Index-Card-A-Day 2013: Week 5

It's week 5 of Index-Card-A-Day 2013 (at least in my little world). No, it's really two days until the end of nine weeks of Index-Card-A-Day fun. Can it be over so soon? 

Well, not for me. I'm still catching myself up on cards and catching you up on my work. I want to keep all these posts and cards in order, but there may be a post later with cards I went back and made up for. Of course, for too lengthy blog posts, I'm not sharing every single index card. Some of mine came out awful (and that could be a post in itself). 

"Oh, My Deer!" ICAD : 6-30-13

Gelli™ printed tissue paper, acrylic paint, colored pencil, gel pen, text on 3" x 5" index card.

This scrap of Gelli™ printed tissue paper had the exact shape of a deer on it! I just added a few details like the eye, ear definition, shading, and the text.

"Layered Gelli™ Printed Petals" ICAD : 7-1-13

Molding paste, acrylic paint, Gelli™ printed paper collage, marker on 3" x 5" index card. 

My Gelli™ printing sprees produce a ton of yummy papers for collage. These are mainly junk mail scraps and book pages I printed. All the petals were hand-cut and are layered in this collage. I used the end of my finger to curl the ends of all the petals, but the scan I have here doesn't show the real dimension of the piece. 

"My Favorite Washi Tape" ICAD : 7-2-13

Washi tape and DYMO lettering on 3" x 5" index card. 

I needed a really quick make-up card for this day so I just grabbed my five favorite washi tapes and my DYMO. Is it possible to just have five favorite washi tapes?! NO! 

"Summer Fun" ICAD : 7-3-13

Gelli™ printed background, handmade stamps, gel pen, calligraphy pen, archival ink on 3" x 5" index card. 

There were parts of this Gelli™ printed background that I really didn't like. So I stamped my pie chart and asterisk hand-cut stamps over it. The pie charts looked like beach balls to me on the colorful background. I colored them in with opaque gel pens and added some white gel pen accents. My calligraphy could use some help. I tried to disguise my mistakes with a hot pink opaque gel pen, but the calligraphy ink bled right through.

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I did a card for the 4th of July and it can be seen in my post here. 

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"Heart Garland" ICAD : 7-5-13

Gelli™ printed background with hand-cut paper hearts stitched to 3" x 5" index card. 

The Gelli™ printed background for this one sat on my desk since the start of Index-Card-A-Day. It was too pretty to cover up with a lot of collage. Each heart is Gelli™ printed book page and was hand-cut by me. I lightly glued them to the card before sending the lot through the sewing machine. I really like how this one turned out and may turn the design into something bigger.

"Imagination Is More Important Than Knowledge" ICAD : 7-6-13

Spray ink, acrylic paint, stamp, ink, gel pen, paper collage on 3" x 5" index card. 

I masked and sprayed the background with spray inks. Then I stamped with paint and ink and doodled on it. The quote is stamped on a scrap of painty phonebook page and was given dimension with foam tape behind it. The paper backing the quote is part of the mask I used with the spray ink - it matched the colors! How handy!

- Vickie

Index-Card-A-Day 2013 : Week 4

Humor me and pretend it's the end of June. Index-Card-A-Day 2013 is still going strong. It's week 4 (June 23-29) and I finally feel more like myself again after surgery. It's back to some serious art time. 

"Home Sweet Home" 6-23-13: This card began as a Gelli™ printed background. I glued down two pieces of printed tissue paper for the houses and painted over them. The scallops at the top are also Gelli™ printed and came from another project they just weren't working with well. I added a lot of detail with my gel pens. This is one of my favorite cards.

  

"What A Wonderful World" 6-24-13 : The background started with gesso etched with some texture. I added some grungy paint techniques and splattered paint on it. The torn paper roses are from old book pages, some in English, French, and Japanese. I lightly edged them with a pink pigment ink pad. The leaves are cut from my Gelli™ printed paper stash, which is ever growing. "Lyric" was one of the week's prompts so I went with one I could make with those Tim Holtz chit chat stickers. Each word has a Gelli™ printed background, which I distressed with my craft knife. The shiny rhinestone brads look funny in this scanned image of the card - but trust me - they shiiiiiiine. In order to tie the card together more I added stitching around the outside. 

