ICAD uber-post!

for the 2015 index card a day project, i've actually been posting my cards every single morning... via iphone + instagram, which is seriously the most convenient thing ever. on the other hand, it's meant that i've done worse than ever in terms of blogging the cards and putting them into my flickr album, so here's a huge catch up post for both of those! one of the coolest ICAD-related things this year has been having some fellow participants right here in my house to make cards together!!! my lovely blogging friends june and tracy were here for several days last week, which was utterly awesome, obviously! then on sunday, jeff and i hosted our annual big summer brunch, for which i set up my extra-long "art camp" table so that niece madeline and nephew matthew could work on some cards, too. luckily it *IS* an extra-long, extra-sturdy table, because as it turns out many of the grown-ups wanted to sit down for a bit, as well, and paint or doodle or color or... well, just generally get a little bit artsy! so if you want my suggestion for the best party ever: add an art station along with the buffet and the bar and then get out of the way, lol! :)

006: taxi

yes, this one is out of order, which i've done quite shamelessly, so my favorite card (so far!) can be on top. this is also by far the most detailed drawing/coloring i've done,.. there are A LOT of tiny windows. (a lot!) :)

003: map

who's to say a map has to be of a town or a city or a country? how about a map of your bedroom or the setting of your favorite book or maybe... of the side garden in which you've spent the last four weekends digging, planting, weeding and mulching?!

004: mailbox

the best thing that happens in any mailbox is HAPPY MAIL, am i right? yeah. 'nuff said!

005: owl

a sort of doodly, patterny version of an owl. doesn't quiiiiiiiiiiiite look like the picture that was in my head but definitely fun to draw and color!

007: periodic table

this one really stumped me, until i thought of using design elements instead of the chemical kind. specifcally, categorizing different types of patterns. ok, yeah, it's kind of weird. which is probably why i like it.

008: grapefruit and cherry

for this week's prompts, tammy chose a bunch of combinations which can represent foods or colors or just spark you off into some completely different direction. i went with a literal grapefruit and cherry, mostly just because i thought i could draw them! :)

009: carrot and lemon

yes, the prompt was carrot and LEMON, not lime. no, i didn't realize that when i was drawing my adorable kawaii food friends, obviously. but no big deal, i just swapped the lemon to a different day. citrus fruit is pretty easy going, it must be all that vitamin c!

010: eggplant and ginger

this time i just took the colors and played with layers and shadows, an experiment i curtailed a bit early when i realized that multiple coats of watercolor were pilling my paper surface. note to self: index cards are not all that resilliant. duh, lauren.

011: mango and lime

a bit of hand lettering, with a couple of letters swapped out for fruits. my favorite part is the coloration on the mango letters.

012: kiwi and parsnip

well, kiwi, anyway; the parsnips kind of stomped off in protest when they realized the kiwis were turning into stylized flowers and taking over the whole card. ah well, these things happen.

013: blueberry and plum

again, i've taken the colors, and added in a suggestion of the fruits' shapes with a very loose mandala composed mostly of circles and ovals.

014: salt and pepper

a cartoon idea that's been in my head for a bit, i thought it'd look good in black and white.

and thus my delightful mega-ICAD catch-up post is done... for now, anyway, darlings! :) :) :)

claus and effect

we're still celebrating santa OR making holiday shaker cards at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ with our lovely friend marianne's theme, "shake it, santa baby". won't you join us? this week, i focused on the man in the red suit:

i used the current sketch from fusion card challenge; though not the nautically nice theme, obviously:

need a little more xmas inspiration? check out marianne's and stephanie's cards, not to mention the shake it, santa baby reader's gallery at ♥JINGLE BELLES♥!

oh deer

this week at shopping our stash we're at code red for a cute critter alert! by which we mean: we want to see projects which feature... well... a cute critter. ok, i guess this one was actually pretty self explanatory! for my card, i chose an old favorite i haven't used for a bit, the cute little fawn i first found in the paper-piecing pages of scrapbooks, etc, many moons ago. and wouldja believe that even though that magazine ceased publication years ago, their extensive paper-piecing archive including this sweet little guy are still available for free?! check it out!

