I am in love with encaustic painting right now. Encaustic is a mixture of beeswax & damar resin and gives the most wonderful texture & translucence to your work. I recently attended an encaustic workshop and finished the below piece for an upcoming gallery show called Meltdown. It is a mixture of oil paint, transfers, & beeswax on wood and is titled “For the Love of Art”. TFL!
Add comment July 1st, 2009
I added a new page to the blog with all of my video tutorials for the Hero Arts blog and this one in one location. You can see them all here.
Enjoy!
1 comment June 25th, 2009
Back on Mother’s Day, I made the below trio for my Mom complete with hand-stamped lavender-filled sachets, greeting card and altered notepad cover. You can find the notepad cover template over HERE on the Hero Arts website. TFL!
Add comment June 17th, 2009
My dad’s birthday was last week and I thought I’d share the card I made for him. He’s a petroleum engineer - so I’m always searching for stamps related to the industry. Found this one about 6 months ago at my local stamp store (Stamp Asylum). It’s by Deadbeat Designs & proves that there are stamps out there for everything! 
Felt letters are American Crafts & background houndstooth stamp is Hero Arts.
A close-up:
1 comment June 16th, 2009
Lisa Spangler has a great new line of challenges over on her blog HERE. She is giving tutorials on how to use your camera and photo editing software to take better images of your cards. What a great idea!
Below is a card I made for my niece’s 8th birthday. She just finished her first soccer season, so I thought I’d use that as the theme. The grass was hand-cut & the border hand-drawn.
Here’s my original image (taken by natural light at end of day):
And the image with adjusted levels in Photoshop CS3:
Here’s another view where you can see the Spica bling on the soccer ball…
Supplies: Blue & green notecards (Hero Arts); Soccer image (Stampabilities); Sentiment (Hero Arts): Sparkle Gemstones (Hero Arts); Chipboard Thickers (American Crafts); white gel pen (Ranger); black glitter pen (Spica) ; blue pigment ink (Versacolor)
TFL!
2 comments June 14th, 2009
I picked up a jar of fresh honey from a local TX honeybee farm to give to a co-worker. Honey is considered a “superfood” and can boost the immune system, soothe a sore throat, reduce cholesterol, and the list goes on…
I decided to decorate the jar with a lil’ diecut bee (Sizzix) and some flowers for fun and thought I’d share with you here.
1 comment June 9th, 2009
Staedtler (the folks who distribute Fimo polymer clay here in the US) had this great make n’ take at CHA using ring forms they are considering importing to the US. They have adjustable bands, contain bezels on top, and are perfect for filling with your favorite polymer clay. Hopefully they will be available for clayers sometime soon… see below for a sample of a square version. And here is a link to the ones they are currently selling in Germany, I believe. This is a lot easier than making your own ring forms!
Add comment May 27th, 2009
If you haven’t figured it out by now…I’m not someone who sticks to just one method of artistic expression. I love to learn new techniques & end up dabbling in them all. So far, that includes stamping, papercrafting, polymer clay, sewing, metal embossing, silversmithing, painting, writing/performing music, graphic design, and the latest….encaustic wax.
I recently joined the TexasWAX Dallas guild and am experimenting in encaustic wax art. (Encaustic is a mixture of beeswax and damar resin and is an art form that has been around for centuries.)
The first piece I made was this journal:
I adhered watercolor paper to the front of two masonite boards, then painted melted wax onto the cover in gold, brown, red, & white hues. I embedded the hand-stamped “journal” piece into the wax and hand-carved the branch and bird images.
The text on the back panel came from a vintage book, and I inserted around 25 hand-stamped art papers inside using the book rings.
Next, I’ll be working on some 12×12 art pieces for an upcoming gallery show. I’ll be sure to post those when they are complete. TFL!
Add comment May 26th, 2009
I absolutely adore Amy Butler fabrics. Amy’s prints are the perfect blend of vintage and modern and have recently inspired me to start sewing again. So I was thrilled when K&Company began distributing a line of Amy Butler designer papers & embellishments.
I particularly love these dimensional purse stickers. I thought they would help make a nice gift card set by adding them to some high-grade Italian notecards (Fabriano) with a simple stamped sentiment beneath. I took designer papers and lined each Fabriano envelope to match. These were so fun & simple to make that I’m sure I’ll be making more sets in the near future. To finish them off, place them in a clear plastic box with a pen and tie it up with your favorite ribbon.
(stamped thank you sentiment is Hero Arts, birthday sentiments are Papertrey Ink)
Add comment May 25th, 2009
