Love You To The Moon & Back ~ Mini Scrapbook Pages with Melinda

Hey everyone and welcome to the blog today! I hope you are managing to stay dry and warm wherever you are! Here in WA it seems Autumn went totally MIA and we have been hit with Winter!

Anyways, onto the fun stuff, that is unless you too love jumping in all the puddles ;)

I have something a little different to share today, and LITTLE sums it up! I am working on a project for my nephew who turned one last month and my contribution (besides the supplies ;) ) is some 6x8 pages! These are the first 2 I have made and I really love them. They are sweet and simple, yet effective!

Here is the first one! "Love You To The Moon & Back"

This photo was taken at the baby shower and I will do a full 6x8 page of journalling. Perhaps in the form of a letter to my nephew, as yet, I'm undecided!

Only a few quick, simple steps to this and the first was some of the beautiful Envy Colour Paste through a stencil on the diagonal I knew I wanted to work on. Oh, I had also drawn a light pencil line around where my photo was going!

While that was still wet I activated my Colour Shimmer Pot in Envy and using a paintbrush added some splatters on the same diagonal. Not to worry if you don't have the Shimmer Pot, you can always use the Colour Shimmer Spray or even water down some of the Colour Paste and use that to splatter! If you do have the Shimmer Pot/s make sure you let them completely dry out before you pop the lid back on!

I set that aside to dry and got together some bits for the next page I wanted to work on! This photo was taken the day little Emmett was welcomed into the world. You may have even seen this photo before as I have scrapped it for our album! "Baby Love"

Again, a simple and effective page I started with another stencil and this time 2 Colour Pastes - Snow White and Singin' The Blues. I smooshed the 2 colours randomly through my stencil this time covering my whole 6x8 sized page. I set that aside to dry and picked out a few other pieces for this page.

Keeping my mixed media pretty simple meant that these pages came together in not a lot of time so after they were both dry I started adhering my layers and finished off my pages.

I still need to do some journalling for both. Like I mentioned, the first one I think will have a whole 6x8 page and I'm pretty certain the second will be his full name and birth details on the yellow label on the bottom of the page. Here a few close up's of both pages!

I just cannot resist that squishy face lol

And here is the process video if you would like to see these pages come together!

Thanks ever so much for stopping by, I hope I have inspired you to create outside of your "norm" whatever that might be because "clean" mixed media is certainly not my "norm" lol

Have a fantastic weekend and I hope you get some scrappy time!

Until next time!
Melinda

Breathe - Art Journal page with Melinda Sweetman

Hello fellow Colour Blast lovers!! Melinda here with you today and I am sharing my latest DT project which is another art journal page! Here is a bit of a sneaky peek

And I am playing along with the September challenge which is

So, remember, you have until the end of the month to load your project into this album on Facebook using the prompts provided!

And here are my step-by-steps (I did MEAN to have a process video, phone was loaded and ready to go but I forgot to press record!!)

First up I picked a page in my art journal that I had applied some left over products from another project onto some time ago! My White Heavy Gesso and a paint brush and applied a very random (I did not cover the whole page) layer of gesso.

Next up, I of course heat set that first, some stamping for texture. I grabbed my archival black ink and a couple of stamps I wanted to use and again, randomly applied those across my page.

Again with the heat gun! And next was some actual texture! Here I grabbed my Colour Mica Powders in Espresso and Polar. First I mixed the Espresso with some White Heavy Gesso (I accidently discovered you get this beautiful grey colour when you mix these products together!) and then applied randomly through a stencil. 

I cleaned up that mixture and again with the gesso but this time Polar Mica Powder. I had left the stencil in place so again applied this colour randomly over the stencil, both over lapping the other colour and some by itself.

I love how this stencilling came out!! Remember, the more colour you add the bolder the colour you will get mixing it with white gesso!

I left that to dry naturally and started work on my chipboard. I picked a single word for my title and decided to emboss it using the gorgeous Just Blue Colour Embossing Powder. First up however, I wanted a "cleaner" colour so I applied a quick coat of gesso and let that dry.

Next up, I grabbed my embossing ink dabber, applied liberally, added embossing powder in Just Blue, shook off excess and heat set. So pretty!

While embossing I decided that the background needed some more colour so I activated my Just Blue Colour Shimmer Cube by adding a little water. When that was ready to go I applied the watercolour to the page, spritzed with more water and turned and titled the page until I got the colour where I wanted it. 

