A bit gothic

I always wondered how they painted these characters. Well, I had the chance to experience and I like how the girl came out.

DIY foam stamps

Buying stamps to use when making handmade greeting cards, postcards or in your art journal can end in a very expensive investment. I have invested in quite a few rubber and clear stamps. Most of my clear stamps are the cheap ones I find in a local store. It is a lot and I now change my habit into using these stamps. Although I have quite a some stamps I never had the need to buy rubber stamps to use on my art journal. And the most of these stamps are larger and therefor expensive.

Now, there are so, so much tutorials on youtube.com showing us how to make your own stamps. So I gave it a try! And it is done in minutes, especially if you make small stamps on a square of 3x3 inches. Well, I didn't measure my stamps; didn't see the need to measure. I have foam at home, so why not try it?? Here my collection DIY foam stamps. One tip: you don't have to make large stamps. I find smaller easier to use. Give it a try!!

I used Aleene's Tacky glue (watered down!) and some card stock from an empty Quaker Oats box. By the way: I used them as you can see and they do an awesome job! Check out my DIY stamps.

Two art journal pages for the monthly swap @ milliande.ning.com. On the first page you'll see images of my DIY foam stamps.

Prompt first page: "All that glitters..." Create a page incorporating something that is shiny and glittery. 

Prompt second art journal page: Create a page inspired by one of your favourite seasonal traditions, songs or stories.

June challenge

Rosie is the challenge of the month June. The mission was to use any kind of markers. I did used the template we got from Adriana and to be honest it saved me time to draw the dollie first. Coloured with Copic markers. I added decorative tape around my borders to finish the page.

Copic used:
Skin: E000, 00, 11, 13
Hair: E81, 84, 87
Rose: R27, 29
Bow: R05, 28
Shirt: W00, 1, 3
Stockings, bag: 100, W00, 1, 3
Shoes: C1, 3, 5

Pictures of the challenges

May challenge: Black & White 

August challenge: Matryoshka

September challenge: Sirenita

Another Challenge

I did another challenge, the May challenge on dolldreams.ning.com. Hihihi, today I created mine. In fact I finished  three challenges. Challenges of the months August and September are also done. The May challenge was to create a black & white dolldreams doll. No use of other colours allowed. I used the black Tombow and my waterbrush. After the May challenge I started the August challenge and I had to use a black ballpoint pen (I used my pencil), draw a mermaid on an old newspaper (I used a page of a magazine) and use some watercolour markers (like Tombows) for the background. The last challenge I did tonight is the August challenge. The challenge was to create a beautiful matryoshka Russia doll. Acrylic paints were used to colour this doll and I used templates from Crafters workshop and Spellbinders and inkpads to create the nice background. I did not used the template. In fact I created my matryoshka almost a year ago, but I never finished it. I could not decide which colour, etc. Until this challenge and I am really satisfied.

I still have three challenges to go: June, July and November. I'll get there, for sure! No pictures tonight; They came out quite dark and they don't look too well. I'll have to try it another day.

Good night☺

Simply made (Christmas) cards

My daughter is in Suriname for her internship. A good reason for me to make her greeting cards. I thought it would be fun for her to receive some international snail mail from her mom. An image of sweetpea stamps coloured with Copic markers. I coloured this image a while ago and I do not remember the colour combination I used. For a 3-D effect I adhered the image with foam dots. Now lets hope this postcard will make a safe trip to Surinam, without being damaged. The greeting is an clear stamp from Hero Arts; the text ' with love' is from Papermania. The swirl is an clear stamp from Inkadinkado (patterned bugs collection).
The small bird and flowers are also stamped and these are clear tamps from Papermania Chatsworth vintage collection. This card is also simply made, since I only added text, swirl, little bird and flowers and the rub on in the corner above.  That´s all!

Too busy these days and I created these easy made Christmas greeting cards. The card stock has so many patterns, so layering would cover the patterns. No need to do that. These are postcards and will be send as such. I finished the back of these postcards as a regular store bought postcard. I did use my Copic markers for the images. The clear stamp images are as the patterned card stock from an unknown brand. To finish the front of the postcard I added a tag, distressed the tags and stamped a greeting on the tag.

With simply made I refer to the card stock, which is beautiful so there is no need to layer with other card stock. Adding an image and a greeting and voila!

More pages

On this Sunday I had to let my mind flow, so I my acrylic paints and my Moleskine art journal. A while ago, somewhere in April, I had the opportunity to take part of challenges on dolldreams.ning. Life took much of my attention and I postponed these challenges. Well, if I start with the April challenge today, you can guess the rest, huh? The April challenge has the theme "Green Spring". It is Winter and I am dreaming of a warm sunnyy:-D No, I do not miss the insects, but butterflies are nice to see in the Summer. This is my page:

Used: acrylic paints, acrylic stamps, Copic marker, Copic multiliner, Uni Signo white gelpen.

A second challenge for December, the Christmas Angel challenge. We supposed to make a Christmas card with the image. I did not drew this one by myself. We received the doll from our teacher and we have her permission to use the image. To safe time I just printed the image and coloured it with my Copic markers.

I do not like this Copic marker paper, but I noticed that it does not bleed. The pictures is not the best I took, but I'll have to do with this one:-))

My finished page of the mini workshop "Pixie Dust Princess".

Used: acrylic paints, Copic marker, Copic multiliner, Uni Signo white gelpen, embellishment.