Believe

This week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge is an open one, so I´ve chosen a card I haven´t shown yet - it could be used as a holiday card but doesn´t have to ...

Angels

 

My card for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Angels" was made with rubber stamps from Tim Holtz/Stampers Anonymous and Visible Image. I love to combine traditional items like the angel with modern images like the cityscape.

Travel

 

Due to Corona, I haven´t left my hometown for almost two years now. But even before, I´ve never been on a plane or outside Europe. When I travel, I love it, but if I don´t, I´m not missing that much. I still enjoy travels I´ve made in the early 80s, and there are many parts of the world that don´t attract me at all.

But what I really love is travelling in my thoughts when reading a GOOD book - even then I prefer some regions and avoid others, but I really love exploring the world through books. 

So this is my card for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Travel" (hosted by my sister, one of my favourite travel partners!). I´ve used rubber stamps from Stamperia and Kaisercraft for it

Nevermore

 

You may have seen my last blog post, and trying some drawing again during the Life Book taster sessions has encouraged me to also draw my sample card for this week´s  Sunday Postcard Art challenge for that I´ve picked "Ravens and Crows" as my theme. 

If you know me a bit longer, you also know that I have LOTS of raven and crow stamps and have even hosted several raven themed ATC swaps myself. So it would have been easy to make something with them, but instead I started with a watercolour paper and sketched my raven head with a pencil. I added an eye from a Jane Davenport washi tape and painted my raven with watercolours, Then I chose more washi tape from Jane Davenport and AALL & Create for the background and painted the rest of the background. The raven was then enhanced with pencils and pens, and finally I added the VLVS "nevermore" stamp.

I´m pretty happy with my card and hope I´ll give drawing a try more often now, and I hope you´ll also like it and find it inspiring to make your own piece for this week´s challenge!

Life Book Taster Lessons

Today I started watching the Life Book Taster lessons that are free for two weeks on Tamara Laporte´s Willowing site. 

When I saw Toni Burt´s "Quirky Girl" lesson, I decided to draw while watching it, and the picture below shows the result. Then she started putting watercolour and gouache on it, and I went on and had so much fun emphasizing my sketch. In the end I really liked my quirky character and think I´ll even frame it ...

My first trial of sketching while watching the video lesson was for Tamara´s "Focus on Love" portrait, and I liked that my person looks totally different from her style. I´ve taken notes on her way of colouring and using mixed media on this and will go on when I have more time.

Asemic Writing

I think it was Dina Wakley who introduced me to the term "Asemic Writing". But as a lover of handwriting, handlettering and calligraphy, I´ve always loved the look of letters as a graphic element. For my first card above I´ve used a stamp from Dina and another one from Darkroom Door, but though I liked the result, I wanted to go forward and made this second card below using the same border from Darkroom Door but added my own handwriting and some Dada Stamps from Heindesign, and I think this tells the story much better: Asemic  Writing is about the graphic design of letters, and the concept of Dada is to tell nothing serious, so I´ve brought all this together. I hope that my samples inspire you to show us your own interpretation of this theme! I´ve picked "Asemic Writing" as this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge and can´t wait to see your interpretation of this theme!

On my Way

 
I don´t have a driving license and have never been on a plane, so I have to take the train when I travel and use my bicycle for any trips I don´t use the bus for. My hometown is known for its many bikes, and in fact there are more bikes than inhabitants here.

For my card for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Bicycles" I have used a background made with the gelli plate, added a strip of a map and rubber stamps from Heindesign and Klartext.

Night Owl

 

This is a confession - yes, I am a night owl. As a teenager, I made my homework for school around 10 p.m. (thanks to my parents who didn´t care as long as I´ve been good at school), then later I wrote my final thesis at the university mostly between 10 and 12 p.m., and today, I still love to create at night - while I have to get up at 5.30 a. m. during the week ... maybe you can imagine how much I love weekends!

For this week´s Owl themed card for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge I´ve used stamps from Visible Image, Distress Mica Sprays and some embossing powder.

