Mermaid Canvas - Flying Unicorn KOM

Howdy Blogger peeps! How's your weekend going? It's cold here, we're finally getting some of the winter the rest of the continent has been experiencing.

Today's project is a little bit summery. I mean, I'm sure mermaids might live in cold water, too, but you can't fault me for imagining they're warm water creatures.

The Mixed Art add-on from Flying Unicorn always contains a canvas - this month's is a 6x12 wrapped canvas, and along with it there is a package of watercolor paints. I started by painting my background blue and green, then spritzing with water before heat setting. I then liberally sprayed on Lindy's Stamp Gang mists for an incredible shimmer.

I love this new mermaid stamp from Prima! I paper pieced her with pieces of 6x6 Authentique Classique: Elegant collection from the Small Art Big Passion kit, then added detailing with a mix of Shimmerz sprays and watercolor pencils.

I added some extra details to the background with the watercolors, and added some white dots using a Faber-Castell Artist Big Brush Pen.

I love the depth of the 13 Arts stencil included in the add-on. I used 13 Arts Modeling Paste, then painted it once dry with Silks in Mallard and Pretty Peridot.

To create the seafloor, I applied gel medium to the canvas and scrunched kraft-colored tissue paper, then went over the top with more gel medium, followed by glass bead gel and lots of mist, including the Bucaneer Bay Blue Moonshadow Mist from the main kit.

 
A closeup of the colours and textures of the tissue paper.

And finished off with the amazing resist alphas from the main kit.

Thank you for stopping by! Pick up your March kit if you haven't had a chance yet, and check out the Julie Nutting stamps (and other new Prima products) in the Flying Unicorn Store.

Blue Fern Studios March Sketch Challenge

It's a new month, and that means it's time for a new sketch challenge at Blue Fern Studios!  Did you know that you can create any type of project for the sketch challenge, including layouts, tags, cards, ATCs, canvases, off-the-page projects - anything you'd like, as long as you follow the sketch and use Blue Fern Studios chipboard on your project.

This month I chose to make a spring-inspired card (ironically, I made it on one of the 2 snowy days we've had this year) using the gorgeous Blue Fern Garden papers.

I treated the Tweet Friends branch to several layers of paints, building and blending until I was happy with the result, including chalk edger, Silks, Shimmerz Shimmerz and Dazzlerz and Distress Ink. I love that Blue Fern Studios chipboard is sturdy enough to stand up to this type of layering, as I tend to tinker with my chipboard until it is just right.

I painted both the Bits of Honey and Veranda Cage Set with Silks in Emperor's Gold, then added some shading with Distress Ink in Walnut Stain.

Have you noticed that the cut strips at the bottom of each of the Blue Fern Garden papers are beautiful little banners? I've used some here as layers. Aren't they lovely?

Here is this month's gorgeous sketch, designed by the uber-talented Michele Singh.

I hope you'll play along, check out this amazing Blue Fern prize pack up for grabs:

Blue Fern Studios Products Used

Papers: Blue Fern Garden In Bloom

Blue Fern Garden Calling Cards

Chipboard: Bits of Honey

Tweet Friends

Veranda Cage Set

Flying Unicorn March KOM - Part 2

The March Flying Unicorn Kit of the Month is so elegant. The black and white papers and curlicue motifs just lend themselves to classic, dramatic projects.

This month's Small Art Big Passion add-on includes a giant tag, and as soon as I saw the large format I knew it would be perfect for one of the new Prima Bloom Girls stamps.

I started by covering the tag with some of the Authentique paper and added some stamping with the rocking Bo Bunny stamp from the main kit. The random word stickers you have leftover after you've completed your other projects make great background elements.

I loved the way the scrolled oval from one of the papers looked like a fancy mirror. The Bloom Girl herself is stamped straight onto the Authentique paper, which held up gorgeously to Copic markers, which I used to colour her skin. Her hair, top and the flowers in her hair are fussy cut from paper in the kit, I then painted the flowers with Twinkling H2Os, and the leaves and her eyes with the watercolour paints included in the kit. Add in some trim and Liquid Pearls and voila!

If you haven't had a chance to pick up the March kit of the month, be sure to get one quick - they are sure to sell out.

Thanks for stopping by!

Flying Unicorn March KOM - Part 1

Good morning! How is it the last day of February already? It's been a bit of a crazy month around our place; I'm really looking forward to putting February behind me.

Amidst all the chaos, I did have some time to create with the lovely March Flying Unicorn kit of the month. Have you had a chance to check it out yet? Blue, black and white - swoon!

My first project is an elegant little card. The stickers in the Mixed Passion kit are perfect for cards! And the feathers? Perfection.

A couple closeups:

Thanks for stopping by!

