Spare Parts for Art (for Let's Play) + WOYWW

...or how I am a packrat who keeps odd bits.

Odd bits can be fun to collect. For years, I rode mass transit from place to place, and in between I used to walk a good bit. I found this to be a healthy choice, one I'd never regret. But not only for the exercise and the fresh air, but for what I used to see scattered everywhere.

Sidewalks and paths can be strewn with other people's flotsam and cast off objects. Also, some bits have a tendency to fall out of car engines, to be left behind to rust. I collect such things because they fascinate me. I once saw new flotsam nearly every time that I went out.

Rubber bits. Metal bits, some rusted and some not. The occasional bead or coin.

This month's Let's Play challenge is especially challenging for someone like me LOL. After all, one collects, yet may never use. Carolyn Dube's idea is that we need to look at our creative items for something we thought that we just love too much to use and then either "use it or lose it." I thought that this was a great idea, even while I was a bit nervous about it.

So. I do not know why I LOVE my itsy-bitsy metal bits and pieces. A little scrap heap is all it really might look to be to the average person rummaging through my creative space. Am I a magpie at heart? A true packrat? I had to find out. After all, the challenge this time is "Use it or lose it"!

Today's project is incomplete. I admit that it's only a work in progress. I hope to have more time to finish it later on this month, once I've had my visit with company and can relax and creatively play for a change.

But first, please meet my messy and playful new project.

Some of the bits used

I realized had been with me

for nearly a decade!

"Use it or lose it!"

 A closer look at what's stuck in my foil bundle.

Gears, washers, bolts and screws make my heart smile.

One great grandparent was 

a blacksmith--so did I inherit his love of metal things?

:)

The final project hopefully should be finished later in the month. It is all about storage or places to put things, along with the last of the lovely metal bits and parts.

The main body of the tiny piece of table top furniture I am about to make has been drawn from another "Use it or lose it" stash, my cigar boxes. We're talking at least 8 years on that collection. The 2 small wooden drawers I've had since (I think) 2007, give or take a few months. These will be inserted into another structure. I am currently awaiting the arrival of the foam core which I ordered for it. The theme, to match my previous paper storage caddy, is, of course, to be Steampunk.

I've never done anything quite like this before, so it is a real departure from the usual for me.

Who knew that spring cleaning, organizing and storage could be so much fun?

:)

Happy Playful Wednesday, everybody!

DIY Gesso Pages

Using an unusual ingredient which even our local Ace Hardware store has:

At several different places online, I kept running into things about DIY Gesso. In my latest junk journal, the one with the duct taped cover, I wanted to strengthen some of the brown paper pages with gesso or paint--or something. Brown paper can be very brittle, easily torn. I liked the wrinkly look I'd achieved, and also like the torn edges I've added, but brown paper needs more body before certain kinds of treatment. 

I already had used up all of my white gesso, unfortunately. I did not wish to track down a new bottle so late in the creative process. I did still have some chocolate brown gesso left, but applying one brown to another seemed a bad idea for my blue and green color choices.

The recipes for DIY gesso do vary widely, especially where the ratios are concerned. Mine started off pretty grainy, even a bit lumpy--sort of like extremely white, very bad pancake batter! LOL

So now I've added more white acrylic paint to my previous mixture, stirring away lumps. Here is how it looked on the page prior to my adding more Titanium White paint and smoothing the mixture.

Though it's a rough cut journal and those are wrinkled 

pages, I must say that it looks unusually bumpy!

The 2 acrylic paint colors (later applied using my fingers and some water for a thinned look) have stuck to ridges and bumps. I'm not sure yet what to do with these pages. Perhaps by next week, I will have the answer.

Hope everybody's enjoying their week!

Auto Parts Stamps on White

Welcome to the Wild Stamp Deli!

Last week, I got a small box of deli paper sheets. The tip I followed in order to find the right ones was from Shel C. Thanks, Shel!

