Sara's Never-Never La-La Land

A mini-book & big news

2012-01-07T09:38:00.000-08:00

Hello friends! I know it's been a while and I've been busy over at Craft Test Dummies doing some super-fun reviews of some AMAZING products! One of those products was the MyStik glue runner; I reviewed the permanent and vellum runners. It's a pretty handy little tool, especially since it's an adjustable handle, making it perfect for long projects or maybe a more elderly crafter.

Here's a little minibook I made using the Mystik glue runner. It truly is invisible behind the vellum names that I printed out!

The patterned paper and chipboard embellishments are from the Ambrosia line by Basic Grey. An oldie, but goodie.

Now for the BIG news...

I'm going to CHA!!! For those of you that don't know, CHA is a semi-annual trade show with the largest names in the crafting business showcasing their new products for the next season. I will be going as a reporter with Craft Test Dummies so be sure to check their website January 29th through February 2nd for updates from my the whole team of gals at Craft Test Dummies! I'm going to put their blogs over to the right, too, so you'll have easy access to all of us!

This is a dream come true for me, so a BIG shout-out to Jenny who's "Mama" Craft Test Dummy, who has given me this opportunity and been patient with showing me the ropes!!!

Talk to you soon, my crafty friends!

Masked Painting mini-Tutorial And The BIG News

2011-07-27T11:58:00.000-07:00

Greetings! After looking at all of the CHA goodness coming, it looks like canvas is going to be a big trend this year, from painting on canvas tags, canvas paper, canvas minibooks or just a regular old gallery wrapped canvas. So, I thought I'd post a little project/tutorial!

And if you want to know the big happy dance information just go on ahead and scroll to the bottom.

Let's get started!

What you will need:
Canvas (Mine is 9x12 & gesso two layers)
Acrylic paints
Vinyl (to use for masking)
Shape Punches (I used circles)
Brayer

Start with your blank canvas. I did about 2-3 layers of gesso to prep my canvas.

Then I painted it a lovely color of turquoise... turquoise makes me happy.

Then I painted splatters and textures all over it. No need to get technical or think too much here, just have fun. Let your inner five year old take over. Is it just me, or does it kind of remind you of those marbled-looking caboodles from the 80's?

<---- Word

Next, I used two different sized punches to punch circles out of vinyl and stuck them to the top of my canvas. Use a brayer to get them "extra down." This will help the paint not to seep through into our blue portions.

"I see a canvas and I want it painted black..."

Once the paint is COMPLETELY dry, carefully pull up your vinyl circles and see the pretty, pretty creation you made!

Now, if you think you might want to use your circles again and want an easy way to store them just stick them all to a piece of wax paper. BAM! Done!

Now this is about the time I got stuck. I wanted to do a word on the front of the canvas, but couldn't think of a "good enough" word. (I know, I'm crazy, right?) Well, I happened to be listening to one of my FAVORITE artists of all TIME, Plumb. She is seriously amazing... I can listen to any of her cd's and it will immediately take me back to a certain point in my life. And if you're going to listen to any of her songs, I suggest, "Stranded," "Blush," and "Drugstore Jesus." Anywho, one of her songs, "Nice, Naive and Beautiful," came on and LIGHTBULB. I decided to turn my canvas clockwise and use those three words.

I used my cricut and SCAL to do the three words and cut them out in vinyl and positioned on my canvas.

I found that cutting out the whole word, and trying very carefully to leave the whole portion intact, meaning don't remove the inner letters at all yet. Does this make sense? NOW, use a pair of tweezers to again, carefully remove the letters, but leave the little "innards" inside. Now, that I've totally confused you, brayer down your words and paint the inside. I did about SIX coats of white paint...

Make sure your paint is fully dry before removing the masks.

Now I did have some of the white paint creep beneath the vinyl on the words, so some careful touch up was in order. I also outlined the letters in black pen to really make them pop. (above photo was taken at night... sorry!)

So here's the final product again:

As always, I had a ton of fun making this little creation. I'm defintely going to be doing some more masking and painting on canvas in the future! What do you think? Is this something you would try.

And.

Now.

THE. BIG. NEWS.

