/* */ Beulah Bee: Civil War series
Showing posts with label Civil War series. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Civil War series. Show all posts

May 08, 2015

Dotty




dot·ty  (dŏt′ē)

adj. dot·ti·er, dot·ti·est

Mentally unbalanced; crazy.

Amusingly eccentric or unconventional.

Ridiculous or absurd: a dotty scheme.

Having a feeble or unsteady gait; shaky.

Obsessively infatuated or enamored.








The Monday blog challenge this week at Simon Says Stamp is the color coral and that's where my "dottiness" all began.

I found some paper in my stash that I used for the background and then a vintage photo and butterfly that paired well together. Embracing the pattern of her dress, I embellished the tag with washi tape and black and white gelly roll pens.

Her full name is Dorothea, but everyone calls her Dot.

April 15, 2015

Middle Ground

Click to Enlarge

mid·dle ground

noun

1. an area of compromise or possible agreement between two extreme positions, especially political ones.

2. the middle distance of a painting or photograph.





I have a journal page for your perusal today made for the express pleasure of experimenting with a new stencil. As you can see, I got a bit carried away but what better way to see just what it can do?


The ladies were cut and pasted down first, then I painted the sky and ground and added the stenciling last. I went back in and adjusted some of the values to try and give it more depth which included adding the lake and mountains in the distance.

This lovely little glass trinket was my inspiration for the slightly unusual tint. Yes, I could have used more traditional landscape colors but I wanted the challenge of trying something different.

I'm linking to Simon's Monday blog challenge where this week's most excellent theme is in the middle.

April 13, 2015

Blue Butterfly


I still have one more Flower Garden stamp to go but, after making five in a row, I needed a break!

So I played around with another new toy instead. It's an adhesive silkscreen from Martha Stewart and it's pretty awesome. It's like a stencil but with way more detail.

I began the tag by using acrylic paint to apply the fern design right smack-dab in the middle. Then I envisioned adding figures on either side, found a photo that would work and did an image transfer. Since image transfers are transparent, I went over the darkest areas of the ferns with some additional green paint to make it more opaque and stand-out better.

I painted in a blue background and added some black lines with a gel pen. I stamped a butterfly with white, then embossed it and painted the insides blue to match the background.

Martha probably didn't expect her stencil to be used this way but, nevertheless, it was good practice and great fun. If anyone's interested in seeing how these work, up-close and personal, let me know in the comments and I'll put together a demo for a future post.

It's pure coincidence, but I'm linking to the Monday blog challenge at Simon Says Stamp because this week's theme is in the middle and that is exactly where my fern ended up!

February 26, 2015

Miss Divine

I am in love with Miss Divine.

It's an image I'm sure to use again (and maybe again).

She must have moved a bit during the photo shoot as her clothing is a bit fuzzy but her face is beautiful.

The cameo, the curls, the mysterious hint of red, oh be still my heart!

I collaged some Ideo-ology Tissue Wrap and pages from the French Industrial Paper Stash after transferring the image with gel medium.

I used a gelly roll pen, a bit of acrylic paint and white Distress Stain to bring out some of the paper's scroll work then Black Soot to distress the edges of the tag.


If you'd like to use the image, I found it here. I'm linking it to the Monday blog challenge at SSS--this week's theme is anything goes.

June 20, 2014

Faith


This is the fifth tag made in my Civil War series and there are lots of layers here. I fiddled with this one quite a bit but the good thing about collage is--if something doesn't work, you can just cover it up with something else!

Click to Enlarge
The first layer (now almost invisible) is book paper cut in strips with washi tape along some edges.

It wasn't working so I covered everything with plain tissue paper and deli wrap stamped with acrylic paint. To lighten it up and unify the colors, I applied Picket Fence distress stain all over and used Broken China and Vintage Photo distress inks here and there.

I added the mirror, lady, and text, applied Tim's tissue tape on the top and left edge, sanded some edges to expose the first layer of washi tape and used Walnut Stain distress ink along the edges for framing.

I'm linking it to Simon's Monday blog challenge where the theme is anything goes.

June 09, 2014

Adorata


Number four in my series of southern belles, this tag consists of a digital image of handwriting printed and pasted under some tissue paper stamped with a seed packet image (Stampendous).

The ladies were printed and cut from two photos found here and distress inks and colored pencils were used for tint.

May 25, 2014

For Paula

Still working with my "southern belles," this tag was a simple case of cut and paste.

The background is from a sheet of Idea-ology paper stash, the frame was made out of paper called Antique Script by Bazzill, the plantation ruin and my little lady were digital images I printed.

Not much was done in the way of coloring--I only used a little pencil to create a shadow behind the frame. I did, however, knock back the plantation drawing with thin off-white acrylic paint to fade it into the background.

I do wish more papers were made like this one from Bazzill because it is very thin and works so much better in collages than thicker cardstock.

May 19, 2014

Trois Dames


For me, the best part of crafting is the problem solving required when things don't go the way you expected. I believe I used "everything but the kitchen sink" when making this tag and finally stopped tweaking it when I ran out of ideas and the paper just couldn't take anymore.

It may seem a bit odd but, one of my favorite papers is a striped dark brown and off white pattern that can be cut into tiny strips to add accents where needed. An example of that paper runs across the bottom of this tag.

This is tag number two in a series I'm working on that feature some vintage photos I found on Pinterest (see earlier post here).

May 11, 2014

Cabbage Salad

Click to enlarge
I stumbled upon a person who collects images of women's fashion from the Civil War era and I've begun to follow her board. This discovery has prompted me to create collages using similar images. I hope to work out a series and this tag is my first go at it.

I'm also curious why, in many vintage photos, the subject looks so serious. Did no one say "cheese" when the photo was taken? I expect the grumpy face on this lady is why I chose to use her.

I began with a variety of papers including store-bought scrapbook paper, pages from a dictionary, a vintage cookbook and sheet music which I cut into small pieces and pasted on the tag.

After printing the lady, she was added to the tag using my image transfer technique. A homemade stencil was used to trace the outline of a frame with a fine tip marker and several areas were tinted with colored pencils to provide color and contrast. For framing, I cut thin strips from black and white striped paper and pasted them along the edges.

Why Cabbage Salad? For one thing, it's her expression and her face is rather round. And, if you look real close, you'll see that the cookbook's menu page has a listing for cabbage salad aka cole slaw.