Wow-I am featured artist over at MMCA

and I am honored :)
http://www.mixedmediacollageartists.com/featuredartist.htm

Stamped Domino

After doing the dominoes for My Paper Moon I felt like I was on a roll.........so for the TTS Chat list challenge, I did a domino for my contribution!

Images by Time To Stamp

Todays Stamping: Domino stamps from My Paper Moon

These are some new stamps designed to fit on dominoes put out by My Paper Moon

I used them for more than just dominoes though :) And of course I used all different techniques for them all. The one piece above, the red one-thats an art glass piece called a "Clink It" and put out by my pal AliciaG

So I am on a roll

Just finished another one :)

I haven't named this one yet either.

My brain is not doing too good at naming things today so I will wait and give it a name later LOL

Untitled Collage

I haven't given this one a name .........yet. I just finished this one. I did a background on this that is from "Acrylic Revolution" -a technique I had not tried yet. I like it :)

I just grabbed some stuff from my stash and was determined to finish something today. I worked on this all morning. I am really feeling like doing lots of art. My daughter is sick and so I can't really leave the house today-gives me a good excuse :)

Todays Project

I was working on something today that I was asked to do for a friend who comes up with humorous greeting card ideas -but she doesn't write them down! So a friend asked me if I would cover one of those composition books and put some other things on it that she requested.

I used stamps from MaVinci, PSX, and Pam Bell (available through Onyxpressions)

Created By Hand Challenge: Tyvek

This is for the "created by hand" Tuesday Challenge!

It utilizes products by Quietfire Design. This week is Tyvek!

The background is inked with distress inks and stamped with Quietfire's Dotted Harlequin background.

I inked an extra piece of tyvek in coordinating colors and heated it with a heat gun to make it curl up a bit, and layered on the Inscribed hand image.

What a mail day!

I had the most awesome mail day today!

First off, got my Secret Santa Package from one of the groups I belong to. I was thrilled to see my Secret Santa was the ever talented Heather Robinson. I took a picture of the goodies and scanned the Microscope Slide holder she did along with two ornaments inside. Beautiful!

And, I got a GREAT book from Amazon that I ordered called "Acrylic Revolution" and so far just thumbing through it, I can tell I am going to just LOVE this book.

And, I got some rubber from Quietfire Design-I am going to be doing a little work for her-so you will be seeing that before too long :)

Hows that for an awesome mail day?????

Sadly I didn't get any art done today-normally I do on the weekend. But, we had this Cable/Internet/Phone thing installed today so that took up my art time-we had to get the house ready for that and things moved, etc. But for the first time ever , we have cable. Yes, thats right, we have NEVER had it. All these years we have only had an antenna. So, we are really excited :) We were always just too cheap to get it-but for the price of the internet and phone, with the package we just signed up for its just about $10 more to have cable with it :) Not bad.

I've been tagged!

I've been tagged by Debi and Wanda
Here are the simple rules:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself: some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post and list their names (linking to them).
4. Let them know they've been tagged by leaving a comment at their blogs.

Here are the facts (this was very hard for me to do-I don't think there are ANY weird facts about me!LOL):
1-I fall asleep almost every night on the couch, watching TV
2-I am an AVID alternative music listener, but when doing my artwork I HAVE to listen to classical (brain music, ya know)!
3-I have to have chocolate every day to survive.
4-I took piano lessons for 8 years
5- I am a capricorn
6-When I get really mad I like to go scrub the bathtub.
7-I am afraid of scary rides-I prefer the kiddie ones :) LOL

I tag:
Bethel of Bethania
Darlene
Jo
Kelly B
Mandy C
Mandy N
Mary S

Theme Thursday: Friends (another one)

I was so inspired to do something with these stamps today. I ordered this sheet from Melanie Sage-its a sheet of stamps in memory of her mother , and my friend, Vickie Enkoff. Being she was a special friend, I wanted to do something with them and as I looked at these today I knew I HAD to do something.......the Friends theme was so perfect.

Indeed, Vickie was a " Beautiful spirit."

I miss her.

Theme Thursday: Friends

Stamps:

Art By Moonlight (photo and Phrase) & background stamp by I Brake For Stamps

Beautiful marble paper from Quietfire design

TMTA-Mosaics

This is my effort this week for the TMTA challenge of Mosaics!

