After a long stretch of time away from my art, I finally was able to do something creative again.
A trip to South Carolina to see our son Nick and his family while he was there, from where he is stationed in Germany, for training and his wife and son were visiting family, was a tiring but great way to end the month of April. We visited a botanical garden and wandered downtown Charleston while we were down there.
Flower Tent Inside before Mother’s Day
May brought Ken’s new endeavor, selling plants and flowers at a Flower Tent near home. Unfortunately, he needed help and I ended up spending some of May in my glory, surrounded by and helping customers choose flowers and plants for their gardens. I quickly found that too many hours spent there resulted in full days lost, spent in bed… What a bummer of a way to spend some of the nicest days of the year… Seeing all the flowers was quite therapeutic and I got lots of photos of beautiful flowers. I also had one boring, cold, rainy day that I had to watch the tent… very few customers came out in the ikky rain. I try to keep my camera with me at all times, so I spent some of the day taking photos of flowers, raindrops and raindrops on flowers.
Flood in tent… The “river” running through the tent… We are extremely lucky to have a location on a paved parking lot… lots of rivers and lakes, but no muck and mire….
The Photo above just doesn’t show the depth and flow of the water… Thankfully my shoes have thick soles… My feet still did get wet… Following are a few of the many photos I took that day… The two that turned into butterflies are noted in the captions…
Raindrops on the tent frame reflecting trees
Raindrop with reflections of hanging baskets.. One of the photos used for butterfly wings.
Raindrop with Impatiens flower reflections… Drop number 2 used for wings.
White Lobelia with water drops
Raindrops in Pink… I think these were Verbena flowers.
Raindrop on pink Rose Petal
Raindrop on a random stem with interesting reflections.
Wet Hen… The Hens and Chicks really hold the drops of rain
While spending time and playing with raindrops at the tent, the latest round of Art Cards for the Arts in the Cards trade group were nearing their deadline to be sent… Knowing I might not have much time for art in May, I started them early during April, little by little, adding more layers to one of the pages of an old calender that I have been using as bases for collaging, painting, stamping, etc. Each time my granddaughter visited and spent some time painting with her Grammy, I tried to add a bit more to this page. The photo was taken just after I started cutting it apart.
Collaged Base with layers of paint, bleeding tissue paper glued on, and white paint added using sequin waste and paper doilies as stencils and stamps.
And now for the “Fun” part! The butterflies…. The page above was quite interesting, but needed more to make the Art Cards complete. The Photoshopping began…. raindrop number one and two were copied, flipped, rotated, and merged to create the shape of the butterfly. One drop became the lower wings, and the other became the upper ones. Once the parts were put together, I played with coloring parts of the raindrops till I had the right shade of blue to look good with my background paper.
Butterfly Image printed on white Kraft Tex
I decided to see what would happen if I printed the butterflies on C&T Publishing’s new Kraft Tex in white. I was lucky enough to be one of the testers for the product and had a bunch left to keep playing with. It feeds nicely through my printer and the above photo shows the printed result. The black ink soaked into the paper a bit, so I enhanced some of the black areas with a black Sharpie marker.
Kraft Tex Butterfly with Sharpie accents and Glossy Accents
Of course, after darkening the black, I just HAD to add one of my new favorite supplies- Ranger’s Glossy Accents.
Glossed Butterfly cut out from the Kraft Tex printout
Once the gloss dried, the butterflies were carefully cut out, then some bending and manipulating was done.
Butterfly Wings Folded to prepare for gluing on cards.
Since I wanted the wings to be free on the cards, I folded the wings to crease them so that the body and head would lie flat on the cards while the wings would be loose.
Butterfly Wings Curled to give dimension.
With the wings curled, they looked a bit more realistic. The Kraft Tex is a heavy paper-like product that will also tend to hold some curling and shaping for more interest.
Butterfly on ATC
One of the butterflies glued onto one of the cards cut from the collaged base paper.
Wing Loose on Card- Only the body is glued so the background can be peeked at.
Look! The wings can be lifted to peek at the textures and colors under them.
Group of 4 Calypso cards
Four of the cards with their antennae added, ready to be packed and shipped to their new owners.
Single Finished Calypso Card
I hope the new owners of these cards will enjoy them as much as I enjoyed making them. Check out the Arts in the Cards Blog to see the other cards made for this theme. The Kraft Tex material from C & T has been very interesting to try out. It is described as a paper that has the feel and texture of leather that is very durable and I have been finding new used for it all the time.
This has just shown you how being bored on a rainy day can actually turn into a good thing…. You just never know what can be done with a camera, and some time spent with Phohotoshop.
I am a former textile artist and new pattern designer with a degree in horticulture, wishing to share my love of nature, flowers and gardens with everyone through my photos, sunprinted fabrics, and now pattern designs. Chronic Lyme Disease has caused major changes to the direction my life. I have to limit the amount of time spent digging in my gardens, and quilting has become more difficult. I discovered pattern design as a way to get art back into my life. I now use my gardens and photos to inspire designs that can be used on fabrics and print on demand items.
