Artventurous Saturday

The day began early and I was feeling pretty good despite the fact that I spent the previous evening/early morning making 22 ATCs to trade at the Carson Rubber Stamp Convention! I originally chose a Frida theme but later added the second design. I like to give people more choices when it comes to trading but sometimes it only confuses people on what to choose. LOL! The popularity of birds was evident as those ran out before my Frida cards. I used orange, hot pink and mustard acrylics as the main backgrounds on my Frida cards. A turquoise acrylic paint was painted around the edges. Stickles (glitter glue) was added on the halo, wings and edges. I used a lime green and robin blue acrylic paint on my bird tag which was later mounted onto decorative paper. I edged the ATC with China Blue Distressed Ink and dropped a small glob of Stickles onto an egg in the nest.


These are the cards I came away with! I'm glad I made the amount I did. It may not look like a large swap for a convention, but from what I understand this year's ATC trade was the largest one! I hope this inspires more people to get involved for the July Convention. I love collecting these little works of art.

This is a display board of Studio Blackbird's awesome ATCs and tags they make showcasing their stamps. This is just one board. Their tiny shopping area is crammed with stamps, ephemera, books and so much more and these displays are surrounding it all. I love their use of vibrant colors.

Here's a group of goodies I brought back with me! Grunge paper is amazing and you can see what it's about at http://TimHoltz.com. He's got amazing demos going on over there. The package of unmounted stamps are his design also. I love this kind of imagery for backgrounds. The book is jam packed with painting, journaling, drawing, etc ideas for art projects. Couldn't leave it behind. Those little spritz bottles will be holding cool sprays of color and sparkle to spray over inked and painted pages/tags. The small glass tiles are the perfect size for my inchies!!!!!!!! YAY!! Another cool idea on what to do with inchies. Remember I had that contest waaay back when on what to do with them? Well, they will look very cool on these tiles and then the tiles can sit atop a bracelet (once glued) that has those little squares to put stuff on. You've probably seen them before. They're plain so that you can adorn them. Anyway, I'm ready to start that project!

Here's another pic of what I bought. Love the colorful papers in the pack. I have a close-up below for you to drool over. The stamps are very weird - just the way I like them. Actually, these are mild-weird because I have some that will give you nightmares if you see them before bedtime. LOL! These stamps are from Invoke and they have lots of cool stamps. Go to http://invokearts.com to get your artsy fix. Those are watercolors and they're translucent and if you paint them over matte colors they will transform into a metallic look. I found some cool monkey head beads, a little dolls head, a white pen....oh, you'll see below cause I have close-ups for you to see.

Here's that paper pack. I love the colors and they'll be used in the future for something fun and exciting!

See that stamp with the roses? It's going to become a crown for one of my altered women. It was a steal at $2! The tiny one next to it was another deal at $1.75. Oh, and how about that altered flower?! I could not leave it behind. I think it'll look great planted in a pot filled with clay and covered with moss. Or maybe something strange to go with it's uniqueness. Any ideas? There's a little white porcelain doll that you can't see very well due to the flash. I have a special plan for her too. She had an accident somewhere cause she's missing an arm. LOL! Oh, sorry out there if you or a loved one is missing an arm. I'm not hatin'. LOL! See the pretty pendant below? This picture doesn't do it any justice. It is an awesome design and the colors are beautiful! It was a steal actually. The person who designed it sells lots of handmade beads and the coolest looking "bead animals, bead people, bead things" pendants. You can check out her site at http://pennymichelle.com . I haven't been there but she probably has her creations for all to see and buy. Anyway, I love this pendant and it's got really pretty stones (believe me, it takes a lot to make me use the word pretty. LOL!). Let's see, we have a blue green stone in the center called Labradorite and it's surrounded by citrine (but they look olive-ish) and something called sapphires. WOW! Set in sterling silver. Man-oh-man, someone was looking out for me, huh?! Cause there was only one, and it was the show special at $21. Yes, really! phew. The description alone has left me feeling loaded. as in high. ROFL!!!! OK, enough.

The day was long and fun and I didn't spend as much as I have in the past. And I even met fellow blogger, Sherry from http://gotart4u.blogspot.com . She really likes Diamond Glaze and last I saw of her she was debating over the gallon or pint. LOL!

While driving home I decided that we'd have something to eat from House of Tacos because I was suffering from sleep deprivation and I was craving enchiladas. So off to House of Tacos it was. After dinner, I decided it was time to get off my feet cause I'd been on them ALL day. And that's the last anyone saw of me until today. And here we are, a day later and I'm still smiling from my Artventurous Saturday!