Saturday, July 5, 2025

Star Maidens & Christmas in July!

 Hello my ink stained friends! Today I am fortunate to share my makes for this month's theme at Gecko Galz.... Star Maidens!!

I had such fun with this theme - so many ideas came to mind, I had a hard time narrowing it down.

So to kick things off I created this fun round wall art piece. I painted the background using a variety of metallic paints then flicked on a bit of white paint to help create my night sky. The main image is from the Star Maiden collage sheet set which I printed and fussy cut to fit my very large 13" sky. 

My next project is this lovely Star Maiden door hanger. A bit of embossing to make her pop.


My next Star Maiden is this canvas piece. She is just so lovely I really wanted to make a colorful background to frame her. Added a few air dry clay embellishments to enforce the "star" aspect.


Up-cycled Gift Boxes...Originally these boxes were filled with sheets of washi stickers...well, you know how it goes - the boxes were just too nice to throw away so I decided to turn them into some pretty Starry Maiden gift boxes. 




Finally I have a pair of cards I made using various bits and bobs from my stash.  The top card is very me...blue, sparkles, shimmer but I was really stretching myself with the bottom card.  I very rarely work with oranges and yellows (well aside from Halloween) so this was out of my galactic comfort zone....hope you like it.


I hope you have enjoyed my projects for July but don't go yet...
This month Gecko Galz is celebrating Christmas in July!!

We are giving away an full collage sheet on every Design Team post this month instead of the usual single collage image. I am so excited for you to head over to the Gecko Galz blog and snag today's Christmas present...

The Girl Next Door!

I simply adore this collage sheet because you know how much I love retro, sassy ladies.  Here are a few projects I made with this sheet...





Be sure to pop on over to the blog to collect this and every free Christmas in July collage sheet this month!! Happy Crafting my friends...stay inky!!

Tuesday, July 1, 2025

Crafts Galore - Fred She Said...

 


Hello friends! New month, new Anything Goes challenge at Crafts Galore!!  If you create anything during the month of July be sure to pop it onto the blog and you could be the lucky winner!


This month the design team is playing with images from Fred She Said. I am tickled to say I was able to choose the lovely Hollyhocks image for this challenge and here is what I made...


I printed an arrangement of the different hollyhock images from the set onto a piece of watercolor paper. I then colored them using a combination of Prisma colored pencils, watercolor paints (background) and added some highlights with a marker. I then popped a bit of fence diecuts and sentiment. 

Be sure to stop over at Fred She Said to see all of their lovely digis and remember if you make anything during the month of July to add it to the list...you can't win if you don't enter!

Thursday, June 19, 2025

Conjurer of Dreams - Retro Ladies!!

 Hello Friends!

Today is my day to share my creations over at Conjurer of Dreams.

The theme was anything goes so I chose to work with all the fun retro ladies.


Bookmarks - Retro Pilots, Retro Mechanic, Retro Stewardess


A small journal made using Retro Beauty.


Guest Check Tags using Retro Diner Waitress.


And finally a set of sassy cards made using Retro Homemaker. 







Friday, June 13, 2025

June Challenge Gecko Galz

 Hello friends...I hope you have had a lovely week so far.

Today I wanted to share what I have created for this month's image challenges over at Gecko Galz blog. As I have mentioned in the past each month Gecko Galz hosts several challenges on their blog where they give you a collage image and you create something with it.

Yesterday I shared my Fantasy creation and here are the remainder...


Card Challenge - Isn't she lovely...


Christmas Challenge - this is such a jolly Santa - I wanted to do something special for him. The card background die was in the sticker deal I got a few weeks ago. It was time consuming to color it but oh so worth it.


ATC Challenge - Oh My...you know how I love cows - and highlanders no less!! I had such fun making these. Lots of layers - papers, inks, embossing, metallic flakes, so much fun!!