"Owl" 6-25-13 : Guess what?! It's another Gelli™ printed background! The owl is on very vintage French text paper. It was fragile so I glued it to a bit of thicker cardstock in order to draw on it. The owl consists of paint, marker, colored pencil, and gel pen. I drew the tree branch and the little stem with leaves, cut them out, and collaged them to the card. Then I cut the owl out and glued it on. A bit of a doodle around the edge completed it.

"Roses" 6-26-13 : These roses are more of a complex paper layering design than can really be seen in this image. There are five paper layers: one for all seven flowers, one for the middle back rose, another for all four in front, one for the middle left front rose and one for the middle right front rose. Except for the last top layer, each layer was made to include the flowers that would be layered above it in order to avoid the lines that happen when overlapping this many layers. I got lazy with the last roses - the ones in the front middle - and you can see the line from where they overlap.

All the leaves and stems were cut separately and put back together creating a lot more layers. The image was painted only after all the paper layers were complete.  

"Love" 6-27-13 : Not being one who likes to waste paint, this card was painted with left overs from another piece. I dragged the paint across the card with an old credit card. The word is drawn with a big brush shaped Sharpie™ and outlined with a white gel pen.

"Time Flies" 6-28-13 : It's another Gelli™ printed background! I disliked the left side of the print so I collaged a piece of Gelli™ printed junk mail over it. The wings and clock are stamped on tissue paper and collaged to the card. I added white and shiny silver gel pen to the stamped image. The little doodles were added last. 

"Not All Who Wander Are Lost" 6-29-13 : The background is torn paper from old books and acrylic paint. I stamped the typewriter and bird on tan paper and cut them out. Then I had to engineer the paper banner coming from the typewriter. It's all one piece of folded paper. Stamping the lettering was nerve wracking as I had one chance to get it right or I had to make the banner all over again. Nailed it on my second try. A slit cut in the typewriter allowed me to tuck the end of the banner in it. I used foam tape under the parts of the banner that have words. Those shadows you see are real, not digitally added. Sweet! 

If you click on the images of my index cards, you will go to flickr where they can be seen much larger. Check out the Daisy Yellow Index-Card-A-Day flickr group while you're there! 

- Vickie

ICAD 2013 First Week Catch-Up

Presenting a round-up of my first 6 days of Index-Card-A-Day (and my {be creative everyday} practice, too!)

ICAD3 : JUNE 2 : Queen
Prompt: crown.  Theme: rainbow colors.

Created with a background of painty phonebook pages from cleaning off my brayer when Gelli™ printing. The rest is acrylic paint, ink, gel pen, & colored pencil.

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ICAD3 : JUNE 3 : Fearless
Prompt: zebra

Woman cut from magazine. I added her stripes with a Sharpie™. The background is acrylic paint and my own handmade stamp designs.

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ICAD3 : JUNE 4 : Klimt

Gustav Klimt has been on my mind lately. Created with thick handmade paper collage,  watercolor crayons, a brown Sharpie™, white gel pen, gold gel pen, and graphite.

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ICAD3 : JUNE 5 : Love

This one doesn't fit any prompts. She has been hanging around in my head for some time and I had to let her out. I plan on doing something with her for a painting.

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ICAD3 : JUNE 6 : {Grow Beauty}

This started with a scrapbook paper background I chose because I liked the colors. I used acrylic paint to stamp the flower designs that are my own handmade stamps. I added detailing with my white gel pen. The letters are stickers I embellished a little. Black ink added to the edges makes the contrast pop. 

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For June 7th, I had an all day painting class and totally forgot to paint my index card there! So that one will be a "make-up" card related to my class. I might add a little photo of my painting!

