First Letter Ideas

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And, this afternoon I played with some letters...just trying to get a good Uppercase letter...here is what I came up with... different options and of course I can change the "filler" for each depending on what I'm doing because I like some better than others.

Today I Made a Yarn Stash Book

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HUH? What's that you say? Well, I have a friend that knits and yesterday was her birthday soooooo, I decided to make her a book she can track all her yarn in. (no, I'm not worried she will see this, she too busy knitting!)

Outside:

The guy on the bottom is thinking ... "I knew the new guy wasn't gonna fit!"

Inside pages: 

And I found this idea on Pinterest.com.  I thought I could put different colored solid ribbons so she could quickly find the "Reds" or "Yellows" etc.

Speaking of Pinterest.com.  OH MY GOSH!!!  I have found a whole new world!!!  I've known about it for a while but only just last week started using it.  OH MERCY!!!  I have found one of my "happy places!" And I'm having a hard time not just living there!  Come follow me there... click the link below and see what I have pinned already:

On Assignment

I have wanted to be able to draw a MALE angel forever! ... because  they are almost never drawn as males and I think they all are... (no mention of female angels anywhere in the Bible...they are all KICK BUTT POWERFUL MEN!)

Anyway, today I did!  This is actually my first ever man of any kind.  I watched a guy on YouTube...Sycra do a "how to" drawing. (you can learn most anything on YouTube!)

And then I worked my PSE magic on it (because when I scanned it I noticed how off his left nostril and eye are)   and got this:  if you notice, the right and left sides are almost identical... I copied the right side and flipped it to make the left ... I erased some things but not all...you can see it mostly in the hair.

And then I tried coloring him.... hummm...not lovin' it anyway but then the scanner made it even worse!!!

Below is a really lousy version of him colored in. (he looks completely different >:-/   shoot!

OK!  If you have any suggestions on how to get a better scan PLEASE tell me!!!  The colors are NOTHING like the actual drawing! This is WAY TOO PINK!  OH WELL!  It was good practice using the Pan Pastels anyway....even if a lot of the shading is lost in the scan.  ARGH!!!

Psalm 91:11-12:

 For he will command his angels concerning you

   to guard you in all your ways;  they will lift you up
in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot
against a stone. 

OH!  One more thing!  I just signed up for a free Online class for PSElements by Kim Klassen.  I'm not too sure what she is teaching but its FREE!  Check it out.

Taking Advantage of Technology

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Hi All!  I have been off line all week actually DOing!  I have mentioned wanting to draw in several posts lately and this week I did just that.  Unfortunately, nothing is at that "I'm DONE! Finished" place... everything is a piece of something or "I just want to do one more thing to it" stage.  And as I was trying to go to sleep I realized that if I don't post something it could be months before I "finish" something!  Not good.


That, and I really do want to document the process...so tonight I start the documenting of the process.


Here are some of the things I did this week:


This is the scan of the original pencil drawing I did with a regular pencil on cardstock

I liked her, but I needed to add color, and I wanted to do several versions of her to see what I like best, then I'll redraw an original drawing of the one (or more) that I like best ....  SO, I scanned her, whited out the eyes (because the scan was TERRIBLE and the eyes were just black dots ...look at it again...UGH!  So, I white out the eyes and print 4 of her on a piece of cardstock.

And here ya go... her done three different ways:

I'm still not done, I think I like the green one with the word "Why" ... doesn't it look like that's what she thinking?  And there could be many reasons she is asking "Why?" ... "Why did I get cancer?"  "Why did he leave me?"  Whatever... it is just a sad "Why?"

but I moved on to other drawings...I'll get back to her....

Again, here ya go...a TERRIBLE scan (gotta learn what I'm doing wrong!):

modified for printing:

and with some color added:

I will add more color later...She's not there yet... I do like her like this but I want to see what she will look like in full color.

I did these two with a plan to add words ... once I get happy with them.  They are my two little "Bee" attitudes.  I actually did them separately then used PSE to overlap them (that's how I was able to do the transparent wings on the front one).  I practiced with both having black faces and both with yellow... I'm liking the mix of the two.

And then Thursday I got my Pan Pastels!!!  OH MY GOSH!!!  I AM IN LOVE!!!  I also got a little 3.5 x 5 watercolor pad so I decided to just jump right in and not worry about messing up, just go for it!  


Here is what I have done so far:

quick watercolor flower...the border is the PPastels!  AMAZING STUFF... you put it on with a makeup sponge (or the thing that looks like a makeup sponge)  swish/ swish and you are done!!!

 And here I was messing with color combinations and possible future borders ... and, I wondered if I could draw AFTER I put the Pan Pastels down...yes... I colored the stripe first then did the flowers on the right side of the page:

And just another watercolor with the borders done with PP

I did the two watercolors after I saw a class being offered by Martha Lever .  I wanted to see if I could do them without the class.  It costs $30 so I am still debating.... tools or class??? or GAS for that matter!  OH MY GOSH!  When will it stop going up?!

Anyway, THAT's where I have been this week!  I have been coloring :-)  I did do some other stuff but it is downstairs in another book... I'll show you that later.

OH!  And welcome to my new followers!  I got a few this week.  I OWE you your "gift"... I know.... I actually did one this afternoon and my computer CRASHED just as I was exporting the file and I lost every bit of work....so, I did what comes naturally and said.... SHOOOOOT!  I'm going to get something to eat! ..... and I did.