Flying Unicorn March Kit of the Month Reveal

We are so excited to bring you our March 2014 Kit of the Month. We begin with out MAIN KIT and the INCLUDED off the page project

You get the latest and the greatest in the main kit to get your creative mojo flowing and we will always include an off the page project ( OTP) that will inspire and sometimes challenge your inspiration- but always creative fun! Our March kit is filled with creative goodies that will excite

Your Passion .Your Art !

Just take a look at some of the amazing inspirational projects from the creative team :

Welcome to the Mixed Art! Our new add on kit will always come with a canvas and a variety mediums, mists, tools that compliment that main kit.

Here are a few amazing inspirational projects by the Flying Unicorn Creative Team

Our Mixed Passion add on kit if filled with flowers, ribbons, trinkets and more. Jam packed with embellishments that compliment the main kit.

Small Art. Big Passion is exactly what this new add on kit is filled with. Papers that are on a smaller scale that will compliment the main kit and embellishments that are scaled to compliment the main kit or to entice you to create cards, tags, atc's and so much more !

Our educational creativeness explodes this month with amazing creations and tutorials by Shona and Erica !

Join Shona on March 4th, 2014 - In our BAP forums to create and play in our art journal using the kit of the month !

Join Erica on March 6th on our You Tube Channel where she show us a step by step tutorial in creating an amazing layout!

As you can see we have filled our March kit and add on Kits with so much creative awesomeness - CLICK HERE - to get yours now - Remember there are no sign ups - they are sold on a first come first serve basis and once they are gone they are gone !

13 Days With 13 Arts

Hello bloggers! I hope you've had a chance to follow along with the 13 Days With 13 Arts promotion between the Flying Unicorn and 13 Arts. If you haven't, it's not too late to start. On alternating days creative team members from Flying Unicorn and 13 Arts are preparing projects and tutorials to inspire you, and each day there is a fantastic RAK up for grabs. Keep reading for all the details on your chance to win.

It's my turn to provide some inspiration today, and I've been playing with 13 Arts' new Timeless collection. I love the colour orange, though I know it can scare some people off, and partnered with blue as it is in this collection? Perfection!

Here I've used it to capture a memory of my two year old, Colby, goofing around at a friend's pool. Because the colours in the photo are pretty neutral, I had free rein to use it with brightly-colored background papers and embellishments.

I knew I wanted to do lots of misting on the background, but found that I did not have the right orange-red colour.

Have you had a chance to play with 13 Arts mists? I love them, and my tutorial for you today is about making your mists work harder for you. How often do you have a project and turn to your mists only to find that you do not have the right colour, or that what you have is too bold? Despite my copious, and growing, mist collection, it happens to me all the time. But there's an easy solution - custom mixing your mists to achieve the colour you're after. You can combine your 13 Arts mists with each other (Pearl and Chalk can be mixed together), and even better, you can drop in some 13 Arts Water Ink (which is transparent) to give you even more possibilities.

To illustrate my point, I prepared a cheat sheet of some of the possible combinations I could make using the Water Inks, Chalk Mists and Pearl Mists I had on hand.

As you can see, some of the combinations are stunning (check out the two greens on the top row) while others were less successful (I didn't manage to get a good purple from the colours I have).

Rather than mix up a whole bunch of mist only to discover it isn't a pleasing combination, I start by mixing a couple of drops on a non-porous surface (your craft mat, for instance, or a palette; in my case I used one of the plastic cutting mats for my Big Shot) and then painting the mixture onto a piece of watercolour paper.

I chose to go with one of the bolder papers for my background, and layered on my background elements - strips of paper from the collection, canvas tape, film strip and mesh tape.

I added some misting using my custom orange-red mist through a stencil, and also stamped randomly on the page with the wet stencil.

Next I added some masking with the fabulous 13 Arts Modeling Paste. The texture of this stuff is amazing, light and whipped. For an added pop of colour I stamped with 13 Arts Water Ink in Scarlet.

I finished everything up by stamping with some of the Burnt Sienna Chalk mist and a mist cap and with flicks of Black Water Ink off a stiff-bristled brush. I also fussy cut some elements from the paper, used a sticker from the collection and created some custom embellishments with punched circles.

Here is today's gorgeous RAK, provided by Aida at 13 Arts (did I mention there is a RAK up for grabs for each of the 13 days?).

To be in the running, head over to the 13 Arts Facebook page. Like them and share the project of the day between 7am and 9pm EST and you will be entered to win.

Products Used:

13 Arts Timeless Collection: Perfect Moment; Remember When; Today, Tomorrow, Always; All The Time & Timeless Sticker Sheet

13 Arts Mists: Burnt Sienna Chalk, Sky Blue Pearl (on the flowers)

13 Arts Water Inks: Scarlet, Yellow, Black

13 Arts Media: Modeling Paste