A Riot of Colour in my ICAD Catch Up

I was going to post these ICAD cards last night, but sleep got the better of me, so today it is. 

These are my latest cards, made by experimenting with a really vibrant watercolour paint set.

 

 This first card was a rectangle cut from a textured wallpaper and the squares were painted to bring out the texture.

This second one is a result of experimenting with my watercolour paint set and some white glue:

 

The streak of glue was put down the left hand side of the page and then some spots of paint . I then dragged a plastic palette knife across the card to spread the colour.   This card is a combination of different cards done in that way that were ripped and joined together. 

 These two cards were created by cutting blocked lines out of one card and using it as a stencil for the other.  Random painting was added both before and after the stencilling.

I also made a card that looked better when it was wet so that was the card I posted to the flickr group:

 It was created by the rain!

 I put random food colouring spots onto my card and then left it out for the rain to do the creating.  (Note: Grab it in before it all washes away!)  The texture was still interesting when it dried but the colours went a very disappointingly shade of 'dull.'

Taking part in this ICAD group has really helped me to try techniques that I wouldn't have tackled otherwise and as each card is only 5 x 3", it doesn't make it too big a task.  Some of  the techniques I used were ideas that I had pinned on Pinterest, what a great way to try them out!

Off to Ireland tomorrow so not sure when I will be posting next as internet access isn't readily available.  I may be posting some Instagram pictures though, I love the scenery of Ireland.  To follow me (please do!) my user name on Instagram is @doodledoo.  

Thanks for looking and for any comments,

Nicky 

Summer Holiday Activities for Kids of All Ages!

Today was the day my boys broke up from school and we have already started on the first of our holiday activities!  I got this great book that is jammed packed with creative things to make and today whilst I was stuck at home waiting for the gas man to arrive I made a start.

I've allocated and titled up a ringbinder that we will use to put pictures that we create in and also photos of any models that we make.

The title comes from the book of the same name:

It's an Usborne children's activity book that is priced on the back at £20!! But, get this, I got it (new!) in a charity shop for just 50p!! Yay!

I had this bright idea yesterday that I would challenge myself to make (with the boys) all 1000 items starting at the beginning of the book and working through everything.  I even made a start with projects 1-9, these cat drawing exercises:

 (Following and copying the instructions) 

I then moved on to these monkey collages:

Which I finished off today waiting for the gas man. The bottom right one is made of felt and material - me! I never rarely ever use materials!

And, because the gas man took his time, I got started on the next project, making cardboard dinosaurs.   Then, whilst I went shopping,  I asked my husband to get the boys to help him finish the models off by  making some cardboard trees.  Good as gold (for a change!), they did this and the scene was complete for when I got back:

 Roooooaaaar!! (Good fun, but you need some nice comfortable handles on your scissors when cutting all that cardboard).

Taking a look at the book we worked out that some of the Summer themed projects were buried in amongst, say some Christmas projects or ones with an Easter theme, so we decided that we will just pick and choose what we do from it after all.

My boys are obsessed with  like playing Minecraft, so it will be useful to have a creative outlet on our non-Sunshiny days that doesn't involve the computer!  

We are off to Ireland on Sunday but plan to take the book and some basic supplies with us. Hopefully we will get chance to do some more of the projects whilst over there.   I am also hoping to carry on creating  index cards for the ICAD project, I am still keeping up with that most days.  I will be back later to show you some of my latest creations.

Thanks for looking and for any comments,

Nicky

Art Journalling Course 'In the Sun'

I'm being very good and keeping up to date with this online course 'In the Sun' run by Natalie Malik.  I love her style and sometimes I spot elements of it creeping into my pages, which is a good thing, I think!   

In date order since I showed you last, we have this page:

A confessional page.  Our prompt was 'our weakness' and mine is spelled out in my page!  (Bit of a shopaholic me!)  The vintage picture was a copy of a comic frame from a 1970's annual called 'Diana'.  (The story was that this rich spoiled girl kept buying loads of stuff using her mother's credit card.  She became a 'better person' when she ended up going into hospital after a ski-ing accident and the girl in the bed next to her turned out to be very ill and died...)  