I have TONS of ideas for cards this year. Running out of inspiration won't be a problem. Over the weekend I Gelli™ printed a bunch of cards to have handy backgrounds already started. I cannot recommend doing this enough for those days when you have little to no time to do a card. Just add a doodle or some text. Voilà!!

- Vickie

"Soar & Fly" Art Journal Page

From this ...

... to this ...

... to this! Ta da!

This page had more planned for me than I did for it! My muse was here in my presence. I could hear her whispering to me to "let my Little Bird fly". 

Fly, Little Bird. 

Fly and soar. 

Trust your wings. 

Sing your song! 

Your amazing tiny heart 

will take you anywhere.

This bird stamp is my design, and is made from foam sheet and cardboard. It is outlined in orange Copic marker and then black Stabilo pencil for dimension. The bird cage is white-out pen. I drew over that with a sparkly gel pen to make the bars look shiny and metal. 

The purple circle and scalloped dictionary page were scraps laying around. I added my handmade button stamp to the circle and layered them. I used my label maker to print the words because I was in a hurry. They are pixelated, and that bugs me, but it's not a deal-killer on this piece. 

The letters for "soar" were brown to start with. I painted them and stamped some dots and lettering on them with paint. The dimension the raised letters add is lovely! 

The little heart banner is punched hearts from book pages and baker's twine. A little watercolor splashed on the hearts creates some interest. 

Look! I managed to sew in curvy lines - not jagged straight-ish arcs! The paper itself is created with gelli plate printing and white gel pen. This is before I drew the heart and swirly black line.

To connect the theme of singing I glued down some tissue tape with music on it. That needed some color so I washed a little acrylic paint over the tape. Using a Molotow white paint pen I wrote the words "sing your song" and added black to make it more readable. Some little doodles and stars here and there finished the piece nicely. 

There you have it! This is the first art journal page I have completed this year. It took several days to work out. I printed the background about a month ago with my gelli plate right into the journal. 

I worked on it here and there for a while until the full image finally came together. I wanted to experiment with some ideas I had in my sketchbook, and this piece gave me the chance to work those ideas out more thoroughly. That's what I love about art journaling! Mad science experiments! Focusing on the process! Mastering techniques! Practice  Practice. Practice!! 

I hope you have a wonderful weekend! Happy Easter if you celebrate! Also, Mr. M turns 40 this weekend! Huzzah!

- Vickie

{be creative everyday: 2013} MARCH 8

{be creative everyday} MARCH 8 :: gelli print collage, a photo by Vickie @ In My Head Studios on Flickr.

Gelli Print Collage - work in progress

paper collage of acrylic monoprints, gel pen, ink, handmade stamps
5.5" x 4.25"
© 2013 Victoria Porter

This isn't quite the finished version. I added a little more detail to it after I took this photo with my phone. 

All of these pieces of paper were printed on my gelli plate. Some were already printed with text, like the Japanese newspaper I picked up on a visit to Austin, Texas, and some dictionary pages. Using my hand-carved stamps and black archival ink, I stamped some designs on some of the pieces.  

I'm deciding whether or not to send it through my sewing machine for some random stitching. It feels disparate to me and needs some cohesion. 

What do you think? Stitching or not?

Happy Monday!

- Vickie

With Love From Friends! 2013

Happy Valentine's Day!!!

For the past three years I have been delighted to volunteer for With Love From Friends (WLFF) by making Valentine's Day cards for people who are without family or friends to remember them. 

The fabulous Eve Elzenga developed and coordinates this project. WLFF is such a wonderful program. I adore Eve and her work. I'm not alone... Eve was the recipient of a Jefferson Award in 2011 for her public service for WLFF! 

Eve strives to have high quality cards made with great materials and by artists in our community. She really wants the cards to be well made as the people who get them really do cherish them and deserve nice cards created by adults for adults. In years passed she opened her home for all of January so people could come over and make cards. Her collection of high quality supplies, papers  embellishments, ribbons, and little gorgeous what-nots were made available to artists to pick up and use this year. She collects Valentine art supplies all year round. 