WordArt

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I went to Dick Blick Wednesday and bought myself all kinds of colors!  Lots of watercolor pencils (LOVE) and several Copics (OUCH!!!)  I have resisted them this long and finally gave in and got some.  I have to admit I do love the "paintbrush" tip... but OUCH!!!

Since then, I have been playing.... here are a few things that I did from scratch...my very own self.  

How to Create Your Own Word Art ... the easy way.

I actually had a method to my madness today.  Welll....sorta.  Last week I discovered Stephanie Ackerman's art and I LOOOOOVE IT!  

But before I show you some of her stuff let me show you where we are going, because I have learned that the first picture shown is what will show up on Blog Links.

Now, examples of Stephanie's work:

I just LOVE the messy, easiness of it!  I love it so much that I bought both of her classes to learn how to doodle!!!  How sad is that?!  I have to be taught to just relax and do it!  Even though I am a VERY MESSY person, I am also a perfectionist so just "letting go" is HARD for me.  But her stuff is SO SIMPLE it should be SO SIMPLE to do, right?!  My brain struggles...but I CAN DO THIS!!! PRACTICE! PRACTICE! PRACTICE!!!

But, in the meantime... there are a couple artists, Rani and Jilustration, at Lettering Delights that have the same "feel" and I have now bought almost everything they have available!  They have the same double black outline, primitive like drawing.  CUTE! CUTE stuff!  They can easily be printed out and modified with the shadowing and markings that Stephanie has.  FUN!

Example... The first is a font and a graphic directly from Lettering Delights.  I printed a copy of this then colored and added lines  to the one below

 Same thing, but with my added coloring and drawings...see, kinda has the same feel as Stephanie's.

Neato Alphabet for the words

Noteworthy Friends Graphic Set for the lamb

Other options:

A font that has no color at all like: LDJ Happy Trails Font (then you can use any color you want)

OR, if you take Stephanie's class you get her empty font!!!!

Doing It the EASY WAY!

OK!  Feeling pretty darn dumb today!  I spent HOURS yesterday making that card look somewhat real, and layered.  Today, in about 15 minutes I figured out how to do it the RIGHT WAY!  OH MY GOODNESS!!!

The thing I'm learning, slowly but surely, is that if there is something you want to do, there is probably a button that does it.  I seem to be working on one or two buttons a day so I'm learning the VERY HARD WAY!

The main thing I learned today is how to add a "glow around the outside edge of any element...making it "3-D"  I did that manually yesterday, and I didn't do a very good job of it!

Another thing you may not be able to tell immediately is that you can turn object around so it looks like you are seeing it from a different angle... the bottom flower on each side was the result of duplicating the main flower and twisting it...and making it smaller.

Other new things are the stitches and brads.  I bought those babies from http://www.twopeasinabucket.com/:

• DigiKit - Element-ary Stitches No. 1 - By Carina Gardner
• DigiKit - Brads - By Vinnie Pearce (you get 200 brads for $2.00) beats the heck out of making them myself !!!  Actually, you can make even more than that by changing the hue... these were actually bright pink, I changed them to coral.

OH!  and one more thing I did to help it look 3D... The picture looks like I printed it and actually made a card from it... NOT!!!  I found a picture of a card and layered my faux card over the front and changed the perspective.  HA!  Gotta love that!

OK, I'm REALLY sick of this coral and brown now!  Time for something different!

A Card That Really Isn't...

Today's thang is to make a card that really isn't. I wanted to to draw everything from scratch...

• stamp
• paper
• trim
• whatever

Here ya go....

A card that really isn't:

see...

same thing, only different:

Boone, my inspiration:

Thank You for Loving Mom

The Spotted Chick (http://thespottedchick.blogspot.com/) now has a "That's Krafty Thursday" challenge...This week (the first) you just had to use Kraft paper somewhere on the card... any stamp.  That was great because it forced me to think about how the heck to use a "stamp" I just came up with.  I thought when I did it that it would make a good Mother's Day or Father's Day card... soooo

Kraft paper = Dad's day, in my mind ... 

One of the things I use to do when I used real stamps was sponge the outside edges...now that I'm trying to do as much as possible BEFORE I print my digital stamps I digitally colored these then "sponged" the edges... I NEED PRACTICE!!  One has too much, then next doesn't have enough...gotta practice!

 I decided to include this picture so you can see why I LOVE coloring on the PC!  I can print this page and be ready with 6 cards, with one page print! 

You can also see in this photo that I saved a version with the "sponging" done in a circle in case I decide to cut it in a circle.

If you look closely at the little boy's shirt... and the dress and hat on the card below, you will see that I used background paper, that I scanned and have saved. If I had known I was going to use the plaid on the card I would have used that for the boy's shirt... Oh well...next time.

Actually.... I am adding this part a few days later... all I had to do the change the boys shirt was open the photo file and change the shirt!  EASY ENOUGH!  Matches better :-)

LOOK what I made!!!...Stamp On Steroids!

I was given a new challenge this week!  I just never know what is around the corner!  

Four years ago a friend that I used to work with went to work as an Events Planner at a church here in Atlanta.  We haven't seen each other but one time since then.  This week she had a "problem" come up and remembered me...thinking I might be able to help her out.

Their church is having a conference next weekend and the pastor's wife wanted a 5 foot lady on the front of a punching bag.  LOOK what I came up with!!!  I'm excited because its another thing I have never done.  The coloring (dark skin, blonde hair) was her choice, I would have done something different...but  YEA!!!

If you look back at my post on April 2nd you will see that I came up with the face/hair that day.  GOD IS SO COOL!!!  I had NO CLUE why I have been learning and drawing the things I have been this month... now we know :-)