This week, for Carolyn Dube's "Let's Play" weekly Link Party (see link button in my right hand column) I tried a first experiment using a number of the sheets plus pigment ink pads. The stamps I chose were a mixed bag. Many of those stamps are old rubber auto parts. While they are not exactly hardware items, they at least would be unusual and also not the kind of thing generally to be found in most people's art kits. They are actually among my very favorite art tools.

Auto part, lower left.

Above that is something which I will explain later on.

Upper right, some sort of rubber pedal cover.

(?)

Lower right is a rubber stamp store blank + shelf liner imprint.

Left to right:

Far left--Regular rubber stamps.

Next--Rubber auto part.

Green is made using a broken off piece from 

a rubber flipflop which I sanitized.

Left to right:

Pink + purple + orange is the rubber auto part.

Black is 2 postage rubber stamps + 2 stray rubber car parts and London's Big Ben.

Lower right is a set of nature rubber stamps.

Again, left to right:

Lower left is 2 rubber auto parts + a cast off toy truck tire track.

The others are, of course, flip flop bit and rubber auto part.

Another view of the same pile.

I am really enjoying the new lamp bulb!

Ott Light bulbs really do light nicely.

Somewhere in this mix are imprints made 

using a cast off spark plug's rubber handle.

What I've learned by this experience:

When I heat set these sheets using an old light weight iron and my Talbot Arts Release Paper, what I noticed was that the pigment stamping ink did dry, but would smear if dampness touched it.

In other words, I will have to bear in mind that this will be an issue. I think that next time I will go with acrylic paints instead of stamp inks. Same stamps, just paint, not ink.

Can hardly wait to make some time for visiting everyone else's Let's Play pages. See you there!

:)

Let's Play: Hardware #2

The Duct Tape Saga, Episode Two

Having fallen in love with the newly handbound duct tape junk journal, I really wanted to keep the style loose and nice 'n' easy.

It is freeing to simply let go and stop working the pages in favor of play. Plus reupcycling everything is so much fun!

Hope everybody's having a good week.
~Rose

Doodles and Wrinkles
OR
(with a grateful nod to Zsuzsa)
"Wrinkly Inky Doodle!"
;)

WOYWW # ? Altered Book

From second hand to creative play.

I'm a bit late, but it is still Wednesday here!

This week, I've been playing around using my monoprint stash. 

Today's project was a relatively simple one. I had already used brown gesso on the outside sides of 2 doubled and already glued together pages, prior to cutting them using decorative scissors.

Then I simply tucked my monoprint page in between the 2 snipped and doubled ones, and glued all 3 pieces together using Mod Podge.

Still working on that lamp problem. Sorry the photo looks a bit wonky.

Monoprint Page, Altered Book Art Journal

WOYWW

Inspired by artist Shel C

...and my silly tendency to make puns or connect things together in weird ways.

This is what's been on my work desk for 3 days. At the moment, it's had waxed paper laid over it and is in the process of being flattened, so here is yesterday's photo of my cartoon

Moptopus!

You see, Shel and I had been sharing some ideas one day very recently. She had posted her recent YouTube of her splendid octopus.

You can see it right here or visit her channel. Lots of fun things happening there!

Awesomeness!

We ended up chatting about which brand of Deli Paper I should choose over at Amazon. She pointed me in the right direction. Thanks, Shel! I'm looking forward to being able to play with some one day very soon.

But the story did not end there. Oh, no. Somehow, 3 wires in my brain crossed, and sparks flew. Well, perhaps suds began to bubble instead LOL. I had a journal page to complete, and so far had not one idea in my pea brain as to how to tackle the problem. That page was a clean-up or mop-up pull from an earlier adventure in monoprints using my glass sheet (an earlier post here at this blog). This had turned out to be a little more interesting once I'd coated it with a transparent glaze of blue. In fact, it had begun to remind me of the ocean's depth.

Brain said: "Mop-up print page. Shel's brilliant octopus. Ocean floor. Bathroom mess." It mooshed everything together and that is my excuse for my double pun for this week's WOYWW.

And would you like to know what I really find most funny of all? LOL I usually dislike tentacles of all types intensely!

:)

Thanks, Shel!

A Book with an Edge

Starring the Handy Woman's Secret Weapon!

