The Good Kind of Cleaning and a Hot Mess

Playing around on a hot mess of a canvas with Stencilgirl stencils and distress crayons

Cleaning and play can go hand in hand. Not house cleaning…but cleaning excess paint off stencils. My fast and favorite way to clean off an inky or painty stencil, especially when gel printing, is by blotting it off on another surface like an art journal or in this case a wood panel.

Since this is not the actual piece I was working on as the stencils got painty, I just tossed them on to it willy nilly. Clearly there were no worries of colors being placed strategically since this is a bit of a hot mess. Excess paint was stenciled too since I usually have way too much paint on my palette. Wasting color is a crime to my muse so I use every drop possible.

Now that I had a messy place to start, the play began with careful mark making. If you’ve seen much of my play you probably heard a bit of sarcasm in the “careful mark making”. I just scribbled away like a little kid with Distress Crayons.

This still looks like a big hot mess. It has no direction and no pressure to be anything but play full of happy moments seeing the layers of colors build up.

Paint was smeared in areas for no reason other than the fun of smearing paint and that created some open spaces. Those open areas created places to stencil the words that summed up the meaning and reason for this piece. Play Today.

I could have stopped at just one Play Today, but why! If one Play Today was good, then more is better!

Here are the supplies I used. Some of these links are affiliate links which means I get a small percentage. It doesn’t cost you anything extra and it helps keep the free tutorials coming!

InLinkz.com

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Print it. Make it. Love it. A Weekend Retreat

Imagine an artful weekend of gel printing loaded with techniques and projects all while being pampered…a private room,scrumptious homemade meals and freedom to work at your own pace! Cozing up by the fire laughing and playing, pouring a glass of wine and having a quiet conversation, or enjoy the walking trails and labyrinth. That is Print it! Make it! Love it!

2 and 1/2 days of gel printing play in the most wonderful retreat setting-St. Mary’s at Transfiguration Spirituality Center in Cincinnati, OH. We’ll be gel printing then making 4 different projects with your prints. With this retreat being in November it is a great opportunity to get a head start making gifts for the holidays.

I’m there to help you by sharing techniques I’ve learned through years of printing, by answering your questions as they pop up, and guiding you through the building up of layers. I’m delighted to be co-teaching with the talented Kari McKnight Holbrook, frequently seen in Cloth Paper Scissors.

This is limited to only 20 students (~~at the time of writing this post it is over half sold~~ there is only one spot left) so we’ll have a chance to get to know each other. Since we have the entire building to ourselves, you can create in your pajamas all weekend if you want! Saturday night, the evening kicks off with ridiculously awesome artsy gifts, all provided, with a side of silly at the White Elephant Event. Plus FREE goodies from Gel Press + StencilGirl + Deco Art!

Join me and Kari McKnight Holbrook for a weekend of gel printing hosted by the heartful Glenda Miles this November. The all inclusive fee of $545 includes (early bird price and bonus $25 StencilGirl gift certificate) all your meals, light snacks, private room and ensuite bathroom, a goodie bag and so much more! But the early bird price flies away on Saturday, May 27th. You can find all the details and registration info here.

Hope to see you this November for a weekend of play!

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How Disco Helped Me Deal with an Ugly Art Journal Page

Playing in a cardboard art journal with color and pattern video tutorial by Carolyn Dube

What do I do with a hideous start to an art journal page? Call it an OOPS and add more layers! An O.O.P.S. is an Outstanding Opportunity Presenting Suddenly and little did I know that the word discover would take me to the 70’s and disco.

Watch How I dealt with an ugly art journal page on YouTube.

How do I build the cardboard journals? It’s all covered in the free workshop Permission to Play – join the fun and let yourself play.

The early layers on this page were hideously blah. They just looked like a mess and not even in colors I like! Since this is mixed media, when a layer looks that way, it just means it is time for more layers.

In the process of adding color that discover became disco. And yes, I started hearing the Bee Gee’s and Donna Summer in my head. Don’t worry, I didn’t sing on the video- autotune couldn’t help me hit a note.

A bit of orange pattern was added by using 1 of the 4 patterns on my Rectangular Patterns for Play stencil from StencilGirl. One of the many things I adore about stencils is that you can use just part of it to get different looks. There is an irregularly shaped patch of the little squares in the center, then a line of them at the bottom, and just a few in the upper corner. All from just one of the patterns.

Perhaps this is a bit of a controversial statement for all those kids of the 80’s who were raised that disco just wasn’t cool but…Disco should stand out, so I traced over the word with a black pen to make it pop a bit more.

Then it was disco dot fever time as I added splots of acrylic ink on top of some of the squares. The plan was to do just a few dots but it was too much fun, so I just kept on adding more and more. And yes, Donna Summer was still playing in my head… New to fineliners? Here’s a video that explains them in detail.

If you ever happen to have an ugly art journal page, try saying O.O.P.S. and adding more layers. That’s what I do!

If you’d like to see how to make a cardboard art journal as well as specific ways to let yourself play, check out my free workshop, Permission to Play.

Here are the supplies I used. Some of these links are affiliate links which means I get a small percentage. It doesn’t cost you anything extra and it helps keep the free tutorials coming!