Awhile back I did a guest review spot over at Craft Test Dummies. Jenny runs this fabulous site that reviews, tries and reports about all kinds of crafting products, stretching from every creative spectrum.

Well, Jenny asked me if I would be interested in becoming a regular contributor and reporter for Craft Test Dummies. Ummm... can we all say, "YES!"

So now, you are looking at the new contributor to Craft Test Dummies. So check out the website a couple times a week (OR every day) to see new and fun crafty projects and reviews written by yours truly.

And do you know what I might *also* get to do with this new shnazzy job???

Not even three words...

Three letters...

C.H.A.

That's right... if I'm a lucky-ducky enough girl I just might be able to get one of those magical golden tickets into CHA to see all of the new fabby crafty products before it comes out on the market. Isn't that JUMP-UP-AND-DOWN-DO-THE-SNOOPY-DANCE-EXCITING!?!?!?! It is for me!

Thanks for stopping by and sharing in my excitement. Talk to you soon! And be sure to check out Craft Test Dummies sooner than later for crafty awesomeness!

Smash Book (part deux)

2011-07-18T16:46:00.000-07:00

Well, the last post was on my homemade smash book and I wanted to follow up with my thoughts on the real Smash book by K & Company. I had ordered the black one as well as a few other goodies. The first thing I wanted to check out was of course the fabby little pen/glue stick it came with. The pen is very similar to a Micron and I'd say it's a "02" line width, which in normal terms is .30 mm. The glue stick.... ahhhh... the glue stick. First thing I had to do was smell it. That's right... I smell everything. Would you like to know what it smells like WHILE finding out just how CRAZY I am?

Yes?

Well, I think that the glue stick smells like "My Little Ponies" dolls when they're fresh out of the box. But not the new ones.... oh, no. The new MLP's don't smell like the ponies did in the 80's from when I was a girl.

See, I told ya'll I'm crazy.

And in other news, I just admitted to sniffing glue.

But DOES it stick? Oh yes, yes it does. I'm a glue-stick advocate and self-proclaimed glue stick expert. People overlook them too quickly for their handiness, size and capabilities. Just by using a brayer, you can really expand the possibilities of the glue stick. Anyways, the Smash stick seems a bit greasy, but if you need to reposition your paper quickly you can move it and it does to a permanent state dry fast. Once it's down, it's down and if you try to pull it up, you will end up ripping paper.

On to the Smash book itself. I was a bit disappointed when I opened it up and the chipboard cover wasn't embossed! Looking closely at the video and photos, I apparently picked the ONLY one that wasn't embossed. No worries though, I'm not complaining. It's O-Wires on the inside are a little screechy when you open it up. Kind of like nails-on-a-chalkboard-screechy. I'm hoping this goes away with some more use, which I'm sure it will. The paper inside of it is a nice, thick quality. If I take my Smash pen and hold it in place on the paper it will bleed through in about 3 seconds, which isn't too bad, considering. When I draw some doodles though there is no bleeding through to the other side.

I was slightly disappointed that a lot of the graphics in the book are printed in darker colors. This makes the whole "list making/note taking" aspect of the book a bit more difficult... Maybe they'll come out with a fabby little white smash pen. (Do you hear me K & Co. ?)

The book is binded by using three different pieces of chipboard (a front and back cover and spine) then connected them together with what looks like extra-wide gaffer tape. Instead of using the plastic page as I did with my homemade Smash book to connect the o-wired pages to the cover, they had an extra page of paper at the front and back of the binded pages that they glued to the inner sides of the chipboard covers. I've used this method for binding books before and generally prefer it and don't really know why I didn't think of it originally. I will definitely try this next time I make another homemade smash book.

On to some of the accessories...

I purchased some of the dot tape that's similar to Japanese washi tape or if you're familiar with it, the Tim Holtz tissue tape. It doesn't feel that sticky, but it really is, tears easily and stays down. I also got some of the little stickies which weren't very sticky and I had to use the glue stick to get them to actually stay down. They're cute, though! There's ten per design and seven designs total. I also have one of the Smash pads (the quotes) which is super fun. There's 10 designs and three copies of each. The Smash bands are really cute (I love stripes) but they're a very tight fit over the book. I must admit, I'm partial to the band that I made. The other goodies I got are pretty standard; the page marker man with the moustache, mini envelopes, paper clips and tabs are super cute. Oh and the Smash stamp is also fun! It has an adjustable date side and a phrase side. Some of the phrases include, "*Smashed," "Oh, Snap," and "Hot Mess."

