Challenge #199 - Out with the Old, In with the New!

Poobah Rosemary here and you know what, it's time to look at the year that was and ahead to the year to be.  I would like you to create with the theme of:

 Out with the old, in with the new

Have you learned new technique?  

Taking up one you've forgotten?  

Show us what you have made with it!!!!

Electra here:

I made a couple of digital pieces using some sunrise photos I took on my
Christmas vacation.  I know, I know, digital art is not new for me, but the sunrise evokes
a feeling of hope, with the coming of a new year.



Credits can be found on my blog.

I also made a card using a thread technique I have not used for a long time:

 THAT is my real new technique for this challenge!

Deena here: I have been playing around with the dump load of washi tape I have laying around and decided to try and make some of these feathers....they are fun to play with and don't take much effort...might have to play around with some different colours and styles next.

The Poobahs wish you a happy and healthful 2015!!!!

Link your creation below in the comments and 

we will see you with our 200th challenge on 

January 11, 2015!!!

(who knows, there may be a big giveaway in store)

Challenge #198 - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas

Have yourself a Merry little 

Christmas....pull out all the stops and 

show us your most fabulous Christmas 

creations.

You have plenty of time to link up below

 in our comments, this challenge doesn't 

close until December 27.

Electra here 

I am, by the time you read this, winging my

way to my grandson and happily leaving 

the cold of my own home.  (Hah!)

Before I left though, I made a "hanging" for 

want of a better word, using all sorts of

 bits and pieces from my stash. 

 Amost all images used are from Gecko

 Galz, with the exception of the mod Xmas 

tree and the penguin.

I hope you have the best Christmas ever

and that we continue to share our art with 

you in the coming year! 


Chat Noir here, from the beginning of a sunny summer's day on the opposite side of the world..........

I was hoping to show off some Christmas cards, but once again I can only display good intentions,so I started on a set of ATCs that I can add to cards if I ever get around to making them. And if I don't, I'll have lots of little treasures to tuck into the parcels instead.

   

 I love the faded colours and the old-fashioned images.

  Deena here:I have been busy making and mailing cards this past couple of weeks and here are a few that I have completed (there are at least 4 of each kind made...most of them, I made 6 of cuz that was how the paper divided up nicely - about 50 cards or so...I am soooo done with Christmas cards right now....I am putting it all away until next October)....play along with us, will you? Oh, and have a super awesome Christmas season!

 

Challenge #197 - Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!!!!

Poobah Deena wants you to be influenced by SNOW in all its forms:

FLUFFY, WHITE, SPARKLING, COLD, BLOWING, LACY, LOVELY SNOW
(There's plenty of ways to look at SNOW)

So, the theme is:

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow!!!!

Electra  here.  I used digital stamps and collage sheets from Gecko Galz, and made something that could have come from the North Pole!

Deena here:
Brrrr...with all the snow storms in the States and the cold weather here, I thought snow men would be a good idea with this challenge...I like the way these two projects turned out the same but completely different by adding some background paper....

Chat Noir here, and I have to tell you, snow is a foreign concept in my part of the world!!  But I can imagine, so I put myself in my favourite childrens book ("The Snowman" by Raymond Briggs) and dreamed a little.  These snowflakes are drifting down in the night sky, glittering in the moonlight and shining like jewels.

and now its your turn....

So from now until December 13th, we want to see what you make of SNOW.

Just create and then add your blog post link below in our comments!

Challenge #196 - Reflection

Poobah Rosemary here and for this fortnight's challenge I want you to consider:

REFLECTION

It's nearly the end of the calendar year and that brings a slew of festive holidays -  in the United States we are almost at Thanksgiving, a time of reflection on the blessings in our lives, other countries have their Thanksgiving holidays earlier in autumn, and then there is Christmas and New Years and we find our thoughts considering what we've done, where we're going, etc.  So, you can look at the challenge that way and perhaps you've learned a new craft, tried a new technique, or have changed a habit, whatever.  Or you might look at the term REFLECTION literally and share with us a craft or art piece that has a reflective quality.

That's the beauty of our challenges, you aren't constricted by us, only your imagination.

Deena here:  this card is my idea of a reflective card...shiny and bright with lots of 3-d layers....plus the girl is reflecting on something dreamy in the image itself...so I think I may have hit both aspects of the challenge :)




Electra  here;  I love reflections.  And I love making digital art.
So I made this...

Rosemary here again and I'm sharing an art journal page of recent reflections and all the different stamps of faces just lent themselves to the process.

