Another flower page

I love how this turned out. 

I did a few things on the background, 

Small back dots.

Bigger white dots.

I was also going to fussy cut the flower like I did

on this page, however, I really

like the background in the picture sooo....

It must be kept.

Had that little gnome painted already and

it had purple in it.

A simple sentiment completed it 

AND

How about that bee.

 

Throwback

So yeah yeah I don't do enough about me.

Not sure why either.

However, we shall endeavor to do better.

Maybe....

 Those flowers were fussy cut from a 12x12 paper

and then I popped them up. 

I was in Michael's and found a stencil

with those adorable fairies - you'll be seeing them

a lot on the granddaughter pages.

Using the packaging technique I splatted 

watercolors all about and then the title - sigh.

I really couldn't think of one so

 I found #throwback

that really works for the throwback photo is of moi.

So that was me back in 1984 - still sporting a Farrah 'do

in my natural color.

That was 2 years after Nick was born.

Life was going really good.

There's a tag tucked in the bag that I haven't

journaled on yet. It's perculating on the back of the brain right now. 

Studio Calico.

Driving down the road

They look like snap dragons to me.

You see that bee?

 I love bridges.

 And mountains.

 And tunnels.

 Trains and cars and barges.

 Rolling roads and mountains.

 and Plateaus...

It never gets boring down the highway in the state of Washington.

'Twas a Banner Day!

 
Notice anything different??? 

My feet are wearing the same shoes. Woohoo!!! Good news on the footfront. Its healed; yet tender and tired. The caveat is to wear the sneakers until it aches and hurts, then break out the boot. I wore shoes for about 8 hours, moving around, but not bouncing off the rafters. and I'm good with that for a first day. Bonus!!! I don't have to sleep with it on anymore.

And then!!!

My first purchase of Basic Grey Warehouse box.

Its kind of like a grab bag with an attitude.

It wasn't what I thought it would be. 

I was thinking more lines, howevever, its about the

warehouse getting rid of old product to make room for the new.

I'm sure I'll be using quite a bit of this as Basic Grey

has always been my go-to line.

Especially when the mojo tanked.

The package of alphas - are alphas from all the lines and the embellishments

are the same - got stamps, bling, rubons, flowers, and enamels.

Lots of goodies.

The album is adorable - really adorable and I'll probably

dither about doing something with it because its 

really really adorable. LOL!

Watercolors, stamping, and paint, oh my

And here's Amelia - the wild child. She's sooo funny and serious. We had a great time on the playground, and being basically grounded by the boot , I thought I was pretty fast in getting some photos. Amelia can be loud and demanding. Knows what she wants and goes after. She can be sweet and also talks in a demonic voice. Her personality blows me away.

So this photo was perfect for a page of its own.

Therefore, continuing in the mode of actually pulling together the stuff I used, but NOT telling how I used it - here ya go! I used the watercolors with my watercolor pen - which I love. (Its filled with water with a brush on the end and you just squeeze the water through). I also mixed and mushed the colors around til I got colors I wanted. I KNOW. Surprised me toooo....

I used a charcol color ink to stamp with and then colored in the flowers. I drew the colors from the photo; the pink and teal/blue. The Yellow background just made the photo pop and some pink enamel puffy dots.

I used a sissix die for the branches that I jazzed up with watercolors as well. Yellow washi.

Studio Calico of course.

OH OH and you can barely seeeee but there is pencil doodling above the photo on the left.

I didn't do that.

What I did do was doodle with a pencil on the left toward the bottom and also from the branches down to the flowers in the corner on the right.

Swoon.

My darling sweet eldest son surprised me

for no particular reason and bought me a Sigma 30mm f/s 1.4 fixed lens. Totally blew me away and I'm beyond thrilled. Its his favorite lens and he thought I might need one as well. And I've had the best time playing around with it. I have to tell you I.Love.It. However, I'm used to a zoom/telephoto so I'm shocked when I have to actually get closer to the subject.

 I had a great time practicing. I haven't taken it off since I got it. And I need to practice WAY more. I collected these pine cones from my back yard and they're still hanging out though it may lean a bit toward Christmas. Well okay totally Christmas however, pine cones never go bad.

Love the lighting and how fun is this dancing daisy - all run by sun power. As long as the sun is shining and hitting the solar panel these babies dance all.day.long.

And how close I can get - more light and shadows. This poor foliage has been doing well despite my best efforts to kill it through neglect and high hopes.

Here is a Christmas cactus that will hopefully make it through neglect and high hopes because it doesn't need as much attention as the rest of the needy plants do. Like water on a daily basis.

Check out this new pineapple coming up. Its about our 8th in this season. Can't wait till it ripens. We have the best tasting pineapples ever. All organic. 

And fun flowers in front of the house. I can't remember what these are called. Love yellow.

And weeds. Who knew they could be so much pretty. And I love the depth of field. 