Fun stuff! What do you think? Would you want to make your own Smash book or buy one of the new ones?

In the comments from the Homemade Smash book, Renee said that scoring and binding the book may prove difficult. I was able to score the chipboard by taking a ruler and positioning it down the book where I wanted to score and using and a bone folder and my big, scary muscles I was able to get a good score down it. For binding, if you don't have a bind-it-all or cinch, you can always use binding rings and punch holes in your pages, then have an extra piece of paper in the front and back of your book, and glue these to the inside of your cover. This is similar to what I did with the Grungepaper minibook. Hope this helps, Renee!

Well, talk to you all soon! I'll be back with the SUPER HAPPY news soon!

Homemade Smash Book

2011-07-15T16:51:00.001-07:00

Has it really been three months?!?!?! WOWZERS! Things have been a bit crazy around here; this was the first year that the girls have done ballet and dance and recital week was absolutely insane! I will have to go into it in another blog post, as well as our trip to Lake Powell. Which was an absolute TRIP, because I have a crippling fear of large bodies of water. Well, onto crafty things...

Last CHA, K & Company premiered a new line of products called, Smash Books. Here is the somewhat viral video that's been sweeping the crafty blogs and message boards by storm:

Pretty cool, eh? Well, it was SO COOL that as soon as the Smash books hit the shelves, they flew off in an instant. And I mean INSTANT. As soon as I received the in-stock notifications in my email they were *poof* all gone. No. more.

Well, I FINALLY was able to track down a Black Smash book through the K & Co. Website and ordered it about a week ago. But then I read a blog post by the fabby-mc-fab-fabulous Shimelle which questioned (in a round about way) why can't we just make our own Smash books? Haven't we been doing something like this already... like in our high school days before all of this pre-made stuff was around?

I kinda like the idea of a Smash book because I'm a list maker and super note taker. I have lists for everything, Post-it's all over the place, pads of paper with notes, quotes and lyrics on them, etc... So, to have a fabby little place to put all of my little smatterings seemed like a good idea to me.

And so, the race was on. I wanted to make my own Smash book. And this is the final product:

I wanted to create something that was pretty close to the original smash book. I saw that it had a thick chipboard cover, so I grabbed a piece of 12x12 chipboard and scored a spine down the center. I then used green floral tape to tape off some sides and painted the spine and connecting portions turquoise. Also, it looked as if the chipboard cover on the real smash books had been embossed. I was on a new mission now. I knew my Vagabond and Tim Holtz texture fades would emboss the thick chipboard, but I couldn't fit the whole cover through the Vagabond. Hmmm... google to the rescue! I found This fab blog where the super smart lady figured out that you can turn your cricut blade, get this... are you ready??? UPSIDE DOWN. And then you have an embossing tool! How cool is that? Now, there are a few more steps if you want to emboss paper or foil, so watch her video, but for my chipboard purposes, I just put my cover onto my mat, taped it down around the edges (to prevent sliding) and "cut" my design. OK, given it's shallow and hard to see, especially in photos, but it actually did work. ( You can double-click any of the photos to see a larger version.)

Next up was that flowery thing you see on the front of the book. I saw that the original Smash books came with some elastic bands (sold separately) to help keep your book "together" especially once you start "smashing" more and more loveliness into it. I wanted to make my own. I took a piece of elastic band (found in your local craft store in the sewing section) and added it to a felt circle that I had topped with some baubles. I sewed a few fun ribbons on the bottom, and voila! Cute little band to keep your book intact.

OR....

A CRAZY HIPSTER HEADBAND! BWAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!

Just kidding.... don't do this.

Next comes the insides. The original Smash book seemed to have fun quotes, prompts and decorated papers within it. I found a fabulous website, Incompotech Graph Paper that lets your customize your own graph paper in all types of styles and colors and then download it in a PDF format. Seriously, go take a look... it's fabulous. Once I downloaded all of my paper, I opened them in photoshop and added quotes or listed numbers to each. I then printed it out on regular printer paper. In hindsight, I wish I would have printed on some non-textured white cardstock; the computer paper is a bit flimsy. Here are a few of the pages:

I also did some patterned paper pages that I added some pockets to...

