Discover, Travel, Journey Delivered!

My daughter and I made our way to Allentown, Pa this weekend. We visited my BFF Tracey, her husband Frank and "the boys". I put the finishing touches on this piece, mounted it on black matt board, wired on the chenille stem, covered back with alcohol inked paper, added sentiment on back, signature and voila, finee! Tracey and Frank are celebrating 20 years of wedded bliss this year. They make it look easy. This is my homage to them. Oh and by the way, they liked it!!

My next idea was to make 63 more backgrounds for ATC's to swap for Virginia Art and Soul. Want to come prepared with 100 trades! I started with a vintage postcard:

Sized her to ATC, literally cut and pasted Art sign in her hand along with word banner, (not doing digital art YET)

gel mediumed her to painted background, added metal shell corner from Bonnies Best Art Tools, netting from my stash, adhered with my whimpy hammer. This is what I have so far:


I'm gonna add some gel pen details. I only have 30 shell corners, and in the spirit of using what I have, I'm gonna dip into my pieces of sea glass when I run out of corners, or maybe small shells....I only have 16 gals cut out so far (who knew I'd only wait 45 minutes to have my oil changed on Friday) and I'm hoping it's slow at my real job tomorrow so I can get some more gals cut out. I can't believe A and S is only 8 weeks away.

The only other reason to visit Allentown, besides my BFF, is Dick Blick's !!!!! Here are my supplies purchased for A and S:

Ok, in reality, the awls, ruler, paint and gel mediums are the only things I really needed! I can't find the variety of colors for the Rub N Buff's locally, so I stocked up! And the acid free tissue, had to have it! Also had to have the Golden Gold Mica Flake and the Black Mica Flake. Texture, baby! I also bought water based resist by Jacquard cause I think I read about it in one of my art books. I'm sure I'll need it desperately, soon! My most favorite find? ATC sized stretched canvases! OMG! My second favorite part of the day was being taken care of my the handsome and charming Dano, who hooked me up with the student discount! Hopefully, he will visit my blog (had to give him a moo card) and take credit where credit is due! Sunday is double discount day!!! XO Dano! The lightweight but non whimpy hammer and the 11 piece set of chisels I found at Harbor Freight Tools. It was worth getting soaking wet in the rain for the $4.50 set, since I only need the 1/4 palm chisel for my class with Daniel Essig. The hammer was like 4 bucks, too!
Of course there are still a couple other things I need to buy for my classes. Remember when we used to spend money on shoes and purses???? Now its art supplies.......