Tip In with a Twist Journal Page Swap

Yes, that's a mouthful!
I've joined yet another swap on Craftster.org and this time it comes with a twist. We all were required to pre-purchase a Cachet brand watercolor journal like this one from Dick Blick art supplies in a 5"x7" size. The plan: to "art-up" your own cover and post it, then we get partners and swap pages to go in our journals. It was along the lines of numbers and letters but we are free to do anything we want.
The plan I initially went with for my cover soon went completely by the wayside but I'm very happy with the way it and the back cover turned out.
Here's the front. I still need to add some wording into the top left corner but this will basically be it. I used mostly acrylics with some pencils and outlined with a micron pen. I also used a bunch of watch parts (gears) an oil board stencil, the letter 'z' and some dimensional letter beads.

The back is basically the same as the front with alot more of the watch parts (gears) but I used the prismacolor pencils more here.

More Halloween ATC's

The Red Pages Are Done!

These were most definitely the hardest ones. I had no idea where I was going with them. No plan or clue on what I wanted. I started with the base of some music and washed it down and then used my spiffy new harlequin stamp on it. Funny thing is, you can barely even see it.

Then I was stumped...completely. I had to walk away from it for a couple of hours. Then very slowly, and I mean slowly came together and then BAM they just took off. I had the two ladies up on my inspiration board for a couple of weeks and they were simply staring at me when it dawned on me that they were what I needed for these pages.

I'm very pleased with the way they turned out and I'll be putting them in the mail today. She should receive them by saturday I think. They are traveling within the US so shouldn't take too long.

Halloween ATC's

Yet another swap on Craftster.org that I could not pass up and who doesn't like Halloween anyway. I received 4 partners for this swap with varying likes. I, of course, picked the ones from their list most suited to my tastes and went from there.

The first one to leave for a new home is George. He is a homely guy just looking for the right woman. He's not had much luck on the dating scene, even going so far as to join an on-line dating service. He didn't get any views on his profile.

Tip In Journal Pages

Totally a new addiction for me. I joined the swap on Craftster.org having never done this type of thing before and I have to admit, I'm hooked! I've finished 4 of the 5 so far. The fourth will be sent out on Tues. October 8th. The sets were to be in the color choice of each person and had to be monochrome. Boy was that harder than I thought it would be.

My first set was orange. Not so hard, right? Actually, it wasn't as difficult as I ended up making it but I like the way they turned out.

My next set was turquoise and I immediately knew I wanted to make them mermaids. I love the sparkly sequins. I love how the fun fibres on these make it totally feel like water. These pages also started off differently than they ended up. I had originally used vontage Life photos but you can't see any of those left after I finished painting them.



My third set was muddy green or olive. These are by far my favorites. I really like the freedom of the Zetti style. She said she liked rock music so I felt like incorporating the lyrics from a Metallica song. I loved the mood that they set for these. I'm really loving my little zetti bird and believe he has become my unofficial mascot of sorts.

They went all the way to Spain and judging from the e-mail I got, they were very well received. She said she LOVED them! Yay, I'm so happy!










The tree tops I ended up using fabric swatches that I had laying around that I sewed sparkly sequins to. Very tactile.


The fourth set was off-white, cream, ecru or any non-color close to it. These were by far the hardest pages yet. VERY hard to tone down a color that has none. I'm very pleased with the way they turned out. My partner has yet to receive them but she should soon. I will know wether or not she likes them soon.

I'm now getting ready to start work on the last set. These are to be red. I think that these will be my biggest challenge yet. I may need help....