Crusade No. 36

One of my favorite cyber friends (Michelle Ward) has a fun thing going over at he web site.

Every month-ish she posts a fun project to do that is creative, inspiring and fun!

Join in on the fun at:

http://michelleward.typepad.com/how_cool_is_that/

I only compleated 1/2 the project this time but hey...1/2 is always better than nothing at all!

I will have the 2nd 1/2 to do on another day.

I do plan on painting, stenciling and journaling with my snow flakes, I just love Michelles idea!

 

It's Prom Time! AND My California Trip!

Saturday was prom in our area. I can hardly believe how many girls got their hair and make-up done! We had 37 young divas come into the salon!

Judging by this, I don't see signs of a bad economy here!

I didn't get a chance to get pictures of some of the girls who were getting their hair done but

I thought I'd show you a few pictures of an up-do I did on my mannequin for a display.

Doing up-do's puts me into the same creative mode that drawing or sculpting does. It's intuitive and and in most cases can't be repeated twice! I've tried to take step by step pictures of my hair creations so I could try to reproduce a look but for some reason I still can't get it to ever look the same again! That's' OK because that makes for one of a kind hair do's for proms and weddings!

-----------------------------------------------------------

FRIDAY April 24th is the day

That I've been waiting for for months!

My son Sean and I are heading out early Friday to San Diego. When we get there we will rent a car, get checked in to our hotel then head on over to the baseball stadium to see the Padres play!

Then the next day I'm gong to meet up with my friend Julie who I met last year on the Internet via Michelle Wards GreenPepperPress Street Team. We have never met in person so I am so super excited to finally do just that! The two of us are going up for a two day art party at Suzi Blu's house by the beach! Two blissful days of painting and creating eating, and what ever we come up with!

While I'm having fun at the art party Sean is gong to do his own thing. He'll drive around and see what he can see, lay on the beach, go on a boat ride, what ever he decides he wants to do!

New Year - New Background :-)

I figured out how to add a new background thanks to

Plo @ http://amothintoabutterfly.blogspot.com/ And

The Background Fairy @ http://www.backgroundfairy.com/.

This is a Christmas background but it matched my There is No Box critter so well! WOW!

I was checking out the latest at the GPP Street Team page @

http://michelleward.typepad.com/how_cool_is_that/2009/01/crusade-no-26-winner.html .

While following all the fun links I realized some of the pages had backgrounds different than what Blogger offers and I liked them better, they were more creative! I'm thinking I can make my own background with my own art...as soon as I can figure out how to write the code for it, obviously this can be done! :-)

This new Year - 2009 I plan a few simple things...

~Create just a little more~

~Sleep when I want too~

and

~Stay out of the fridge a lot more! ~

Have a great hair day and a GREAT 2009! Becci

Crusade #25 - Better late than never... is what I say ! :-)

I'd love to hear your thoughts about the articles and the ideas from these articles I have added to my post... They would be super appreciated!

Experiment #one

I painted gesso on this paper, let it dry, then added about 4 more layers! The gesso I bought is so thin and not what I expected at all! But... as I added the layers it did start to build up some neat texture and created ridges in the horizontal stroke I applied it with. I let a dish of the gesso stay in the open air for a few hours and this did dry out enough to give it the thickness I was expecting in the first place. So I blobbed it in the corner and embedded a picture of a candle my Mom drew and painted some time in the 80's. The candle stick was one that my Grandma had in her house as far back as I can remember. I wrote some affirmations onto the gesso using thoughts from an article torn from "The Science of Mind" magazine. I absolutely love this article because I am into the "spring" of the second half of my life and find it hard at times to accept this natural progression with grace!

Geeze!

Click the pages to enlarge them if you'd like to read this.

Finally to finish it up I uploaded it into Photo Shop and added the map background and digitally burned the edges.

Isn't this a beautiful picture...


