Workshop

We have just had a full day crafting – isn’t that every crafter’s idea of a perfect day? Several hours amongst friends playing with stamps and inks!

We were not told what we would be doing during the two sessions but were advised what to bring along to work with. That’s always tricky – I never have the right stamps/inks with me!    Still, like stamp club, it’s showing a technique which we can take away and replicate using different images and colours etc…. a prototype. Actually, I was delighted with both items and don’t need to hide them away in shame – they both turned out great and I’m full of ideas for different themes now.

The morning was spent with Gloria teaching one half of the group to make a CD Case Calendar. It involves, not unexpectedly, an empty cd case (the clear type) with all the black innards removed. Twelve squares of card were decorated to depict each month by adding colour, images etc. The calendar pages themselves were also lightly coloured so they didn’t ‘shout’ at you (being too white!).  I added some beads and glitter (yuck – I hate glitter!!!) when I got home and may add a few more snaps/brads. These can’t be too thick or they won’t sit nicely in the front of the cd case.

I’ve added some more photos taken on the day below, choose to view individual shots or as a slideshow if you wish (or use piclens if you can, it’s sooooo much fun!). If you choose to view as a slideshow then you can see them full screen size by clicking the bottom right-hand button.

By the way, if you recognise your work and would like me to add your name then just let me know and I’ll fix it.

CD Calendar Oct 09

[Show as slideshow]

[View with PicLens]

Welsh Anthem

When I was a member of our local W.I. (for about 10 years), I discovered a competitive streak which I didn’t realise I had!

Every year there is an agricultural show which encompasses two neighbouring counties, Flintshire and Denbighshire, and my local village had not been entering much. When I found out about this (and was cajoled onto the committee!) I put a lot of pressure onto our members to join in and make stuff for these shows. We did quite well, on the whole, for such a small membership.

I had been going to calligraphy classes for a couple of years, evening class once a week, and so tried my hand at that part of the competition (as well as lots of other crafty/baking/sewing/embroidering entries) – calligraphy being the only ‘arty’ thing I could even attempt. Put a paint brush in my hand and, unless it’s a large wall, I go completely to pieces – I really cannot draw or paint but I am not bad with a dip pen and some ink or gouache.

The photo above shows the Welsh National Anthem written in uncial font which is quite ‘celtic’ looking. I like to write on a curve as it’s easier to hide the odd mistake such as letters not being exactly the perfect heights etc..!

The paper I wrote on is pale green with an image of a tree which I decided was quite apt due to the W.I. logo being a tree. I used black engrossing ink for the wording and then printed out a few copies of the Welsh Dragon which I painted (yes, OK, I know I said I can’t paint but I can colour in the lines!) and then decoupaged below the verse.

The Celtic-knot border around the mat-board was drawn in pencil first and then inked over with a wide dip pen and the same black ink – that really did make me cross-eyed!

I won first prize

Welsh words

Decoupaged Dragon

The Night Will Never Stay

Night

The black paper I used for this was ‘splattered’ through a circular mask with a silver metallic pen and my ‘blitzer’ – this is a bulb-like contraption with a place to attach a marker pen, with which you blow the ink from the tip onto whatever medium you want.

Closer view

I stencilled silver stars around the ‘moon’ and penned the words with a yellow gouache which was watered down and applied to a dip pen with a brush. This is an italic script with quite a fine nib and you may notice that it’s written on curvy lines, again.

I won first prize

A Nursery Rhyme

Magpie

‘Magpie’ was written again in an italic script with a slightly fatter nib than the last piece. I used watercolour paints on my dip pen this time and watercolour paper to get the fading appearance. The numbers were coloured-in with well-watered-watercolours and I added the odd little flourish here and there (using the pen with its natural angled nib) to take away the starkness of the background. You can’t really see from the photos but, for example, the words for ’5′ read ’5 for silver’ and the silver was written in silver ink.

I won first prize

1 thru 7

1 thru 6

5 thru 7

An Old Adage

There was a lot of research to be done to find an adage which I liked and which I thought would translate to a piece of calligraphy nicely.

The purple mat gives quite a regal feel to the piece when teamed with the gold paint of the illuminated letters. Gold gouache for them, green gouache for the uncial lettering and then simple flowers painted (no, I still can’t paint!) over the gold base. There are little tiny dots done with a very fine nib all around the large letters, and the lettering this time used a much broader nib.

