Gearing Up

I'm doing a lot of this and that's; and have a lot of photos to share this week.

I did try my hand at acrylics in the paint journal. I took an old magazine ad and traced it. It's not bad but I will never understand why I use the colors I do. It's never a good choice but it's my choice.

I think the ad was for NyQuil. I did NOT do this guy justice at first! Look at the colors!! Yuck.

Final decisions were to lighten the face (looks much better), and to stop hyper focusing on his hand and just cut it out from my print out and use it here. The face isn't bad ... I haven't drawn a face in over a year so even though it's been traced, it's a win in my book.

I'm making collage fodder or working through stages with the things I've been making. For instance, the scrap paper on old receipts project that never ends. As I decide what to do with some of them, I might take what I have and add sticker phrases to them and maybe use my fancy scissors and cut them. Then they go back in a box as I try to decide where to place them. On a card? In a journal? As I make a decision, I continue to add scraps to paper. It has become a ritual, like everything else I do, to sit and add some painted papers, magazine scraps, etc to something.

 

This past week I spent time inking stickers that had a lot of white around the designs. These came from my cousin and I think she got them at Temu. In any case, after doing an entire day of inking around edges, some I felt just needed a grungier look to them and I put ink across the whole sticker making them grey in color. I like that. These shiny stickers aren't a favorite and every time I use them, I wish I hadn't added them before cutting out the white parts or doing something to them before use. Spending a rainy day inking all these stickers was exactly what I needed. I have two more containers I could do but might leave them until the next wave of low energy arrives. These don't take much to do.

 

I've got embroidery on my mind and although my fingers really don't like to do much, I am going to practice the stitches on an old cloth I have. I cut all the lace and stitching done on all the hankies I had belonging to my relatives. Lace is a fun thing to add to journals or sew on a card or tag. Many were filled with spots of blood or rust. While I don't mind rust, I couldn't tell which was which, so I tossed those all out.

I started a new collage a day book this week. I'm happy I've continued with it. The last square in the 2nd book was finished on my birthday and the start of the Autumnal Equinox. Woohoo!

 

Days 209-215 in the collage a day journal. I really enjoy doing these each morning!

I also finished my mosaic vase! I finally grouted it over the weekend. It's so pretty.

I'm practicing a little bit for the classes I'll be taking soon. I bought myself a month of classes through the Fodder School called the Challenge as a birthday gift to myself. I am going to have a great time watching others create in mixed media, take notes and do a bit of playing. I also have another class I signed up for, in addition to this one, so October will be very busy! Yay!

 

I finished up the tags I started a while ago, adding ribbon and/or jute to them as well as inking them around the edges. I have so many more to do. I like grabbing a box and deciding I'll do at least one thing inside that needs my attention. Then move onto another. Some of these tags are very small and will get stapled together and added to pockets in journals, I believe.

Right now I'm feeling the need to do some painted papers although I have so many. I don't use them as they are, so maybe doing some embellishments on them will help me figure out how to use them. And some, as I look at them and crinkle up my nose, will get painted over completely quite possibly. And I'm okay with that.

 

 As I did a lot of inking, I grabbed a piece of paper and used it to catch the extra ink. Little did I know when I finished that I'd have a work of art in its own right! Check this out!

Looks good enough to frame, doesn't it?

Enjoy your week!

Cindy,  EarthMotherMosaics - Mixed Media Art

Instagram: @artbyearthmothermosaics 

Stay Peaceful and Enjoy the Journey

 

Sometimes No Decision is the Best Decision

Funny thing happened on the way to set up an appointment to get gallbladder surgery. I discovered a few roadblocks, mostly due to doctors no longer in my network with my insurance, and so for now, I'm not doing anything. I'm not always in pain and when I am, pain relievers and a heating pad make it stop. I'm eating differently, again, many smaller meals which are less difficult to digest seem to help. Therefore, no decision has been made as to when.

Which leaves me to making no decision on my Facebook Art Page. I was going to deactivate it but I have a lot of people I follow using that page and am not sure I have the stamina to go through each one and follow them on my personal page. I don't like my personal page very much, really. I do like my art page but there's spam to deal with and ridiculous messages coming through asking me if the art is for sale when clearly it's not and if someone really read the caption or the description or even the blurb under my page that says I do not sell my art, I wouldn't get any messages at all. I'm okay with that. I just like to have a dedicated art page after so many years of doing it this way, I don't want to really change it anyway.

And so, no decision has been made about that either.

Now, let's look at what I DID make decisions on, at the art table, because it was a fun week. I even finished the mosaic vase! Whoohoo!!

 

Numbers 177-180 in the collage a day journal

This card is on my blue table at the moment. I love it's simplicity and it's message.

Look who is finished and resting, waiting for grout! Yay!! She's gorgeous, isn't she?

I had an entirely different plan for this awesome yellow butterfly but it wanted to go here. So be it.

