Christmas Burlap Panels & Sleigh

I made these Christmas burlap panels and sleigh for a class I taught at Art from the Heart in November this year.

They are looking very festive on my wall at home.

I really love putting up Christmas decorations I've made, it makes them that little bit more special.

I've used the Tim Holtz burlap panels which are great because they have a hard panel behind the canvas so you can stick and stamp anything on the front of them.

I've used the gorgeous Graphic 45 12 days of Christmas papers for the panels and on the sleigh.

The sleigh has lots of Tim Holtz festive die cuts on it.

I really enjoyed teaching the class we had Christmas music, crackers and chocolates too :)

I'll be back tomorrow with another blog post, bring it on!

I have a lot of time to make up for.

Michelle x

Mixed Media canvas for Sarah

Hello you may remember me for such things as mixed-media canvases, altered art and the occasional arty tag! :)   Or you may not its been that long since I blogged last, but I'd like to try and blog something everyday while I'm off over the Christmas holidays.

I've got tons of crafty projects I've done over the past few months, mainly for classes, but I'd love to share them with you and to keep a record of what I've done too.

I'm really pleased to be able to put up this mixed-media canvas I've made for my friend Sarah. 

She's a beauty therapist and has magic hands when it comes to massage!

She has a fab new beauty salon and she asked me to make her a painting to go on her bare wall.

Her business name is Sulis Beauty Salon, Sulis is the Roman goddess of thermal springs, hence the healing waters of Sulis.

I've used lots of random things for the background and for the texture on the canvas.

Here's what I started with.

Some old map paper, lace, mulberry paper, ribbons, sheet music, hessian, book pages and Sarah's treatment leaflet.

I gessoed over the top of the bits of paper and ribbon, and used teal, blue and cream acrylic paint to blend in the background.  I painted through lots of different stencils to add interest and stencilled some grunge paste for texture. Then rubbed treasure gold over the top to make it shine.

I started to draw and paint the goddess Sulis, made up from my imagination, but loosely based on how Sarah looks. I used Golden interference blue paint on the hair and on the water so it looks like shimmering water too. You can just see the effect here on the hair.

I've used a mixture of shells and beads to represent the crashing water at her feet, with gesso over the top and blue treasure gold rubbed over the top.

No painting is complete without some drippage and there is lots on this painting. 

I'm pleased to report after handing this over to Sarah today, that she loves it. 

I'm always unsure if other people would love it as much as I do, so very pleased that she likes it.

I hope you do too x

See you tomorrow

Michelle xx

Normal service will resume shortly :) x

Normal service will resume very shortly.

In fact very soon....maybe this evening!

Michelle :)