paper pieced deer pattern from BHG scrapbooks etc archive; piece of real birch bark that was laying on my lawn after a big rainstorm last week... can't imagine whence it came b/c i don't think anyone anywhere in our neighborhood even has a birch tree, but i was pretty psyched to find it; patterned paper: basoc grey, glitz design, k and co + a bit of index from an old atlas; white glossy cardstock: paper accents; self-stick felt fern: prima; leafy ribbon: may arts; cloud punches: ek success; butterfly punch: martha stewart; ink: colorbox; adhesives: elmers brand gluetape, 3m foamtape, sewing machine 

do you see the cool mat that looks like birch bark? well, IT IS birch bark!!! would you believe i found it laying on my lawn last week after a huge rainstorm we had? true story. so of course i had to use it, asap. i've used the faux polaroid idea about a gazzillion times before, and i'm willing to predict i'll eventually use it a gazzillion times more... because it always seems like such a good way to turn a bunch of little elements into a scene.

want to see additional uber-cute critters? there are many awaiting you at shopping our stash right now!!!

shake it, santa baby!

this week's awesome ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ title and idea comes from our lovely fellow belle marianne who came up with "shake it, santa baby" while she was in the shower!* can you guess the brief? you actually get a choice for this one: you can make a shaker card OR make a card that features santa OR... both... which is what i did:

two recycled xmas cards and a piece of (unprinted) inkjet transparency from my stash; red cardstock: core'dinations; tiny clear microbeads made especially for shaker cards that have the price tag from a LSS that closed at least 8 years ago, but somehow do not have a manufacturer's name on them??; adhesives: elmers brand gluetape, 3m foam tape, sewing machine

apparently the overall theme of my week is "CHEATING" lol. i put it down to the fact that engineering is not my strong suit, so i'm always looking for a way to minimize that aspect of design. in the case of shaker cards, it means that whereas i love the look of a fancy multi-paned window, the thought of cutting one out with a craft knife does not particularly appeal. sooooooooo... i took a pre-existing diecut window from a pretty store-bought card i was sent over the holidays... and i layered it over a pretty snowscape featuring santa and his reindeer from another pretty store-bought card i got last christmas. here's a shot of the two original cards, just so you can see what bits are which:

i used a piece of clear acrylic behind the cut out, foam tape around the window opening to raise the top layer high enough to accommodate the little clear microbeads which fill the shaker, and i machine stitched around the perimeter just to hold things together with extra security. in the closeup i think you can very nearly almost see how the little beads and the glitter on the background layer give the whole thing a really festive and magical shimmer. ok, no, you really can't see that, but trust me, irl it's cool, k?

and now why not hop over to ♥JINGLE BELLES♥ where you can see marianne's and stephanie's gorgeous cards and start planning your own! ♥

*i ~LOVE~ that story b/c i'm always having all my best ideas in the shower, too!!! :)

SOS204: red red wine

there's a fun choice for this week's challenge at shopping our stash: you can make a card (or other project) that is mostly red OR you can make something with a wine theme. sound interesting? awesome! here's what i made:

patterned paper: basic grey grid + scraps that include... october afternoon, k and co, doodlebug, crate paper, anna griffin, recollections, cosmo cricket... and ummmm... others! :) red glossy cardstock: michaels; florals: prima, petaloo, heidi swapp; brad: american crafts; ink: colorbox; adhesive: elmers brand gluetape

i went with the shades of red after i saw this verrrrrrrrrrrry cool pin of some gorgeous hand painted chevron fabric. my first thought was to replicate the idea using watercolors, but at SOS we're all about using stuff up, so i swapped the technique in favor of a sort of applique made from patterned paper scraps. there's a little tutorial in the post below this one if you want to see exactly what i did, but to summarize briefly : i trimmed a bunch of paper strips to a consistent 1/2" width, put a 45-degree angle on each end, then used a piece of background paper with a grid design to make it easy to line those boogers up. (because at times like this, the crucial factor is knowing HOW TO CHEAT!) 

why not hop over to SOS where some of my fellow dt members are "seeing red" and others are hitting the bottle, lol! in other words... just another tuesday morning, darlings! ♥♥♥

scrappy chevron card tutorial

ok, so, like most things that involve a modicum of precision and many small pieces, there is nothing difficult about this, but it's definitely fiddly. on the other hand, it's a great way to use up LOTS of tiny scraps. as i mentioned in the post above, the most crucial bit of designing for this is to select a background paper that is gridded (or at least lined!) because that will allow you to place the chevron halves easily in pairs without having to measure and mark where they all go. because honestly... life's too short for that much measuring, darlings! :)

step 1: 

trim a bunch of scraps to whatever consistent width you'd like to use. 

