Recent Swaps

I recently hosted an "Old Techniques are New Again" swap. We revisited a marbling technique using shaving cream which has been around for years.  Basically the technique uses shaving cream sprayed into a pan and leveled out like frosting. Then drops of a few colors of acrylic ink, paint, alcohol ink, or even food coloring are dropped onto the shaving cream and "combed" through with various tools. A sheet of paper is placed on top and rubbed gently. After removing the paper and scraping off excess shaving cream, it is left to dry and you end up with some amazing background papers!

For this swap we had to make a card using one of our marbled backgrounds.

This was the one I sent off. I used a second marbled piece to die cut the bird.

And I received this one.  I think we were all thinking "spring" as the cards were all bright and colorful.

If you haven't tried this technique before, give it a whirl. It's expensive and fun and the papers smell amazing. I've even seen this on Pinterest used for coloring Easter eggs, which would be fun to do with kiddos!

I am also participating in a "Divided Postcard" swap where we each divide a postcard into thirds and decorated one section. We then send it to two more people and, when completed, gets sent on to a fourth person. This is truly cooperative art!

Here is the postcard I started with. I decorated the address side with stamps and watercolors.

For my section on the reverse side, I used modeling paste through a floral stencil and then added Color Burst powder watercolors. I finished with a stamp and some spritzes of gold paint.

This is the first postcard I've received. The left section was already completed. I used Distress Ink on my background and stamped a Ken Oliver daisy stamp in Archival ink.  I colored with regular colored pencils, white paint for the flower and used gold Stickles for the flower center.

It will be fun to see how these postcards progress and what they look like finished!