Steampunk Card

Afternoon!
It is a beautiful sunny, winter's day today. Im so pleased to see the sun shining and the birds singing.
Today I was inspired by a piece of scrapbook cardstock that I have had for a few years now and have always seemed to overlook.
It just popped right out at me this morning and I just knew I had to make a Steampunk Greeting card with it.
I have fallen in love with Steampunk themes and wanted to try my hand it so badly and now I had the chance!
I gathered some images and managed to create this card. I just love the ferris wheel and glitter and knew it would make a great backround for my steampunk theme.

Hmm, I'm thinking this may be the start of another Trade addiciton perhaps!!!!

Recent Art Trading Cards

Hello!
I have been a very busy crafter lately. Having so much fun.
I am right into the swing of things with my ATC's. I started a little rusty but am now feeling Im getting into my groove again.
Here are some, I made over the past few days. I love them all so very much, they will be hard to trade.
Oh, Im sure I will, but not just for any card. I hope to start collecting my favourite themes.
The masquerade card is definetely for my private collection, as I want to collect this theme, as well as steampunk and victorian vintage styled cards.



My two other favourites hard to part with are, 'The Frog Prince' and 'Legends of Their Time'.

I will list all my trade cards on my Flickr site here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/upcycledtoday/

My username is ARTBYSONYA.

On another artsy note, i have also been making some handcarved stamps. I have done these the hard way as I don't have a carving set yet and had to use my standley knife instead. However it was a good way in discovering if I enjoyed it or not before I fork out for the carving tools. And YES I loved making these stamps. Hopefully I can do more intricate designs when the better tools arrive.

Here are my basic stamps I carved with the knife.

Not too bad for a first attempt I think.

My swapping addiction

Hello again,
Ive got a few minutes before I leave for work, so I thought I would keep you posted on what I have been working on recently.
I decided to join http://swap-bot.com/ because I am just loving the journal round robins I am in at the moment, through  the Doll Dreams site and  can't get enough!
I used to make art to purely sell, and I found a small happiness when a piece sold. However the money was never a part of it. When your creating art and sell it for a small price, I realised your really only in it for the gratification. Then I discovered a whole internet world of swapping.
I can't tell you how much more satisfying it is for someone who creates for the love of it, to do so and then get somebody elses art in return. I highly recommend you have a try, but be warned it is highly addictive!

Here are two things I have been working on. The first one is from the Cardboard Project through
http://dolldreams.ning.com/. Each of us send away a cardboard packet we have decorated with drawings and paint to the person below us on the list and mine is well on its way. I recieved a members project yesterday and was eager to do my cardboard page for her packet.

Here is my page:


Made from torn cardboard, acrylic paint, glitter, watercolor crayons, sumi ink and prismacolor pencils

The second thing I have been doing, is through Swapbot. I have signed up for a Alice in Wonderland ATC swap. Its a one for one swap, but I love Alice so much, I though I would make a whole series of ATC's in this theme and place them on flickr available for swaps. I think I would like to swap with someone else's Alice in Wonderland Atc's.
If your interested I will be listing them soon on my flickr site under the username: Artbysonya.
Here are my 1st two, one for Swapbot and the other one is for my series. I am not sure which one will go to my swapbot partner yet. Which one do you think is the nicest?

Stitched Junk Journal

Hi all,
Yes Im starting yet another journal... hehhe.
For me, part of art journalling is handmaking the journal. It is an art in itself.
I guess one day I will have so many journals, I'll never run out of pages to create in.
This journal is a first for me. I have made it using a fabric cover this time and I LOVE LOve Love it!
I was playing around on the net and saw a picture of one like this, so it's not my brainwave, but I can't remember where I saw it.
Anyway here is my cover so far. I haven't quite finished yet as I still need to sew on the cord to use as a tie to close the journal. Then more fun to come, as I will be stitching all the pages like a junk journal. I will be keeping you upto date with my progression and will be adding a tutorial shortly on my
Handmade Art Journal Tutorials page. ( It's Up Now )
Here's a peek -

Finger paint for Mother's Day

Happy Mother's day to all the lovely mums out there!
I had a lovely day. It started with breakfast in bed, then my daughter helped me at work, so that I would finish earlier. We spent a beautiful lunch out at a winery with my mother and mother in law and I even managed to recieve some great chocolate as a pressie. Wow I was blown away, I am so blessed to have two great kids. I love them dearly.
Well to finish the day, I did some art as usual, when my youngest who is now 11 years old, piped up that she would like to try some finger painting with me. Of course I jumped at the chance of creating with my daughter who usually isnt interested.
So below is my journal page for the day and my daughters page, who did pretty well in copying what mum did.

My journal page

my daughters finger painting

finger painting flowers

Don't you just love Saturday's! There is something special about them, just like Friday nights have a special feel and Monday morning a not so good feel... Tuesday is a little better because your over Monday, Thursday's have a okay feel because it is nearly Friday, Sundays are lovely sleep in days. Hmm does Wednesday have a feel? Not sure about that one...
Anyway enough about my ramblings, and more about glorious art journalling.