I used the technique junkies " scraped oil pastels" technique (LOVE that!).

Stamps are from I Brake For Stamps

and the wee little "art" stamp is from Time To Stamp (now from I Brake for Stamps also!)

"Mary's Expression"

Mary's Expression

6x6 on canvas

image transfer, collaged bits, layers of acrylics, stamping

Hearts In Touch-Angels (as in Cemetary Angels!)

I have wanted some stamps from Hearts In Touch for a while.......Frances is a dear friend and we go way back! Anyway, I just got some yesterday and got a little play time in tonight . Gillian and I sat a played at the art table. I made these up really quick to try these new stamps out .

Very simple, but I didn't want to take away from the beautiful images.

4x4 Friday: Mona Lisa

I used the Scraped Oil Pastels technique (one of my favorite techniques of all time) for this one!

I used the technique on an old book page. Stamped the Mona Lisa image 4x (image by Time To Stamp) and layered the text on (also Time To Stamp).

Theme Thursday: Playing Cards

Stamps by Time To Stamp and MaVinci's Reliquary (gotta love those Mona's!)

I just lightly sanded a playing card then dry brushed a light coat of Gesso and stamped on it.

Today's stamping fun

Today I played around with some of I Brake For Stamps' stuff :) What fun!

It was fun to play with new stamps!

Had to use one of Time To Stamps' text stamps too-its one of my favorites, and never leaves my art table.

"Light Within"

Started this one last night...........its a wee 5x5 on masonite.

Image transfer, acrylics, found papers.

Its official now

My "baby" is gone. Its sold........the new owner is "I Brake For Stamps." The new owner, Della, is wonderful. We have really hit it off and she is excited about them.
I will be feeling the void for a while.......but I will get through it. I need to fill that void with things I love to do. I am gonna let myself kinda veg out maybe a day or two, but after that I need to get back to doing stuff !

A final farewell

Here's our truck..........loaded up with everything. Its off to its new owner very soon.

At this moment I am doing okay.........but when the deal is done, who knows.

All I know is right now, I am exhausted!

TMTA-Headwear

So I am a tad bit late, but I had to do something today!

This week's think monday, think atc is headwear. I found a crown punch in my stash I forgot I had so had to use it for this. Images by Time To Stamp.

The Cutest Bird Ornament!

I just received this in the mail! I ordered it via

Mrs. Kwitty at her Etsy shop-I simply could NOT resist! Her etsy shop address is at:

http://misseskwittys.etsy.com

It cheered me up-this morning packing some of my stamp co. stuff was

a little difficult. But, it will be , its been almost 9 years of doing this.

I will get through this!

My son's big purchase

My son saved for MONTHS for this! We went and visited the pawn shop today-my son and husband are into coin collecting-and low and behold they had quite a few guitars!LOL

So, they gave him a good deal on that plus an amplifier. Not a bad guitar-good brand , and its in great shape. Now he needs to learn how to play!LOL

Anyway, I know its not art related (well I guess music is considered an art!) but had to share :)

PS-I don't know why his hair is a little red in the picture-its not in real life!

Happy Thanksgiving to all

First off Happy Thanksgiving! I hope everyone has a wonderful day.

I want to say thank you to everyone who has sent me a message about the sale of my business. You don't know how much the notes of support have meant. Its making this much easier for me. Its great to know I have such great friends out there. Some of the notes have literally brought me to tears. I am just so thankful for friends at this time.

I look forward to some time to myself. I have a long list of things I want to do, just for me.

Of course, those are art related. Art therapy is SO good for the soul. Believe me, my poor neglected soul needs it!

Some friends have asked to see a picture of my Piggie, Rosey. So here she is! This was cute-Gillian wrapped her up in one of her blankets when I was cleaning her cage this morning so had to get a shot of her :)

