Micro Bead Bird Embellishment

On one of my last pieces for FOG, I created a beaded bird. If you look at the photo, you will see that the bird is outlined in black and that micro beads fill in the areas between. The black outline of the bird is actually a sticker that I picked up at a scrap booking store. Although there are many of these types of stickers, some in black and some in white, the one I used came from a sheet of birds (see photo), and was designed by Elizabeth Craft Designs (#2350). This bird sticker is approximately 2” long by 1 1/2” wide. Although this is a sticker, I felt that it would need a little extra glue to keep it in place, so I used gel medium to adhere it to my background. By the way, my background is a piece of felt covered with painted fusible web, stitched, and distressed with a heat gun.

After the glue had dried, I then put gel medium onto one section of the bird at a time and poured micro beads onto it. This process was repeated for each section. Sometimes I found that I had to redo parts of a section, or pick beads off the black outline as these sections are very tiny and my accuracy with my toothpick wasn’t always perfect.

Anyway, after a number of days, the bird was complete. I was very pleased with the outcome and that my fellow mixed media artists at FOG were impressed.                   Jan S.

January FOG Session and Embossing

At our FOG session in January we worked on encompassing our December Fun Foam embellishment into our journal page. Diane came with hers already embedded into her journal cover, so she was ahead of the rest of us.  Finished projects will be posted at a later date.

Our afternoon technique was working with rubber stamps and embossing powders. If it laid flat and could be stamped, it was embossed. It worked very well on most things; fabric, hand made papers and card stock, balsa wood business cards from Lee Valley Tools, metals and mica.

One of the neatest things we discovered was making a non metal substrate look like metal. First off stamp your rubber stamp in the VersaMark ink pad and set aside. To achieve this great metallic look on non metal surfaces first coat the surface with a clear VersaMark ink pad then liberally coat with a metallic coloured embossing powder (silver, gold, copper), tap off the excess powder and heat with a heat gun. Repeat this 3 - 4 times to lay down a thick layer of the embossing powders. As soon as you have completed the final layer of the embossing powder and before it cools, quickly stamp your rubber stamp into the surface. Just a note, do not reheat after it has been stamped or you will lose the imprint. Askme how I know :)

Top Left: Embossing on Mica, Top Right: Embossing on Hand Made Papers, Middle: Metallic Look on Card Stock; Bottom Left: Embossing on Lee Valley Balsa Business Cards, Bottom Right: Embossing on Painted Card Stock that has also been Dry Embossed in a Sizzix.

I think it was safe to say that we had a great time with the embossing powders and the possibilities for use in our mixed media projects.

Merry Ho Ho

and a Happy New Year to all our blog followers.
Thanks for taking the time to visit with us.

Paper Cloth & Foam Embellishments

Our December FOG session was a stimulating one. We were working with our paper cloth, or fabric paper (whichever term you like) from Diane’s demo at our November session, and using it as the background of our art piece. Pat came with hers virtually completed, but the rest of us were still busy working by lunch break. 

Completed Paper Cloth/Fabric Paper Samples

We spent the afternoon making Fun/Craft Foam embellishments. Yes, even though that sounds rather hokey, they really do turn out great. In a nutshell, you heat up your Fun/Craft Foam with a heat gun, press a rubber stamp into it until it cools and voilà, you have an embellishment ready for painting, inking, or colouring by other means. The harder red rubber stamps with simple, deeply etched designs seem to work the best.

We discovered that we could heat the foam sheets and run it through the dry embossing machine (Sizzix) to impress the image. This opens up a plethora of possibilities for designs. We also cut some shapes out of the foam, folded over the top (around a knitting needle), carefully heated the foam and impressed it. This makes a rather nice pendant, especially painted with the Lumiere paints.

Fun with Fun Foam

 We also discovered that not all Fun/Craft Foam is created equal. The thicker the Fun/Craft Foam, the better the impression of the stamp, or embosser. We were really churning them out and didn't get a lot of time to paint, ink or colour them. (Lumiere paint by Jacquard is the best for some metallic or pearlescent colour).

January Challenge

In fact, we were so enamoured with our efforts that we have decided to use the woman’s face for our January challenge, the start of an ongoing art journal project. Can’t wait!

Thornhill Branch

Well, we finished our last Inspired Art Journal session with the Calgary Public Library at the Thornhill Branch.  We had a very energetic group and they were all very creative with their journal pages. It is so inspiring to see people jump in, be creative and want to continue on when they leave.  We have certainly had great support from the library staff for these sessions and we are glad we were able to be a part of the One Book One Calgary event.

Thornhill Branch Journalers

We are happy to announce that we will be leading a Fibre Arts session in the Spring at the Calgary Public Library, Central Branch downtown. We'll post further details as we approach that time.

Glenmore Square Branch

Christina won the Eco-Journal

Our second to last Inspired Journal session based on the Book of Awesome was held on Thursday at the Glenmore Square Branch tucked away in the corner of a small shopping mall. The group was lively and enthusiastic and jumped right in trying out some new found hand lettering skills and decorating their pages.

Glenmore Square Branch

Our final session of the Inspired Journals will be held next Saturday, November 24 at the Thornhill Branch  from 10:30 - 12:00. Sign up on line at the Calgary Public Library. 

The Book of Awesome - Inspired Art Journals

We've completed two of the four sessions of Inspired Art Journals at the Calgary Public Library for the One Book, One Calgary programs based on The Book of Awesome by Canadian author Neil Pasricha.

The first was at the newly opened Bowness branch in the NW and the Southwood branch in the SW. Participants were shown a number of mixed media techniques to decorate their journals and discovered that with a few white dots and some black dashes that their own handwriting was quite cool! We also wowed them with heat embossing with embossing powders and our industrial strength heat guns! Fortunately we didn't set off the fire alarms this time!

Bowness Library

Southwood Library

There are still two sessions of Inspired Art Journals remaining. November 15 at Glenmore Square and November 24 at Thornhill. You can register at the Calgary Public Library site.

Each participant is given a wonderful journal courtesy of the Calgary Public Library. For a $12 per year library membership fee these adult programs are a real bargain!