Next experiment

I painted gesso onto a piece of journal sized paper then let it dry. I was disappointed with the gesso because it was so thin and seemed like plain ole' white paint. BUT... when I began adding my paint and doodles to it I was amazed how it felt for lack of a better description. The paint glided on so smooth, the pencil was so crisp and was very, very forgivable and erasable when I didn't like what I did!

Now I am pleased! :-)

Last experiment

First, I let my gesso dry out again until it was thick enough to blob on the canvas. I got one of my photos from a hairdressing contest that I entered then smushed it down so it squished out from under the photo. I also used some rubber stamps to add more texture. My beautiful model is Daisy and is one of my best friends who happens to be

just as beautiful on the inside as well!

Here is the original photo. My son Brian was the photographer that year.

AND...we made it to the top 10 finalists that year!

I deleted the back ground with the "magic wand" in my Photo Shop CS3 then printed it out and doodled on Daisy's photo, as you can tell here...

This is a copy of an article my Mom sent to me at a time of my life when I was really needing to hear this wisdom called "Diamond Dust".

She cut it out from the "Christian Science Monitor", which she read faithfully.

Click on it to enlarge it so you can read this beautiful article.

Then with Photo Shop I made it a layer that was then added behind Daisy.

One of Angela Cartwright's awesome papers is my final background to this finished piece.

I'm too tired to check for typo's and gibber jabber right now

but have a great hair day!

Becci

I will clean my plate

I will clean my plate of all the reasons I've made up to not get close to others. I have pushed friends I had away, I have pushed people who I know would like to be my friend away. When my Mom died I must have subconsciously decided to never let anyone into my space and to never love some one that much ever again! I think I remember feeling this way a little even when I was in grade school when 2 of my best friends moved away... Anyway, I am conscious of this about myself now and see the craziness of not nurturing my friendships and cherishing them.

So...I will clean my plate of all my excuses.

Has anyone else done this to themselves after losing their Mom, or a dear friend or a pet?

Have a great hair day! Becci

PS. Actually - my husband and my 2 sons came along before this subconscious thing I must have decided and I love my family very very much and show it every chance I get! But I have to say my grandson Bryce came along after my Mom died and as you all know I love him very very much too! I remember while holding him when he was about 2 weeks old it was then that my love for him hit me like a ton of bricks - the love I felt at that moment for this child was so intensely strong!

I looked into his eyes and told him that

I am giving him my heart forever!

Love, Becci

Crusade #21 - Gravestone rubbing attempt and a fun outing!

Michelle Wards Green Pepper Press Street Team monthly project is doing wax rubbings. Click the banner below to go to her site if you want to find out more...

The idea of going to a cemetery to get rubbings sounded interesting to me. After all this would be something that's certainly isn't an ordinary thing to do in the course of a day and I get thrilled when out of the ordinary happens! SO Bryce and I set out for the adventure! We gathered paper and couldn't find the crayons so settled on pastels. After getting to the cemetery I discovered I didn't put the paper in the van! But I did have an insert from the newspaper we could use...We have a little old cemetery close by that I thought would be a good one to find older stones to get some good rubbings from. It was such a pretty afternoon and being in the cemetery really was quite relaxing and peaceful. The neat and unexpected thing was that Bryce and I had the opportunity to talk about dieing. This is quite a big subject for a little guy of 4 yrs. But it is a very important thing to talk about at what ever age. Death is made out to be so scary in out society and can be such a paralyzing fear to so many people.

The stone I picked had a deco looking flower design on it. Bryce was my photographer. He's really good at getting the perfect shot too! "Grandma, just sit right here and I'll shoot from over here", were his instructions..He's a natural!

The rubbing turned out to be a dud! But after I fixed it up digitally with borders I think it looks kinda neat! I was disappointed that I didn't get a good rubbing though...I guess pastels aren't the best choice to use for this.

BUT!

That evening I went to the class I started at our local Center for the Arts and guess what technique we played with was!

RUBBINGS! :-)

so I got some good rubbings accomplished that day and I ended up with a neat piece of art!

