimes.  It's going to be SOOOO quiet around here and very strange not having her around.  I know that my little man is going to miss her terribly.  He's two and he wants to go to school with his big sister.....morning drop-off's are going to be full of lots of tears.  My quest to get healthy still hasn't started. lol  I'm hoping that getting back into the school routine will help motivate me into better lifestyle changes for myself as well.  I did get a lot of yummy veggies at the farmer's market and I need to start fixing those up.....I just need to start.  Plain and simple.

I was able to make it down into the dark pit of our unfinished basement to work on a journal page the other night.  To make matters even worse, the bulb went out in one of my desk lamps, so it was really gloomy down there.  And, it's a complete mess.  I'm hoping to spend some quality time down there today and possibly move my desk to a different wall.  I need a change down there.  I can't wait until that area is finished, has real floors and painted walls.  Oh, and a ceiling. lol  Oh well, I can't complain because at least I have a space to create.  That's all that matters, right? Anyway, I'm really tickled with the journal page that I created....I had no idea what to do, just knew I needed to push some paint around, and this is what I ended up with.  Oh, how I love how creating soothes my soul......

Click here to watch me create this page on my You Tube channel

Lyrics from Crazy- by Gnarls Barkley

Thanks so much for stopping by! 

di

A Collaged Tag

Hi everyone! Well, I totally fell off of Effy's daily August blogging wagon....it's been so busy with trying to get things ready for school to start, not to mention some more birthdays happening!  But, I have been able to spend some time in my "studio" and I completed this tag the other night for a FB group that I'm in.   It had to have collage on it as well as words/letters and wire/string/yarn/ribbon etc.  I used some great vintage goodness on this, including newspaper from my hometown that my mom gave me the other day.  It's from December 28, 1946 and has an article about my mom's uncle who was killed when he was hit by a train.  I kept that part for my genealogy work, but have lots of old, yellow newspaper to play with now.  I also pulled out one of my old Holiday Magazines....I think it was from January 1955....and used an image from it.

You can watch me create this tag here:

The flower was made by cutting out random flower shapes from some book text in different sizes.  I then sprayed them with a few colors of spray, went around the edges with distress ink, wrinkled them up real well and then assembled the pieces, big to small, pushed a brad through the center, and there ya go....a great shabby flower!  It's topped off with a piece of torn fabric that's tied on at the top.

Thanks so much for stopping by! I'm working on uploading a watch-the-process video of the journal page that I created last night...so be sure to stop by again tomorrow to see photos of that page! 

Take care,

di

sacred ground....

Well, I feel like I'm running out of things to say. lol  I think it's just because I had another wild day and I'm just worn out.  I really need to go down and try to do some art.  I know that it will help calm my mind so much, but there are so many other things that need to be done instead.  Laundry for one.  Ugh, I loathe doing laundry.   Not to mention keeping my house clean, cooking meals, taking care of my little ones...it all adds up and then there I am not making sure that I made some time for just ME.  As a mom, that's a really hard one for me to deal with.  I tend to get that mommy-guilt if I do something or buy something for for ME.

Speaking of doing things for ME.....my little GG has always been totally terrified of the idea of riding in our VW buggy with the top down.....until this past week.  She turned 6, you know, so she's all grown up now.  So, there goes my one last thing that I had that was just all mine.  First it was Borders/Barnes and Noble, then JoAnns, then Hobby Lobby, then Whole Foods, then Trader Joe's....and then Dick Blicks....*sigh*.....and now riding in the buggy.  This means that whenever I mention it, she wants to go, too.  And, it's not all mine anymore. lol  How selfish am I for feeling like that? I know I can still do those things, of course, but they once used to be my sacred ground where no kids had ventured with me. lol

Besides that, things are as busy as ever.  I have a long to-do list that I really need to start working on.  I'm hoping that tomorrow I will be able to be home all day, no errands to do, and I can start focusing on important things that need to be done.  Mainly, finishing up some traveling canvases that I'm a part of.  I have 3 to work on and get them into the mail by this weekend.  I'll try to post some pictures of them tomorrow!

Take care,
di

one of those days.

Day 4/31

Yep.  It's been one of those days where I wonder if I'm going to make it through being a mom of two little ones again. My little guy (he's every bit of two) just didn't have a good day.  He was grumpy and if he wasn't grumpy then he was being ornery.  That made out trip to Home Depot and Costco quite interesting.  Let's just say that I really don't need anything else to make Costco on a Sunday afternoon any more worse than it already is. lol  He finally took a long nap and after he woke up, then GG had to start in....she's 6 and acts like she's 16. lol  By then I just wanted to go lock myself in my bedroom closet and hide until morning.  My older kids are 22, 20, and 17, by the way. lol Just a bit of a difference in age from the two little ones. ;-)

Obviously, I missed the memo that the conga line was forming on the kitchen counter top last night....at least I got a picture..... 

 As the FlyLady would say....this is a major "Hot Spot" in my house....