Steampunk Challenge - OMG I loved this image. A Steampunk Owl plaque...  He didn't have a tail in the original image BUT I had printed off 2 - one for the body and a second so I could give him dimension by cutting and adding his face over the first image with foam tape. I had the rest of the body left over from the second print so I die-cut feathers to create a tail!!  I used the cool looking stick to cover the seam.


Gothic Challenge....ALWAYS a favorite of mine!! I trimmed away the background for this image and used tons of fun stickers to create an entire story around him.  This is a journal page in my Goth/Halloween junk journal.


Finally Gecko Galz also hosts a tag challenge on their business page on Facebook. This is June's image.... He's amazing looking don't you think?  Found the perfect quote for him.


Hope you all have an amazing weekend...
take care and stay inky :)



Wednesday, June 11, 2025

Stained Glass Fantasy - Mixed Media Canvas

 Each month Gecko Galz hosts several image challenges on their blog.

Well, I've been playing with the Fantasy challenge image and oh my...have I had some fun! This is what I created....


Oh my gosh, told you I had fun... this is layers and layers of various mediums.
So to start off with she had such a lovely stained glass look to her which reminded me I had a Stained Glass 3D Liquid Lead from DecoArt


I went over her wings, dress and halo with the faux leading and let it dry.
I then painted inside each little cell with Twinkling H2O paints. If you've never seen them before they are a lovely mica paint cake that you just add water and paint. It's wonderful stuff. Adds such a lovely shimmer.


The next step might sound crazy but it really amplified the colors and texture. I used "Vintage" Creative Medium  - it's a lovely sepia toned medium that dries translucent yielding a lovely vintage hue. I used it on the dress by painting it on adding thicker and thinner layers to give it depth and "movement".


I used a clear glossy dimensional medium for the wings and halo to give them a glass like look. 
I wish you could see it in person as the texture created by these various mediums is amazing.


Finally I added some glitter glue to her collar, added some diamonds around her halo and I used mulberry flowers for her ruffled collar!! I folded the flowers in half and glued them on - it worked perfectly - it was exactly the look I wanted!

I added this image to a black canvas with a bit of gold leafing around the edges.

I tell you I love it when you start off just messing around and the project turns out even better than you had hoped for. It makes it that much more fun.

Have a great day friends!!




Thursday, June 5, 2025

Sea Goddess

Hello Friends!

I hope you're having a wonderful day...today it's my turn to share my creations for the new theme at Gecko Galz....Sea Goddess!  Now you know how much I love mermaids so I had such fun with it...

Gecko Galz - Goddess of the Sea

My first creation is a little bit of home decor that I made using some shells as the base and loads of little bits and pieces. The fish, turtle, seahorse, bottle and some of the tiny shells were made using paper clay and the new Prima mould. There are micro beads, shells, a piece of junk jewelry and more.  


I love this oval piece - it has 4 layers so it creates a tunnel effect. The back layer is the ship/ocean, layer 3 is the lighthouse, layer 2 is the mermaid and the top layer is comprised of sand, glitter, shells and flowers.

Gecko Galz - Nautical Mile

Mom's house is decorated with sea themed canvases and she needed something to fit in a  particular space. I found an old cutting board that I gave new life.  LOVE this ship from the new Nautical Mile collage sheet.


Gecko Galz - Goddess of the Sea

I had a few water globes in my stash that I thought would go perfectly with this theme so I went with it.  this is the first... The goddess on one side and little boy playing by the sea on the other. 


Gecko Galz - Nautical Mile

The next water globe is a taller one...

Gecko Galz - Goddess of the Sea

 My final creation is a shell book...M is for Mermaid...



Sunday, June 1, 2025

Crafts Galore Encore Challenge - #136 - MoondreaDesigns

 Hello Friends - Happy June!!

A new month full of fun new challenges.  To start the month off I'd like to share the new challenge at Crafts Galore!  This month the challenge as always is Anything Goes - so if you create anything at all during the month of June please feel free to enter the challenge for your chance to win. 

This month's sponsor is MoondreaDesigns and here is my creation using the Poppy Fairy...


She was colored using Prima watercolors, Prismacolor colored pencils and Zig Real Brush markers.