Watercolor and enamel paints oh my

Some more instagram love going on and its a fun photo of Amelia. I used bits and pieces of left over papers for this and love and the transparency was a fun addition. I started the base with flinging paint around - 3 colors; grey, pink & reddish mist. I forgot to take a photo of it mostly because it was taking FOREVER to dry and I was getting annoyed. LOL.

Most of the paint has been covered up.

 What I wanted to point out was the golden color - I took the idea from Ashli (SoaphouseMama)  when she used it to highlight this page she was making and it added that little something to it. I used it at the bottom to help highlight that area. This was the 3rd alpha thickers I pulled out - getting frustrated with the lack thereof of alphas I needed. I did a play on words of the title (thanks April) in order to make it work. I only had 2 t's and needed one for cute. And I lacked an E so therefore whacking off part of an ampersand - and wa-la an E (I didn't have a 3 in the pack). Woo hooo!!! The A at the top can start off the title or just be A for Amelia (AND she's 2 in the photo). Genius. LOL!

And then a splash at the top to bring it all together. Its really not hard, just smoosh your brush in the color and then smear it where you want it. I am happy to report that I am slowly working my way through a stash of flowers that I've had forever. And I still can't remember the mfg. of the huge one - I do know its not one of the top flower makers.

Gotta few kits for the crop goin' on

Wooowhheeee!!!

Go me.

The first one was the hardest and has the most stuff

going on. And that's a good thing.

This will be a 3 photo page.

 It's getting serious now.......Have I mentioned that I scrap by the seat of my pants.
And its always a crap shoot.

This one and the next I actually did simultaneously. Boggles the mind I know. Still packing a bunch of choices just in case.

Choices can be a good thing. I know I put more flowers in this one. hmmm...

 This next one I printed an 8.5 x 11 photo

and that will be my background paper. I'm really

jazzed about doing that one.

As I'm kitting my mind, such as it is, is trying to envision wet mediums to bring.

And thickers - how many - as I have a drawful.

And textures. OMG. 

You may notice this one is a bit light. However, from the other kits, I have stuff I can pull in, hopefully.  If not, I'll be in a scrapbook store. Doesn't get any better than that.

I purchased some Halloween paper while I was there the other day and I'm hoping I'll get some pix of my ghouls and goblins in time.....

I'm also throwing in some stamps I used a bit and some inks

I use a lot. I'm also taking a bunch of Studio Calico Stuff.

They're in containers all their own.

I'm currently collecting punches, watercolors and gelatoes.

I'm needing containers.

Lots of containers.

I only get a 4th of a table.

Stay tuned.

Documenting a not so great photo

My mom loved this photo as its her sitting with her favorite doll. If she told me the house - sadly I've forgotten as I had more pressing things on my mind.

The pressing matter was how to save the photo. This photo was in a glass frame and sat for years in a window or near a window. One day the glass broke and being the keeper of all things past I was on a mission to save it.

Sadly because of "said years" in a glass frame, the photo was stuck to the glass and no amount of undu, dental floss or coaxing could get it out. And if it was to come out - it wouldn't be in one piece.

Therefore, I took a picture of it as it was and tried to photoshop - all to no avail. So I decided since my mom adored the photo - just scrap it as it is. And note in the journaling.

You may also noticed that the flowers I handcrafted here - are being used on this page. Love it bunches. LOL.

Of course some of you will know what a "stoop is". Its a sort of porch or top of stairs where you can sit and while the hours away visiting neighbors.

Moving right aloing, I put a strip across the bottom and tossed and glued the flowers on - because I'm brave that way. Then I had to figure out how to use the rest of the space. And a circle worked. Stamping some Heidi Swapp clocks on the dictionary paper was fun - and Miss Connie over at Crafty Goodies does it a lot. I found a journaling page from Creative Imaginations - really old stash, and split it up (since flowers were already in the way). And a tiny American Crafts label for fun as well as some feathers and birds.

Flower Power

This is the stamp I used yesterday on my Gram's page. I really liked it a lot so I decided more would be better.

Therefore I stamped a bunch with black ink on some white cardstock and broke out the watercolors.

Being the decisive person I am, I decided that one of every color would work really really well. Remember RoyG.Biv? That's how I remember all of the colors of the rainbow. 

 I painted out of the lines because I wanted to cut them out and it keeps the white from peeking out. However, if it does peek on out - that's what layers are for.

Broke out the Tim Holtz scissors - I love them because the big handles are friendly to my arthritic fingers. In cutting the intricate details in the flowers - that was annoying and tedious but oh so worth it, turn the paper and not the scissors.

Also don't have a death grip on the scissors like my hands kept insisting on because it just annoys any tendonitus you may have going on in your arm. 

And Wa--LA don't they rock on that paper. Hmm.....that was totally a lucky toss. 

And then I printed a photo that has nothing to do with flowers. ooooooo a dilema. 

Stay tuned......................