As someone who has been lucky enough to spend a lot of time with my grandparents and great grandparents, I appreciate and value my elders. Now that they are gone, as well as my beloved father - who will always be my first Valentine - I felt like their memory needed to be honored, especially on a day all about love. So in memory of my loved ones passed, I made ten cards for With Love From Friends. 

"You Are Loved"
acrylic monoprint, paper, mixed media
4.25" x 5.5"
© 2013 Victoria Porter

My cards started as Artist Trading Card sized (2.5" x 3.5") original monoprints made on my Gelli Plate. I added red and pink cardstock mats behind and stitched them together. The heart is crumbled red cardstock inked to add some dimension. Don't you love the tiny staples?! Everything but the straight lines on the mats behind the monoprint are all hand cut by me. The words are all hand stamped. The wings are my design and took a long time to cut out. (I do not even own a die cutting machine. I do it old school!)

Each card I made is a one-of-a-kind piece of artwork as all of the monoprinted backgrounds are different. 

Every card donated to WLFF is stamped with "With Love From Friends" on the inside. Did someone say 1500 cards need to be stamped?!?!?! I am so on that. My mother and I spent many hours stamping the inside of cards last week. We had a ball hanging out with Eve and her partner! 

This year WLFF is in need of a Sizzix Big Shot Die Cutting Machine, Valentine themed cutting dies, and cash gifts so they can update their website. Supporting Eve in her efforts pays off in ways you can't even imagine. Hop on over to WLFF and see how you can help for next year! 

- Vickie

"Put A Bird On It!" :: RNEST Challenge

It's time for another Rochester NY Etsy Street Team Monthly Challenge! November's theme is "Put A Bird On It!", which is more in reference to the delicious and varied poultry we will enjoy on Thanksgiving than the current cute trend. 

Personally though, I love putting birds on anything. I adore little birdies. If I could be any animal it would definitely be a little bird!

My "Party Bird" domino pendant was created with ridiculously tiny, hand-cut pieces of paper that I painted myself. Even the little poofy part on top of the hat is hand-cut! 

Head on over to the Rochester NY Etsy Street Team's blog to cast your vote! You have until November 14th at midnight.

You can also head on over to In My Head Studios' Etsy shop to buy this dapper little fellow for yourself! 

- Vickie

LOVE: Index-Card-A-Day 2012: 6/28/12

For so long I have been blown away by some scrapbook pages - the kind with the sort of minimalist use of space with a lot of design and embellishment in one area around the photo. Particularly the work of Finnabair makes my brain pop. It's amazing, and I would love to speak to this artist about her work. 

After several attempts at this type of collage, I had kind of given up on getting it how I wanted. But I am not one to give up that easily. So I studied her work and the work of her peers. I studied the composition, layers, and colors. I deconstructed the pieces in my head and put them back together.

Of course this made for a good Index-Card-A-Day 2012 challenge. I'm trying NEW things for #icad2 and using up supplies I haven't even touched or have been saving forever. Time to open the scrap box...

... and pull everything out but the kitchen sink! Here we have random book pages, tickets, a cardboard coffee sleeve, tags, baker's twine, staples, stars, old paper from books and ledgers, sheet music, a paper clip, envelopes, a money band, washi tape, canvas, embroidery trim, a star brad, hangtag packaging, and stitching. 

I literally spent hours and hours fiddling, and that turned into about three days of pushing bits and bobs around to get this done. I simply had to walk away from it several times to clear my head. At one point, all of it finally "clicked into place" - the layers, the arrangement, colors, and textures. 

A lot of this was experimentation. Not knowing where I'm going with something can be very freeing to me. I asked things of my paper punches that only a mad scientist would try. I added some collage. Then went to the sewing machine. Then to the paint, and on and on until basically I made a tour of my studio in supplies and paper ephemera. 