The prompts were: a window, green, something blurry, a repeating shape. Taken from Seek, Gather, Create a free, twice-yearly mixed-media art scavenger hunt challenge hosted on Instagram, probably over a year ago maybe two years ago (and yes, I'm just getting to it!).

Using the scrap papers on old store receipts, I made birds with words. 

Nothing makes my heart sing more than a new package of paint brushes.

This long armed stapler has been on my wish list for a while. It will help me staple my handmade books together instead of only having the option of sewing the signatures in place (although I'll still do that as well).

The latest journal pages were done in black and while (and silver). They are not meant for the end of the year but for the September birthdays coming up in my family. I just happen to have a few black and white things that I thought would work on these pages.

I made a belly-band using the black and white sunflowers and the card in the middle is the only bit of color there is on these pages.

Here's to Health to all those that I love.

Using Emerson quotes I've got printed out by the hundreds, I took some of them and put them on my little scrap papers that are on receipts. I'll finish these up with ink and maybe using some decorative scissors to cut them, possibly paint the backs and then put them in journals when the mood strikes. I love having options to use for my journal page days.

This was so much fun. Taking embroidery floss and adding wonky things to old vintage photos is something I've seen on YouTube, done much better than what I managed here, but I have to say, I am going to make more without too much concern as to exactly how perfect they are. I'm more concerned with the fun I'm having as I'm creating things.

This little fairy will have a pink skirt attached to the bit of embroidered cloth I had in my stash. It fits well as a little apron here. Still considering what to change the suitcase into. Stay tuned!

Days 181-184 in the collage a day journal

Enjoy your week!

Cindy,  EarthMotherMosaics - Mixed Media Art

Instagram: @artbyearthmothermosaics 

Stay Peaceful and Enjoy the Journey

Time to Reflect

Depending on where the moon is, I find there are times to be active with art and times to study what I've done, where I'd like to go and how I'd like to get there. Art has a language that I understand. I try to listen to it and follow it's lead. It's the muse that guides me and I'm okay with that.

Right now, today as I write this, I'm having a low energy day. It's a New Moon, meaning for me, a time to plant metaphorical seeds for art not yet tried, to turn inward for quiet introspection. In other words: it's time to reflect. I get a lot of low energy days around this time in the moon's cycle. Physically I'm struggling a little bit which adds to the energy ebb and flow but within the next few months that should be taken care of and I should find more energy, more often. Cross those fingers. 🤞

Meanwhile, on the days when I am filled with ideas, I try things. And almost always something surprises me. This past week was filled with surprises! Check them out below.

A new art box. 2-1/2 x 1-3/4 x 2-1/2 inches

Inside shows hand drawn cut out doodles, the door has a broken piece of a charm and the deer sticker stays on the outside. Painted papers and scrap book pieces were glued to this.

Love this broken pendant as a topper for the box.

Magazine scraps glued together, coffee stained and Plaster of Paris added.

My favorite coffee stained painted paper at the moment. It dried a softer color but it's still perfectly grungy and awesome.

Alcohol ink is a lot of fun to play with but I have a heavy hand and it requires a light touch. This is medical exam paper that I grabbed to pick up the excess. Gorgeous!

Alcohol ink test pieces. Teal is a bit overly done here but I really love the pink. Can't over do that color! 

Celery leaves from the gel plate using magenta acrylic paint. I'm on a pink kick, I think.

New stamps. These are so cool.

I had to cut the dandelion stamp to fit the mini die cut machine and then didn't use them in the machine anyway. But small additions here and there of these stamps are definitely going to be used.

Another hour spent in the Purple Palace produced another side of the mosaic vase completed.

This is an edited and cropped photo of Gaara from a few years ago. I'm planning on eventually making a collage of him using this photo but I need to work on his eye which is round.

When I picked up my Sidekick journal I found a page that had roll off paint on it. I wish I had taken a photo of it before I drew the eye because right where the eye is, there was a shape that looked a little like a cat eye and I followed it's guidance and created this.

I really love how this turned out and it was good practice. Following the random paint smears turned out to be a great exercise in finding a pattern within it. I said it was a fluke that I found it, but really, there are no accidents during times like this. It was meant to be!

Mindlessly doodling using colored ink pens, alcohol ink markers and a black fineliner pen is probably the best thing I do for my health. Being creative every day is important to me especially with Glaucoma. Precious time spent and never wasted at the art table.

The little piece on the left is a Gelli plate pull that didn't turn out too well (you can sort of see a design on it) but it's perfect for these little die cut wildflowers I made. It looks like they are in front of a pond with grass and storm clouds in the distance. All of that from one paper! And of course next to it is a random sunflower that I drew and put glue on for another piece and then decided not to use it but it had glue on it, so here is where it ended up!

Enjoy your week!

Cindy,  EarthMotherMosaics - Mixed Media Art

Instagram: @artbyearthmothermosaics 

Stay Peaceful and Enjoy the Journey