Mineral Spirits, Pens and Colored Pencils Experiment

Happy Sunday Everyone!

I hope you have had a peaceful and blessed weekend.  We've had some warm and humid weather this weekend, but that is all to change tomorrow.  What's that saying....if you don't like the weather, wait a minute!

Tonight I decided to conduct a little experiment.  I love to color and I got a lovely new set of 48 Prismacolor pencils for Christmas.  I'm also getting more into doodling and word art, so I wanted to know what pens I have will work with the colored pencil/odorless mineral spirits technique without bleeding.  This was a very quick, spur-of-the-moment experiment, so please excuse  my super messy scribblings and coloring!

I used a piece of Canson Mixed Media 98lb paper for my test.  Then I proceeded to write in all the different black pens that I have.  I used the following:

• Uniball Signo Gel Pen
• Staedtler Ballpoint Pen
• Foray StyleMark Fine Felt Tip Pen
• Sharpie Marker
• Zig Millenium Pen (mine is almost dead)
• Stampin' Up! Stampin' Write Marker
• Bic Mark It Marker
• Copic Multiliner
• PITT Artist Pen

Here are some closeups of each pen experiment.  I'm pleased (and surprised) to say, that none of the pens lost their integrity by bleeding or fading.  I was most surprised by the Stampin' Up markers because they are water based, so I expected them to bleed.  What a nice surprise they didn't, because I have them in all the colors!  Yay, me!  I used standard odorless mineral spirits and a paper stump blender (sometimes called a tortillion), and I deliberately went over the outlines and drew the color outside the lines.  I wanted to be sure of the integrity of each ink.

Now my mind will be at ease regardless of which of my black pens I reach for when the word art and doodle bug strikes me!  How about you?  What's your favorite black pen?


Thanks for looking at my blog. I appreciate all the wonderful comments everyone leaves. Happy Crafting!

Tag It Tuesday Link Party for February

Happy Tuesday Everyone!

I have a confession to make.  As of 9am my time this morning, I did not have a tag made for today's link party.  For some reason, I had the 20th in my mind as the due date.  Heck -- that's not even a Tuesday!  What was I thinking?!?!?

Needless to say, I have dashed around frantically the past couple of hours coming up with an idea and rapidly making my tag.  Our theme this month was Valentine's Day/love/romance/hearts/pink and red, and I challenged you to think outside the box for this one.  Since I issued that challenge, I thought it only fair that I accept the challenge myself!  This was tough, because I am a pink girl all the way and wanted so badly to pull out hearts and flowers and purdy stuff!  Instead, I started flipping through stamp sets, and believe it or not, a monkey caught my eye.

I quickly gessoed one of my tags and dried it with my heat gun.  Obviously, I didn't do a good job heating both sides...hence the mangled appearance of my tag!  It gets better -- I promise!

I then grabbed my trusty Prang watercolors and set to work dabbing a background of blue, blue green, blue violet and yellow.  As I added each color, I then dabbed it with a baby wipe.  That's how I got the mottled look.  I like it!

Introducing, Mr. Monkey!  I took my Versa Magic Chalk Ink in the color gingerbread and stamped the branch and Mr. Monkey onto my tag.  For some strange reason, I decided to do a bit of paper piecing with this tag, even though I despise paper piecing!  I grabbed some scraps of patterned card stock that were on my work table and stamped and then cut out the leaves, his "muzzle," tummy and big feet.  I added a bit of inking to the edges for some shading.

I got his body parts glued down, including popping his feet up for a bit of dimension.  It's at this point that I realize I cannot find the leaves I had already cut out and inked.  I look and look and look, to no avail.  I know as soon as I stamp and cut another one, the original one will appear.  Isn't that a Murphy's law or something???

Here's the finished tag.  I did some very quick and simple coloring of his body and the branch with colored pencils.  I rough cut some jungle-ish hearts from the same paper I cut the leaves from, inked the edges and added them.  I had to get some hearts in there somehow!

As you can see, I popped up his feet and the leaves for some dimension.  The sentiment banner is also popped up so it cleared the twine I wrapped around the bottom of the tag.  I inked the edges of that, as well as the tag itself.  I also took the original string that was on the tag, held it down with my distress ink applicator, and pulled it through several times to age it a bit and just reattached it to the tag.

While this is not Valentiney per se, it is a sentiment of love or affection.  Who would YOU go out on a limb for???

Okay....it's time for you to link up your February tag.  I'm excited to see what you came up with.  Be sure to visit each other, make a new friend, and leave a comment!  Have fun!




Thanks for looking at my blog. I appreciate all the wonderful comments everyone leaves. Happy Crafting!

Tag It Tuesday February Theme

Happy Monday Everyone!

Another month....another chance to make a big old mess in the craft room.  Yippee!!!

January marked the first month of Tag It Tuesday.  While participation was small, I was so very pleased with each submission.  Such beautiful work, and a joy to read about your inspiration for each tag!  I hope you'll help me spread the word about our little linky party so we can have more folks join in and get to know one another.

Because I don't always have the most creative, out-of-the-box ideas, you can probably guess February's theme all by your little self.  Yes, you're right.....our theme is Valentine's Day/love/romance/hearts/pink and red....and all that jazz!!
(You'll just have to image me doing my Bob Fosse jazz hands there.)

Jazz hands!

The actual link part post will go up on February 17.  Please feel free to think outside the box on this one.  I would love to see some non-traditional interpretations on Valentine's Day.  Just keep it clean, folks!


Don't forget I've started a Pinterest board for altered tags.  I will be pinning everyone's tags over there....hopefully I don't miss anyone!

Thanks for looking at my blog. I appreciate all the wonderful comments everyone leaves. Happy Crafting!