be yourself poppies...

Hello my wonderful friends!

It's time for another Unity hop!

(and sale!)

Somehow, despite everything, time passes. I find myself marveling that we are nearing the end of March already. Some days it feels like time has stopped, but most days seem to slip past without me knowing. How does that happen?

The past year or so has been filled with a lot of discovery, growth, and change. Some of it has been liberating and joyful. Some of it has been painful and hard. Lately, I have been feeling like I have totally lost myself, like I have no idea who I really am....

I guess you could say, I'm a work in progress. I'm still growing. I'm still finding my place.

And that's ok.

Flowers may not look like much at first either, but when they finally open up, they are beautiful, just they way they are.

(Donna Poppies, Vintage Handwritten, and Dwelling Dots LOL 11/14)

I know, I should have taken pictures while doing this, but my friend came over to my studio, and I was distracted, and didn't get my camera out. SORRY! I'll try to explain what did, and hopefully it will make some sense. (I promise, nothing too complex here.)

I started this canvas with a couple colors of spray inks. I then sealed the color in with a layer of mod podge. (this allows the blue to stay in the background instead of reactivating and mixing with all future layers.)

For the poppies... I stamped one of the big poppies and one of the little poppies on a piece of paper. I then used my PicScan mat and Silhouette to scan them in and create both stencils and masks SUPER quick. I made sure to cut the stencils and masks out of acetate so they can be used over and over.
(here's a video made by Camille from the Unity DT on PicScan basics.)

*note: when she is cutting out her stamped and colored images, she traces then uses the 'off set' feature to create a slight border... for my stencils and masks, I chose not to do that.*

After I had my stencils all cut out, I sponged gesso through them onto the canvas. Because of the layer of mod podge, the gesso stayed white... otherwise it would have turned a light blue as the inks underneath react to the moisture...

At this point, it looked like I had a bunch of clouds in a blue sky. LOL!

Once the gesso was dry, I stamped the Vintage Handwritten  background stamp through the stencil using Archival ink. Once that was dry, I sponged on just a touch more gesso to lighten the script.

I then went back and stamped the Donna Poppies outline stamps over the gessoed "clouds" using acrylic paint. It was super fun to see the clouds turn into fantastic flowers!

One  complaint I have heard about rubber stamps is that you can't line them up because you can't see through them. Well, for this, I didn't really care. It gives it a very artsy look to have it slightly offset.

I hand painted the stems in, then added a wash of pinkish coral watercolor over the poppies.

Finally, I stamped the sentiment "be yourself" with acrylic paint. This time, I did want to make sure everything was lined up perfectly and STRAIGHT, so I used a stamp positioner.

Nice and simple...

Next time, I'll remember to take pics. :)

Tip: One of the challenges of stamping on a wrapped canvas is that you have a 'gap' in the back. The wood frame lends support to the outer edges, but stamping on the center leads to problems because there is nothing supporting the center. To fix this, place a piece of wood (or, I stacked about 4-5 flat canvases) underneath the center. Make sure it is the same height as the frame so when you flip it over to stamp, you have a flat solid surface all the way across.

You will notice that my inserted canvases don't quite fill the whole back.... that's ok, I just had to make sure to move them to whatever area I was stamping in.

alright... that's all I've got for you today...

Have a wonderful day, a fantastic weekend, and ENJOY the hop!

Don't forget---
 Leave a comment on EACH blog in the hop (including the Unity blog) for your chance to win.  The winners will be announced Monday on the Unity blog.

Enjoy!