So, put on that thinking cap and create art!  We would love to see where your muse takes you on this challenge.

Share a link in the comments to your blog post.

Challenge #195 - TREAT Yourself!

Per our Opus Gluei Poobah Electra:

Today is my darling daughter's birthday. Be selfish.  Make 

something for yourself that is for you alone.  Something

 special. Something you've been wanting to make, and 

maybe will display in your home, so you will smile often 

when you see it. 

so....."Treat yourself"

Chat Noir here with FINALLY something finished and out of the UFO corner....I've been moving this box from one side of the bench to the other for long enough so today it has a new lease of life.  The paper is one I've been keeping for something just like this.  It reminds me of so many things and its just right for my new desk.

Its my sort of treat, what's yours?

Electra here:

I love Minions.
LOVE Minions!
I have a few little minions on my desk at work and
for some time now I have to wanting to make something
with Minions in it.
So that is what I did.

and a closeup for those of you who do not know what Minions are:

OK, now you know.  I love Minions.

(CN - so THATs how the clock works...)

Deena here: I am in love with Electra's minions....those are soooo super cute!  Wow....I love sentiment stamps...LOVE them...and I love wood grain paper...just can't get enough...so I made myself this little inspirational card to look at on my desk at work....should replace the hallowe'en one I put up a couple of weeks ago...just need to shove it in a frame and voila...done...and then it is still ready to give away when I am done looking at it :)


Rosemary here and I look at my scrapping time as my treat to myself.  I went away with girlfriends last weekend to do just that and what did I scrap?  Well, one of our previous get togethers!  BUT, it inspired me and recharged my batteries enough to get myself scrapping when I got home and I've started a December album (not a daily, I just am not that thrilling even at Christmas) for me to fill up as we fill in our calendar with events!

 

You have until November 15 to share your artistic work with us here in the comments.  Just link to your blog post.

We look forward to seeing you treat yourself right!

Challenge #194 - Ghostly Goings On

The Opus Gluei Poobahs are feeling spooooky, scary, silly, costumey, retro/vintage....all things Halloweeny....

(Halloweenie? eh, whatever)

That's right, it is time to get into the SPIRIT of the Halloween mood and create some

GHOSTLY GOINGS ON

It's fun to pull out the Halloween decor and crafty goodness.
So, please do just that and then share your creations with us here at Opus Gluei!


Chat Noir here with a Halloween inspired card, even though we don't celebrate Halloween in Australia....yet.  

I was given this digi from Zoe at Make It Crafty but I'm new to digital images in my work, so I probably didn't make as much of it as I could have done...... BUT, I like the unraveling zombie/mummy creature so I made him balance on the cobweb and it all came together from there.  He's supposed to drawing on the bat for support, but I forgive you if it isn't clear. I think the silliest bit is the roll of toilet paper - surely that's not what he's wrapped in??

Electra 

I think ghosties should be sneaky.  Well, I think they ARE, actually.
What you you think?
You might need to look hard to find the ghosties in my piece.
BUT BEWARE.
They are there.
And they are coming!
BWAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

Rosemary here and I really enjoy Halloween, I like more of the scary that isn't gory and decor that is more vintage and retro.  So, I made a cross stitch home decor item because I like to fill my mantle with plenty of stuff!!!!

Not too scary, right?  It stitches up very quickly.  I love their patterns!

It's a Prairie Schooler chart from Cats, Bats and Witches (#174)

Deena here:
I am not really one to make halloween type cards...not that I don't like them, I just would never hand them out...not sure why??  Maybe because it is usually snowing by halloween in my neck of the woods and it is hard enough to get candy out to those little ghosts and goblins...I did however have this paper burning a hole in my pile and I had to use it, so this is what I came up with:

You have lots of time to play along with us.  Just create, link below to your blog post in the comments, and then prepare for visits to admire your art!

You have until the witching hour on November 1st to link up!  

BEWARE BEWARE

Challenge #193 - Time

The theme for this fortnight is....

Time.  It waits for no man.

Use clocks in your work (or just set the alarm to make sure you get it finished in time).  Here's what we've been up to....

Electra....

I was in Joshua Tree Park this year and standing in the desert which seemed to go on forever, I was struck by the enormity of time.  How it's always been and always will be. So I made a page with that in mind.

 

Chat Noir here..........  I made two ATCs with clocks in mind, and using an old stamp I bought on a whim (simply had to have it) but have rarely used.

Here's the first

I love the sentiment "an unhurried sense of time is in itself a form of wealth"and so I let it take pride of place on this one.

