Hello friends! Wow, I could have used an extra 8 hours in this week! I was right out strait it seemed. I am looking forward to some relaxing this weekend (between scouts and softball that is!) If you have some downtime this weekend why not try something new? Like sketching and coloring with your colored pencils. This is a viewer request of how to paint a lady slipper in traditional colored pencils. I used Prismacolors but try whatever you have before buying new:)
I really like the way it turned out plus pink and green is one of my favorite color combos. Thanks so much for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Howdy friends! I hope you had a good April Fools Day, Mine started early with my twin daughters up at the crack of dawn trying to prank their brother LOL! I have no tricks up my sleeve for you but I do get to announce the winner of the dragonfly stamps and gift certificate from About Art Accents (drum-roll please) Dawn Y. Yay! Check your email for your confirmation and info on how to get your prize. Speaking of Dragonflies here is a tutorial on how to paint one in colored pencils:
I just love the rich color I get with my colored pencils! The digital stamp is available here in my ShopHandmade shop. I have been filling orders like crazy today, apparently everyone is in the mood to color! If you want to order multiple items and combine payments you can email me at artstudiosofbangor@yahoo.com, there is a glitch in the shop where it asks you to pay separately for every item, it is fine if you want to do it that way but if I combine the order it saves me paypal fees and you get a free $1 worth of product for ever $5 you spend so if you rack up $15 in stamps you get 3 images (or $3 worth of product) free! I was just made aware of this glitch so if you placed separate orders totaling over $5 just email me and I will make it right. Aint technology grand? To clarify the orders ordered from my Lindsay’s stamp stuff shop handmade shop are emailed out within 24 hours. If you want instant downloads you can shop Lindsay’s stamp stuff @ MyGrafico, but the stamp I used today had been retired from my MyGrafico shop because it was an older design.
If you need any help using digital stamps you can see my easy tutorial using free simple software here. Thanks so much to everyone who stopped by my shop and ordered this set today, I truly appreciate it! Happy crafting!
Howdy folks! I am feeling pretty darn happy tonight! That storm that might dump 10-15″ of snow on us seems to have shifted a bit so snowfall total tomorrow is now forecasted at 3″-5″, I am relieved because we still have so much snow yet to melt here and I think the kids are out of snow days. Of course I only checked one weather site because I liked that forecast LOL! I’m an optimist I guess! I was playing with some new colored pencils and stamps from About Art Accents yesterday and using the inspiration at Oriental Stamp Art I made this card:
The challenge at Oriental Stamp Art was to use the folded circles on a card. I also had some stamps from About Art Accents to give away, the winner will receive the 3 dragonfly stamps I used (new ones though LOL!) and a $10 gift certificate (Thanks About Art Accents!) I’m going to show you how I made this card. I used a brand-new supply, Metallic watercolor pencils by Derwent, I’m not sure what I think of them, I’ll let you be the judge:
I think if I look at these pencils not as metallic colored pencils but as opaque colored pencils or faux bleach look colored pencils I will like them more. It’s all about how you look at things sometimes! I wanted to show you the full stamp set the dragonfly stamps came from, it is normally $20 but it is on sale now for $10! And if you have any non-sale rubber in your order at About Art Accents you can use the coupon code Lindsay10% to save 10% on the regular priced stuff.
I can’t wait to use the snail next, they are so cute and what a bargain, I would not wait if you like them because I have no idea how long the sale will last. So, do you want to win? Well then, just leave a comment and I will pick a winner at random next Tuesday. Yep, that’s it, nifty huh? Thanks to About Art Accents for providing me with stamps to give away and thanks to you for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Hello friends! Check out this fun card and bookmark set. The neat thing how I blended the colored pencils on the bookmarks, not with stinky solvents but with baby oil!
Not only does it work but it is quicker and uses less pigment than blending with dry pencils. See how in today’s video tutorial:
I hope you give this a try, it will work with any regular wax or oil based pencils, even the inexpensive children’s brands. Have a great night and til next time happy crafting!
Hello friends! I recently mentioned that I had put all of my pastel pencils, watercolor crayons and colored pencils back in the tins they came in. They were previously in a pen rack I picked up at a scrapbook store for $5 when it was closing and I liked having them all out within reach but I got a really nice bar stool from my sister for Christmas so now I like to sit at my high table and work and I can place the tins on my shelf behind me, I have a heater under the table as I explained in my craftroom winter mode video. Also I wanted them to be portable in case I want work elsewhere, like say upstairs by the fire. All of my pencils had tins except for my Prismacolors, I got my first set of 60 when I was 5 (my art teacher insisted) and replaced used up ones through the years then got a 144 set 15 years ago and as they would get used up I’d replace them as well. I’d say I have about 175 pencils. So I made a plan and asked my hubby to make it:
Want to see it in action, have a look:
Now, I’m not a woodworker but I did measure my box and noted the sizes and materials for you here, I hope it is helpful, if the measurements are odd it could be due to sanding or using up what was on hand. The removable dividers are 1/4″ plywood while the top and bottom are 1/4″ Masonite, I’m pretty sure you could use all plywood or all Masonite. I love the Masonite for the lid because it make a really great surface to color on, talk about portable!
