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Monday, July 25, 2022

We're All Mad Here

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It should come as no surprise that I'm a HUGE Lewis Carroll fan. My dad read us ALL the books, dozens of times. His copy of Alice was the annotated one with all the chessboards, etc. If you don't have that version - get it!

Like the Hobbit, the illustrations were just marvelous and they always looked new to me, even if it was our 100th time hearing the story. 

My favorite character, bar none, was the Cheshire Cat. The spookiness was just over the top, but also the sort of smart alecky thing that most of the characters had, the Cheshire Cat had in spades. So fun. 

Today, my friend Mary Ann, and the illustrator of the Clarence images, has a wonderful Alice-themed series of character sets, one of which features this amazing Cheshire cat

First, I used this foil plate to emboss a piece of watercolor paper. (I don't foil much, but I LOVE foil plates for texture.) Then I sprayed magenta, yellow and turquoise acrylic sprays on my craft mat and brayered them lightly over that panel so the pattern popped out. I also spritzed it a few times after that with the three colors. Then, I colored the kitty with OLO markers, and cut him out with his matching dies. I embossed the sentiment from this set in white alabaster embossing powder - look how crispy it is! I never used to get embossing that crisp - I give all credit to the embossing brush of hers. I think that clay is slicker than cornstarch or whatever is in the little pillows.

My favorite sentiment in this set is "when you can't look at the bright side, I'll sit with you in the dark."

I colored the edges of the die cut black to match the circle and added some white gel pen highlights.

He's got a little Tigger vibe with his twisty tail!


She also has two beautiful scenic stamps to use all these characters in: A tea party scene, and this AWESOME castle scene

Inspired by the sentiment I called out above, I wanted to make a nighttime scene, with the castle shining a little beacon. 

First, I colored the mushrooms, the path and the castle with OLO markers. Then I used masking tape to make little beams coming from the side windows, and I lightly blended Metropolis and Wild Dandelion inks over the scene. 

It's impossible to see in this photo but I added Sparkle lacquer to the white spots on mushrooms in the front, and added the Hugs die cut with black glitter paper.

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Here are all the supplies I used today:

Wonderland 3 4x6 – The Rabbit Hole...
[ THR ]
Wonderland 3 Dies – The Rabbit Hole...
[ THR ]
Heard in Wonderland 4x6 – The Rabbit...
[ THR ]
Path to the Castle Background 6x6 –...
[ THR ]
Wonderland 2 4x6 – The Rabbit Hole...
[ THR ]
Wonderland 2 Dies – The Rabbit Hole...
[ THR ]
Wonderland 1 4x6 – The Rabbit Hole...
[ THR ]
Wonderland 1 Dies – The Rabbit Hole...
[ THR ]
Tea Party Background 6x6 – The Rabbit...
[ THR ]
Hugs - Scripty Word with Shadow Layer...
[ THR ]
Garden Trellis Hot Foil Coverplate –...
[ THR ]
OLO
[ OLM ]
Cottontail Embossing Powder Tool –...
[ THR ]
NK351 Sparkle Clear Lacquer Pen |...
[ HA ]
Brutus Monroe ALABASTER Ultra Fine...
[ SSS | SSS | SBC ]
Sakura Gelly Roll Opaque White Pens -...
[ BLIC ]
Dina Wakley Media Gloss Spray -...
[ JGG ]
Dina Wakley Media Gloss Spray - Lemon
[ JGG ]
Dina Wakley Media Gloss Spray -...
[ JGG ]
PS777 Glitter Paper Basics - Hero Arts
[ HA ]
DI199 Nesting Circle Infinity Dies...
[ HA ]
Floral Glass Craft Mat — Glassboard...
[ GLS ]
MISTI Stamping Tool
[ MSP | ELH ]
Scor-Buddy Mini Scoring Board 9x7.5 -...
[ ELH ]
MIS-T Rulers
[ MSP ]
Rotatrim Professional Series Cutter -...
[ BLIC ]
Understand Blue Bundles Specials for...
[ CTC ]
Teflon Bone Folder - Ellen Hutson LLC
[ ELH ]
Storage Envelopes, Medium 25pk,...
[ ELH ]
CheckOutStore Stamp & Die Clear...
[ CHC ]
Extra Large -50 pk, Avery Elle Stamp...
[ ELH ]
Airtable: Organize your stamps & dies
[ ART ]
Amazon.com: The Annotated Alice:...
[ AMZUS ]


I didn't do any cooking this weekend at all. I had already made chili, hummus, cauliflower salad and refried beans last week, so that was enough for us to survive for a few days without turning the oven on. I had more than a few cold meals with the salad, hummus and kalamata olives because it's just hot. One night I had guacamole for dinner. PS - Mezzetta has the BEST kalamata olives. My goodness. 

Did you know that avocados basically have eternal life in the fridge? I put them in my drawer section of the fridge and they SLOWLY ripen and NEVER turn brown. An amazing life hack I wish I'd learned years ago.

This week, I'm going to make a tri tip roast - marinate it in that homemade Italian dressing - same one from the salad - and have that all week. So a single oven session again. This is the first year since I've lived here that I've wished for a mild Gulf hurricane to break this bizarre pattern. It's a battle every day for every plant in my yard, and they've already been through so much with the last two winters. I only need one extreme season per year, not two. And our water bill is insane. 

What are you cooking this week?

Loveyameanitbye.





1 comment:

  1. Omg-I recently discovered (during Covid) the same wonderful thing about avocados!! I was dumbfounded to be able to keep them much longer in the fridge as they slowly ripened. I love both of these cards, that cat is a screaming riot and I love the mushroom forest and those cool light beams (think June DD theme). I am also very intrigued with your use of foil plates as a texture plate, I am not a foil-er unless I can use glue or something, but I've only dabbled a tiny bit with that. I'm not buying into hot foil machines, so I would love to know more about using the plates as a texture accessory.

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