I also used large bubble wrap and some corrugated card board to print some more texture with acrylics over the crayon rubbings... You can click on the picture to see a larger view if you'd like.
Have a great hair day! Becci

Crusade #19 Makin' my own stencils!

This project turned out to be so fun! I had a great time outside with the spray paint on a day that was 100% beautiful! It was 68 degrees with no wind at all...which is very odd for Kansas! I stenciled my t-shirt after dinner so the sun was a that "golden- glowing" stage of the early evening. Just absolutely beautiful!

After drawing out my designs I used the burning tool to cut out my stencils. I have tried to cut stencils before but I used scissors and an exacto blade and I hated it ! I'm a bit of a perfectionist...well actually I'm a full breed perfectionist but don't tell anyone!

I really like how my t-shirt turned out but the real treat is my Grandson Bryce!

Have a great hair day! Becci

More crusade #18 - play time!

Bryce & I continued crusade #18 yesterday morning...We decided that art comes before cleaning (A before C) so we left the dishes in the sink, toys everywhere, beds unmade & jammie's on! :-)

This is Bryce, my grandson and I creating with our newly carved rubber stamp

The cat stamps (which Bryce (4yrs.old) helped pick out to carve) were what he wanted to stamp and paint. He has a red, black, blue and green Power Ranger cats here...

This is my doodle checker board stamp I drew then carved


And... below is what I ended up with this morning using it.
Super spontaneous in deed...Don't have any idea where it came from it just happened!

Happy Easter!

Becci

Great Intentions...Mission Acomplished!

Crusade #18 - carving my very own rubber stamp.

First I picked out a few pictures I liked then scanned them into my computer. I changed the sizes, desaturated and adjusted the contrast to a very black and white image. Then I printed them so I could take them to the grocery store to copy them again on the copier with a toner type ink. Toner ink will transfer better than ink jet printer ink...So after doing all the adjusting to my picture on my computer with ease you'd think the copier at the grocery store would have been easy-peasy! NO! I screwed around with that stupid thing for 20 minutes just to get 1 copy! 1 copy is 10cents but I spent 60cents before I got it done! I don't think I've used a copier like that for years! Ever since I got my home computer I don't need to get copies done at the store... On the other hand do you think there was anyone who worked there who knew how to operate it either? NO! geezzz.... :-)

Then...

I was going to use Michelle's suggestion of Goof-Off to do my image transfers to the carving rubber. I got home from the grocery store positive I had some of the stuff...No I didn't! It was pouring rain and the temperature was sitting at 34degrees Burrr! I was dreading going back out to get Goof-Off. My son Brian saved the day "Hey Mom, just use wintergreen oil to do the same thing." Well, I was somewhat stunned and said something sorta snippy like "oh sure, like every ones cabinet had wintergreen oil in it"! His reply..."I have some in my bathroom cabinet down stairs you can use." Well, sure enough he did! And no I didn't ask why and I don't think I want to know! HA! :-) . Really he is quite the artist himself and he must have done a transfer at one time for one of his projects. Neat guy! I did this out side real fast so I didn't freeze and stink up the house with the oil. Wintergreen is a good smell but I tell you what, that oil was extremely strong smelling!

Next... after great success transferring the images to the carving rubber, I began to carve. I am really liking this project, thanks Michelle! It really is super easy and is fast to get something carved and ready to use in a very short amount of time...I'm pleasantly surprised!

Carving in progress...

Up in the top right corner are a couple of fairies I made with pipe cleaners, embroidery floss, and torn up silk flowers. I can't remember the name of the book I got the idea from sorry... Anyway I enlarged them below to share with you all...The horses are great aren't they!

The eyes turned out really good and yep they are my eyes...


I tired out my eye stamp to see how it worked or if I'd done all that only to have it be a flop!

Nope it works really really Great! YES!
I scanned a piece of 50's fabric and printed that

to try my stamp on.

Have a great hair day! Becci