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Wednesday 24 April 2013

Life is just a journey!

Hello Blogland, I have seemed to move away from the good old cards for my last post and this one. But as they say "Variety is the Spice of Life!" So I bring you my first ever mixed media project.

I had a canvas in my crafty stash, that I bought about a month ago, has I was going to have a dab at acrylics, but never did.When I was sent the Curio by Sarah Hurley digi kit, I thought I would try a mixed media project and combine the two, Sarah's Curio digi kit and the canvas.

The canvas was already sized with gesso, so that was one problem out of the way. I started by printing three sheets of the background papers, the blue butterfly, the cream butterfly and the script papers. I just ripped the paper up, I was not bothered if the pieces weren't uniform in size, because I thought it would work better. Ripping paper by the way, is a great stress reliever. I then brushed a thin layer of drys clear PVA glue and started to stick. I tried to be as random as I could when picking up the pieces, but looking at the finished project, I didn't quite manage it lol. After I placed a piece of background paper, I brushed a thin layer of the drys clear PVA. I carried on covering the canvas until it was completely covered. I then brushed a final thin layer of the drys clear PVA over the completed canvas, the edges too and put aside to dry.

I was looking through the embellishments in the kit and found some butterflies that match the background papers. I loaded the kit into Serif CraftArtist and I opened an A4 blank page. I then dragged the butterfly embellishments onto my work area, resized them, so they would fit on an A4 page and printed them out. Then came the hard part, and when you hear what it is, you will be thinking "That ain't hard!", but all will be explained lol. I have never been the best cutter outer. From being a child until now, I even cut, leaving a jagged  edge or cut into the design. I try to move the thing I am cutting out and not the scissors, but still no joy. Any tips from my fellow Crafters will be greatly received! I manage to gut out all the butterflies and then had a play with positioning and how many I would use. I decided on using the ones that has some blue in them. After a lot of umming and Arring I decided that I would only use two and I would place them on the top left and bottom right corners of the canvas.

That left me with another choice to make, what to put in the center of the canvas. I opened up the Embellishment file of the kit and one of Sarah's sentiments that jumped out of me straight away. "Enjoy the journey" Why this sentiment though. The passed couple of years have not been the smoothest and I have found myself getting completely stressed at the smallest thing, so one day I decided just to sit back and change the things that I could and not worry about the things I couldn't, because life is just a journey and nobody knows what lies around the corner. So I chose this sentiment as a constant reminder to, sit back and enjoy the journey. I pulled the sentiment to my work space on CraftArtist and printed it out. I then cut it up using a guillotine, again any tips on how to cut a straight line using a guillotine, will be gratefully received, and put it to one side along with the two butterflies that I had already cut out, ready to attach to the canvas when it had dried. I decided to add a little sparkle to the butterflies wings, so I used a quickie glue pen and some ultra fine glitter in blue and purple.

when the canvas was completely dry I attached the butterflies to the top left and the bottom right corners, using the same PVA glue that I used on the canvas. I attached the sentiment to the middle of the Canvas using 3D foam tape.

There we have it, my constant reminder, that life is just a journey.

I hope you like it.

Ian xx


13 comments:

Linda Simpson said...

Hi Ian, I am loving the papers and the colours on your canvas.

Hugs
Linda xxx

Unknown said...

lovely work Ian, so pretty! x

jaine drake said...

You're so right, don't dwell on the past, it's gone and can't be changed so enjoy every moment of the now because these will be the memories of tomorrow. Love the canvas Ian and you're cutting out looks perfect to me.

Andree said...

A fabulous canvas Ian. The torn papers make a super background and the butterflies are gorgeous x

Unknown said...

What a great canvas Ian...a fantastic piece of art, you must be really proud of this xxx

Jan said...

This looks great Ian xx Jan

jane stillman said...

A brilliant canvas Ian, love how you've done the background and the butterflies are fabulous

Mandy Ashley said...

Hi Ian :)

WOW, I think you have made a fantastic creation! I love your colour theme & the butterflies & sentiment are great. I can't see what you mean about your cutting out, all looks fab to me! :)

Sandra Wright. said...

Yay....I can leave you comments now.
Great you have managed to get your blog sorted.

Sandie x

Unknown said...

Fantastic Canvass .Love the creativity and the colour and design is lovely xx

Gwyneth said...

Fab project. It's great that you've used a sentiment that's got a meaning for you. Now stop stressing about getting your cutting perfect - I found that finding a scissors that had larger holes so that my fingers were more comfortable holding them, and that cut sharper to the end, and then stopped stressing about getting my cutting perfect, which it is never going to be, and my cutting actually improved.

jane stillman said...

Back here with my DT hat on! As I said before, the canvas is brilliant, love the design. Thank you for joining in Emma's Crafty Challenge, good luck

Unknown said...

Great work Ian, with a huge amount of thought.
The words could not be truer.

Claire