Big Changes

It is with a very heavy heart that I announce that I have sold my company, Time To Stamp.
As some of you are aware, I have a child who needs alot of care and has a myriad of appointments. I have tried SO hard to balance everything out. It is rare for me to have any time for myself-that has made me extra stressed out and a mess. I have been doing alot of re-evaluating and have come to realize that I need to take care of myself better, and that something needed to go. Unfortunately it had to be the business. Part of my heart is broken right now. I know there will be a grieving process. But at the same time, I look so forward to being able to have less pressure in my life and that I can do more of what I love: art. Stamping for fun......my collages......whatever I want to do. Usually when my daughter was at school in the mornings I was generally doing business stuff and IF I had time, I could do some stuff for me.
Unfortunately that has not happened for a while. I am finding that with all she requires, its SO necessary for me to take care of myself, so I can take care of her. There are some mornings I get going so much that I don't even eat any breakfast. That should change. I can go back to the gym and get some of those happy endorphins going on too! :)
I have been pretty burned out lately by life in general. With a little pampering and some time for myself, I will be back to the old Kristy in no time at all.
This past week and a half, I have watched my husband's grandfather die. As I sat there with him for hours, and saw him in that state it made me do alot of thinking. It made me realize how truly short life is. Its SO important that we enjoy the time we have as it can be taken from us at any given moment. Its SO important for us to do what we love. Thats what I want to do.
I will still be around-I look forward to doing some things I have wanted to do for a long time.
I have a list! :) I will be posting more art here , thats for sure.
I am SO thankful for the wonderful friends I have made and great experiences I have had while in the stamp industry. I have learned SO much that I would have never learned had I not owned this business. I will be forever grateful.
The transfer will take place in a couple of weeks. I know that day will be hard. But I will get through it some how.
The buyer is very excited about it and has the same concerns with service that I do. Rest assured she will take care of my customers-she has promised me :) I will still be around it-these stamps are my babies-a big part of me that I will always be connected to.

"Good Lookin' "

Just finished yet another collage, this one I am calling "Good Lookin" because of not only the text, but the good looking guy in the old photo that serves as the focal point in this piece.

For some reason I am really stuck on these blues and greens-so like my other recent two pieces this one has the same colors.

"Escape"

Another new collage piece I just finished-"Escape."

Its 12x12-the image of the Palm tree is a transfer to a piece of canvas. You can't read it in the photo but the tiny word stuck onto the photo of the Palm Tree says "escape."

New Collage Piece: Solace

Finally I got a break! Yahoooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!


I started this last night (the background and the transfer) and just completed it today.
Just needs a coat of varnish!

I named it "Solace" as these trees look so very calm to me-I guess its something I long for right know (solace) as my life is so full of stress and craziness right now.


The colors on this piece are also very calming and peaceful. Its just the mood I am in right now.

You cant see it in the photo, but I also stamped some text onto it randomly in white, to add a final touch. It really looks much better in person. The color is SO much better in person too.
Lots of texture too. I love making collages that make you want to reach out and touch them.
I didn't want to overload this with elements-I didn't want to take away from the beautiful background.

Halloween Costumes

Here's pictures of the kids in their costumes-my mom made the costumes :)

Doing Gilly's green make-up was a bit of a challenge! But after I took the picture I realized I should have also added some make up to her chin-oh well. Will do that halloween night, I guess LOL

feeling blah and california fires and winds

This past couple weeks has been about the worst in a while for me-I think I have gotten SO run down that I just about hit rock bottom. I have been SO stressed for so long that I think my poor body just about gave out. Pure exhaustion, just feeling yucky-I ended up getting a severe sinus infection, then just as I was getting to feeling better for a couple days I ended up with some stomach thing. I think due to all my stress my immune system is really in bad shape.
I am feeling better today-hopefully I can get some art done. The art I have done lately I have just not been totally satisfied with :(
Gillian is on her 4th ear infection in like 6 weeks. ARGH!! I hate this. I am making notes of all of them along with dates, so that I can take to her Ear Nose Throat Doctor in January. More ammunition to get tubes. He wanted to re-evaluate her for it then. Its looking pretty positive for them, I am sure. I want her to have them anyway-she has fluid in her ears and its causing her to have some slight hearing loss. I am sure the fluid is not helping the ear infection situation anyway.
These California fires and wind have been just terrible. To add to my stress, the kids have been home ALL week long from school! Some of the schools here in Beaumont suffered extensive damage due to the strong winds and so have to be fixed and deep cleaned. I went to the store the other day and the dirt from the winds was almost up to the curb-they had one entrance open to both enter and exit-it was horrible. Not far from here in Hemet- the winds get bad also and the dirt was so high it literally almost covered up cars. CRAZY!! It was THAT bad.
We are not too close to the fires-maybe half hour or so-but we are now getting some effects from the fires-the smell of smoke is in the air and I just went to my car this morning and there is ash all over the place. I have to be careful with Gillian being around all this with her lung issues. Its hard to tell a very active 5 year old they can't go outside! She LIVES for playing outside. I know its also good for her as well, but I don't want her inhaling any of the particles floating around.
Here's hoping I can get some art done that I really like.
Oh, I am starting a new project. Its inspired by the recent "White on White" project I did.
I am calling this "Project White Trash" where I am collecting predominantly white stuff that you would normally throw away. I am taking these things and piecing them into white collages onto canvas. So if ya have any cool white trash, send it my way :)

