Paint it Purple!

Do you love the colour purple? I know I do! So I´ve been thrilled to see the new Tumble Fish Studio kit called "Shades of Purple". I´ve made three samples for you with this kit, one digital one and two Moleskine pages with the collage sheets included in this kit. And don´t forget to check out the lovely new purple and pink journal cards that I´ve used in the first Moleskine sample.

Mail Art Postcards

For this week´s SPA challenge I´ve made two cut and paste postcards - both use images from Tumble Fish Studios, the one above combines them with images from Hidden Vintage Studios, the one below has an additional image from Crowabout Studios. Tape, real postage stamps, hand-dyed paper and several postage stamps finish my cards that will go out as mail art very soon ... if you want to get one of them, you should join the mail art challenge at Deviant Scrap until April 30.

My Bonnie

Amanda´s theme for her Paper Traders tip-in book is "Ocean". Here are my pages for her, and as California is definitely over the ocean from here, I hope that my pages won´t get wet on their way to her ...
(please click on the image for more details)

Viva Mexico!

For my Mexican themed postcard that I´ve made for our postcard exchange, I´ve based my design on the Mexican flag and added elements that I associate with Mexico: Dia de los muertos, a Mexican pyramid, a map of the region, and Frida Kahlo of course ... This card is already on its way to Michigan!

And the Winner is ...

JoAnne!
I´ve just drawn her name as the winner for my giveaway at last weekend´s Paper Traders´ Blog Hop. Congrats to JoAnne and many thanks to all who hopped with us and left me those lovely comments!

Tape It!

If you´re a stuff hoarder like me, you have a huge collection of tapes of all kinds: tissue tapes, washi tapes, masking tapes, you name it ... That´s why I´ve chosen Tapes for the challenge that I´m hosting this week, and these are the tapes I´ve chosen for my SPA card:

What do you do with yours? I like to use mine for mixed-media backgrounds like I did for the card above. I took a dyed paper from my stash and put down pieces of several tapes totally randomly. To unify the background as well as to fix the tapes (that would easily peel off otherwise) I brushed some gesso on and removed parts of it with a paper towel.

Then I stamped my images (stamps by VLVS and Madrat) ...

and coloured them with watercolour pencils. I decided to make the words stand out by using even more tape and coloured the hands on the tape, drawing over the tape borders to blend the strips into my design. As a last step I added shadows and highlights.

Now it´s up to you to show me how you like to use tapes in your designs! Hope you´ll have fun with this challenge!

Paper Traders´ First Blog Hop

This weekend, one of my favourite Yahoo Groups has its first Blog Hop - it´s Paper Traders! I´ve been a member from the beginning (in fact I joined the group on day three of their existence which was Nov 19, 2005), and you´ll find so many ATCs, book pages etc. on my blog that I´ve made for projects of this group. Former group members have even inspired me to start my own blog in 2006!

If you´re here for the first time, let me tell you that I´m Marion from Germany, and I´d call myself a mixed-media person. I love to combine collage, rubber stamping and other techniques and also like to make digital collages. I don´t really have one favourite technique, so you´ll see various techniques, media and formats on this blog constantly.
I don´t sell my work, but I´m a member of the creative teams for Tumble Fish Studio and Hidden Vintage Studios (both at DeviantScrap.com) right now.

I am excited to participate in the First Paper Traders Blog Hop. I hope it will be a way for you to get to know me and a few of the other group members better, see our art, and get a chance to win some nice prizes that are being offered along the way.  Maybe you'll even be inspired by what you see and want to join the group.

The Blog Hop will be open the entire weekend of April 19-21, 2013.  Be sure to start at the Paper Traders Art Blog here http://papertraders-art.blogspot.com/ and follow the blog hop list of participating members below:

Paper Traders Art Blog

Bockel24

Art and Soul

Sunshine,Lollipops and Butterflies

Creative Solace

Art Beckons

Scrap Panda

Creative Musings

A Surcee Life

Textile Delights

Stamp Gram’s

Glenda’s Art Escapes

Fairy Rocks

Each member will share a little bit about herself and offer either a handmade art piece or other quality prize that will be randomly awarded to blog readers who leave a warm, fuzzy comment.  Just comment below and provide a way for me to contact you and I will pick a randomly drawn name from those who leave a comment.  One entry per person, please.
I`ve decided to give away my card for last week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge as it´s quite typical for me:

The winner´s name will be drawn on Monday April 22. 

Have fun on your journey and I hope you'll come back to visit soon!

Do You Like Dalí?

Of course I had seen a lot of Salvador Dalí´s paintings before, and some of them in real life, but I´ve never been so very impressed by them before I saw more of Dalí´s work at the latest Documenta in Kassel. If you think you know a lot about him, I´d like to encourage you to take another look at his work - maybe you´ll discover some new facettes.
I´ve made these ATCs for a Dalí themed ATC swap and can´t wait to see the ideas the other participants will come up with ...

Swing into Spring!

Temperatures are rising now, yeah!, and Hidden Vintage Studios have come out with the appropriate kit for your Spring collages - Swing into Spring! I just love those birdies on my sample above and the colourful flowers in the one below. As always, jpg sheets are included within the kit for all your cut and paste projects.

Soar

This week´s SPA challenge theme is "Soar", and this theme fits the weather outside so well! Now that the sun begins to come out and the temperatures are rising, you can feel an energy that seemed to have been buried forever ... but no, it´s a little bird that has just been waiting for its time to come!

Flight of Fancy

Have you noticed that Hidden Vintage Studios and Holliewood Studios have come up with a new kit each called "Flight of Fancy"? My digital collage above shows how nice they go together. If you want to make some spring-inspired art, you should have a look at Tracey´s and Hollie´s kits at Deviant Scrap.

Back to the Roots

I think that the Cherry Pie Yahoo group was my first international one that I joined back in 2004 ... So stamping my ATCs for a Cherry Pie swap in a German ATC group felt like getting back to the roots.

Hello??

Pssssst, this message is confidential: Vintage Telephone is this week´s theme for the SPA challenge, so here´s my card using a Dover image and stamps from Cavallini and VLVS.

A Little Bird Told Me ...

You all know that I´m a bird lover, so it was obvious for me that I had to join the latest Red Lead swap "A Little Bird Told Me". We have to decorate three wooden birds in different sizes that should be dangling together in the end. I have used book pages dyed with leftovers from Easter egg dyes, several Red Lead stamps and Glossy Accents to make the eyes and wings pop. Can´t wait to see what the other participants come up with!