Week In The Life

Ali Edwards ran her Week in the Life project this year from Oct 27 to Nov 2.  I was a bit of a rebel.  I prefer my weeks to start on Sunday, so I just moved it one day back.  :-)

I really wanted to use stuff I had on hand, so I grabbed an old, bought-on-clearance Smash Book and went to town.  It really was the perfect size--and I had plenty of pages too!  I loved it so much I bought another Smash Book for next year!!  (Yes, yes. I know.  It totally defeats the purpose of using stuff I have on hand.  SIGH.)

Here are a few pages from 2014's Week in the Life............

I loved the mix of pages in the Smash Book.  There were printed images and words on most pages. I tried to not cover them, but to highlight them with Distress Markers.

I also loved it when a particular page went perfectly with a photo, like this flower (above) from Wednesday.  (Excuse the wonky writing--I'm trying to learn some art journaling fonts.)

We had reallllllllly lovely weather that week.  I tried to hike as much as I could.

On Thursday (above), my Mom and I went to North Carolina's Blue Ridge Parkway.  More beautiful weather and gorgeous scenery!

On the last day, Tim Holtz posted his November Tag so I played along and got all inky!  While eating Halloween candy....of course.




I'll be doing two new (to me) projects in 2015.  One is Stephanie Ackerman's Documented Faith and in conjunction with that is Art to the Fifth's the Documented Life Project.

Both are free!  I'm already excited to see what craftiness (crafty-mess??) both of these projects will bring to 2015.  I've already done a few things to prep the journal/planner the classes use.  Check them out if you are looking to step out of your comfort zone!


And that's it for me today.  Thanks for dropping in!  Stay crafty, my friends!  :-)


~Cynthia

Tim's Tag Time!!

Gosh, has it been another whole month already??  It seems like I just posted the October tag two days ago!!  :-O

Sir Tim has created another gorgeous tag for this month and you can see that here.

AS USUAL I don't have all the fancy toys he has, so I went MacGyver on this tag big time.  I got super inky in the process!!  Love it!


Step One:  Distress Paint the heck out of a tag and then root around for an embossing folder that looks fallish:

Step Two:  Panic because you don't have the gold foil stuff Tim used.  Use gold embossing powder instead.  Watch as gold embossing powder goes everywhere.  Did I mention that gold embossing powder goes everywhere?  It does.

Step Three:  Spend way. too. much. dang. time trying to find some cardboard stuff.  Spend way. too. much. time fiddling with a leaf die cut.  Give up after three attempts and make do.  Attach to Distress Painted tag.  Go to distress edges of leaf cutout with ink.  Notice that there is now gold embossing powder on your beloved Gathered Twigs Distress Ink pad.

Step Four:  Eat some Halloween candy and feel better.

Step Five:  Flick brown ink on tag.  Realize you have no Distress Sprays.  Pout.

Step Six:  Smoosh Tarnished Brass Distress Stain on your craft sheet, spray liberally with water.  Make a huge mess.  Sop some up with a paint brush and flick it on the tag.  Feel pretty good about your MacGyver skills.

Step Seven:  Eat more Halloween candy.

Step Eight:  CAREFULLY press rub-on words onto a vial label. Remember that you believe rub-ons are evil.

Step Nine:  Eat more Halloween candy.

Step Ten:  Admire rubbed-on words.

Steps Eleven, Twelve and Thirteen:  Add Philosophy Tag thingy (it says LISTEN) with bakers twine and pop dots.  Ink up some seam binding for the tag topper.  Distress edges of tag and brush with gold-embossing-powder-covered-Gathered Twigs Distress Ink.

Step Fourteen:  Eat more Halloween candy.

Step Fifteen:  Admire finished MacGyver-ed November Tag.  Notice there is gold embossing powder on your computer screen.

Step Sixteen:  Eat more Halloween candy.  Repeat as needed.




Thanks so much for stopping in today!!

And Happy Fall, y'all!!  :-)



~Cynthia

It's October already???

Yep, it's October the first and you know what that means around here...Tim's TAG TIME!!!


And as usual, I had to go all MacGyver on this tag because I don't have any of the supplies Tim Holtz used.  Totally check out his tag here.

Here's my take:

 

I used Embossing Paste for the background, hit it with about a gallon of spray inks, then mopped it off.  The paper towel removed a lot of the ink from the paste so when I hit it with a bit of Distress Spritzer-ed Distress Marker, the speckles really showed up.

The stencil is actually a large tree.  When I first removed the stencil and saw the paste....um...it looked awful.  Kinda like broken glass shards or something.  But with the addition of the spray inks, I think you can see the branches if you really squint.  ;-)

I did make the mask for the leaf like Tim did with his spider, but it faded into the background too much.  So I just made a leaf from watercolor paper and a stamp, then pop-dotted it into the little recessed area.

The pumpkin, however, is wicked cool. Here's a closeup of it...

See all that texture?  I stamped the pumpkin on watercolor paper, colored it, then slapped Rock Candy Distress Crackle on it.

Then I may have been in a hurry and I may have overheated it to the point where the Crackle may have bubbled and blistered.

So.  Freakin.  Cool.

It's like those weird pumpkins you find with warts and bumps all over them.

