Stampaway Specimen Box Collage Class

Don't you just love finding something new?  When my buddy Tim introduced his large houses die cut, I knew immediately that I'd need those in my collection.  But it wasn't until 4 days before Stampaway that I knew I'd use them in my Specimen Box Collage class. 

This is a class I've taught at Stampaway several times before, but each time it's different.  The first time we created art dolls with castles in the background.  The second time around we used a clip art "angel", think vintage photos of little girls altered with wings & fairy wands, and elements from Tim's grungeboard adding dimension and interest to the background.

So it's no surprise that I didn't want to repeat an idea.  After all, the name of the class was "Secrets of a Specimen Box Collage".  And 33 ladies joined me for this little adventure.

The big surprise for me was that more than half these girls had never taken a class with me before!  Wow.  So glad you chose this year to join me!

My classes always include techniques, and this one was a perfect example.  I love introducing my students to new ideas and new "tools" for making backgrounds.  In this particular class we were applying all those techniques to a background, to houses, and to roof tops.  Way too much fun.

This collage isn't finished as I'm sure you can tell, but please check out all the textures on these houses.  Aren't they wonderful?

I apologize for my photography, but look closely and you'll see Clearsnap's Magic Stamp blocks on the table.  It wouldn't be a class with Lovely Linda if we didn't have those.  And once again, I'm amazed by the number of people who don't know about this valuable stamping tool.

Check out the upper right corner of the background; it was made with the Magic Stamp I'd impressed at home with a rubber stamp.  How dynamic is that?

Every kit was filled with pages torn from foreign text books including Greek, Russian, & German, plus sheet music,Asian text & newsprint, and my favorite for this class:  a text book on building homes.  Notice the largest house on the left:  a page from that very book.

Now look at the roof of the second house from the right.  Coffee Break Designs sells these wonderful chipboard pennants that I'd bought for my Elevated ATC class last year, but they were perfect for the roof of a house.  Not just because of their size, but because it was an added element of dimension.

Every kit this year was packaged with a 6" stencil I'd purchased from The Crafters Workshop.  They offer such a fabulous collection of stencils you can't imagine!  At the beginning of class the ladies lined up to trade their tickets for a kit.  It was interesting to see how often they'd sort through 3 or 4 specimen boxes, trying to decide which stencil they liked best, before moving on to collect the rest of their supplies.  Only 2 came back to the front to swap out their box because of the stencil choices.  I would have expected it from more.

Notice the pattern in the upper lefthand corner and on the second house from the left.  Yep, those were done with a stencil.

The roof of the house on the left was cut from a large border stamp made by Artful Illusions.  And the roof on the second house from the right is metal flashing tape that I'd run through a texture plate.  The key and token are real.  Imagine assembling 40 kits with old rusty keys and metal tokens, but that's exactly what I did.  Of course there were jewels and Bingo markers, Tim's spinners & tissue tape...the ladies had access to everything.

Another new product I introduced them to was Viva's Inka Gold...a waxy pigment that adheres to metal much like Rub n Buf, but far superior in consistency & color choices.  So lots of the gals used it on their metal embellishments, including their rooftops.  If you scroll back up and look at the houses, you'll see several of the roofs are made from the metal flashing tape that's been colored.  How divine.

As always, I thank you for stopping by to visit.  And to all the Lovelies who attended my classes, a HUGE thank you.  Maybe next year I should make name tags for everyone that read "I'm one of Linda's Lovelies".  Think anyone would wear one?

Stampaway Classes

My first class at this year's convention was a 3 hour Visual Art Journal as Memory Book.  I shipped 2 cartons of supplies with a total weight of 88 lb, and that didn't include my luggage which weighed another 90 lb.  So much paper, so much weight!

Everyone's kit included everything from stamped images on sticker paper to library pockets, glassine envelopes, coin envelopes, and their own set of watercolors.

We began with 2 simple techniques, one dry and one wet, and then using both background pieces I showed them how to use lots of fun tools unrelated to stamping that make perfectly wonderful patterns and backgrounds.

I brought along 5 of my own journals so everyone could flip the pages for inspiration, and of course photography was allowed to keep that creativity flowing once they were back home and ready to play.

My carry on bag was filled with about 400 rubber stamps, half mounted, half unmounted.  So many choices...

I had seen a magazine ad for Sally Hanson nail colors with an entire page of nails in every color and pattern.  If you look closely at the above photo you'll see where individual nails were cut out of a strip to use on a journal page.