This next page we were asked to go outside and 'feel our Summer' and write down our thoughts.  As it was yet another wet day here in the UK, I made this page:

 I used wrapping paper with coloured dots for the background and lots of patterned washi tape to represent the rain falling.

  This one is a bit of a cheat, because the picture of Leonardo da Vinci was simply copied and cut out from a children's book.  The prompt this time was about our Summer night routine.

I do have trouble with pens in journals sometimes.  Quite often they refuse to write on particular types of paper.  I end up having to correct or go over the words again, which isn't always successful.

(The quote "The night is only just beginning - and someone has to keep the stars company" is about how I  end up crafting way into the early hours.  I am definately a night owl, twitter-wooooo!  )

This next page was how we would spend a day in bed!:

The prompt even referred to the film, 'Bedknobs and Broomsticks' so I included pictures of that on my page.  Showing my age, but I do remember watching & enjoying it when it came out...

Finally, for these art journalling pages, we had the prompt, 'A Checklist for Road Trips':

 

My map is of Ireland, which is the theme of my page.  We are going there next week - by plane - but will be driving around places when we get there.  Hence this useful list, mustn't forget the essentials!  (Other essentials for this holiday will be raincoats, wellies and umbrellas, unfortunately!...)  

And for the photo prompt on patterns, I took a picture of a tiled floor:

Which consists of basic shapes that are joined together to create this pleasing pattern.  It's on an area of outdoor building and I bet it would take some cleaning!

Hope you enjoyed your weekend,

Nicky

Instagram

Not content with spending all my time on Pinterest, Flickr and the hundreds of blogs I read using blog readers, I now have a new interest that many creatives in Blogland seem to be a part of, Instagram.

I love photography so this seems right up my street.  At the moment I've only put a few pics on, just to 'dip my feet in the water' but I'm sure it won't be long before I'm diving in head first and swimming with the sharks fish!

(these are screen grabs of my photos taken from Webstagram, an online Instagram viewer)

This picture above is of a tshirt in a clothes shop window.

 This one is of a double rainbow, seen over our garden the other night

And this is one of the very first photos I took when I first got my iPhone a year ago.

If you are a fan of Instagram and are looking for new people to follow, please look me up. As you can see I'm on there as @doodledoo.  It would make my experience on Instagram a lot less lonely!  (Thanks!)

Thanks also for stopping by and for any comments.

Have a great weekend,

Nicky

Warwickshire Open Studios Event - Spoooky!

You may remember photos of my friend's interesting mosaic work I showed you on the day of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee?  Well yesterday we went to another fascinating (but quite spoooky!) place of mosaics.  This place was only a couple of streets away from where we live.  Who knows what some people (your neighbours?) have hiding in their back gardens?:

Yes, this is the interesting place our family visited yesterday - it was an open house & garden held as part of a Warwickshire Open Studios art event.  I have loads of photos to show you, because it was just so fascinating.

See what I mean about spooky?  What's great about this event is that visitors are allowed free reign to wander all over the treehouse and garden, spotting all the creative touches that are hiding all around.  (I'm not sure Health & Safety would like it, there are some seriously steep wooden steps leading to the top floor of that tree house).

View from the back window of the tree house.

The structure was covered in all kinds of cobweb covered objects:

 (Spot the 'I Love You' message in the bottle)

In the artist's house there were some interesting pieces hung on the walls:

and this art installation:

 I love these art open days where you get to see interesting, normally hidden artistic talents.  If you have them where you live do pop along, you never know what sort of inspirational treasure you'll find.

Thanks for looking and for any comments,

Nicky

ICAD Catch Up

The sun actually shone for a while today and as a family we went on a visit to an interesting place...but I'll show you photos of that tomorrow. Today it's time to catch up with ICAD (Index-Card-A-Day).

 Working backwards as I did yesterday, this was yesterday's creation:

What fun! I love the idea of made up creative words, especially when they have a humorous element, 'mibbling' - filling in letters on a page (the background words I filled in were from a proper, enlarged print dictionary).