I totally buy those for my jack-o-lantern each year.  No, really.  I do.

I added some ribbon stuff, that awesome skeleton skull and the fun letters.

So that's it for me!  Thanks so much for dropping on by!

Peace, spray ink, and bumpy pumpkins!

~Cynthia

Tim's Tag for September!!

It's the first of the month and you know what that means!!

Tim's Tag Time!!!!!!

Head over to Tim Holtz's blog for all the details and directions and secret recipes.  ;-)

Tim did this cool ghosting thing with alcohol inks on glossy cardstock.

Here's how my first attempt turned out:

See any ghosting?  No?  Me neither.  So I went to Plan B which was to use the kinda cool backgrounds I ended up with and SMOOSH the Alcohol Ink Blending Solution through the stencil onto the tag.

BINGO.

Worked so nicely that way!

Check it:

 

Oooooooo.  Ghostly!

Then I stamped this image on the tag:

One of my faves and I was so excited to use it!

See that headdress thingy going on?  I smooshed more Alcohol Inks on another piece of glossy cardstock then die cut feathers from that.  And then I rubbed on some Remnant Rubs to the ghostly tag and glued and pop-dotted the feathers on too.

Which gave me THIS:

Whoah!  Nice, eh?

I mighta sorta went and gone a little crazy on this one.  Since I forgot to stamp script on my feathers like Tim did on his butterflies, I just die cut MORE feathers, stamped script and added them!  WOO HOOO!!!!!!!!

It's kinda funky, but I had fun and got all inky and so there ya have it!

Thanks so much for checking this one out!

Peace, love and Alcohol Ink feathers!!

~Cynthia

Tim's Tag Time!

Yep, it's August first already--time for another installment of Tim's Tags!!

I had So. Much. Fun. making this month's tag.  Check out Tim's version here for all the details and instructions.

Here's mine:

 

I've got Tissue Tape, stamps, Archival Ink, Vial Label, stencil, stencil paste, Distress Inks, Remnant Rubs, Distress Embossing Powder and Embossing Ink on this bad boy.  Whatever I had...I threw at this tag!

So cool.

My deepest thanks, as always, to Tim Holtz for being the creative mind behind the tags.

And thanks so much to you for stopping by!  Have a crafty day!!  =D

~Cynthia

Tim's Tag for July

And it's July first so you know what that means!!  Tim's Tag Time!!!!!!!!!  Woot woot!!

This month, as with all months, Tim wowed with his creativity.

And this month--for the first time EVER--I pretty much had everything Tim used...or variations thereof.

Check it:

 

I mean...is that cool or what??

I've got freakin SAND on that baby!!!!!

Head over to Tim's blog for all the deets.  And you should totally make this tag.  Totally.

Those seahorses are from an old Cuttlebug die cut.  Tim used Crackle stuff on his seahorses.

I may or may not have made them that way first off and then hated them and then I may or may not have thrown them away in a fit of anger and I may or may not have kicked the trash can as I threw them away.

Sooooo.  I just made another set of seahorses following his recipe for the sand dollar and starfish, and left off that Crackle stuff.

Much better.

=D

And, so I can embarrass myself further....funny story about what happened when I took the photo.  I went outside in the sun and placed the tag carefully on the railing and bent over a bit to take the shot with my phone.  Buuuuuut I didn't realize the lawn guys were there and walking across the yard like 10 feet away from me and in bending over whilst not wearing, shall we say...proper undergarment support for The Girls, I may have flashed the lawn jockeys.  They were pretty calm about the whole thing while I died of embarrassment.  ARRRGGHHHHHH.

Making art can be difficult.  Taking photos of art should not be.

:-P

Aaaaaand that's it for me!  Head over to Tim's to see the rest of the creativity happening on his blog, oh and try not to flash your lawn jockeys today!  ;-)

Peace, love and all things grunge,

~Cynthia

Tim's June Tag!!

Yep, it's June 1st and Tim Holtz is on the ball with his latest tag!  Check it out--love the colors and the technique he used with stencils!

Here's my take....

Sorry about the horrid photo.  The sun went down hours ago!  ;-)

It took me a few tries to find a stencil I liked.  The first ones didn't have enough "blank" space to get much color on the tag.  I love the Dylusions circle stencil.  Perfect for a summery/oceany tag!

I used lots of Distress Inks too.  Mustard Seed, Dried Marigold, Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey and Broken China.  The Broken China mixed with all those yellowy colors and made a beautiful green!  I misted the stencil and pressed it on a piece of watercolor paper.

The effect is just SO. COOL.

Then I totally held my breath and stamped the seahorses in a row.  Not too bad!  :-)

Next I stamped the seahorses again, on watercolor paper, and cut them out.  (ETA:  And used pop dots for some dimension.)

Then I held my breath AGAIN and stamped the Serenity on the side.

Whew!  Got it straight-ish!!  =D

I distressed the edges with Gathered Twigs Distress Ink.

I added the token and the stars, plus the Distress Ink-colored seam binding.

And then I called it a day...er...night!


So that's it for me.  I'm headed to wash the ink off my very ink fingers!!  LOL!!



Thanks so much for dropping by!

~Cynthia