Being GRATEFUL... An ATC Giveaway

Happy Day Everyone!  Today I am sharing some Artist's Trading Cards (ATCs) I made created around the theme Gratitude.  One card (that I have not shown) will be winging its way around the globe to a new arty friend in New Zealand, but of course I could not make just one ATC (she says smiling). 

So Gratitude was what I was feeling as I was creating these bits of art, gratitude for the life I live today in this beautiful country of Canada, and I felt the biggest desire to share these feelings.

So I have decided to Give Away all these bits of ART, which are permeated with my own loving, grateful and artistic energy - from me to YOU, my awesome followers!

And why would I like to do this?  Well one reason is because I am so very grateful for the amazing life I am living today.  Another reason is because I want to share my joy in art with everyone.

But the biggest reason is because I want to do something to help spread some joy and love and acceptance through our world.

Because it HAS to start somewhere.  Because I believe one person CAN make a difference. Because I believe that each individual act of love, no matter how small, will be added to the cosmic sand heap and will grown exponentially.

Remember I come from the country that birthed Terry Fox, so I truly believe "One Person CAN make a difference."  And if this idea resonates with you please do JOIN IN! Any way, any how... Smile.

So I hope you will leave me a comment and help me to hopefully starting a wave of artistic love that will maybe one day sweep the globe...

If you would like one of these miniature pieces of my art just leave me a comment on this post and on Tuesday, November 29th I will draw six names from all the comments left and announce the winners on Wednesday November 30th.  Winners will then send me their addresses so I can mail off these tiny little ambassadors of gratitude and love and hope for a joyful future across the globe.

Now if you are interested in our little group of ATC swappers, we are a private facebook group started up in 2016 through the Documented Life Project by the loveliest of people, Ms. Dawn Murdock.  If you would like to play with all of us go HERE and ask to join: 

So that's it today! Thanks for popping in today to see what I am up to and if you feel the desire to share this particular post with anyone I would be ever so GRATEFUL!... Smile

Lynne Mizera, Mixed Media Artist

Creston, British Columbia, Canada

I am entering these ATCs into the following challenges:

Rubber Dance Stamps - November Colour Challenge

Viva Las Vegas Stamps - November Challenge

We'd like to inspire you with words like gold, warm, yellow, tans, browns, vintage, black and white, background stamps, doodles, harlequin, diamond, distressed, polka dots, swirls, circles, hearts, stripes and more!

Creative Artiste Challenge #20 - Anything Mixed Media Goes

Stamps used on these ATCs:

Da Vinci by Rubber Dance Art Stamps

Tangle Turtle by Viva Las Vegas Stamps

Creating Impressionistic ATC's - My September Mixed Media Tutorial For STAMPlorations

Hello Blogland Peeps, and Welcome to my monthly mixed media tutorial for STAMPlorations - this is my time to teach and to inspire!

This month I am sharing some simple techniques for creating ATC's (Artists Trading Cards) using stencils, masks and stamps that will make your ATC's look like tiny pieces of impressionist art.

Impressionism: a movement in the late 19th century in French painting, characterized by the goal of reproducing an impression of a subject by use of reflected light and color and the blurring of outlines. —

And these same mixed media techniques can be applied to a canvas or an art journal page.  So sit back, relax and enjoy this photo-tutorial and I do hope inspiration finds you as you scroll through my lesson today.

For my background I used my Dylusion Inks sprayed onto a piece of 140lbs watercolor paper, and then after it had dried I used my brayer to roll a very small bit of white gesso overtop - this faded my background colors back and added some texture. Then I cut my paper into the standard business card sized bits of 2.5"x3.5".

Now, using my masks, white gesso and a makeup sponge, I dabbed the gesso overtop the mask to create a base image.... like these below:

I only dab on enough white gesso to cover the mask so that the background color peeks through.

