Gloria J Zucaro's "Many Thanks"

A strange thing happened.  I went on my trip and really enjoyed the respite from all the online challenges I had been doing for over a year.  When I returned in early April, I found that when I started looking at the challenges again each week, I felt a strong resistance to doing them.  True, I have had family and other life issues lately,but definitely my first real artist block.  So I am starting back slowly with odds and ends of projects.  Here is a small 6 x 6 cotton canvas panel I learned how to texturize last weekend.  First we added a very thick almost paste-like matte medium and then while it was wet we layered papers, eyelet lace, bottle caps, corrugated cardboard, torn paper pieces, buttons, pieces of different artificial flowers and string.  They were all coated with the medium as well.  We used a heat gun to dry the surface.  Then we completely covered the entire surface of each piece with white gesso.  Dried it, then sprayed the surface with two colors of spray inks.  After that was dry, we dry-brushed on black acrylic and highlighted the edges of things with the gesso.  We did that two-step process a couple of times until we were satisfied with the depth it created.  Then we glued on the rhinestones.  It was fun and easy and could be applied to larger art pieces.  The class was held at Stamp, Scrap 'N More in Mundelein,Il.

Then I was really pleased to get a wonderful journal as a gift from Judy Shea who is a wonderful multimedia artist at http://thekeytomyart.wordpress.com.  My name was a random pick from her comment list.  Here is the gorgeous journal.  I love the gilded edges and all the beads and colors.  Oh, and Judy also makes her own button shapes and other pieces to add to your journal pages and covers.  She sent those along as an extra special surprise.

Thank you so much, Judy!  I am a happy camper!

Next, a big "Thank You" to my daughter for the time she spent before Easter to buy these kits from Ebay and for putting them all together for my Easter hostess/Moms gift.  They are so beautiful!  When my children were young, we would go to a craft store in East Dundee, Illinois called Lee Ward's to buy these kits to make holiday ornaments together.  So these hold great memories, too.  I still have them on my mantel.  Thank you, Lucy! :>)

I am posting this to Paint Party Friday, as I have missed a whole month or more!