Traps, Treasures, and Secret Doors!

Pin It Now! Having watched the 2001 sequel to Secret Garden, The Return to the Secret Garden recently.  I've had floating around in the ole brain pan the thought that my current Journal, Secret Garden needs to have a secret door.  Also, being slightly addicted to Pinerest (first stage is denial, right?!) I've seen that there are a few cards being made now that use an embossing resist for the central design.  When I started this layout those two thoughts were forefront. I started out by stamping the branch and leaf pattern then embossing with clear powder.  I then took the same stamp and using Mowed Grass Distress Ink stamped again.  I used my heat tool to dry it a little bit and lightly wiped off the ink from the embossed surface. I then stamped the Lock and Key.  I had the butterflies floating on my desk so I transferred them using gel medium.  The embossed surface also resisted the transfer so the butterflies look like they are behind the branches.  Very cool!!!

That green really needed additional color and I've had these Prima flowers in my stash for quite a while so I starting gluing them down.  The larger flowers I used brads to secure and then glued to the page.  After all my elements were down I drew the framework of the door around them, which you can see in the photo below.

I took out my Prometheus Pen and Black Magic and inked in the door frame.  I couldn't help adding the tiny red bird to the foliage.  I'm currently debating on whether or not to paint the door a different color or leave it as is. hmm...

Magician's Secrets

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Started this watching Immortals the other day. I was thinking steampunk, but it segued into the magician. I'm enjoying the crazy symbol on her face whatever it is. Had a time with her shirt. I started with a pinky mauve color but it was too close to the background so I kept trying darker colors until I settled on the blue.

Take a Hike! The Zombie Apocalypse and more

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Sometimes you just have to take a hike and last Sunday was just such a day. I didn't realize how much I needed to breathe in new air. So the Bink, Hanzmo, and I went to the Mountains. We choose Southwest Virginia because we've not done much hiking there so we pointed north and drove. We thought about Flag Rock, High Knob, but decided on Bark Lake Camp. Very nice lake, there wasn't but 2 other families sitting around the lake. Looked like they'd gotten a lot a rain, but everything was so green. The trail around the lake was a mix of gravel, rock path, and bridges. From either side of the trail it was a sea of ferns and these ferns were massive. Fungi was prevalent as well due to the abundance of rainfall. Bink kept finding and showing us animal signs, especially beaver. The boys didn't appreciate me in the lead as I wasn't clearing the spiderwebs. We juggling walking order until Bink was in front with his new walking stick he had rescued from the dam. After the 3rd or 4th bridge he would rush ahead of us and we would hear, "None shall pass." We passed anyway... Sometimes when we hike its in silence and other times our conversations are random. At one point Bink said he would head for the hills if the Zombie apocalypse ever came. That way we would be able to see, hear and smell them for they got to us. Set up the mountainside like the Swiss Family Robinson. We would even be safe from the Zombie Pirates when they came. My argument was how would Pirate Zombies make it to SWVA in the first place. Of course they would be pirates first, then zombiefied and become lost. But never fear Ninja's would be brought in to fight the pirate zombies. It wouldn't matter if the a couple Ninja's fell to the Pirate Zombies and became Ninja Zombies because since they are such mortal enemies they would continue to fight themselves and leave the Apocalypse Survivors alone. So went our hike until Bink decided that you just "don't cross the streams" at the next bridge we crossed to much groaning from Hanzmo and myself. We had lots of fun on that hike, can you guess which of us would be the Ranger, Druid, and Rogue, or effectively the DPS, Healer, and the Tank?

Mixed Media/Collage Napkin Tutorial

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Da Masta Cheef posed the question on how I was going to remove the layers from my table cloth doodle. So here is how I utilize tissue and/or napkins in my Journals. I like using tissue and napkins because of the added texture that they give.

Materials: napkins, matte/gel medium, brush or palette knife

Step 1: find a napkin you like	Step 2: find your plys by separating the corners.

Step 3: Remove plys from design	Step 4: Lay down medium and place design

Examples:

I've stamped a napkin ply	collage	peacock girl by L.Cox