Blue Background

I had two challenges ahead of me that needed a blue background – the Make A Moo or Two Beach theme and the 4×4 Friday Mask theme. So I decided it was time to get the paints out again.

I started with two A4 sheets of white card. I added some Jo Sonja’s Sapphire to a pallet. Using a dry brush, I started criss-crossing randomly around the page. Then I added a little water to the paint and continued criss-crossing all around.  The painted got watered down some more and the process repeated. When the page was nearly all blue, I used the remaining paint, not much more than coloured water by now, to fill what white was left. Go carefully here; adding too much water will start your nice criss-crosses to run and loose definition. Leave to dry.  If the sheet warps too much, let dry and then sit under the phone books for a day.

Once dry, I stamped with an array of stamps that suited my theme; Autumn Leaves Swirls, Stamp Oasis French text, All Night Media motif and Blockheads backgrounds for these sheets.  Brilliance ink was used with Graphite Black, Moonlight White and Platinum Planet (silver). Once the stamping is complete, this usually defines which way is “up” for the sheet. While the swirls are stamped randomly, the text is always stamped horizontally. Again, leave to dry.

There you have it – my method of how to create your own backgrounds. I have since cut mine up for the 4×4 Friday Challenge and into Moo size cards for the Make A Moo or Two challenge.

Have fun creating!

Michelle

4×4 Friday – Masks

Such a great theme for 4×4 Friday this week – Masks have always intrigued me and the glamour of an old-fashioned masquerade ball sends tingles down my spine!

The blue background was made by me – painted brush strokes with one colour and used the watering of the paint to give it different shades. Stamped with Autumn Leaves Swirls, Stamp Oasis French text, All Night Media motif, in Brilliance ink (Black, white and silver). Image from Art-e-zine. Printed text searched for painfully in pages removed from an altered book (I think I ended up doing more reading than word finding – very annoying when I’d already removed a work from the bit I wanted to read!) Black border stamp by Collections.

The image from Art-e-zine is one of my favourites – If you have great places you’ve found images, please let me know!

Michelle