Some may call me "thrifty." I just call it what it is... I'm cheap. Money, or lack thereof, has been an issue most of my 40+ years. As a result, I hate wasting things. The crafty side of me is always coming up with ways to re-use items. Right now, I have a bag of ripped t-shirts in my closet with the assumption that someday I'll have time to sew them into cute stuffed animals or patchwork skirts.
Anyhow, when I paint, I tend to put a bit too much paint on my palette. What to do with that leftover paint?
Well a few years ago, I started just scraping it onto sheets of drawing paper with an old plastic gift card and storing it in a drawer. A few weeks ago I stumbled on to some amazing collage artists on Instagram who created their own papers for their collages. Bingo! There's what my drawer of leftover painted pages will become.
So after I painted this page in my Bible (see blog post HERE for details), I decided to be intentional with my leftover paint.
 |
| acrylic craft paint layered over watercolor |
I have a pad of 9x12 white drawing paper and with my old, trusty brushes, I used all of the excess paint to paint a large square or rectangle. Note: this is just cheap acrylic craft paint.
 |
| my tiny craft desk |
And then I simply let them dry overnight.
I really loved how that Bible Journaling page turned out so I made a reference page and taped it above my desk. It has my go-to flower doodles with a favorite color palette (with Martha Stewart craft paints) on it.
 |
| reference page |
So the next weekend when I had some time and was trying to find a creative outlet for some anxiety and grief, I got out the painted pages and with the reference page taped to the wall as inspiration, I just started cutting out shapes to make flowers similar to the ones I draw all of the time.
Only this time, I didn't draw or pre-plan anything first. I just started cutting. Like in elementary school, I just needed to be a kid and play and cut and glue things for a little bit.
 |
| a sunflower and lots of leaves in several sizes |
And cut and move around and re-cut and glue I did! It was so fun to just play for a few minutes.
My pad of drawing paper was on my desk and I had placed a sheet of watercolor paper (that I had dabbled blue watercolor on the day before) on it to serve as a sample background while I cut my flowers... and I really liked the little bits of flowers hanging off of the edge of the blue and onto the white paper.
 |
| daisy petals lined up waiting to be glued on |
After I had finished cutting and gluing together all 4 flowers, I decided to keep that background arrangement.
And ta-dah! My finished piece...
 |
| leftover paint collage flowers |
It was such a fun, playful, stress-relieving time, that when things were a little overwhelming last Sunday, I made myself sit down and make some more.
 |
| even more flowers! |
 |
| waiting for stems and leaves |
I didn't have enough green left so I simply pulled out the pad of drawing paper and squirted some Martha Stewart "granny smith" green on the paper and spread it out evenly with a paint brush.
 |
| now with stems and leaves |
They have been sitting out on my desk all week and have curled up a bit. But that will be resolved with a few days of being pressed in a book and then mounted to thicker cardstock.
 |
| happy flowers |
Another fun, relaxing time at my little craft desk.
Keep blooming,
Ann :)
No comments:
Post a Comment