Egg-stra Special Design

Hi Ladies,

I am still bubbling with enthusiasm over that crop in Sulphur, LA with the 2 Crafty Chicks, Wendy and Amy. Amy does another crop in march in Alexandria, LA called Croppin' on the Red. (Just sayin')

So, in my unwillingness to have only cookie cutter ideas, I drove myself a bit nutty trying to come up with an idea. I really wanted my own paper. The previous ideas were too color saturated to be a background. Or so I kept telling myself. To get the colors I wanted and the look I wanted, I was going to need white as the bulk of the design. Which I believe is called white space. I should have prefaced this with, "I have no design training." :)

That being abundantly clear, I checked out some zentangle and doodling books from my local library. I tried many different designs. I quickly realized that this art form takes lot of practice which translates into lots of time. Fast forward to an easy design choice. EASY is a relative term. They suggested starting with a 5" x 5" paper. Did I listen? No, I am on a schedule. Did I draw circles? No, I can make my own design! Arrogance my be part of the invention process. I thought I was good enough at .... at what? No, I am just an experimenter. <SIGH>

So, I used egg shapes instead of circles and I used 12" x 12" water color paper instead of ANYTHING else. I sketched a border in pencil leaving about a half inch around the sides and made the it about 1 1/2" thick. I then went about spacing the larger eggs around so that they looked balanced, but not uniform. I drew in the other odd sized eggs moving outward from the larger eggs and rotating the paper every 5 minutes or so, in order to keep from clumping sizes together. I found that as I got tired the eggs got bigger because I wanted to finish more quickly. DAYS later, I was finished drawing eggs and started watercoloring the eggs. (Disaster struck, as I am no watercolor expert either, and I panicked. Blah, blah, blah, and in the end I moved on.) Then I used my Micron pen (5) to color in around the eggs. I cut out my border and mounted it on white smooth cardstock.

Molly did the matting of the picture while I made the GOOD egg.

And that, my dear friends, is not even the end of this story. Not even close. Molly, who loves all things original with a twist, scanned this border into her computer and manipulated the colors. So, she has an original design for her scrapbook. For detail, click here. She can tell you more about the technical info than I can. She knows more about Photoshop and deign than the law should allow, but I am NOT jealous or anything. (Heehee)

Until next time, take what you need and leave the rest.

Willy Wonka-ness

Inspiration was everywhere!

I recently attended the 2 Crafty Chicks crop in Sulphur, LA and it was fantastic! We crafted, swapped, photographed, shopped, giggled, and ATE. What more can a crafty girl want?

Can I share with you a little of my adventure? YAY!!! Here goes….

The theme was Willy Wonka Presents Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  Wendy, one of the gals that throws the shendig, made a two page layout that we could purchase to put our fun photos on. I have way too many photos for one layout and I like to have something of my own originality. I did purchase her kit and I used her kit to get an idea about the color scheme she was going for in her props and shirts.

I went to my local Hobby Lobby and bought cardstock based on what I could see in her layout.

I then took my Dylusions sprays in those colors and some stencils that I liked and I got busy creating.

I stamped the beakers using an Inkadinkadoo set that was made for Halloween and stamped them on orange and hot pink, sprayed paper.

           

I wrote on the original background with my favorite Willy Wonka quote. I took that to a copier and sized it for a postcard (4.5 x 5.5) which turns out to be a quarter of a letter size sheet.

I put the beakers on and copied it again.

The colors are a bit muted compared to the original, but it turned out perfectly for the project.

I will save my other original work for the crop for my next post. Come back to see what Molly did with it as well! That girl has mad computer skills!

Until then, take what you need and leave the rest behind!

Belinda <**>

Introducing my blog!

Hi Ladies! Belinda here with my first blog. I have so much to share with you and I hopefully you have so much to share with me as well. We have plenty of folks to blame if this all goes sideways, but until then let's hope for the best.

I can't really say where it all started, but I can fill you in on recent events that led to this blog. I follow a few crafty folks in Instagram and I found myself finally realizing what I like. You may have that all figured out, but I am a jumble of crafty hopelessness that wants to find a home. So, I found this pile of books in my home and I think I have found some things I really like and want to share with you.

The one on top is how to be on social media and is really motivational. It is super easy to read and makes sense for a novice. If you are not wanting to start a blog though, skip it.

The second from the top, Eat Clean Stay Lean, is a book put out by a magazine. It is also easy to read, but it is one heck of a guilt trip. If you like food and would like to hide from your health or any health issues, don't read that one either. (Turning into a pile no one wants very quickly isn't it???) BUT, if you are looking to eat better for a better life and need to cut to chase, this one is for you. My daughter loves this book and we should probably purchase it. Covering all sorts of food choices, from rice and tortillas to meat choices, this one is going to be the topic of several blogs this year. Making tough choices are not my favorite thing to do, but a necessity.

On to the craftiness! Most of my posts will be about my crafty, artsy endeavors. I find crafting lifts my mood and connects me with my soft yet strong side. I have always been a doodler, but always only a few things. The repetition of a pattern soothes me nerves. (There is probably a few therapy sessions in all of that, but who has time???) So doodling is something I have been trying as well as hand lettering. I think of words more than I do pictures, so my doodling will probably be with letters.

These last two books on the pile are fun ones if you want to join in that quest with me. I checked them all out of my local library. And since I work at the library, it was convenient too. Oh, and did I mention FREE? Free is my favorite. I will fill you in on that as well as the year goes on.

Thanks for reading. There will be more updates and reasons to laugh very soon. Until then, take what you need and leave the rest behind.