(mine are 1/2" wide.)

step 2: 

use a protractor OR... if, like me, you're totally non-mathy, a diagonally bisected square... to give each end a 45-degree angle. i've also used my 1.5" punched square as a template in order to make each small angled strip the same size without having to do a lot of measuring. (because as i mentioned in the intro, i'm just not that keen.)

step 3:

repeat step two a whoooooooooooooooole lot of times until you have twice as many segments as you'd like there to be chevrons in your design. if you'd like to ink, outline, stamp or otherwise decorate your segments, this is the time to do so.

step 4:

use your gridded or lined background paper to pair up the two halves of each chevron. i've arranged mine in three rows of five chevrons, and i've left one tiny 1/8" grid square of my (sadly retired) basic grey "basics" paper blank between the two halves of each chevron, because it makes the design look more like my orginal inspiration pin! 

step 5:

repeat step four until you've completed the entire design. add flowers or other embellishments, if desired. then come back here and leave me a link to your awesome creation!!! ♥

"...on the first day of ICAD my true love gave to meEeeEeeeEEEE..."

can you believe it's june first already? yeah, me neither, this year is just totally FLYING by! on the other hand it means my favorite 61 days of the year are finally upon us: the index card a day project begins today, devised and hosted by the awesome tammy garcia on the daisy yellow art blog. (can i get a, "woohoo"?! ta v much!) you don't need any fancy supplies, or an official book, or ANYTHING to participate, except a pack of index cards and a writing implement, but something i learned about myself a few years ago is that i will be a lot more excited about... and committed to... a project if i've done a little bit of prep. so yeah, i decorated the cover of my store-bought, spiral-bound index cards in advance: 

official ICAD 2015 book cover

you don't have to have a plan, a theme, or a format going into ICAD, either, and i definitely like to keep loose to maximize sponteneity; but again, it's cool to have a bit of a "wish list" right? so this year i'd like to do more drawing and doodling. it's possible my cool cover inspired me a little too much, because on saturday night i saw the (100% optional!) daily prompts and weekly themes were posted at daisy yellow, and i just COULD NOT WAIT one more minute to start! so i did:

001: chevrons

i don't always use the prompts, and i expect at some point this year i'll go off on my own tangents too, but there are definitely times that i see something on the list that shouts inspiration to me, and, "chevrons!" was one of those, lol.

002: carnival

my first thoughts went in the direction of the circus-style tents, thrill rides, skeeball and funnel cakes that inhabited the firehouse carnivals i loved as a kid, but nothing spoke to me art-wise. and then i thought of the carnival that precedes lent and culminates in mardi gras... and *that* got me going. 

my favorite thing about this project is that it's a chance to try turning absolutely *ANY* crazy/cool/whimsical idea that intrigues or inspires us into a drawing or collage or poem or... whatever! tammy's very specific, inexpensive and un-artist-y choice of index cards as our base means we have nothing to lose with an attempt that doesn't quite work; and the daily format means there's another awesome chance to try again tomorrow. over the years a few people have said to me that they're intrigued by the idea but they're not art journalers and don't want to be; they're cardmakers or scrapbookers and don't have time and supplies to "waste". the only comparison i can think of is cross-training in sports: swimmers also run to boost their stamina... football players lift weights to build muscle mass... boxers jump rope to increase their coordination. i've never seen a straight line between making little doodle-y bits of art on index cards and feeling different about creativity, but somehow it really is there. plus... it's just sooooooooooo flippin' fun! so if you feel like joining in-- with or without sharing what you make-- i say, "a very happy ICAD to you, darlings!" ♥♥♥