.

I did one page using a darice mirror, which you can find in your local craft store around the magnets and velcro section.

I also cut down and glimmer misted some water color paper for fun and maybe added a stamp, too...

I added some Kraft pages, because who doesn't LOVE kraft??? Plus, any kind of rub-on looks FABULOUS on them...

You can also see I added some tabbed page dividers to the book, too. These were from Target on clearance. (Yay clearance!)

Once I acquired all of my pages, I ran them through my Bind-it-All (which I've had for years and just now learned how to use it properly... oops) and the last page of my book was a thin piece of plastic paper/acrylic. I made an almost seamless pocket using kraft paper on the back cover and trimmed the plastic page slightly smaller then slid it in! Voila! Now you don't have to see the rings on the outside of your book!

Pretty fun, huh??? If you have any questions, feel free to shoot them at me. The Smash book that I ordered is here and sitting in a box in the corner of the studio. I promised myself that I wouldn't open it until I posted this blog. Hopefully on Monday I'll give you a run-down of all of the pages and goodness inside of the Smash book. Plus, I have some SUPER exciting information for you all. As in, JUMP UP AND DOWN, PEE IN YOUR PANTS, THIS IS SO FRACKING EXCITING, kind of information. Oh yeah... it's THAT good.

The Traveling Art Journal - PageTwo -

2011-04-22T17:13:00.000-07:00

Hello!!! Here's my final spread for the Traveling Art Journal! The lyrics are from a song by Jack's Mannequin called, "Dark Blue." It's one of my favorite songs from back in my college days. I had fun with this one... lots of paint, gesso and layers of doodle-goodness. It's amazing to me that you can start out with totally blank pages and end up with something fun and messy like this. I started out with a two thick layers of gesso, then I mixed some blue and black acrylic paints together to get a mucky blue color. Then I did what I LOVE to do with art journaling... I finger painted. I love getting messy and feeling like a total kid when it comes to this stuff. One thing I've had to come to terms with this medium is that there are no mistakes. There is nothing a litte gesso or an extra layer of paint or a collage peice can't fix. And every little page is it's own masterpeice. Anyways after the acrylic layer I did little drips and splats of black watercolor paint, which unfortunately didn't have the vibrancy I wanted. So, I watered down some black acrylic paint and that managed to work like a charm. After that I did all of the circles in white and traced them. Then I did some stamping with the Tim Holtz Fabulous flourish stamp and some darker blue watercolor here and there around the page. Well, after that, in a nutshell, I did the wording, added the piano, some rub-ons, distress stickles and some little doodles, then called it a day.

We also had to complete an artist card to add into the journal. Here's mine:

Next the journal is off to the AMAZING Liz Caldwell. When I say "AMAZING," I mean it. Like She-Designs-For-Target-AMAZING. And we also have a mutual obsession for the Delicious Mr. Darcy from A&E's "Pride and Prejudice." Oh, and did I mention Liz is just about one of the sweetest people you'd ever meet? Yes, she is... PROMISE. I hope I get to see her on my trip to NYC in 2012.

Check ya later, DUDES! (hopefully sooner than later!)

Sara

The Traveling Art Journal - Page One -

2011-03-25T14:49:00.000-07:00

I've met some pretty awesome people on twitter. Especially many creative types, which is so amazing to see their work and be inspired daily! Well, I had the pleasure of meeting the fabulous Jessica through doing the Sketchbook Project and she has started a Traveling Art Journal that I have signed up for. This is my first "layout;" I have one more to complete!

I kind of did an ode to twitter... I wanted to keep this one fairly simple because I already know what I'm going to do for the next spread and it will be more of my traditional/messy/collaged style. I first did a light gesso, drew the twitter bird and then zentangled inside of it The only two contraints we had with the sketchbook was that the theme was "blue" and that we had to continue a horizon or line from the previous artist's page. The little swirles are a continuation of wind that Jessica had drawn on the previous page.

Well, that's it! I've never claimed to be an artist! I just pretend! See ya'll soon!

Sara