Gloria J Zucaro's "Culmination"

Today I am linking to Jennifer Mclean's theme of the week which is "Woman".  The idea of the theme came from the International Woman's Day Celebration on March 8th.  I decided to do a journal page using the word "Culmination" as my main focus.  I feel that my attitudes as a woman are a culmination of the environment in my original home with my parents and my life experiences.   I used some of my gelli plate paper to write my journaling upon.  Then pieces of torn paper printed with various "roles" I have played in life.  A couple of attitudes like "Go with the Flow" and "I am Woman" were also added.   I don't know if other woman are the same, especially if they are younger, but I never had a bucket list, and was brought up to always be "nice".  I moved a lot as a child/young adult because my father was in the military.  There was no choice about that, but my mother always had a good attitude about moving, so as children we didn't feel like it was a bad thing, but a new adventure.  The most valuable thing to me is freedom of choice.  I am fortunate to be able to make choices for myself, as I now live alone.  I realize that many women are not able to make some choices because of great financial limitations.  
I definitely do  believe in equal rights of all types for all women.  If a woman has the same education and devotes the same amount of work-day time to a job, she should be paid the same amount of money as a man in the same work position. 
I used pen, markers, Silks Acrylic Glaze, stickers and rubber cement.  I found out that matte medium will remove your ink printing, but rubber cement will not.
Please visit "The Artist's Playroom" to see how everyone interpreted this theme.

Click on image to enlarge

9"H x 12"W Sketchbook.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Seuss Backs and New"

Today after meeting my accountant to talk about taxes, I spent the afternoon working on finishing up my Inspirational Card Deck Swap hosted by Jennifer Brogan over at "In Search of Dessert".   I will be shipping the cards out next weekend or sooner if they are dry.  I had already added quotes and paint and stickers and stamps to the fronts.  Today I worked on the backs to adhere my personal information(name,blog,etc.) that I had printed onto mailing labels, outlined around those stickers with crayons, and hand-printed my on-earth location with permanent marker.  Then I edged each card in gold or silver leaf pen.  I am thinking I want to spray them with a sealer, but am a little nervous about lettering smearing  or their not drying quickly for mailing.  Does anyone have suggestions for what sealer would be best?  They are not due until the 29th, but I was allowing plenty of time for delivery.  Plus it doesn't seem quite right to drop them on her on the very last day.  This picture shows the backs before I finished hand lettering and edging.  When I complete the set I will post a picture of the fronts.

I also sprayed the back of my Seuss inspired ATC's from my post earlier this week with various inks through my Julie Fei-Fan Balzer stencils.  Then adhered my info on those.  These are some of the designs on the backs.

Next I created three more ATC's.  I had cut old Christmas cards to 2 1/2 x 3 1/2" rectangles.  I then lightly brushed on gesso to mostly but not entirely obscure the designs and colors.  I did both sides at once, so when I laid them down on the table, they got squashy designs on them that are so pretty.  I decided to tangle some of them and add Silks Acrylic Glaze and glitter. I left some of the card peaking through on each one.  I also finished the backs of those cards with the ink spray as on the cards above.

"Red Heart"

"Winter"

"Cactus Flower"

That's all folks!  Have a nice Sunday

Gloria J Zucaro's "Getting Ready"

Today I started the preparation for the Inspirational Card Deck Swap 2013.   I had not realized until I emailed Jessica Brogan, the hostess for this swap, that the quotes each artist puts on the cards actually have to be "inspirational".  I had collected some quotes by famous actors and actresses, and had gotten some photos of several of them to use on my cards.  But I went through and eliminated the quotes that weren't actually inspirational...only very funny!  I can use those quotes and photos for making other ATC cards on my own. I took some pages out of one of the paper selections by Melody Ross that I bought on sale and glued the cards onto various pages.  I had put glue on the pages first as I got to each page, so attached a few 2.5 x 3.5 extra cardboard pieces where I had already put the book binders adhesive.  I had done this with a wet wash brush, so the paper got too wet and ripped off some of the design when I picked it up to move to another place to dry.  But I am not worried it will add interest as I add another layer.  When I cut the cards apart, they will each have a different back. I plan on putting some Silks Acrylic Glaze  over these papers anyway and also my name and blog information, too.

