Painted Fingers

 The supplies came out last night! Journals, rubber stamps, spray inks, paints, stencils, crayons, pencils...

While I have all these goodies and more in my own studio, sometimes it's fun to take a workshop and try the unexplored. Last night the visual journals came out at the Occasional Artist with artist, Dina Wakley leading the way.

 

The first thing I grabbed was my new Dylusions Creative Journal. It's perfect for paints and inks although I'm not sure I would use it much for collage.

 

We started out stamping then built up the layers with each step.

Getting me to use figurative imagery takes a lot of prodding but if I'm taking a workshop I should be willing to get out of my comfort zone. I was in a crazy hair mood.

Anything goes in a visual journal. One of our prompts was to draw. A Picasso wasn't required. Simple shapes would do. Here's a good start. The right side is ready to go with the left waiting for more layers of fun.

While I stamped and slapped color on multiple pages, this was the last of the almost finished pages. I held off on any journaling. The creating part of my brain and the writing part come out at different times.

I came home excited and inspired. Then after sitting for a moment in the studio the day caught up to me, lol. All my classes have been painting so it was a day full of color.

The temperatures are up again after a week of unusually freezing temps here in the desert. No spending time indoors in the studio when it's this nice but I plan on playing some more the next few evenings. First stop, revisiting some of my rubber stamps that haven't seen the light of day lately.

Marissa

Oh, Goodies!

Some of my friends on Facebook might have read that I did a bit of a lightning visit to some of my favorite stores last Saturday. I was on the east side of the valley Saturday morning but I was taking a class on the west side in the afternoon. If I timed everything just right, I figured I could make all my stops.First stop Mystic Paper in Downtown Mesa. I'd received a call that the Tim Holtz Tissue tapes I'd ordered way back in February had arrived. Then Jennifer, the owner, posted these Pink Paisley brand tapes on the store blog. Tape! Tape! I couldn't wait!Here are the Tim Holtz tissue tapes. They come in packs of two, four different themes which I hope you can see on the packaging, "Marketplace," "Traveler, "Nostalgia," and "Symphony."

Speaking of packaging, I was happy to see that the recycling symbol was on the plastic as I took it off to photograph the tapes. I rarely find it as I remove it from mixed media/scrapbook supplies which create a lot of waste. On the other hand, the big pieces of plastic from these, didn't have the symbol, hmmm...Next stop: Frenzy Stamper in Downtown Scottsdale. Ms. Debbie blogged that the new Tim Holtz tapes and embossing folders had arrived. Although school is out and I have more time to stop by the store, I knew some of the designs would be sold out. I was right, but no worries, she'll re-order more.Again, these came in two-packs and pictured are the paper backing from the packaging. The embossing folders themselves didn't photograph well. There are eight sets, one was similar to some I already owned by another company so I passed.I wasn't looking for paper but Ms. Debbie showed me 3 new paper packs with rich, gorgeous colors. I'm not into the tea stained/sepia vintage look which the other two paper packs were rich with. Although he had a series of green papers in one of them that I still have in my head... As a pack, the baby pink/blue combo makes me a little nuts but on their own, these papers are beautiful. My photo doesn't come close to giving these papers justice.

With embossing folders and papers in hand, plus an m&m's or two under my belt, I was on my way to Creative Quest in old downtown Glendale for a Dina Wakley's "Graffiti of My life" workshop. They also had their shipment of Tim Holtz goodies and I was able to find the one set of his embossing folders that Frenzy was out of. Good timing.

It was a great workshop. Worked on some of the pages yesterday while at school and had the space to spread out. I'm taking another class with Dina this Friday night. It feels great to be creating again. Well, maybe I need to correct that. It feels great to be working with mixed media again. The gardening and clay work had taken over for awhile...
Marissa