Do you see the wine bottles in the above photo?  I bought a $30 magazine that featured prize winning advertising, just so I could cut it up to be used as elements on their pages. 

Not only did I pack dozens of small items in a popcorn bag, but I showed everyone how to fold and adhere it to the page of their journal to create an oversized pocket.

There were a few questions, lots of stamping, and tons of fun creating pages, as well as embellishing the book covers.

Each participant was to bring their own dye-based ink pads, and the color selections were like a rainbow.

Here's an example of someone who stamped lots of images to cut out and use later.  Clearly she liked the image of the panic button!

To you it may look like chaos, but everyone spread out at the tables, with piles on empty chairs, and had a marvelous time playing.

For those of who in attendance, I'm overwhelmed with gratitude that you spent 3 hours playing in one of my classes.  And to those who weren't there, I hope you can join me next year.

Check back tomorrow for photos from my other classes, and as always, thanks for checking in today.

Stampaway USA 2011

What's the best thing about attending and teaching at Stampaway in Cincinnati each August?  Easily it's meeting up with old friends and making new friends.  This year my dear friend Mike Meador, owner of Coffee Break Designs, was sorely missed by so many of us, and certainly by me.  His wife, Chris, is on my right above and the new proprietor of Coffee Break Designs, Kris Hubick, is on my left.

Mike's booth was always my first stop, and it wasn't just for the quirky inventory, but for a chance to visit with him and Chris, always a highlight of my Ohio trip.  He was witty beyond words, never without a smile on his face, and the wink of mischief never far away.

Chris was gracious enough to give me a pin to wear with his photo and everytime someone would comment on it, I'd get teary eyed and have to walk away for fear I'd cry in front of a crowd.  He was loved and he is missed, but I'm so glad I got the chance to visit with Chris again and to meet Kristin face to face. 

Sharon was the only one of my local girls to attend, for her fifth year, and we were both exhausted when we returned home Sunday.  The good news:  according to an email from her yesterday, we've both caught up on some much needed sleep now that we're back in NC.

Another friend is Carol, whose husband Gil spent more time with me on Friday than she did.  We found ourselves together on an elevator ride and after an hour of chat outside the classrooms, parted ways; he to search for a local coin shop and me in search of food!

Carol has attended 2 of my art retreat weekends, and like several others, she wanted to know when the next one will be held.  Start looking at your October calendars girls!

I failed to get photos of Mary Jo McGraw, Cecile, Connie or Tammy.  I was too tired to think straight and never once pulled out a camera while we were on the show floor.  Michelle and Anne from St. Louis invited me to their room on Friday night after the Preview Party for our annual show & tell.  We missed Lori, who didn't attend this year, but still managed to eat pizza and laugh til 3am!!  And again I didn't take a single photo.  Sheesh!

I did get to visit with my pal Barb, even had a chance to sit and eat with her during the Friday night event.  She was dolled up here for the Flower Power theme.  When I asked if the curly locks were hers she said "Yes, I paid for them"!  Too funny.  I got a big hug and wouldn't you just know, she was covered with glitter, which meant of course that I was also covered with glitter for the rest of the night.  Help me Rhonda!

Greg of Marco's Paper was over-the-top fabulous as always.  One big flower.  Yep, that would be him.

Ted, at the Stamper's Anonymous booth, took flower power in a completely different direction.  How divine is he???

I failed to get a photo of my dear friends Joni & Mark, owners of Artful Illusions, but I did get one of Lemon Drop.  Isn't he a jewel?  And I liked his shirt so much that I bought one for myself.  (Actually bought 2, but one was the same artwork he's wearing, just in a lovely shade of brown to flatter my blonde hair.)
More to come, including photos from all 3 of my classes.  Thanks for dropping by and do come again.

Art House Display Guinea Pig Class

Yesterday afternoon I had a few "guinea pigs" over for a test run of an upcoming Stampaway class.  I designed this class so that everyone had the same set of supplies but was curious to see if they'd be uniquely different.