Be sure to stop by the Crafts Galore Encore Challenge blog to see all of the other amazing creations by our design team!!

Good Luck and Happy June


Monday, May 26, 2025

I'm Back!!

 Well, that has been a long break...but I'm back! 

My  computer started to die a couple weeks ago and I was limping it along until I could get my new one. It arrived on Saturday and I had quite a time with getting it to work. I finally gave up on installing the Adobe Photoshop (it just will not load) so I am in search of a new photo editing app. If you have an EASY one you like - I'm mostly in need of being to add layers so I can add a watermark to my design team creations. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Now that I am back, I can share my creations I made for the Gecko Galz blog challenges this month. 

Hope you enjoy!!

Gothic Challenge - LOVE this image - she is beautiful!!
I made a page for my goth/Halloween journal.



Christmas - I made an "I" card - this is such a fun type of card to make, don't know why I don't do it more often. I like how you can see bits of the insides of the card.


Card Challenge - She's so very pretty and I got to use some of my new PET Journal Papers/Stickers (more on that later).


Fantasy Challenge. LOVE this image!! Decided to turn her into a Gothic Arch card. 
I really had fun with this arch.


Steampunk challenge...LOVE this - she's so cool looking isn't she? 



If you're so inclined there is still time to play. All you need to do is go over to the Gecko Galz blog, grab the free images and create! You might be the lucky winner of a $25.00 gift certificate to Gecko Galz!!

So, now onto other fun stuff... well, I have been known to watch FB Marketplace in case there is something I just can't live without. As it turns out I found an AMAZING deal on Saturday. A lady was selling a whole load of brand spanking new PET journal stickers, papers, journals, scrapbook embellishments and so much more all for $70.00.  

I have been wanting some of those clear PET journal stickers for a long time but they are SOOO expensive. Anywhere from 2.00 - 10.00 per package (of about 10 - 30 stickers). Way too rich for my cheap a$$. So we made a quick trip to Dunlap (about an hour away) and I snagged it all. I saw from the pics that there were some Goth/Halloween stickers which I was very excited about but from the pics I couldn't really tell what it all was.  WELL....when I started sorting I was thrilled...mostly all of it was my style!! 

This box is misc & flowers...


All flowers!!!


This box is full of Halloween, Goth and Steampunk stuff!!!
(BE STILL MY HEART!!!!)


MORE Goth/Steampunk/Halloween stickers....


I looked up some of the different stickers and they range in price from about 3.50 - 9.00 EACH package. There must be about 300-400 packages of stickers alone.  There are packages of paper that usually run 10-15 per set, rolls of PET stickers, Washi Tape stickers, and so much more.  I didn't even take pics of the scrapbook embellishments or journals.  I can not imaging what this person spent on all the stuff. I feel so very lucky and I've already started using them and organizing them.  I am just so crafty happy!!! 



Monday, May 5, 2025

Wish Upon A Star

 Hello Friends

Today is the day I get to share my inspiration makes for this months theme over at Gecko Galz.

That theme is Wish Upon A Star!

Gecko Galz - Wish Upon a Star, Starlight ATC Sheet

I started off with this card I made using glitter paper to really make these lovely images pop. 



My next project was this layout in my art journal. I layered on vintage papers and the constellation papers from the Starburst ATC.  I stenciled on snow paste through a star stencil and sprinkled on glitter then spritzed the entire page with a couple shades of blue spray inks. I Then added the image, sentiment, other bits and pieces and finally the sentiment.

My next creation is a Waterfall card...when you pull on the ribbon it flips up the next image on the flap as you can see in the photos...
And finally I have a home decor piece in this plaque I made. I just LOVE this image - she is so very lovely. She has been matted with glitter paper and was mounted on a plaque that I covered with paper from the Starburst ATC collection.  The little paper stars are from the Sun Moon & Stars collage sheet which I inter-mixed with some metal screen stars.

Hope you are inspired and enjoyed taking a peek at my Wish Upon a Star creaitons.