This month, Carolyn Dube's "Let's Play!" theme is all about things that we can find at the hardware store.

Duct Tape is in a class by itself as far as hardware items are concerned. As far as I know, there is nothing more versatile than this extremely sticky and rugged tape. People use it for temporary repairs on car parts, to seal things such as boxes, and even sometimes as a handy art supply.

I'd used it before, of course. I think that most of us surely have. I'd also made a little art using it, as well, one time for a special altered book show years ago. Another time, it was a weirdly wild little ATC card. I used a big, black Sharpie pen with it. That was fun!

This time, I made a book cover using a cereal box and a number of other materials. I finished the pages and the binding last night. This was ten times more fun than my prior two projects!
:)

I made a sort of photo diary of this project. This starts with the "bones" of my book, that is the structure upon which the text block will hang once sewn into place: the cover. I have to tell you that the cover and I had words at more than one tough moment! I am still not satisfied with everything about it, and already plan to alter it to suit the look I wish to achieve.

So here's that very, very, very long photo diary!

1.) Cereal Box

2.) First layer of Duct Tape

3.) A Distressed Lining

The lining is from an old book of scrapbook paper. I used 2 different but similar ones for the lining. I distressed all edges using an old Rubber Stampede Coffee Bean stamp pad. Having kept that well loved stamp pad in a ziploc bag for years has made it last a very long time--at least 6 years! I have never re-inked it, but have kept it for one thing only, that it adds a distressed look that won't budge if any moisture touches it.

4.) Materials and Tools on Display!

I don't show everything in the above picture, but you get the point, I'm sure. I'll give a list later on in this post. The white template on the book's inside cover (over its spine area) was used to gauge where to place the holes prior to binding. This was later removed.

5.) Junk Journal Spine

The spine may have a rougher look, a kind of "edgy" look to it, but it's a rugged enough book to take some hard knocks!

6.) Junk Journal Pages 1

Photos 6 and 7 show the signatures I'd already cut and folded. These are the pages before binding. A signature, for those who've never tried binding their own book before, is a collection of folded sheets, generally (although not always) sized the same way. Here I've shown how I chose to use rougher paper than I normally might to fit with the rugged look of the duct tape cover. All except, of course, for 2 sheets from a recent monoprint adventure (that's in my "No-Gelli Print" post from last month). You can see one of those in Photos 7 and 8, just below.

7.) Pages 2

8.) Sewn Pages 1

Some of you are familiar with my first blog, Plush Possum Studio, a Free Graphics place. If you are one of those people, you might recall my "Favorite Things" posts there, including my "brown paper packages" themed set. I confess it--I just love to play with brown paper. That is, most brown art supplies in general. In Photos 6, 8 and 9 are shown pages cut out of old brown paper items like old paper sacks. Mainly, I've used packing paper. The wrinkles make me happy. How could anybody resist such lovely old folds and wrinkles! Plus, I even added some purposeful tearing at the top and front edges.

9.)More Sewn Pages

10.) Room to Grow

Photo 10 has 2 points to make. The first is how I bound my junk journal with room for stuffing it full of lots of collage and other fun things. the second is that I had a remnant of some very unique crinkled two-tone green paper, and thought it would look fun with the brown wrinkly pages already chosen for this book.

Materials, Techniques and Tools List:

--empty cereal box

--3M Duct Tape (every handy person's secret weapon!)

--waste paper (used paper bags and brown packing paper)

--Stiletto (for poking holes during binding)

--3m Gluestick (all out of Uhu)

--needle and waxed linen thread

--old scrapbook sheets

--2 black card stock monoprints

--discarded manila file folders (for templates + easy sizing of pages)

--ruler

--scissors, pencil, marker

--5 hole pamphlet stitch technique (I needed to brush up on that a bit over at YouTube first)

No bone folders were harmed in the making of this project.

:)

Yes, I really do have one, but I wanted this new fun junky journal to be fully what it is, and not to be refined.

Well I guess that would be all for this particular "Let's Play!" adventure.

Thank you for stopping by!

~Rose