I also did my journaling for the limited 10 minutes for "30 days in your journal" by Julie Fei Fan Balzer.  I must say that for the last two days I have not had the supplies that Julie has, which she said is perfectly okay and that I could substitute with what I have.  I did not have a transfer screen to do a screen printing effect, so I just used regular stencils and stamps. Some with my initials in a very scroll-y alphabet.  I did not have a "frame" so cut one out of my Steampunk book from Dover Press. Today's video showed her adding a photo of herself and circling it with watercolor crayons.  Again, I had no photo of myself so added puzzle pieces, some glitter and used my Derwent Inktense Watercolor Pencils to get a similar effect.

The last thing I did was paint a page in my smaller journal black.  I am going to do the 8th and last Fall Fearless & Fly journal page.  The colors for it are black with bright colors.  I will be using my "Hot Shots" neon paints over the black.  Have a good evening!

Card backing papers below.

My 3 days of journaling below.  New page tomorrow!

Gloria J Zucaro's "All in a Days Work"

For My Gelli Plate Papers, Scroll to middle of this post

Yesterday I got quite a bit of artwork done.  I copaled a painting which will be in an exhibit the end of the month in the Robert T. Wright Gallery in Grayslake, Illinois.  Copal is a preliminary finish you put on an oil painting before it it has dried enough to put a final varnish on.  You rub it on in circles with a lint free cloth, making sure all areas are covered but don't have puddles.

Then I put the first coat of paint on a frame for that painting.  It is a floater frame, so all the front surface of the painting will show, and not be covered by 1/4 edge being covered all around by a traditional frame.  I am considering put a pewter dry brush over the black.  What do you think of that?  
I stuck the painting in the frame so you could see how a floater frame looks.

Next I worked on my Gelli Plate with two colors of paint at once for Carolyn Dubes' Gelli Plate Paint Party.  I really like the way they look with a mix of different Silks Acrylic Glaze paints by Luminarte. I didn't have anymore plain white paper, so used some pale yellow cardstock.

Last night I spent several hours beading my second set of fabric cards for my January ATC meeting. I beaded around the bird shapes and then glued them to the lattice background.  I also finished up my first set of ATCs which had glitter and pearl accent on the fronts and Martha Stewart Iridescent Tinsel Glitter around my name plate on the backs.  I will put a clear glitter glue around the edge of the applied birds sections, I think, and fill in some of the blank background between the lattice fabric strips with paint.

Martha Stewart

Gloria J Zucaro's "Merry Christmas ATC's"

Tonight I am sharing my first set of Christmas ATC's for a trade party on Saturday.  I had a lot of fun making these cards.  I used advice from Mary C Nasser's blog post on Oct. 09 when she gave her steps for making her deck of cards for the Inspiration Card Swap hosted by Jessica Brogan.  Starting out with a deck of cards, I glued them to a map.  Then sanded the front of the cards & gessoed & painted the fronts red with Silks Acrylic Glaze and the backs green with the same paint.  I then stenciled the green backs with a second green and outlined the stencils with either red or gold pen.  On the front red side I placed vintage looking stickers or some stocking stickers.  I added torn tissue paper that I had mixed up with gloss medium.  Then coating the tissue with a dark rose Silk paint.  The entire surface was covered with medium and sprinkled with gold beads onto the raised tissue areas.  I stamped on the Doves & Merry Christmas  and added the dimensional snow flakes or Christmas Trees.  The only thing left to do is to add my name and blog information to the back.  I only made a dozen Christmas ATCs, so will use the other cards that are glued to the map and already gessoed for next months trade.   I plan on sending a couple of the cards to blog friends who have been so helpful and generous to me and am looking forward to finding out what our prompt will be for January.  

Our group is hosted by Kimberly Butts who is an avid follower of ATCS FOR ALL and helps organize & attends their convention.  Kimberley's special cards are made of sheet metal in which she presses a design, or her wonderful felted birds.

This is my Paint Party Friday entry for this week.  Please go to the party and visit some of the many artist's sites to see what they have been creating this week.