Glitters

Closer view

I can’t say if I find it easier to do fine or broad lettering – when applying paint to the nib with a brush it’s very hit-and-miss. You can run out of ‘ink’ quickly and at an inopportune moment when doing large letters and can very easily overload the reservoir of a fine nib and make it too thick to flow nicely etc…

I won first prize

Jerusalem

This time we were asked to pen the first verse of the W.I. Anthem which is the wonderful ‘Jerusalem’. I used watercolour paper onto which I (painted) hills and mountains green. The lettering is gouache again with a medium-nibbed dip pen and Carolingan font. This is a lovely, spreading font and quite decorative – I love the letter ‘d’ – which seems to be based on uncial.

I actually wrote in straight lines for once.

I won first prize

Jerusalem

I bet you're singing!

Better angle?

A Proverb

The proverb

Oh my, I’m beginning to think I should go back to the beginning and remove what I said about not being able to paint! It’s true really and yet I seem to have ‘painted’ on most of these pieces of artwork. Believe me, it doesn’t come easy and it’s mostly copied……

This is quite a nice simple proverb and I colour washed a piece of watercolour paper in a golden-yellow before writing it in a simple italic with a few flourishes on some of the letters.

The words are framed with a thick red line and the painted flowers which overlap it here and there and also spill out onto the matboard. I rarely put these behind glass, but then they’re not even out on display anywhere yet so they don’t need protecting. I do plan to hang them in the calligraphy area of my craft room ….. one day!

I won first prize

Top corner

Closer

Bottom images

A Celebration Poem

Festival

I spent so long trying to find a poem for this theme. I failed in the attempt and so resorted to choosing a celebratory word – FESTIVAL – and finding words which meant celebration and which began with each letter of the main word, I suppose you’d call them acronyms. I tried to find festivals from all over the world to put here, some were a little obscure and I guess I was clutching at straws but it worked in the end. The paper is parchment and the initial capitals are painted with a copper medium and outlined in black.

Again, I used gouache to write with and double-matted the whole thing – looking at it now I think I should have decorated the cream mount board as it’s rather stark.

What does it mean?……

‘F’: Flowers on Jersey; Fantasy Feelings; Foreign funeral feasts.

‘E’: Easter excitement; Evil spriits; Enlisting supernatural aid.

‘S’: Sabbath; Saturnalia; Shabuoth or Pentecost – harvest of the wheat crop.

‘T’: Thanksgiving; Transfiguration; Tet – celebrating Indochinese lunar New Year.

‘I’: Independence day; Invocation; the Iliad – mythical King and harvest festival.

‘V’: Vernal equinox; Vikings and Jorvik; festivals for the Virgin Mary.

‘A’: Abundance at harvest time; wassailing of the Apple trees.

‘L’: Licentious ancient festivals; Lent

….all this and more.

Wow, reading this back after all this time I really was stuggling wasn’t I?! Never mind…..I won first prize

Close up

The poem

There wasn’t always a calligraphy entry in the schedule, some years they did without and put other skills in like painting on china, silk painting etc….. but, as I was on the committee, I did insist now and again that they put it in the schedule. Unfortunately, they got really sick of me winning all the time and used to try not to have calligraphy in the show at all, I thought that was quite mean-spirited of them

Calligraphy doesn’t flow easily from my hands I’m afraid, it takes me weeks of practising before I’m ready to start on the real thing and lots and lots of screwed-up trial samples. I am left-handed and therefore really struggle with some scripts and yet find others quite easy – the main difficulty is smudging. Left-handers have to follow their pen across a page and can therefore smudge the work very easily, right-handers drag the pen behind them and so don’t have that issue. It’s true of all handwriting, not just this decorative type, and so something we all have to learn to deal with from an early age. There are special nibs available, angled the opposite way to the normal ones, to make it easier and, if you’re thinking of taking up this wonderful hobby, then I heartily recommend investing in the correct tools. Personally, I can’t use a calligraphy felt pen to save my life! Well, I can do rough stuff but have never managed to achieve a classy-looking piece using one. I do find that the chunkier the marker, with a large chisel tip, the easier it is.

I used to volunteer at the infant/junior school which my boys attended and Friday was craft day – we did all sorts of different things and I did show them how to do calligraphy at one stage. We used large felt-pens for this – obviously they couldn’t handle dip pens – and they all did pretty well and loved it when I wrote their names in large fancy letters for them to take home with them. I also had to give a ‘talk’ to a class full of 10-year-olds all about calligraphy once, what a nerve-racking experience that was! Don’t think I was cut out to be a teacher but I loved doing the volunteer crafty stuff with them.