(p.s - Don't look at the date on my photo, I couldnt change the camera settings.)

 I want to introduce you to finger painting! Yes thats right finger painting.. the sort we have all done before, we probably just can't remember LOL
I LOVE finger painting. Its relaxing, messy, funny, it makes me happy, its a stress free, a creative outlet and great for an art fart. An art fart to me is when you just have no idea what to make. But of course you have to make something...
So here is my finger painting to show you all. Its basically a field of flowers and I think just about anyone can do this ( well , as long as you have fingers. OOh that brings me to something else what about toe painting..hmmm)
Im so excited about finger painting, I think Ill do some more.
Why don't you have a try. I would love to see your art.
PS If you haven't already seen I have posted a new journal Ive made on my journal tutorials page ( look for the page above :)
Hugs
Sonya



Yeah I know, I spelt beginning wrong!



Image Transfer Tutorial

Happy Wednesday to you!
This morning I have a new tutorial for you on how to make image transfers from contact paper!
It's super easy, quick and fun. Enjoy.

I also want to tell you how much fun I had yesterday making 2 chunky journal pages for another swap I'm involved in.
Over at the Doll Dreams site, 5 or 6 of us have signed up so far, so that means at the end of the swap I should have a book of 5 or so journal pages from the other artists. So cool.
Here are two that I worked on with mixed media, I used acrylic and water paints, a bubble wrap stencil and a flower stencil, glitter glue, indian ink and whiteout. They are made from cardboard that I gessoed first. I will still add some fancy fibre or ribbon to them to chunky them up a bit more.
I am having such a ball with all these swaps and round robins it is sooo much fun and very rewarding.

All Finished!

The Cardboard Project

Good Morning.
The latest swap I am involved in, is through Doll Dreams with Adriana Almanza.
It's called The Cardboard project and we have to make a cardboard packet, which we then send to other members of the group.
They then all proceed to place their own cardboard art page inside the packet as it travels around the world.
I will be sending my packet off today. Here it is:


See my paper beads on the spine!

You can see my handmade alfoil beads decorating the inside of the cover.

Day 2 Journal page

Afternoon!
Well it's day 2 of my 365 day journal. Yippee. The way I feel right now is awesome, so I hope the enthusiasm keeps up for the 363 more days to come.
I am really loving colours and circles at the moment, so I think that will be reflected in my journal pages for some days to come. My inspirations are coming from 2 fantastic artists by the names of Wendy Brightbill Agirlandherbrush and Donna Downey from Simply Me. These 2 ladies just opened my mind up to the possibilies out there in journal art and I adore pages with texture and this is what they are all about. Texture, paints, spray inks, tapes, paper,stencils its all about mixed media, Having fun and clearing your mind from negatives and just going for it. Don't second guess yourself, if your first instinct is to add yellow, add it right now, don't think twice. There are are no mistakes in this type of journalling.
Here is my day 2 journal page in my handmade journal. You can find the video tutorial on how I made the actual journal Here.
 I just love the little signature page in between. Let me know what you think.

I really had to get these pic's up as well. I am so proud of my two daughters who are studying India traditions at the moment at school. They did some doodling of Henna and Sarie designs. I think they did an absolutely wonderful job.

Yah! I love you Girls...



365 days of mixed media journal art

DAY 1:
Hi again,
Its a good day today. Im feeling better, it's a sunny day and best of all it's Saturday. Time to create!

I've been reading a few blogs lately about journalling regularly and have become so inspired. I have decided to take the plunge and join in. So starting with today, I will be creating a journal page everyday for the next 365 days. Wow. What a crazy number. LOL.

Well Day 1: was so much fun.
 I just opened up my mind, wasnt scared of doing anything wrong and just let the colours and texture appear. I just love this style of mixed media journal art.
Here is my very first page in my journal. I used: acrylic paint, stencils, gyprock plasterers tape, scrap paper, black ink and a flower embellishment. I really love the freedom of mixed media and it was so therapeutic to just PLAY . I'm so glad I am about to embark on 365 days of it!
I hope you join me for the ride. Please go to my 365 days of journal pages see all my pages listed day by day.

Hi,
Well this morning Im feeling a little under the weather. Winter has hit here in South Australia and my sinus problem is playing up again! Im suppose to get my nose broken to fix the problem, but Im too much off a scary cat for that, no way!
So I thought I would just head you in the right direction to my handmade journal tutorial. Please see the tab at the top of the page where I will be listing all my journal tutorials. On that page I plan to provide videos on how I make my journals as well as inspiring mixed media art pages.
Well, have a good one and Ill be back soon when Im feeling a little better.
Sonya

Good morning!
Im so excited to go this morning. I have for you my very first video tutorial on making Paper Beads.
Please excuse the 'shakiness' of it as I used my computer web cam and its not the best. I plan to redo the video in a couple of days so its easier on your eyes...
I'm still excited though to share this with you all and hope you make some paper beads before the day is out! Its such a great way to decorate your art journals so have a go, they are just so easy to do.