Needless to say, no art happened today. Somehow I did manage to get my desk in the kitchen cleaned up.  It's a big catch-all in there and most of the time a mess of papers.  It's just the easy spot to toss everything.  I actually have it set up to work on my collage journal at.  I have all of the supplies that I need to work on my collage journal right there in the middle of the house, the perfect spot to be so that when I free moment opens up or the kids are playing, I can sit there and create.  Everything else is in our basement and it's unfinished and just not a fun place for the kids to play.  They do have a desk down there, so they have a great space to create art long with me if they want to.  

The best part of my day is that I had about 10 minutes in my car while I was waiting for my husband to run into the store to finally start reading this book.  I picked up a used copy on Amazon and it's in excellent condition.  I think my total bill was under $4.00.  It's even a signed copy!  Too bad my name isn't Margarite. ;-)  I know I've mentioned before how I want to focus more on doing more meaningful journaling and I'm hoping that this book can inspire me.  

So, it's kind of been one of those weekends.  I think a lot of it is just let-down from the chaos of the past few weeks.  Moving my Mom was huge and I'm still recovering.  I've been just exhausted and mentally drained.  I am really, really worried about her, too.  This move was completely her choice and we didn't push her to come up here in any way.  But I still feel terribly responsible for her and her happiness here.  She left her home town.  Her friends. Her family.  Her favorite church.  Ugh.  I keep telling myself that I'm not responsible for her happiness, that it's up to her....she wanted to be here by me and my family, by her 5 grandchildren.....but I'm still feeling the pressure.  And I feel responsible for her well-being, too.  She wasn't answering her phone the other day and after several hours I started getting worried.  She was sick with a cold and then I started remembering her saying that she didn't like to take baths anymore, because she was afraid she'd slip.  Well, her new apartment has a tub and no walk-in shower, so you can imagine all of the horrible things that were running through my head.  Visions of the lady from that commercial, "Help! I've fallen and I can't get up!"....or worse.  So, I jumped in my car and drove over as fast as I could.  She wasn't home! She was at the store and didn't know where her phone was.  Ugh! I thought I was going to die with worry on that drive to her apartment!  She's not used to people checking in on her like that, so of course she's used to just getting out and doing whatever she wants and when she wants. lol  We obviously have a lot to adjust to.....a lot. lol

Well, that's enough rambling from me for today.  Tomorrow is Monday.  It's a new day.  Hopefully I'll get some sleep tonight and the little ones and I will have a much better day tomorrow.  Now to go curl up on the couch, under a nice warm blanket, and hopefully spend some time with my nose in my new book. ;-)

Take care,
di

Painty fingers....finally. Blogalong 3/31

Day 3 of Blogalong w/ Effy!

Well, after a couple of long weeks of not being able to really create anything.... 

I'm happy to share this.....

I was afraid it wasn't going to happen either.  I had a some precious free time open up yesterday evening and finally snuck down into my basement where my "studio" is.  (No, I didn't get all of the things done yesterday that I had planned to do....moving those things on to today now lol)  I hadn't sat at my desk in weeks.  And, then I just sat there.  Ugh.  I felt dry and uninspired to do anything at all.  And it was frustrating me like you wouldn't believe.  I wanted to create something.  And, worst of all, I NEEDED to create something.  Anything.  I really didn't care what I did.  I just was desperate to feel that paint under my finger tips.

So, I grabbed one of my journals.  It's almost full and there are just a few pages left in it to create on.  I found a spot and went from there with no intentions at all.  I just didn't care.  I just needed to feel that breath of calm that I feel when I work in my journal.....These pages already had lots of paint on them and quite a bit of texture from the red, heavy body acrylic paint.....leftovers from other journal pages....next step was to cover it with a bit of gesso....a good place for me to start when I don't know where to go or what to do.....painting on that white gesso is soothing to me and helps my mind clear...

So I did that and then wiped some of it away with a baby wipe and let it dry....

The next thing that I decided to do was to start gluing things down.  I love to glue things and it's kind of freeing and for me, it somehow starts breaking down those walls and sprinkles water on that dryness....I grabbed my box of paper scraps and added some music paper and book text.

And then I added some scraps of deli paper that had been used to lay spray-covered stencils on and just sop up extra sprays and paint while working on other projects.

And then things started to happen.  A lot of neon paint actually. lol  I decided to paint a girl and before I knew it, there she was and I had forgotten to take a few photos along the way.....

I rubbed in a lot of different neon paints and regular craft paints onto the background, then added some stamped book text, color sprays with some stencils and finally used my brayer to add some white, acrylic paint.  And, a good rubbing around the edges with a black ink pad.

I was using some deli paper as my pallet and couldn't waste all of that good paint, so I squished it into my journal....

 This will be a fun one to work on....talk about color. lol Maybe I should challenge myself to not cover this with gesso before starting....

And, here it is, all done....

So, if you learned anything from my sharing this, I hope that it is to not give up when you're feeling dry and have no inspiration.  I think that each of us has something that helps get that spark going and starts to open the door to let our Muse out so she can play.  Mine is putting down some gesso/paint and gluing down bits and pieces.  I think it's also important to just sit down and do something.  Anything.  And with no preconceived intentions at all.  No stress.  No worries.  No feeling like you have to create a masterpiece.  Just sit and do something.  When I do that, then usually wonderful things happen!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a wonderful and creative day today!
di