Thanks for stopping by my blog today! 

Today I am sitting at the front desk of the First Site Gallery in Swanston Street, Melbourne, minding the exhibition where my enormous river work is on show.

I worked on the 11 metre work during the two big lockdowns in 2021 - mostly rolled out on my driveway on sunny winter days.

I have an essay about the creation of the work which is included in the RMIT Graduate Profile which just went public online yesterday. You can read it here.

Not everyone can get into Melbourne CBD to see the calendar in real life, so I have created a Fine Art Calendar for 2023. You can have segments of the painting in your own home, to enjoy all year. To pre-order your quality A3 spiral bound calendar, please click on the image below.

Again, thanks for visiting my blog!

Talk soon,

Kathryn Ruddick

(the arty farmer - Mansfield VIC).

Square Tea Light Holder or Lantern

I said I was going to show you more projects I have made recently with the Botanical Blooms Builder Framelits, but I have scheduled that post for another day, because in the meantime, THIS happened!!

I posted this photo on a demonstrator only group on Facebook and in less than 24 hours had 500 reactions!! And plenty of really lovely comments too! Including requests for the instructions.

So, since it has been so well liked, I thought I had better share it with my other stamping friends too, not just demonstrators!

Start with an A4 sheet of Crumb Cake Card stock. Cut it in half lengthways. You'll have two pieces, each measuring 10.5cm x 29.8cm.

Score at 11cm and 22cms, then cut off the end at the 22.5cm mark.

Cut a 13 x 13cm square also of Crumb Cake, score all four sides at the 1cm mark. Snip out the corners.

Line up the largest thinlet from Detailed Floral Thinlets within each square of the side wall pieces and cut it using the Big Shot. You will need to cut it twice in each piece.

Apply Stampin' Up! Tear 'n' Tape as shown in the picture and join the two side wall pieces together.

Decorate by stamping and sponging with Cajun Craze and Soft Suede Ink Pads. I used the border stamp from the co-ordinating Floral Phrases Stamp Set and the spatter stamp from Swirly Bird Stamp Set and lots of sponging with my Stampin' Up! sponge daubers.

When you have done enough "antiquing" its time to attach layers of vellum on the inside of each panel. I used the Stampin' Up! Card Stock Vellum - love this gorgeous, smooth, thick vellum. The start attaching the base by wrapping the long side wall panel around the base starting in one corner and working each side.

Insert a battery operated tea light and enjoy the gorgeous warm glow.

How much do you love that antiqued look and the beautiful cut-out design?

The Detailed Floral Thinlets are $49.00 AUS or can be purchased in a bundle with the lovely co-ordinating stamp set, Floral Phrases which is available in Stampin' Up!s quality red rubber in woodmount or clearmount, to adhere to your clear blocks.

There is in fact, a whole beautiful product suite on pages 76 & 77 of our catalogue. See it here.

And now for something a little arty . . . 

Over the weekend I decided to run an (impromptu) "Virtual Party" for my team on our Secret Facebook Group. It was my birthday on Friday and my hubby had to go away for the weekend, so what better thing to do in the evening than spend a couple of hours (okay, okay, about 8 hours) in my stamping room with my team chatting online, and whipping up some creativity!

I posted an inspiration photo and a Crafty Bingo board image on the group and invited them if they didn't have any projects already on the go, to use the suggestions on the Bingo Board and/or the cute image for their inspiration to make something. The image of a very cute cake with bird and bow, came from a Facebook post with no reference or link to who the original cake decorator was.

Now, I do love a cute bird, and I think the colours in this image so match the Stampin' Up! colours and some of our current stamps and Designer Series Paper patterns.

I grabbed out a stack of supplies in these colours and patterns and whilst chatting to my team, asking them "Get to know you" type questions on the group and setting some challenges for them, I started thinking about how I could make an effective card with these products :

As it happens, because I was very much multi-tasking, I decided to pop over to my Pinterest boards and have a look through the projects there. Did you know I even have a Bird Projects board on Pinterest for just such a moment?

I love this cute bird by Martha Lever, so rather than trying to find a Stampin' Up! tool that I could use to cut out a bird, I decided to draw one by hand similar to this one. I love the sketchy black outline and the collage of images in different layers.

I pulled out several stamp sets including "By The Tide" for the seashell text stamp, "Tap Tap Tap" for the typewriter letters, "You are Remarkable" for the branches, "Butterfly Basics" for a bit of fernery. I also used sponge daubers, aqua wash pen, white gel pen, white embossing powder and Black Journalling pen.

I drew the bird onto the Blushing Bride floral print paper from the Subtles Paper Stack, hand cut it, then sponged it with Daffodil Delight, Pumpkin Pie, Melon Mambo and Cherry Cobbler Inks.

I collage stamped the background images all over the 8" x 6" piece of Soft Sky floral print paper.

I watercoloured the leaves using Old Olive ink and the Aqua-wash pen, and sponged Lost Lagoon, Old Olive and Not Quite Navy over all of the images, leaving some lighter areas.

I stamped and heat embossed with white embossing powder, the sea shell text stamp from "By The Tide" onto the birds body twice. Love that effect!!

Then handwrote with black journalling pen the words around the edge from Victor Hugo :

"Be like the bird,

that pausing in her flight awhile on boughs too slight,

feels them give way beneath her, and sings . . .

knowing she hath wings."

My last step was to add a tiny touch of white gel pen to some of the leaves and the birds tail to bring back a little more light into the overall image, then looked around my room and by some sort of miracle saw this A4 document frame sitting on a shelf. Perfect!

I am so excited to have a new piece of art for the walls of my room. Funnily enough I have been carrying it from room to room throughout my house since Saturday night, so I can keep pausing and admiring it!

Do you ever do any collage stamping? I would love to hear from you so please leave a comment below if you'd like to know more about the techniques used or perhaps attend a class on sponging and collage stamping.

See you soon with Ink on your Fingers (and there's plenty of that with sponging!).

Kathryn

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And just a reminder that the below Weekly Deals end on Tuesday night:

Clothespins [133764] $7.00 $5.25

Decorative Dots Textured Impressions Embossing Folder [133520] $13.00 $9.75

Eclectic Paper-Piercing Pack [133778] $14.00 $10.50

Floral Frames Framelits Die [127012] $45.00 $33.75

Hello Honey Classic Stampin' Pad [133643] $11.50 $8.63