We blog, we bake.
We craft, we create.

Friday 9 November 2012

Mixed Media Ex'bear'imenting

Hello there, Horace here to entertain you today. The team over at Smudgy Antics have come up with another fabulous challenge, this week it's TIc Tac Toe. Now I must admit to feeling a little confused at first, I didn't have any tacs, my facial tics are not for sharing, and my toes were definitely NOT for showing on a public blog!!!

BUT! Wilbear took me aside and explained that I should read the challenge properly, not just the title, and on second perusal I discovered that the idea was to choose three in a row of the suggested techniques. What fun.
I was so excited at the prospect of playing with my journal, I rushed straight to the desk, knocking over Mr. Headly in my haste, and causing him a fatal injury!




Oops! Someone call an ambearlance!
Anyway, I chose the first line down, as Wilbear does when he begins his crosswords, this consisted of:

Paint
Distress
Hardware or metal

To start, I foraged in the bits 'n' pieces box...




I found this fabulous chipboard puzzle alphabet, which set off a creative spark.




To comply with the challenge, I selected masks, acrylic paints and distress inks, and began to create....




I dabbed various colour distress inks through several masks, onto my blank page,




building up layers. then I added splodges of acrylic paint with a foam brush, misted with water, and let them run away with themselves.




There was a stage where I wondered where on earth I was going with my page! I thought it was best to carry on and see where my creativity took me though. After all, if it doesn't work, it can be Gessoed over!! What a weird mess of mist and paint effects below, I call it art-vomit!!




I used Mod Podge to adhere some elements to the page. I love Mod Podge, as it dries completely clear, and can be dabbed on liberally.




Here's my mid-craft mess. I 'borrowed' some of Wilbear's jigsaw for my project. I hope he doesn't want to use it any time soon.




I added some journalling cut from Sizzix Alphabets, we had various bags of pre cut letters waiting to be used.




I thought the page needed more background decoration, so foraged in the stamp box. In my excitement, I leaned a little too far, and fell in! Ouch. (Please excuse the bottom shot! Podgy thought it would be funny to record my little mishap.)




After climbing out, I finished off my page by adding some background stamping, and a stamped sentiment, 'live for the moment'.

The die cut letters on the right hand side have been distressed in purple, to match some of the masked background. To comply with the metal or hardware element of the challenge, I added a key in place of a word.




While creating my page I discovered a new technique - dab kitchen roll on your distress ink pad




and press over the top of chipboard for another distressed effect.




Here I am with my finished page. The wording says




'Life is a big puzzle, the key is to live for the moment'.

After looking at my page a little more, I decided there was something not quite finished about it, so I took a trip to my local scrapbook store, Papermaze, and spent the last of the bears' pocket money on a white gel pen, to highlight my journalling.




A close up of the left hand side




And the right hand side




I'm still not sure about my page being finished, but hey, art is one big ex'bear'iment, and this is my grunge attempt!! ;). I could always gesso over it and re experiment.

Thanks once again to Smudgy Antics for coming up with such interesting inspiration for me, at this rate I'll have my journal filled before Christmas.

TTFN (time to find new jigsaw for Wilbear!)

With love from the bears.

10 comments:

  1. Oh WoW - how cool is that. I love the textures and beautiful colours. It sure does look better with the white pen outlining the text :-)
    I hope Mr Headly has recovered from his nasty accident ??!!!
    Thank you for joining us at Smudgy Antics this week :-D xx

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  2. It's wonderful. I shall try to live for the moment all this weekend, in appreciation of your talents.

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  3. This is really good. The finished effect with the white pen is much better than without it :) well done Horace. I hope the ambearlance made it in time to save Mr. Headly! xx

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  4. Marvelous journal work! I love the textures and colours! The white pen was the perfect item to make the journal words pop. I adore your step-by-step photos and your creativity! I do hope Mr. Headly survived his accident. Thanks for sharing with Smudgy Antics :)

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  5. Brilliant! I think Mr Headly needs some duct tape! Really love your page so much colour and patterns it's great. Thank you for playing along with us at Smudgy antics xxx

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  6. Fab beary crafting, as usual. Can we have an update on Mr Headly's condition. Your incident with the the stamp box made me chuckle (I had the same issue with one of those big freezers in a supermarket once - a member of staff had to pull me out!). I have bought some gesso, so will be starting on my very first journal page soon. Must get some Modge Podge - forgot it when I was at the NEC. Ali x

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  7. Absolutely love these pages, Horace (though I am somewhat paralyzed by concern for Mr Headly)... fabulous colours and shapes - the jigsaw motif works so well throughout - bravo!
    Alison x

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  8. So creative, looks fab! Thank you for joining Smudgy Antics tic tac toe this week!

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  9. awesome pages, the white gel pen really finished it. Love the colours

    thanks for sharing at Smudgy Antics

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  10. Wonderful journal page I love the colors and the theme.Thanks for playing with us at smudgy antics.
    susan s.

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