Use this a guide to design your own. I have some room to grow but if I was going to travel with this I’d put some bubble wrap in ant empty spaces so the pencils would not bounce around in there. Tomorrow I will share a tour of my craft room so you can see how I store other stuff! I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and til next time happy crafting!
Hello friends! I have been making it a point to dust off old supplies that have been in my stash for a while. I bought these prismacolor Artstix before my son was born (about 12 years ago!) I think when we have babies we develop a temporary amnesia of our life before kids because I had not touched them since. I honestly think I forgot I had them! Here is a painting of a bird of paradise I made with them:
And, I did a video while a painted it, I figured that if I had forgotten how to use them and the picture was horrible I would not have to upload it. :D But I DID like it and it reminded me why I also bought a larger set that I also found but have not yet opened! Good grief, can you imagine having these glorious little sticks of color and not using them!?! Don’t worry if you don’t have these ArtStix, which BTW are just Prismacolor Pencils without the wood, because you can follow along with colored pencils, oil pastels, pastels, watercolor crayons or heck, even Crayolas.
I also did some random mark making and doodling, it is a great way to get to know the media without the pressure of making something pretty. Have a look:
If you have never tried colored pencils or pastels on colored paper before give it a whirl, it looks great! You can see how the same range of colors looks so different on the green, brown and black papers I used.
So, what supplies are YOU dying to dig out and try again? Whatever you pick make sure you have fun, be kind to yourself and your efforts and give the inner judge the day off! You will be glad you did. Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Howdy friends! I spent the day in my studio, it was lovely and not once did I think of my van with the dead battery sitting in my driveway LOL! I was a creative machine today, I played with colored pencils, filmed 3 new videos (you can see them on my Youtube channel) and finished knitting a pair of very ugly mittens. Well, maybe they are not that ugly, the yarn was beautiful, the pattern was lovely so the wild card in that equation was me. I’m hoping they look better in the morning, if not there will be a rigorous session of steam blocking and embellishing, either way there is a new thick and toasty pair for the mitten drawer regardless of their looks LOL! Tonight I am going to share one of the videos I filmed today, freehand sketching on a book page with colored pencils, have a look and follow along!
As I mentioned in the video I used Prismacolor pencils (my favorite) but you can really use whatever kind you (or your kids) have on hand. If you are looking for an inexpensive brand of pencils I recommend Prang and they are widely available. Have a great night folks and til next time happy crafting!
OK, I’m not a quilter, I don’t have that kind of patience but I’d heard that some quilters used Inktense pencils on their quilts so I had to have a go at it! I also really wanted to try it because for Christmas I gave one of my best friends a small tin of inktense pencils and she is a talented quilter and seamstress so I wanted to make sure it worked well before I told her about using them on fabric. Well, I really like the results on my craft-fair tool apron. What do you think?
Supplies:
Inktense pencils by Derwent
Textile medium (or any acrylic sealer like mod-podge)
a firm paint brush
a foam brush
black acrylic paint or fabric paint
bold clear stamps
An iron or heat gun for heat setting fabric
some natural fabric to stamp on
a spray bottle of water and also a bucket of water to clean brushes in.
Directions
Stamp designs with black acrylic paint, heat set.
color with pencils
spritz with water and apply textile medium to lock colors
let dry and heat set.
Watch the video for helpful hints and full tutorial! Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
Happy Friday! I spent a lovey day with my good friend Kathy today, we crafted Christmas gifts, drank tea and gabbed a lot! (really it’s mostly about the gabbing when we get together!) :D You will have to wait until later to see what I made but tonight I wanted to share some watercolor pencil art with you:
The above painting I did with my new Derwent Graphitint pencils. They were an early Christmas gift to myself (I found a heck of a sale!) and I decided to open them live on camera and paint something. Here you will see how I created the above painting:
I really liked the colors of the pencils but I noticed that they looked much different wet than dry and I could not really tell what the color I was coloring with was going to look like so I made a color swatch of the colors in the set. It was so handy that I decided to do the same for the other 2 sets of Derwent watercolor pencils I have. If you have watercolor pencils you should take the time to make a hand color chart, in the next video I explain how and why to do it:
Have fun with your materials and get to know them. You can make color charts of all your media. For traditional colored pencils or pastels you might swatch them out on grey as they are opaque or make a chart on black and one on white. You will certainly know more about your supplies if you do this! That’s it from this droopy girl tonight, thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!
