Mixed Media - Believe in Magic...

Happy Monday, everyone! I had to take a little break from crafting recently to tend to some family business and a sick family pet, but I was able to sneak in some crafty time in small bits and pieces during the past couple weeks, and will have a couple projects to share with you this week. :)

The first is a canvas (of sorts) to get back on track for Mixed Media Mondays. I recently purchased some newly released paints by an artist friend, Cheryl Mezzetti. They're called Perfect Paints, and they're acrylic paints with a beautiful sheen to them...colors that are brilliant with just a bit of reflectivity that makes the colors dance...they're called Shimmering Matte Acrylics, and the hardest decision to make was which colors to start my collection with!

Here's the finished project...

Can you tell what my "canvas" is by this photo?

In my stash, I had the backing chipboard piece from an empty wirebound 9x12 watercolor paper pad, already gessoed for later use. When my paint order arrived, I pulled out that piece, and started laying on colors - just playing to see how they covered, how they blended with each other, and what would happen when I layered one on the other after drying. These colors are so rich!

When I saw how beautifully the colors blended, an idea started to take shape...and that's about the time that other life issues started taking priority over my crafting time. So I started jotting notes on post-its as the ideas came while I was tending to other things, and playing with those ideas when I had a few minutes in the evenings.

Along with the paints, I purchased a few colors of Perfect Paints Polishing Plasters...a sort of molding plaster with color...but a bit of a different texture, and when buffed, a slight sheen...or when burnished, a shabby, vintage look. So, following my "try this" notes, I pulled out a couple stencils, and played with laying down the Plasters...and then I had this...

Here's where you can see how different the colors look when the combo of natural light and Ott lights aimed at the canvas board (in my little homemade photo booth) reflect the sheen of the paints. In real life and to the natural eye under normal room lighting, the colors look more like they do in the first photo above. 

I used "Organic Sugar" Polishing Plaster for the stripes along the left side, and a combo of "Cayenne" and "Sunwashed Clay" Polishing Plasters for the tree and branches. Once they had dried, I burnished each with the metal blade of a palette knife, and it gave them a smooth but vintage appearance.

As a finishing touch, I used Stabilo All pencils in black and brown to add a little bit of shading and dimension before adding embellishments on top of the pastes.

And here's where taking stepout photos ended, as I only devoted short periods of time in the following couple weeks to add bits and pieces to the canvas board. 

Among the little burlap flowers and diecut cardstock leaves decorating the tree branches, I added some dark bronze metal flowers, touched up with pink and yellow Shimmering Matte Acrylics. I also dry-brushed those colors on top of the multicolored micro and seed beads that I added around each of the larger metal flowers...

These chipboard hearts were first painted with the pink paint (Peony), and then a watered-down "wash" of the Peacock Blue paint gave me the violet/purple shade for a little variety...

I had painted this chipboard fairy for another project, and didn't use it, so I covered it up with black heavy gesso, then added some of the Peacock Blue and Peony paints to the wings, and topped them with some Rock Candy Distress Stickles...

The sentiment stamp is by Unity Stamp Company - it already has some of the words "blocked" but I drew in a couple more lines and some white dots around "magic" for fun...pens write beautifully over these paints! The pink and blue Shimmering Matte Acrylics were added inside the crystals of the butterfly to make it stand out a bit more...

Supplies:

Color Mediums:   Perfect Paints Shimmering Matte Acrylics ("Cantaloupe" "Rain Slicker" "Peony" "Peacock Blue" "Moss Green")

Perfect Paints Polishing Plasters ("Organic Sugar" "Cayenne" "Sunwashed Clay")

Stencils:   The Crafters Workshop "Branches Reversed";   Tim Holtz "Stripes"

Dies:   Simon Says Stamp "Fancy Believe";   My Favorite Things "Rose Leaves"

Chipboard:   Dusty Attic "Garden Fairy" and "Heart Attack Panel Small #2"

Stamp:   Unity Stamp Company "The Time is Now"

Burlap flowers:   The Paper Studio             Metal flowers:   theFunkieJunkie.com

Crystal butterfly:   Prima             Gems:   Prima and Creative Imaginations

Mixed media ink supplies:   Faber Castell Pitt Artist Pens (black);   Stabilo All pencils (black & brown);   

Mangaka black fine and medium pens;   Uniball Signo white gel pen

Beads and glitter:   Rock Candy Distress Stickles;   Martha Stewart clear coarse glitter;  silver and pink German glass glitter;  

 Doodlebug Sugar Coating BonBon glitter;   craft store micro and seed beads

Thanks for visiting today...I hope your week is starting with a smile!