My goal was to use these things in an "as is" condition as much as possible. I love how the ledger paper holes look as a design element. The letters for "LOVE" are stamped on the edge of a vintage dictionary page; I wanted to preserve the red edges as well as take advantage of the natural patina of the old paper.  

I'm happy with the result. Even more though, I am happy that I TRIED this. Even if it had turned out to be a total FAIL, I still faced the edges of my comfort zone with courage and smashed those barriers to smithereens. I cannot recommend anything more highly than getting off your duff and doing that thing which scares you most in your art. 

Just. Do. It.

It's just paper, after all. Right? 

Right.  

- Vickie

"Home Sweet Home" ICAD2 for 6/21/12

Ok, I might be making the Index-Card-A-Day Challenge a little more challenging than I hoped and/or planned. I've just been so inspired! I didn't realize my brain needed a little discipline to work on something everyday, and now I am hungry, hungry, hungry for art all the time. I LOVE this!
This card is from June 21, 2012. It definitely took me more than one day to do this. I'm not getting a card a day done -  and I gave myself permission to do that at the start. However, I do believe I am still benefitting from this challenge like crazy. If I'm not getting one card a day done then I am at least working on one (or two or three at a time) each day. AND THAT COUNTS.


This house, bird, and nest image is something I've worked on before in different formats - for domino pendants and ATCs. Now I felt it needed an ICAD2 work-up. 
I started by making a house shaped template that fit the index card. I cut the house out of another index card, pasted scrapbook paper over it, and added the tissue tape. Then I stitched around the edges on my sewing machine.  
The sky is layered torn dictionary pages secured with matte medium. I added some watered down blue paint then splattered really watery gesso over it. I left the torn edges because they reminded me of deckled edges on handmade paper. The edge was then shaded with a darker blue Copic marker. 
The lettering is hand stamped in red pigment ink - which I had to stamp a billion times because I always mess up the last letter and ruin it. It's matted with dark red cardstock. The edges are inked to "age" and soften them. 


The bird and nest images are from flickr's collage images group. I love the detail and texture in these pieces. My printer went light on the ink for this printing - not sure why. I went back over the pictures with colored pencils to bring out the color more. The gleaming highlight in the bird's eye is a dot of white gel pen. I also highlighted the eggs with white gel pen. 


After I adhered the bird and nest to the background it all looked very flat. I used colored pencils to shade around the bird and nest for some dimension. It really perked the piece up. I also ran a thin line of dark brown pencil to the very edges of the paper of the collage images to bring them out more. 


Oh, how I love using foreign postage stamps in my collage! I have about 20 pounds of old stamps (anyone need any?). I chose this one for the color and the country of origin - France - so it would tie in with the tissue tape behind it that has French on it.  


The back of the index card has the stitching I did with my sewing machine. I love sewing on paper. I'm stamping the date the card is finished on the back. I should go back and add some more details to the information of the piece. 

"home sweet home" Index-Card-A-Day2
Mixed media & paper collage on index card
3"x 5"
© 2012 Victoria Porter/In My Head Studios

This ICAD2 looks adorable on a tiny easel I found at the craft store! 

I am a bit behind on posting more ICADs that I have finished. There's much more to come!

- Vickie

Happy Father's Day : A Card

We are so blessed to have Mr. M's father in our lives. Father's Day has been hard these past two years since I lost my dad. But Mr. M's dad is such a wonderful guy that I'm grateful for the opportunity to celebrate him! 

Most of the time when I start working on something I really don't have the "Finished Piece" visualized in my head. There may be parts of it or just a color scheme to begin with. For this card I was reaching toward handsome and manly. Mr. M's dad is an outdoorsman and enjoys fishing. So I went with earthy tones and unusual textures. 

I started with a blank piece of ivory cardstock, cut it in half, and folded it to make the card part. Using a foam blending tool I inked the edges of the card with some brown inks. Using two shades adds a lot of dimension and is worth taking the little bit of extra time to do so. 