Autumn around the corner

I just love the monthly ATC swap in the Visible Image FB group. This month, the theme is "Whispers of Autumn", and autumn is really just around the corner - we´ve had so much rain recently, days are getting shorter, and I´ve been thinking about heating in the evening ...

As I don´t have any leave stamps from Visible Image, I started with a collage of paper snippets, gessoing it, and spraying some Distress Mica Stain. Then I used two stamp sets from Visible Image using several autumnal colours of stamppads. A few finishing steps with a white pen and coloured pencils, and my ATC was finished. It will be on its way to Queensland, Australia tomorrow, accompanied by a card that I´ve made using the same two stamp sets. It´s always an adventure to send your art half way around the world, so wish me luck!

 

Make Your Story Incredible

 

It´s a pity that you can´t see the shimmer of the Distress Mica Sprays on this card and the golden spots in this giraffe´s fur - but those just aren´t scannable ...
However, the card was made for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Giraffes", and I couldn´t resist using this lovely giraffe stamp from ArtSpecially and added words from Visible Image.

Alice Chess Game

 

Games is this week´s theme for the Sunday Postcard Art challenge, and as a fan of Alice, I had to chose Chess as my game though I don´t play it myself ...

Getting Older

 

I´m hosting this week´s Sunday Postcard Challenge, and I´ve picked "Old Age" as the theme. 
For my card, I´ve used rubber stamps from A Capella, LaBlanche, and Klartext, and I´ve typed one of my favourite poems from Ulla Hahn about getting older. Bare with me when I try to give you a translation that doesn´t show the beauty of the original words of course ...

hesitate in the midst of a sentence
inquiring when you think you understood
not to be in a hurry anymore with wanting to know
a stone a glass a hand holding longer than necessary
touching the sleeve of your counterpart when talking
to feel you´re still here
to lose a book a view a skin
and don´t want to find it anymore
remembering instead of longing for
the thought: all this will be here when I`m not
train like a muscle
a feeling like someone were in the room

I think there´s a lot to think about in these verses - what are your ideas about getting older?

I can´t wait to see your interpretations of this theme!

Bring me a Unicorn

 

When I was a teenager, a friend of my mom gave me Anne Morrow Lindbergh´s "Bring me a Unicorn" for my birthday, and I liked it. I´m not into fantasy and unicorns and such, but when I think of unicorns, I still think of these words that I just can´t forget. 

This card has been made for this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge, and I´ve used stamps from Zettiology and an alphabet from Concord & 9th.

Get Edgy

 

This month´s ATC swap theme in the Visible Image is "Get Edgy" - we have to think of using different techniques to emphasize the edges by using borders, doodling, embossing etc. 

Here´s my ATC for Shirley in Australia that will be in the mail to her on Monday.

Sing Loud

 I love birds, so I really needed the stamp with these two birds. I`ve stamped them on a book page and combined them with stamps from Klartext and PaperArtsy and a number stencil.

Ocean

 

For this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Ocean", I´ve started by painting with watercolours, then added that fabulous quote stamp from Darkroom Door, some AALL&Create tapes torn in wavy shapes and another stamp from PaperArtsy. 

Sherlock

 

This week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Detectives" was chosen by my sister Sabine, and here´s my card for it featuring Sherlock Holmes.

Not Bad

 

For this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge themed "Monkeys" I´ve decided to go with a street art monkey.

Flower Fairy

 

If you know me a bit, you´ll be surprised to see a fairy card from me, and in fact, when I first saw this week´s Sunday Postcard Art challenge theme "Flower Fairies", my first thought was "I´m out ...".

But then I thought it would be nice to "build" my own flower fairy and to play with colours again as I really feel a need for this right now. And in the end, I´ve been happy with my card using stamps from Visible Image again.

Here Comes Summer

 

For a swap in the Visible Image FB group themed "Here comes summer", I´ve made this ATC using Visible Image stamps only. It´ll be on its way to London tomorrow. My inspiration went Flower Power, neon colours and joy - something unusual for me that is big fun nevertheless from time to time ...