Everyone Is An Artist

I have never been terribly artistic, at least with paint and brush or pen and  ink, but I always enjoyed my coloring books and my school art classes. Even as we only went to art class one day a week in elementary school, we always had various art projects in our classrooms.

Oddly, I distinctly remember drawing assignments in Miss Phipp's fourth grade Virginia History class. I am old enough to have been in school when ONLY Virginia History was taught in fourth grade history class. On an oversized piece of manila construction paper I meticulously drew the Capitol Building in Williamsburg, brick by brick. I was pretty talented at shading those bricks ~  smell the Crayolas.

One reason I enjoy Stampin' Up! so is because I can't draw or paint, but I feel like I can when I use stamps to create a pleasing picture or design.

Artist's Palette is one of the first stamp sets I bought from the new catalog -  it was available during the pre-order season for demonstrators (another great reason for joining SU!). The Playful Palette Suite is on pages 118 - 119 in the new catalog. Aside from loving the washi tape and the cool sentiment 'your idea to have a birthday was simply a stroke of genius!' the catalog's props

remind me of The Color Kittens! Please tell me you remember The Color Kittens!!

I played with several card designs and then searched Pinterest. I discovered many pinned and posted designs in which the easel held a framed picture, not just the clever sentiments provided in the set. Somewhere along the way I met Stephanie Fischer (www.thecraftythinker.com.au) and a design that I wanted to try. Not identical, but ...

I have not yet received my set of the new Layering Square Framelits, so I had to experiment a bit to come up with my measurements, and it worked. I did not use as  many layers as I easily could have with the new framelits, but this is good - I like it.

In her instructions, Stephanie even provided a bit of artistic advice for shadowing - a little Soft Suede marker shadowing on the easel stamped in Soft Suede and the use of a white gel pen on the green leaves. All of which I conveyed to my art students in our class yesterday!

It is difficult to detect from my photo (never really had photography lessons), but the small 2 x 2 canvas of flowers ( Number of Years stamp set) is matted on 2 1/8 x 2 1/8 Watermelon Wonder, and that is layered onto the easel with a slightly smaller piece of fun foam for dimension. It is a great finished look.

Watermelon Wonder is one of the predominant colors in the new Affectionately Yours Specialty Designer Series Paper. I chose the same pattern Stephanie featured in her design, yet, the reverse side of that paper also complements the painting. In class, the students chose their favorite look.

Look through the catalog for small images, or larger ones which can be cropped,  for the subject of your next masterpiece. Think how you can personalize this idea for all of your friends and loved ones: a sailor in your life, a bird lover, a fairy princess ...

Let's stamp!