Next up was my choice of papers. Pretty much went all out brown on this one. Using that large of an area of bold vertical stripes was stepping out of my comfort zone. I like swirly backgrounds. But for a guy simple and stylish is the way to go. I distressed the edges heavily. Even tore some off to make it look really tattered. Then I inked the distressed edges to, once again, add more dimension. 

At this point a plan does need to begin forming. I pulled out a couple scraps of paper and moved them around the face of the card until it looked pleasing, and I could decide where I was going. Eventually I chose a strip of map paper, a dark brown cardstock, paper that looks like burlap, and the sentiment printed from my computer that I designed in a font that looks like tire treads meets tweed meets stenciled lettering. How manly is that?!

I wanted a layered look so I put the strip of map paper between the two mats for the sentiment. That helps tie the elements together. 

When deciding to use my sewing machine on cards I find that if I don't really have a solid plan from here I mess the stitching up. Or sew the card itself shut. (Come on. Don't act like that never happened to you.) 

First I adhered the map strip to the dark brown cardstock with the dark brown behind the map paper. Then I adhered that to the card. Time for the sewing machine! 

I stitched all the way around the card twice and then ran border stitches along the map strip edges. On cards like this where distress is good neatness doesn't count. I wobble the line a bit. It's more interesting. 

I glued the sentiment to the burlap paper and then glued that down over the map strip and stitching. See how planning ahead on the stitching prevented me from sewing through the sentiment? :) 

(Can you tell I'm not a seamstress? 99% of the material put through my sewing machine is paper. I think the only fabric I stitched was my craft show tablecloth hem.)

I love using buttons on cards, and for guys it's especially appropriate. I chose an assortment of brown buttons from my extensive stash. Whenever I use buttons I pretty much always add thread through the holes so it looks like it is stitched to the card. Buttons on my cards without thread look "unfinished" to me. Again since I was going for a distressed look neatness didn't count and I left some straggly threads hanging on. 

I adhered the buttons to the card using Glossy Accents. I did so because it is wicked strong at holding 3D embellishments, and it dries quickly. Regular white craft glue would take hours to dry in that situation. This took 15 minutes. Joy! 

I thought at this point I might be done, but there was this big blankness in the bottom right corner. It looked unbalanced. I had to come up with something to put there. Digging through the piles of paper options on my messy work table I came across a coffee shop cardboard cup sleeve that had been striped down to the corrugated inside part. Texture! And brown! Perfect!

I'm in love with bunting and banners of any sort right now. I thought this corrugate would make a cute flag. I trimmed it down to size and clipped the end to make points. The edges were inked in a dark brown and a little black. A tiny voice in my head wondered what this would do if I ran it through the sewing machine. Hmmmmm. Tiny Voice, you may have a good idea! 

I tested it on a small bit of scrap corrugate. The heavy flattening power of the sewing machine foot smushed the wavy texture down. But it was usable by bending it back into shape. Then I stitched the one for the card. 

The card still didn't seem finished at this point yet. Hmmmmm. What to do? What to do? 

DYMO! A solid go-to when stuck! I punched out the word "hero" and then used a regular 1/4" hole punch to pop out the letters so they would fit my flag. I glued them on lined up with the stitching. 

I have a thing for using odd numbers of items in my design. "Hero" is four letters. Gah! It had to be balanced out so I added the three hearts. Ahhh. My OCD is calmed.

The spot where the flag met the seintiment mats looked stark. Another solid go-to for masculine cards is raffia. It's a good, natural material to get away with making a bow not look too foofoo. And, yes, I did ink the raffia a bit to make it look old. Once again, the Glossy Accents is the glue to use for sticking raffia bows to cards.

I'm wishing ALL the daddies out there a very Happy Father's Day!! I don't care how tough and gruff you are. If a two year-old hands you a toy phone, you answer it! :) xoxo

For the rest of you, have a shiny, sparkle filled Sunday!

- Vickie