Other Pieces

At the class I attended we tried our hand at all sorts of different techniques, not just penmanship. The photos below show a letter A drawn on A4 black card with each section patterned differently and with a couple of pieces cut away completely and then lined with yellow film.

A

Closer view

Can you see the film?

Pessimist

A Pessimist

I love the sentiment behind this verse, just a random piece which has sat in a folder for many years – written with a dip pen and black ink in an italic hand.

Easter Bonnet

Easter bonnet

The Easter bonnet is also just a project from class, guess I had been painting again!

Grandad Tommy

This last item was entered in the W.I. competition but didn’t win!!! I wrote the words on tracing paper in yellows and greens and laid it over a photograph which my husband had taken of his grandad some years ago. He was a wonderful character, a coal miner all his life, and was a great joke-teller. The biggest problem I had was that he was a Yorkshire man and I was born in Lancashire – I had to have someone translate his jokes for me!

“I am the family face, flesh perishes, I live on, projecting trait and trace through time to times anon, and leaping from place to place over oblivion”  Thomas Hardy.

Grandad

Close up

Challenge Card

I’m trying something different…… throwing out a challenge to the ladies at my local Stamp Club. We meet once a month and I took a whole bunch of items with me last month and shared them out giving everyone two months to see what they can come up with.

The items I took were empty cat food foil trays, fancy plastic cocktail sticks and cleansing wipes. The trays were given to me via an offer on our local FreeCycle, the cocktail sticks I have had in my stash for well over 20 years (bought them when we lived in Southern California and we’ve been back a loooooong time now!) and the cotton wipes are actually just the ‘rough’ side of them – they come apart very easily and, as they were falling off and I was throwing them away, I decided that there really must be something I could do with them.

Here are some close-up photos of the items before I started doing anything to them – well, I did cut open the foil tray and start flattening it.

All had 3 of each

Cleansing pad

Cotton discs

Cocktail sticks

Tray

Altering Bits

I have recently been bought a Wizard and have succumbed to the lure of Nestabilities (not many – yet!) so had a play with the scalloped ovals and then a Sizzix embossing plate. Once I’d got them cut out I coloured them with some alcohol inks, chopped the ‘legs’ off the cocktail sticks and coloured them with the same inks while I was at it. I don’t have a photo of the latter on their own but you can see them when I’ve added them to the card with some fine gold wire curled around them.

Frames

Closer

Large Scallop

Embossed

Coloured

Sticks & Wire

Cotton Discs

As I added colour with the alcohol inks to these they distorted and became ovals instead of circles – not a problem as they echo the ovals I’ve punched out of the tins. They were very ‘floppy’ so I painted them with a few coats of pva and let them dry. I then embossed them with a clear/sparkle powder and stamped into them with a large stamp just to add a bit of texture.

Adding Colour

PVA

Embossed

Closer

The Card Design

A very popular card these days is this Tri-Shutter Card which I found at Crafts By Carolyn (who, in turn, links to Ellen from whom she got the idea) who has kindly posted downloadable files so you can make your own – thanks girls!

I cut the base from some plain card I had in stock and decided to decorate with a double-sided scrapbook paper. I coloured the edges of the card (which will be showing) with some brown inks, very roughly, and after cutting out all the small pieces I attached them patterned-side-up to what will be the front of the card.

Card supplies

Scrapbook paper

Inked edges

Papers glued

Different angle

The Back

As I was doing some ‘stamping’ for the reverse of the card I also used the reverse of the scrapbook paper. It’s a beautiful colour and I thought the black versafine ink was suitable for the sentiments and other stamped images. Also on the back I used some of the side pieces left from punching the ovals from the trays – smoothed them out and then ran them through the Wizard with a Fiskars Texture Plate in the feather design. I just cut small rectangles and rounded the corners before mounting onto some black card for definition. I stuck two of the cotton discs onto the large panel and curled some black wire into loops which I then anchored with tiny black brads.

Reverse

ART

Fiskars plate

Close Up

Faffing About!