For a guinea pig class I put out 10 times what I'll pack for an actual out-of-state class, so options were overwhelming.  Roofing choices included vintage tickets, miniature playing cards, fortune cards & zodiac cards from old vending machines, Chance & Community Chest cards as well as Monopoly money, Funny money from another game, wooden sticks, wooden nickels, wooden tape measure pieces, cigar box bands, cigar bands, buttons, and a huge wooden cigar box filled with every kind of game piece from dominoes & checkers, to Monopoly houses & hotels, bingo markers, tiddly winks, and oodles more. 
I also had photocopies of old train tickets, war tokens, & tape measures of every color.  I just knew the tape measures would be a huge hit, but alas, I was mistaken.  Another option were photocopied sheets of letters and numbers, which were also not chosen.  At CHA there was a picket fence in the Ranger booth, with each picket stained a different color with their line of Distress Stains, so I put out coffee stir sticks as well as decorative wooden sticks which I could just envision stained and applied to the roof of a house.  I guess not seeing that picket fence in person explains why no one went for the wooden rooftop.

So the big surprise was that everyone used the vintage tickets.  Sharon & Michele went for the green ones while Mary went for faded red.  Sharon added cigar box bands at the top and on the edges.  Michele had her Martha Stewart fringe scissors so she used funny money on the eaves of her roof, which she turned into fringe.  Mary used a piece of corrugated cardboard across the peak of her roof as an accent.

Here's a close up of Sharon's roof, and I see she also included a row of the red tickets.

This is Mary's roof.  Notice how she turned her tickets to create the look of tiles overlapping one another.

And this is Michele's roof with the green tickets turned so that the holes were lined up on the outer edges.  But look closely at that fringed money.  Way cool!

Each kit also included strips of stamped tickets (images by Invoke Arts).  Mary used individual tickets on the back of her house  with rows of them under the eaves on the front.

Michele added a wooden nickel on the back and used the ticket strips on the front.

Sharon used ticket strips on the front but used just her metal elements and eco board on the back.

The final note I'd like to add was that I had a pack of 250 sheets of paper, with about 2 dozen already pulled out, and everyone made their selections from the ones I'd originally chosen.  Michele narrowed her choices down to 3, all with green, but in the end changed her mind and went with a collaged pattern in browns.
Sharon went with a beautiful blue, which isn't a color she uses much, but at the end, her color palette for the entire house could be found on the shirt she was wearing.
Mary had never taken a class with me and had certainly never been anyone's guina pig, so I really didn't know what to expect from her.  She worked slower, taking time to experiment with different embellishments, and that was interesting to watch.  When she commented that she wanted a clock to go with a ticket that read "the time is now", I pulled down a jar full of watch faces & parts.  The one she selected was white and everyone encouraged her to add color since nothing on the house matched that stark white.  And of course they were right as we pointed out options for adding color to metal.

A new product I brought home from CHA was Inka Gold by Viva.  This is a waxy colorant that you apply with your fingers and buff with a dry cloth.  Their advertising calls it a metal gloss paint, but it's not at all what you'd expect.  If you scroll back up and click on the individual photos of each house where Tim's Ideaology frames and coins are featured, the photo will enlarge so that you can look for the detail.

On Mary's frame she chose a green and applied it just on the oval ring of the frame.  On Michele's house she chose a pink and applied it in the same way on the frame but completely covered her metal coin that says Believe.   On Sharon's house she used gold and covered the entire metal frame.  In person, it was a fabulous yellow.  And when you look at that photo, look at the imagine coin.  She added the yellow over the entire thing and then highlighted with the pink.

I wasn't sure about packing them for the class but the girls made the decision for me.  It's a must have for everyone to try.

I confess that a bonus for me as an instructor is wandering around a classroom to view the color choices people make.  You can always find someone who loves purple in a large classroom, or the girls who go for the shabby chic look.

And while the houses were lovely I knew immediately that Michele would go home and continue to dress hers.  She never fails to impress me by finding exactly the right element that was missing.  Just last week she emailed to tell me she was still tweaking the art doll on the bookmark we made as our stamp club project, and I could just see that little girl coming to life under her expert hands.

So I'll be packing vintage tickets & stamped ticket strips in every kit for Cincinnati, but I'll also be packing some of all the other goodies just in case someone wants to take that road less traveled.

Will I see you there in my class?  Hope you've been inspired.  I certainly was, so a huge thank you to my guinea pigs.  You gals rock!!

Dresses at CHA Summer

If you read my post after attending Winter CHA in California, you saw the scrapbook paper dresses.  Well check these out:

This is an art journaling paper dress by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer.  No kidding.  How incredible is this?

How about this one?  The skirt is made of broken tea cups and saucers.  Can you see all the cup handles?

And this one dressed in packages of felt balls.  You've gotta love all this imagination.