TMTA-Friends

This is my contribution for Think Monday Think ATC-the theme of Friends.


All stamps are Time To Stamp. This is all stamped and sponged with distress inks.


Then I attached the stamped words.

The scan is abit darker-you can barely see the black german scrap in the scan :(

Wednesday Stamper:Children

Here is my contribution, albeit late, for last weeks wednesday stamper for the theme of "Children."

It felt great to actually do some stamping today-its been a while :)

Sick child, I was sick.......you know how that goes !

Images by Time To Stamp. The card is actually not as

dark as the scan shows.

"White on White" Art Exhibit at Ft Worth (TX) Art Center

Check it out if you are out that way! Its a great looking exhibit and it opened yesterday.

I am in this one :)

http://collagemuseum.com/white-on-white/exhibition/White-on-White-Exhibition-Group-Page.html

Attached is my piece (I know I had it in a previous post but I am adding it anyway!)

the texture of this piece just does not come through in the photo-I wish it did.

Wednesday Stamper: Autumn Colors

The challenge this week at Wednesday Stamper is using Autumn Colors-one of my favorites :)

LOVE using Autumn Colors! I made 2 ATCs from Stampbord. This is a surface I had not tried before but have really wanted to play with. I made the backgrounds using watercolor crayons.

Images by Time To Stamp.

My Gilly got an award at school

I just could not be prouder.......Gillian got her first award at school today. It was the first awards assembly at this school so I was even more thrilled :) she got it for

"Outstanding Achievement in Verbal Expression"

4x4 Friday:Black and White

Here's my contribution to 4x4 Friday's Black and White Theme :)

Stamps by Time To Stamp

Wednesday Stamper:Moo Cards

What a fun theme-Moo Cards!

Here's what I did for this.

What a fun size to work with! I did a couple of them :)

New Collage: 5 Senses

I just finished a new collage on canvas! Its been a while since I have done an image transfers or anything, and this image REALLY spoke to me for some reason. I transferred this image to the canvas 2-3 weeks ago and didn't know what t do with it from there, so it sat :)

Today for some reason I was inspired to do something.

There is a story that sort of goes along with this. This image is actually a child. I was originally set out to do something for "Art for Autism" and just didn't get anymore inspiration to complete this. Now for the story. My daughter was diagnosed with Autism back mid march (some of you know that). She has MAJOR sensory issues and is in therapy to help her cope. On the side of this child's face are symbols of the 5 senses (sight, sounds, touch, smell, taste). And of course a 5-it needed one more thing and I just LOVE numbers :)

So, essentially my daughter inspired this piece. With the way we deal with sensory issues on a day to day basis, I have wanted to do something having to do with the senses for a while now. I can see myself doing more on this subject in the future.

This piece contains: Collage, acrylics, image transfer and water soluble crayon. Its 6x8 on canvas.

TMTA-Smile!

This weeks challenge at TMTA is Smile. This stamp is the first one I thought of 'cos this baby image makes me smile :)

I brayered the background, then smudged some gesso on it, then dabbed some EZ Tintz on it for the background.

Image by Time To Stamp, of course :)

Bird Postoid Bind It All Book

I had more fun today with the bind it all! I thought I would never finish this today with the running around I did today.

I did the background using the "Scraped Oil Pastels" technique that I just simply LOVE!!!

I use matboard for the covers-I just LOVE how sturdy it is and I have a load of it from when I used to teach book making classes YEARS ago :) Glad I have so much on hand!

Background stamp is from the Pam Bell Collection, and the bird postoid is from one of my Bird Stamp Sheets.

4x4 Friday: France!

Here's my 4x4 in a French theme for the 4x4 Friday Challenge!

All Stamps are from Time To Stamp/Lucid Dreams