Sometimes you can spend so long just faffing with details! I don’t think any card has ever taken so long to assemble but maybe that’s because I was chronicling it along the way? At Port Sunlight Stamp Festival I fell in love with a collage stamp set and so used the main image on the front of this card, again using the reverse of the scrapbook paper and layering on black card and adding some more tiny black brads. Behind it you can see I cut the scalloped shape in half and mounted that on the scrapbook paper and black card as well. I glued one of the embossed ovals to the centre panel and used some flower brads to attach it more firmly – they were gold so I dipped them into embossing ink and then black embossing powder and melted it.

My new stamp

Front

Brads

Finishing Touches

I have some wonderful glass mosaic tiles in lots of different colours so decided to add a few to the front, just glued them in place with some PVA. I then thought it may be nice to have a dangler from one of the creases so threaded a large bead (toned-down with a little alcohol ink) onto black cord and on the end of that used two small scalloped ovals – cut from the trays and slightly coloured – glued back to back. On the reverse of that panel I had to mount the stamped image onto some card as well as its paper and use raised sticky pads to get around the thickness of the cord there. I finished by wrapping some fancy yarn around a couple of the creases just…… well, just because!

Mosaic collection

Chosen colours

Tiles added

Dangler!

Front of card

Mojo Monday 77

The challenge for this week can be seen at Mojo Monday – I think I will send this one to my sister as a thank you card.

The main card base is a heavy, dark green textured card folded in half and stamped in red ink with a small, art deco stamp; an extra piece of the same was wrapped in a pretty silver ribbon and mounted on top of the piece of decorative paper.

I stamped the large art deco flower onto grey card using red and green inks and then glittered in a few places. I inked the edges of this circle with the same green ink and the back circle was cut out with decorative scissors and the edges embossed with red ink and clear powder and then edged with a little silver ink.

Three small leaf brads in green and silver finish it off – oh, and I inked the edges of all the green card with silver just because I always do!

Mojo77 sketch

Art Deco Flower

Step 1

Step1

This first photo shows the planning, I laid out the canvasses and put some small, round mirrors on them (bought these from Ikea a while ago). I staggered the placement of the mirrors, used some Maya Road decorative cutouts on the corners and the same brand of large letters spelling out the word B-A-T-H.

Step 2

Step2b

Step2a

Once happy with the general layout I sprayed the reverse of the decorative shapes with a temporary adhesive and then placed them back onto the canvasses. To add colour, I found my Adirondak colour washes and sprayed lightly – from a height – over all the canvasses.

Step 3

I only have 4 colours of this spray so choice was limited, I applied the spray to all four canvases and then had a cuppa while waiting for them to dry! (Actually, they were dry almost instantly but I enjoyed the tea break – my butler, Nigel, brought this for me in my current favourite china mug).

Step3a

Step3b

Step3c

Step3d

Step 4

Step4

This shows the effect once the masks were removed, I thought afterwards (which is the way I usually work – act first, think last!!!) that I should perhaps have coloured the blanks first so they weren’t so stark white but then, they are going in a bathroom with white tiles so maybe they’ll be OK.

Step 5

I moved on to the letters then. Coated them in embossing ink and then dipped them in clear UTEE – 3 times each to get a nice thick coating. Stuck my finger to the ‘T’ at one time whilst it was still very hot – Oh dear! I said!

While they were still hot from the final coating of UTEE I sprinkled them with a gorgeous kingfisher blue chunky enamel and heated them for the final time.

Step5a

Step5b

Step5c

Step5d

Step 6

Step6b

Step6a

Once happy with the way they looked I tried them back on the canvasses whereupon I had a revelation – I was hanging these in a bathroom without a bath! It has a lovely shower cubicle so really, spelling out the word BATH on them didn’t make a lot of sense.

Step 7

I found an old scrabble set and practised punching with a crop-o-dile – no problem! I played about with different words that seemed relevant and then coloured the chosen tiles with a dye ink pad and then embossed it with UTEE. Now I know you’re not supposed to use dye inks with embossing powders (dye/dry pigment/powders – that’s how I was taught to remember it) but it worked to add a little base colour.

After they were triple embossed I dipped the edges in the kingfisher crysals, while the enamel was still hot, and heat set that. They do look a little like miniature bathroom tiles.

Step7a

Step7b

Step7c

Step7e

Step 8

These are the words I chose: scruB, relAx, sTeam and sHower and Step8b shows how it was going to look on the canvas. I threaded beads on some fine silver wire and curled it and then found some heavy wire which our electrician had left strewn all over the floor while he was working! I stripped the outer layer off to find this lovely silver stuff and I’ve also got some copper from other work he did. I know he thought I was rather mad wandering around picking up his trash but I love to recycle stuff like this. Anyhow, it’s rather hard stuff to curl so I used the thickest mandrel in the pack and then wrapped some pre-strung, larger beads around it.