Then, after that has dried, using my stencils and Studio 490 Crackle Texture Paste I added some 3-D images overtop of the background images, so  now my cards looked like this:

Now at this point you can leave the cards as they are; all subtle and crackled and faded back, OR you can pump up one of your images using pencil crayons (yup, plain old colored pencils)

Choose a main image and add a faint outline in either the same color a few shades darker or a complimentary color.  See the difference?

And finally... add a stamped saying using the tissue paper method and any other ephemera to embellish and enhance.  The above image is the ATC before I added my stamped saying:

And here is the completed card... 

Before

And completed - You may notice that I have inked the edges of my ATC, I think this gives it a finished look.

Before:

Completed - you may also notice that I like to enhance my crackles by dabbing some spray ink onto the image and wiping off so the ink goes into the cracks.

Here is the Before:

Here is the After

So as always, thank you for popping in today to see what I am up to and to share in my creativity and please do leave me a comment if you like what you are seeing!

Lynne Mizera
 
STAMPlorations products used on this project:

STAMPlorations Stamp Bold Sentiments: Create

ARTplorations Stencil & Mask: Some Birds

What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday #(WOYWW) #367 and my ATC Swapping REVEAL

Happy Wednesday Deskers! (well actually it's 11:00pm on Tuesday here in the Rocky Mountains where I live in the western most province in Canada) but I am determined not to be LAST this week!  It's going to be a short amount of typing and a LOT of photos as I create this photo-heavy post revealing of all the ATCs I have received to date as I promised last week.  But first, Here is My Desk,

well actually this is my work space for all the messy stuff like, sprays and gels and black gesso... and you are seeing the beginnings of lots of projects I am working on all at the same time... which is totally how my creative brain works...lots of days of no inspiration and then WHAM... it all hits at the same time and I am working on 3 to 10 projects all at once! Grin and now, on to the reveal... Enjoy!

Michelle Schratz, MISHRA

Kim Young

ZsuZsa #1 (InkyDinkyDoodle)

ZsuZsa #2

Lunch Lady Jan Appleton

Debbie Rock (acrafterslife.blogspot.co.uk)

Jo (twiglet5.blogspot.co.uk)

Annie (wipso-astitchintime.blogspot.co.uk)

Sylvia (Little Treasures)

Marit Barentsen (Maritspaperworld.com)

Lisca Meyer

Kelly Henkins (kellyscreativedreams.blogspot.com)

Lisa Davolt

Nikki Carpenter

Chris Bedford (pearshapedchris.blogspot.com)

And Finally, here is a photo of the lovely cards that came with a lot of these ATCs.  (I am not showing any of the envelopes or ephemera just yet as I have plans for that stuff.)

As Always, thanks for popping in to visit today and if you leave me a comment I will absolutely return the visit! Smiling and Waving,

Scrapbooking Artist Lynne Mizera

Happy Friday!

Yup it's Friday again and for me that means another Unity Friends with Flair linkup!  Just to re-cap last year I realized that I had a HUGE hoard of brand-new, still-in-their-packages Unity stamps and I was determined to USE THEM, and Unity's Weekly "Friends With Flair" link up was just the motivation I needed to get me going and to keep me going. I have to share that I am REALLY proud of how I've managed to use and touch a bit of my Hoard (maybeeee 20%?)  So here's to another year of Unity Stamps and Friends with Flair and hopefully another 20% used - Grin.

This week I took a quick snap of the Valentines' Day ATC's I'm working on.  This is  something new for me, and I will be sending them out to people all around our Globe, who have touched my life, even if I have NEVER touched them, (thanks to Facebook and Instagram!) 

I am using one of my newest Unity Itty Bitty stamps "Be Joyful" (like I needed MORE?!?) and I really wrestled with this purchase because I don't Need any more stamps... Grin, but boy am I glad I got htis one because it's Adorable and Perfect for what I want to do! And I stamped the John Lennon quote on the back, "I get by with a little help from my Friends."

So Thanks for popping in and before you go check out what everyone else at "Friends with Flair" linked up today, please do leave me some blog lovin' in the form of a comment if you like what you see!

Cheers!

Scrapbook Lynne Mizera