Tricksters

My take on Tim's tag #10 for 2015 includes a found relative photo from the Occasions set and features children in some pretty terrific Halloween costumes.

The photo's orientation is landscape so it was cut in half and layered to fit on my tag.

The creepy castle was cut from a page in Tim's Destinations paper stash and the moon behind trees is a scrapbook page found at a garage sale (maker unknown).

I trimmed it with green, purple and black Stickles and the letters were cut from Tim's big chit-chat stickers.

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As near as I can tell, there are 13 children in this photo and starting with the back-row (from left to right) there's a ghost, a kid with a mask that has Mickey Mouse type ears, a fancy lady, a cat, a witch, a colonel, a skeleton, a pumpkin ghoul, a scarecrow, a nurse, Little Bo Peep, and a couple of clowns.

What a priceless moment in time and what fun they must have had!

Sparkle

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The most difficult stamp I have ever worked with (and also the most expensive) is this image by Lynne Perella for Paper Artsy. I don't know why it's not available in the US so I had to order it from the UK and the shipping added a greal deal to the cost.

It has a tremendous amount of detail and is not deeply etched so it's a bit of a struggle to get an impression that's satisfactory.

This time I used a really bizarre inking method that worked rather well. Surprise, surprise.

I applied thick watercolor using a brush and let it dry then stamped over that layer with black dye ink. Then I lightly spritzed it with water and stamped onto my paper surface.

The paper border was made with one of the most useful stamps I own and if I had to pick a favorite from my collection this would be it because it's so versatile. It's from Tim Holtz and is part of the Visual Artistry Lost and Found stamp set.

The text is Idea-ology chit-chat and the dots are Ranger Liquid Pearls.

I made this card for my bestie Thelma who's got a milestone birthday on the horizon and I'm linking to Simon's Monday blog challenge where this week's theme is use a stamp.

I must give a special shout-out to all the Design Team members who really rocked their creations this week. It was very inspiring!

Artvue

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I'm still rather confused as to what constitutes a piece of "mail art." According to Wiki, it's centered on sending small works through the postal service and that at it's core, it's about interpersonal communication, exchange and the creation of a virtual community of participants. Huh?

I thought it was just about using postal ephemera in collages!

So, while I work on my understanding of this art form, I'll share my latest attempt (interpersonal communication) with my blog readers (virtual community). Gee, maybe this is mail art after all?

Beginning with a virgin postcard (never been mailed), I used an image transfer technique to add the newpaper print. I used a distressed Idea-ology frame sticker and stamped a bird on tinted watercolor paper for the center.

The red and green postage stamps are real, the cat stamp is homemade. The address label is from the Tim Holtz Correspondence stamp set. I applied it to paper then used a typewriter to fill in the address before pasting it on. The postmark in the top left corner and the words Par Avion are also from this set.

With a bit more stamping, tinting, dotting and a strip of washi tape (white strip near the center), I considered it complete.

Now all I have to do is mail it!