Carey Burns

Today's WIP Wednesday is tinkering with a project I put on the back burner. You may or may not remember " The Remains of Love " from May. This piece has sat on my desk, tormenting me with its colors. I finally decided to fiddle with it again. I dry brushed on some gesso to the wood and hit the high points of the arrows and the crown of the heart. Cupid was too blah-looking so I added a bit to his wings and face and body. This is when I got a little crazy. I added some to the photo and then the pile of bones. With the gesso dry, I added some Tim Holtz ® Distress Stain in Mowed Lawn to the wood, arrows, and crown. The green and red roses was too much for my tastes so I added some Broken China which helped, but still wasn't great. After that dried, I added Walnut and then blended with a paper towel. The end result is a lovely verdigris that I can live with. I applied the same color technique to the photo and pile of bones, sans the paper towel blending. ...

I started another assemblage piece called "The Remains of Love" and it started off great with separate pieces somehow just fitting together like magic. A pile of plastic bones...a cobbled-together Cupid...a very old photo of a bride and groom... To say I  am a novice at this "art" thing is a big understatement. I'm getting better, but am still figuring out what supplies do (and don't) play well together. The first mishap was learning that the adhesive I used to attach a bisque doll to a metal piece failed when a rusting agent was applied. There was some cursing, but I got over it. The bisque figure was missing its arms Originally, this was going to be a harpy but the arrows made me think Cupid The second mishap was the glitter texture I wanted over the plastic bones. For some reason, the acrylic paint I used just didn't want to stick to the plastic. Never had this problem before, it was frustrating. Then the glitter was too big and totally...

I had yesterday off so I did a bit of crafting while waiting around for an appointment. I had a to-do list with all of the steps left to finish my Handsome Devil and for Step One, I added the rusting agent to the iron-painted skulls. They took hours to dry and when they dried...no rust. So I waited. This morning there's only a tiny bit of rust. When I get home, I'll need to add another coat of the rusting agent I guess. Sadly, that threw off completion of the rest of the steps. While I grumped about it, I kept busy making another Halloween tag. This one was super easy--just dabbed on Ranger's Distressed Stain in Hickory Smoke on both sides and let it dry. It had a cloudy look to it because the blobs of stain bled together. The moon and skeleton are both Tim Holtz epehmera and I just added black marker to the cut edges of the paper so it didn't look so "new" and put a few foam mounting dots on them to give them a little depth. I might stamp something on the t...