Time to put the finishing touches on! Before I stuck anything down however I decided that I had this new stamp that I HAD to use so I stamped that 3 times onto some tissue paper, heat set and tore around.

Using some different fibres, my title and 2 of my butterflies I came up with placing that I was happy with and stuck everything down. Wet glue for the fibres and title and matt medium for the butterflies.

Oops, I nearly forgot my last 2 finishing touches!! I grabbed some tiny blue beads and matt medium and stuck some of those down around my title - I feel like I now need some shells!  

And then I grabbed my fan brush and my Roadbase Colour Spray for some black splatters!

I love, love, love how this came out! I challenged myself when I started this page to keep LOTS of white space - which is VERY unusual for me in my art journal. I was lucky enough to have Fiona Paltridge create a page in my journal and one of the things I really loved about it was that not every single inch of the paper was covered so I though I'd give it a go myself!! Here are a couple more close ups!

Swoon, I so LOVE all that texture!

That's it for me for today so have fun playing with your fun Colour Blast goodies and make sure you pop into the FB group to share your creations, we love to see what is being made!!

Happy scrapping!

Melinda

xx

Can't Wait to Meet You with Melinda Sweetman

Hi there Colour Blasters, Melinda with you today sharing a page I created without using any patterned paper!!

I will start off straight away by saying that this is not my ultrasound! The journalling does explain that this is indeed my future niece or nephew!

I started this page with one idea in my head and decided as I was going that I just didn't love where it was going! You can see in the video below my process and where the layout changes directions!

And here are my step-by-steps!

First up, I decided to grab a stencil and some Colour Pastes, the colours I have used are Envy, Apple of my Eye and Bling. I have used the pastes one at a time and applied randomly all over the stencil (onto vellum) with some parts of the paste thicker than others and left that over night to dry.

The next day when I came back to my dried mixed media circles I started fussy cutting the circles. As a last minute decision I decided to leave some of the wonky edges for something a little different.

I started to lay the circles and my photo onto my page and at this point I decided that the circles were too big and I just wasn't loving it!! Instead of starting all over I decided to grab some punches, some dies and my scissors and cut a bunch of different sized hearts and felt much happier with that decision!

Next to set to work on my background. A very quick, light coat of White Heavy Gesso to the parts of the page where I knew I wanted to add some extra colour.

Then comes one of my most fave products at the moment - Colour Shimmer Cubes!! For this page I have used the Just Blue (Oh my, I love, love, love this colour!!) as I wanted a contrast but also not an opposite end of the colour wheel contrast! I activated with a little water and just painted the colour on without too much thought other than the basic idea of where I wanted the focus. I did dry this off a little with my heat tool but first I soaked up a lot of the water from the top of the page.

After that was dried I pulled out my Singin The Blues Colour Shimmer Spray and did a couple of spritzes for a bit of colour variation and again left that to dry.

I wanted to bring in some of the green also so did a few squirts of the Apple Of My Eye Colour Shimmer Spray as well and let that dry thoroughly.

Time for splatters! I have very simply used the nozzle from each of the bottles of Colour Shimmer Spray in Bling, Just Blue, Singin The Blues and Apple of My Eye and left that to dry.

While that was drying I pulled out my chipboard pieces and decided to do a multi colour emboss! First up I have used Deep Water Embossing Powder.

After that was dried and cooled I added Bling embossing powder and heat set that too. These 2 colours mix beautifully together while still being able to see the 2 different colours. I love this look!

Time to pull it all together and here is the end design again for you!

I love the pops of all those different colours and how beautifully they all sit together on the page!

Oh, and I forgot, I added a little stamping behind the chipboard! I meant to do that BEFORE I stuck down the chipboard but forgot! Thankfully I had only adhered it with staples where the photo was going to be so it was easy enough to lift the chippy - perhaps you will remember sooner ;) I have used a grey (because I thought I had grabbed black until I stamped!) archival ink and love the extra detail it adds!

I also REALLY love the extra dimension that the vellum gives. When the hearts were stuck down only in the middle the edges all lifted up which was a happy surprise!

And one last photo, this is the title area! I love how those hearts look and those alphas match perfectly with the colours I have chosen!

So, how will you take this fun technique and do YOUR thing with it? We would love to see so please make sure you stop by the FB group and share your own creations with us! 

Also, Colour Blast will be at the Brisbane Scrapbook Expo this weekend and I am making the trip over, so perhaps I may run into you there!! 

Whatever your scrappy plans are make sure you have fun and get a little messy ;)

Until next time,

Melinda