It's the last day, so its Playtime! by Wendy Mallas

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We'd like to thank Wendy very much for guesting for us in November. Its been an absolute pleasure seeing Wendy’s fabulous projects each week.

Hello all. Well this is my last blogpost as Guest DT for That's Crafty and I've enjoyed my time here massively. Thanks for all of your lovely comments. It's good to see that some of my projects have inspired some of you to try something new.

After making lots of Christmas cards this week, I was desperate to plunge my fingers into some gorgeous paints and just play. "So, basically, you were winging it?" I hear you ask. Well, yes I was, but sometimes that's where the happy accidents happen. It's important to forget being an adult and just play.

I started with an 8x8 MDF panel from That's Crafty. I had received some scraps of sheet music and book pages from an ATC swap so this was the perfect time to utilise them. I glued the sheet music all over the panel using gel medium and applied it over the top to seal it. When that had dried (with the help of my heat tool) I set to with a selection of Dylusions paints. Starting with White Linen, I began applying with my fingers. While it was still wet, I added Bubblegum Pink, making sure to only swipe in horizontal or vertical directions. I must add that using your fingers to paint is optional. I like to feel the paint on the substrate and anyway, I'm forever chucking away ruined brushes that I'd forgotten about.

I digress. Again. I continued painting, adding smears of Lemon Zest and Cherry Pie. When I was happy with the overall colours, I doodled into the wet paint with the end of a paint brush (the end that doesn't need cleaning!) There was no particular uniformity. I just drew whatever popped into my head. Circles, obviously, and hearts, swirls, patterns and even a house. I then used some of my handmade stamps, cut from Speedycarve, and stamped several colours and yet more shapes and patterns onto the paint with Archival ink. Then I stamped over it with bits of junk, like pen tops and loo roll inners, dipped in white paint. When that had dried, I even added the odd squiggle with a black Fude Ball pen and a white Uni-ball Signo pen. I think that was enough background.

Now what I needed was a good focal image and perhaps a quote. There was a large stamp of a face in the Stamper's Anonymous Classic #5 set and also a very fitting quote - "We Don't Stop Playing Because We Grow Old; We Grow Old Because We Stop Playing" - I had played all day and I wasn't ready to stop. I stamped the image onto tissue paper so that I could position it in the best place, then 'drew' around it with a wet paint brush. Only wet with water though, nothing that needed cleaning. Using this method, the excess tissue can be gently pulled away from the image leaving only a feathery border and no straight lines. Then when it is glued into place, the tissue appears to vanish leaving just the image behind. Magic! I printed the quote onto card and chopped it all up so that I could play with it some more, finally settling on a spiral pattern which I glued into place and sealed.

After everything was firmly stuck down, I decided that it wasn't the right image for the background after all. It wasn't playfully whimsical enough and today was all about that. The best way to deal with it was to paint over the top. So I did. Out came my trusty PaperArtsy Fresco Acrylics and with my selection of Blush, Cheesecake, Dusty Teal, Snowflake, Very Berry and French Roast, a brand new character was born. I hasten to add that I had to relent and use a paintbrush, only wiping in between colours with a paper towel. I also had the odd panicky moment, especially when I seemed to have created a scary, orange-eyed monster! But I persevered and I finished off the fine details of the new girl with Prismacolor pencils, then a final frenzy with Gelatos (Lemon, Blood Orange, Red Cherry, Licorice).