....and here's my second one: 

  

....which is really just a celebration of some paper I found.  ATCs are so versatile that you can make them into anything.  

Rosemary here and I want to show you an art journal background that I've made which perfectly works for this challenge.  I'm showing it without the words that I've put in because well, sometimes an art journal page is very personal and this one is for me but the images of the butterflies should be a hint that this has to do with transformation - ...just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly.  I'm realizing that all growth, even painful growth, can lead to something really beautiful.  It just takes TIME.

This was fun - decoupaging, dimension, tissue paper, sparkle, pop dots, watercoloring with Distress inks, pearls, etc.  (in case you were wondering - the metal tag in the center of the watch element says ARTFUL)

What have you made? What has this theme inspired in you?

Please link your creation 
below in the comments

You have until late Saturday, October 18

to share your concept of TIME with us here at Opus Gluei!

Challenge #192 - HAPPY BIRTHDAY

It's a certain Poobah's birthday this week at the Poobah Palace, Ms. Deena is blowing out the candles.  In honor of her birthday we are asking YOU to take on the theme of 

BIRTHDAYS!!!!! 

Electra here:

I made a layout for my grandson's second birthday.  Well, I made a few LO's but I think this one shows how our family really is a bunch of circus animals.

Truly.  We have fun though.

What did I read once?  "We're a circus without a tent."

That's us.

Deena here:

 it was my birthday over the weekend and the girls at work sent a card around for signing for me...the funny part was that I had this card with me in the pile of cards at work and one of the girls used it to "give to her mom" and lo and behold it comes around signed and lands on my desk....it feels strange making your own birthday card...but hey, what can I say...they like them.

Chat Noir sneaking in very belatedly......sharing two cards I made for friends with birthdays close together.  I always find it hard to make something for a friend because it never turns out the way it looks in my head, but both friends were kind enough to say they liked their cards! This one is for Ann who loves her garden and the colours of spring...

....and this one for Emmy, using some of the colours she loves and a piece of embossed paper that reminds me of the tiles in her courtyard.

And now its your turn........

Share your creativity with us here by

linking your blog post in the comments section.

Challenge #191 - Artist Trading Cards (ATCs)

Artist trading cards, or ATCs, are little 2-1/2" x 3-1/2" (89 x 64 mm for those on the metric system) works of art.  You make of them whatever you want. Make them from paper, cloth, metal, whatever.  Embellish them however you choose.  Your only limits are the size parameters and your imagination.

This fortnight we want YOU to make ATCs; one, two, or an entire series if you so choose.  You can collect them, trade them, use them on other projects (like greeting cards, scrapbook pages, art journals, the sky is the limit).


Let's see what the Poobahs have made for this theme.


Deena -






this week my husband and I celebrated 20 years of marriage and I thought this little cutie was a good way to reflect on the past years (all while playing with my glitter pens and dies etc.)

Chat Noir

I remember ages ago when someone asked me to make an ATC and I had to ask what they were..........which seems so unlikely now that I have made so many.  They have become my favourite little works of paper-art.

Tonight I let my heart take over and made use of some of the paper I like the best (at the moment).  My first takes me back to the understated colours I like best: there's woodgrain and grey gauzy ribbon in a couple of different widths, and a scrap of the scrabble-letters paper that I'm hoarding.  

The second one has similar colours along with orange which has become my accent colour of choice.  I like the vaguely creepy feel of the plants shadows....maybe I should have saved it for Halloween?

...and then I found the last scrap of a lovely old TE kit paper, and turned it into a Spring-inspired ATC to complete my samples.  Its the beginning of Spring here in Australia and today my garden has been sunny, heady with the scent of blossoms and noisy with a million bees in among the strands of my willow tree.

Rosemary

ATCs are wonderfully versatile - I've seen them made from everything - fabric, clay, papers of all sorts.  You just have to imagine what you want to make and then run with it.

For this challenge I have three to show you.

The first is a lovely little magical seahorse that I stamped, fussy cut and then put on top of an inked and glittered background - hey, with a magical seahorse you can have an ocean of words and glitter.  

My next one is Love is in the Air and I'm not sure which of the young lovers is thinking blarney and which one feels that this is love...left to your interpretation.

Finally there is a pensive little cat and when I stamped this I thought of the stillness of cats when they want to be still, which is in direct ratio to the energy they expend when they want to be frenzied.

Electra here.  I just finished a VAMP ATC swap.

I wish I looked like these ladies still...

Share your creativity with us here  by 

linking your blog post in the comments section. 

You have until 

September 20

to share your ATCs with us!