Hopping around Blogland this last couple of weeks, I kept coming across birds. It seems they are theme of the month in some circles. I like to visit
Emilia's blog, and she uses a lot of Just Joanna stamps, many of them birds, and a greeting stamp that says
Happy Birday. I remember making a birthday card for Lizzie a couple of years ago that had the same greeting and two hand drawn birds with multi-coloured floss tails, so thought I might revisit the idea. I find paper piecing a simple and effective way of quickly producing a card, so I drew out a simple outline, and had a test run using some paisley patterned paper that was lying on my desk. I used a Sharpie to draw the outline, and it bled out a little, so I cut along the centre of the line to reduce it. My handwriting is nothing to write home about, so in an attempt to make this a little less obvious, I staggered the letters...to no avail...it still looks pretty awful.
I was quite happy with my shapes, so I cut myself an acetate stencil, and used it to draw more bird pieces, this time using a Staedtler Lumocolor; much finer and no bleeding. For the greeting I resorted to the computer;
Girls are Weird font and a whistling bird found in an Easter picture font. I filled a whole page with the script and used a coloured pencil to draw a couple of lines before cutting off a strip. The paper for the birds is a Japanese print off the Canon site, printed when the printer had run out of yellow ink, but still had plenty of cyan and magenta in the three colour cartridge.
The last example is a little more masculine in flavour. The paper is gift wrap, the branch is handrawn with little reference to botanical accuracy, and the greeting strip has had a little embellishment that harks back to the trial run. I have made a dozen copies of the pattern, run off a dozen pages of text, and I am hopeful that the Craft Club Ladies will enjoy putting their own twist on the idea on Monday. They will use their own choice of paper and card, and they are going to have to draw in their own versions of legs and eyes, so I am hoping for plenty of variety.
The challenge at Sketch Saturday this week is to make a Christmas card following this sketch. I have pricked holes down the sides of the card to add a little interest. The holly paper is from an Artylicious CD, the vertical vine is recycled from a card, and I drew the little robin and coloured it with oil pastels and a stencil brush.
Following on from my doodlebirds made with a paper cut-out and a doodled outline, and the doodle flowers with the stamped watercolour effect, I tried to combine the two. On the left, taped to a wooden block, is an approximation of a chicken shape cut out of funky foam. I coloured areas with felt tip, sprayed lightly with water, then stamped onto the scraps of card left over from the daisies. I then used permanent pen to scribble more detail. I discovered that I need more practice drawing chicken legs, and that sitting them on a nest is the easy option.
If you look closely, you will see that not only can I not draw chicken legs, but I can't draw chickens either. A little research in Google images gave me a better insight into the proportions of the head to the body, and how the red bits fit together, and as you can see below, I improved on the sketching, and now have a less comical hen shape to work with. The first impression from the yellow funky foam can be seen on the green post-it note. Notice also how carefully I have hidden the legs...
A fabric postcard made to swap on the ArtWeMail Group. I used the same bird outline that I have used in the past for paper piecing, only this time I cut a stencil, outlined the shape with permanent marker onto the cotton (salvaged from the sides of a worn out bed sheet) and then used a stencil brush and oil pastels to colour. I was happy with how the blending worked out. It is much easier to control than using watercolour pencils, and there is no chance of bleeding because the pastel is dry. The legs and the little flower in the beak were drawn free-hand. The flowers and ferns were made using the same stencilling method. I used punches to make the stencils in card and then added details with the permanent pen after colouring. The background was coloured with pastel over torn paper stencils, and the lines added to finish it of. As the card has flown away, I can't tell you if the wiggly line in the top left corner is a stray hair that found its way into the scanner, or a stray thread that found its way between the cotton and the backing. All I can say is that I didn't see it at the time, but then the scanner has better eyesight than I do.
Unlike Jeannie's houses, they have to fit into the strict 2½" x 3½" size, and as I am off Collage at the moment, I thought I would do a little pen and ink drawing. Then I decided it might be good if the door opened in the same way that Julia Rothman's doors do here....
and that there was something inside. Here is The Master of the House.
More Pink Petticoat. This batch of images has been coloured with ordinary cheapo coloured pencils. The black and white background paper is Pink Petticoat, and the pink stripe is something from a stock I had from years ago when I had a printer that used three colour cartridges. I used to carry on printing after one colour ran out (it was always the yellow) so have a lot of magenta and cyan sheets.