This was from the day befores.  The background layered effect was created using Bingo dabbers, bought especially to do art with.  I love the transparent nature of these and they are perfect for layering and creating mixes.  I got a pack of glitter sequins from a charity shop so they ended on top, creating a lovely glimmer (it is all over, but the photo only shows some of the shine). 

Next up we have a flourescent pencil card (from a 'use coloured pencils' prompt).  I put texture on mine by sharpening the pencils and sticking on the bits from the sharpenings.  I also used some more of my neon embossing powder, which was heat set with a heat gun too.  

Finally for today, I did a card that had been missed out from June, the one 'welcoming Summer':

(I'm still waiting for that to happen, lol)

For this card I made a shaving foam and acrylic paint marbled background to which I added a Tim Holtz stamp.  More of the new glitter sequins were added to give it some shine and depth.

And there you have it for my catch up posts, I'm just off to do todays.

Hope you have had an enjoyable weekend,

Nicky

  

In the Sun Catch Up

Despite my lack of posts recently, I am still in high creativity mode and am silently getting through the  daily challenges of my online courses.

This post catches up with the Summer Art Journalling course I'm enjoying called 'In the Sun' run by Natalie Malik.

Working backwards, the first picture I've got to show you is from today, and this unusual picture is of my tootsies in glitter!:

We were given a fun weekend prompt to take a picture of our feet in a favourite place or an unusual one, and you can probably guess which one this is!  (If I had known in advance that I was going to do this, I would have tidied up my nails more and given them some polish.  I had to rush this in the few minutes of sunshine we got in our garden this morning). 

Another prompt we had was to 'Treat Yo'self':

 I was pleased to finally get myself a pair of those lacey 'Made in Britain' knickers that Mary Portas set up in a disused factory on that TV programme.  There was a link in my Facebook to say that 'House of Fraser' had them in and so I ordered them right away, they always sell out really quickly.  [Good service from HOF, I ordered them one day and they were in my local store to pick up the next, with no postage to pay, yay!]

For this journal page I used the packaging that the knickers came in (strange wording though!) plus a small lace stamp that I used down the side. 

This page took ages! It was for July 4th and I used circular stamps with embossing powders in Neon colours to represent the fireworks.  For the splat effect I used an inkblot stamp.  The gold is a gold glitter embossing powder that I got in a charity shop for 49p! 

This one is a page about the food we enjoy in the Summer.  Its a simple collage with the addition of washi tape (♥) and sequins. 

This next page is about planning a Summer Party.  The prompt was to set up a Pinterest board about what decorations, food etc we would have at our party.  Mine is here.   When I was finding things to add, I thought that I would like to do it for real - except the weather is so bad at the moment, it's not very practical.

Finally, for this set of catch up posts (I will do another one for ICAD) I have this page on how I like to relax:

..which is another collage.  I thought of a lot of ways, quite the expert on relaxing me, lol.  

Thanks for stopping by today and for any comments.

See you tomorrow for my ICAD catch up posts,

Nicky.

Olympic Torch Relay comes to Town

Well, we survived the camping, despite the Rain, Sun, Rain, Sun pattern that was our weather for the weekend.  We got back on Sunday at lunchtime in time to see the Olympic Torch Relay in Leamington that was (luckily!) in glorious sunshine! 

Here, first of all then are the Olympic pictures:

There was a great atmostphere, fun but also full of nervous tension too.  There was pressure to get the picture of the torch bearer without someone sticking their head in the way of your shot! (Fortunately, as you can see, I managed it! ☺)

* * * * *

And here are just a few of the weekend camping:

 

 We got ourselves a new giant (9 man) tent this year and everybody crammed into the main area when the rain came.  (The birthday girl herself made the bunting that you see on our tent).

In the field next to us were these nosey donkeys.  They were behind an electric fence and all the kids insisted on touching the fence, just once! (Ouch!) 

 

 We all (20 of us) went on a walk and the ground was so muddy!  Wellies were definately the (albeit non-fashionable) foot atire of the day.

And finally, as a result of the sun and rain, we were treated to this beautiful double rainbow.

British Summers, eh? Still, a good time was had by all and it was another year of great memories that we can add to our memory banks. 

 

Thanks for looking and for any comments,

Nicky