Step8a

Step8b

Step8c

Step8d

Step8e

Step8f

Step8g

Step 9

Did you know that if you heat Othello tiles with a heat gun they come apart? And that the white part is softer and more flexible than the black? What a fount of useless information I can be!

Well, I dipped the black half in that same dye ink I used earlier and tripple embossed it then stamped into it with my stamp inked with clear ink to help release. How worrying is it when one of your prized stamps has a hot, sticky mass adhered to it? And how hard to leave it alone until cool!!!

Some of them I didn’t stamp into and they look a little like seashells – if there are such things as black seashells.

Step9a

Step9b

Step9c

Step9d

Step 10

Out came the hot glue gun to firmly attach that heavy, twisted wire and the ‘shells’, I also used it to add some glass mosaic tiles I had in my stash and to attach the fine, curly, beaded wire onto the mirrors. I coloured round the edge of all the mirrors with that same dye ink just to take the starkness off the white and then stuck tiny tear-drop beads on the opposite edge with some pva. The little flowers were added to hide the hot glue dollops, and I put on a couple of pieces of shrink plastic ‘bits’ that I had in from previous playtimes.

The letters were hung onto the fine wire with jump rings and then ribbon brads pushed through the canvas (and glued in place!) were used to hang the wires from. I coloured these a little with some silver metallic rub-on.

Step10a

Step10b

Step10c

Step10d

Finished!

finished

call-this-a-bath

They will be hung on the wall at various levels, as shown here on the floor – mainly ‘cos it’s far too hard to hang four things in a straight line! And you can see here the ‘bath’ they refer to, it’s something you can scruB away your worries; relAx while listening to your ipod; sTeam open your pores and then sHower yourself clean in.

I just pray that, once they get hung on the wall, they look as nice as I hope. If you would, I’d appreciate your thoughts. Thanks for sharing with me. Joanna

Autumn

My very first entry for a competition didn’t actually make it to the show! I had learnt this calligraphy technique and we were doing a ‘season’ so I produced Autumn, shown here. I hadn’t realised at that time that we were not allowed to openly refer to our own institute name in the WI competition so I had to start again. This hangs on my wall now and I do like it. The second entry I made is shown below, Ode to Autumn. When I find the photos of the whole display I will post them, it was a very attractive grouping of all things in that colour range – and we won!

Many years ago I started to teach myself calligraphy. I watched a show on TV in California where a chap made it look sooooo easy if you just bought his pens and charts. Well, it isn’t! When I moved back here to Wales I came upon a bridal fayre at a hotel and spoke to the lady who was doing the wedding stationary. She gave me details of her tutor and he lives quite close to me so I started going there once a week for lessons. He is a fabulous artist but used to scare me whenever he asked me to pick up a paint brush to do a background – I do not ‘do’ paintbrushes!

I loved these classes and found I wasn’t bad at this art form, I have won several first places at our local agricultural show – WI section – though it always takes me a long time to produce a piece of work.  I had to give up my classes to be a Mum – they clashed with football training to which I had to drive my son so I decided I’d come back to it later.I never did make it back to class but I do still occasionally put pen to paper and love it. I have a drafting table which I can angle to suit and that does make it easier to write but have one big disadvantage – being left-handed! Most pen nibs are slanted for right-handers so I have to be aware of that and make sure I buy the correct ones for me. Also, working with wet ink means that my hand drags through the words I’ve just written and smudges if I’m not careful. I love a challenge though.

I don’t know if any of you use those packs of pre-folded card blanks? Well, one Christmas I bought gold and silver ones to use, the cards are lovely and the insides are white so there was no problem there. The envelopes though — I tried every pen in the house and it was like I was being a spy! Disappearing ink! So, that year, I resorted to a dip pen and engrossing ink which actually showed up on the envelopes – they were probably nicer than the card inside but took me hours!

It’s one of those things, if I had time to practise and keep on top of it then I know it would come easier. Pity we have to eat, wear clean clothes…….

Ode to Autumn is written on watercolour paper and made into a concertina book. The leaves are real, dipped in pearlescent paint and pressed onto the surface briefly.

Dust is a saying which makes me smile and which describes my philosophy perfectly!

Ode to Autumn

I hate dusting!