February Art Adventure - Love!

Happy Valentine's Day, Everyone!  I am the lucky Creative Cohort this month who gets to post on Valentine's Day!  Hope it's a good day for everyone!  To celebrate the day and our theme for this month, I have created a small canvas.

Don't you just love this photo?  I think it is the sweetest thing ever!

I began this project by painting the canvas using DecoArt Gesso to prepare the canvas.  When dry, I used DecoArts paints in Primary Magenta, Titanium White and Paynes Grey, mixing them as I went along.  I knew that I didn't want to alter the photo with color, so I decided to keep the whole piece in white, pink, grey and black.

I then added Creative Impressions grey web ribbon to the left side of the canvas, using matte medium to adhere it to the canvas.  While the matte medium was drying, I stamped a lovely border by Stampendous onto white tissue with black ink, cut it out and adhered it to the top and bottom of the canvas using matte medium.

Next I added the photo.

After adhering the photo to the canvas using matte medium, I also when over the top of the photo with the medium to seal it.

Now to add some color to the piece.  I began by laying down this cute Creative Impressions polka dot ribbon and adding a thinner piece of braid ribbon over the top.  I then made a bow and adhered it to the top left corner.  I also attached little white pearls to several places on the decorative border.

It still needs something at this point.  As you can see, I started adding some sweet little white butterfly brads to the photo.

I found a Tim Holtz Idea-ology Word Band that was perfect, "Capture Life's Moments".  I threaded some Creative Impressions braid ribbon through the band and adhered it to the piece.

To finish the canvas, I cut off the prongs of some darling heart brads and adhered them over the tops of some mini white spiral clips to bring a touch of white back to the ribbon.    It really finished off the project nicely.

I love this project not only because of the photo's subject matter, but also because it was not difficult to put together.  Sometimes I get carried away and work too hard on a project when all it really needed was simplicity to highlight a special photo.

Hope you are all working on your "Love" creations for this month!  Can't wait to see them!

Susan

Valentine Paper Scrap cards with G45 and Creative Impressions

Happy February everyone!  Today I have seven Valentine's Day cards to share with all of you which were created completely out of paper scraps!  I had a small bag with leftover paper scraps from a wonderful class I took at Rocky Mountain Art Retreats last year.  We made a wonderful Birthday Planner paper bag book using Graphic 45's Time to Flourish paper collection.  The scraps were just too beautiful to throw out, so I stored them away and waited for the right time to use them!  Now is the time!

I love to challenge myself to make cards using paper I might have otherwise thrown away.  G45's cut-apart papers are so versatile as there are many designs on a piece of paper.  However, I knew that these cards needed some ribbon and fabulous embellishments, so off to my stash of
Creative Impressions embellishments I went!

Here is the first card I created.  As you look over the different cards, keep in mind that there is a lot of paper piecing going on!

To give you an idea of how I started the card, here is a photo of the different paper pieces I decided to use.  Of course I didn't have a big enough patterned paper piece for a background, so I overlapped two smaller ones together.

Now you can't tell there was even a gap in the background, can you?

The addition of some fussy cutting pieces as well as some Creative Impressions Double Stitch Gros Grain and Crepe ribbon and a Burgundy Country Heart makes this card pop, don't you think?  I had some tag "tops" left over from another G45 project that I had saved.  Now it looks like there is a tag.

Here is another card:

I forgot to take a photo of the "before" of this card, however, it started out in a very similar way.  The background paper only went part of the way down the card, so I used a strip from another piece of paper to "lengthen" it.  I had the two cut apart pieces plus a postage stamp.  I die cut a larger heart, placed it in the center of the card, adhered the two cut-aparts on an angle and then, using foam tape, adhered the postage stamp to the card.  It still wasn't quite right.  Creative Impressions Gingham ribbon tied in a bow onto each cut- apart along with an Antique Copper Country Heart  solved the problem!

Now for the third card:

I like the way this card turned out using cut aparts as well some die cut hearts and a fussy cut rose bush, however, it still needed something.

Creative Impressions Velvet Shimmer ribbon and a word stamp by B Line Designs to the rescue!  Now it "pops".

Now for something a bit different.  I only had a little background paper left, so I decided to try covering an ivory card panel with Natural Web Ribbon from Creative Impressions.  I used matte medium to adhere the mesh to the card panel in three strips.  I love it!

I trimmed off the excess around the card panel, added a G45 cut-apart panel, used foam tape to adhere another "cupid envelope" over the top of the middle one and finished the card by wrapping some Creative Impressions Thin Red Twine around the cream panel and adding an antique Copper Country Heart to the center.

Love this textured background!

This next card was pieced again using a background paper:

Again pretty paper, but too simple a card for me.  Here is the finished card:

A big difference, huh?    I added some brown cardstock as a mat for the patterned paper panel, a piece cut from a decorative border punch that was in my stash, a postage stamp matted with a piece of brown card stock along with the word "Valentine".  Creative Impressions finished off the piece nicely again.  I used their lovely Singe Stitch Gros Grain ribbon along with another Antique Copper Country Heart placed in the center of a die cut heart.  Five cards finished!

Now I was getting low on supplies, but determined to get another two cards made with what I had.  This card has tons of piecing on it!

Now I had two holes to cover on this card!  Once again I added a strip of border  punched cream card stock above the cut-apart border strip.  Then I decided to create a faux tag again using another leftover tag topper and a piece of burgundy card stock with postage stamp images on it.  I made a burgundy mat for the words "Hugs and Kisses" and adhered it to the card.  I used a fabulous Crepe Ribbon from CI to finish this card.

Finally I arrived at my biggest challenge!  This last card started out as nothing more than this:

 and ended up like this:

I truly almost surrendered with this card.  Nothing seemed to work with the pieces I had left.  Then I decided to take the postage cut aparts I had left and see if they would work for the card.  I am pleased with the way it turned out!  Of course adding some "bling" from Creative Impressions really finished the card off well.  I used light and dark silver pearls to different areas of the card as well as a small heart from Heart Bling for the finishing touches!  It worked!

Now it's your turn!  Take a look in that scrap paper drawer of yours, pull out some Creative Impressions ribbons and embellishments and have fun!

Susan