Only scary in a thunderstorm

What could be more ordinary than a duck paddling in the pond that is Asylum Anne's studio extension.  Steampunked with this great stamp from Chocolate Baroque.
Over the years and throughout the year, Tafta Fibre Forum hold week-long retreats at various places in Australia, and I've been wanting to go for 20+ years.  Got to one in Lismore a few years back, this September-October  it was off to Geelong for 5 days with Jen Crossley.  One of the Tafta traditions is for people to donate a piece of art 15cm x 15cm, and the other attendees to buy for $15.  The funds raised provide scholarships for others to attend these forums.  This is my offering:

What was scary was the builder taking part of the house roof off to blend in the Studio roof on the last fine day before a forecast of thundery squally rainy week!  As you know, a duck looks pretty relaxed on the water, no-one can see the feet paddling away at a great rate.  But a flash of lightning reveals the sweat dripping off this duck!

The heat-embossed stencil over the multi-colour painted background is from Artist Cellar.  The embossing powders are from both Seth Apter and Andy Skinner's ranges.  The sizzix die cut multiple cogs from a range of fabrics.  Note panne velvet curls under itself.
As for the sweat, that is 6+ layers of embossing powder - Seth's Antique beeswax is translucent, and builds up as though you were doing encaustic waxing.

You know we're always encouraging you to share your dark, offbeat makes with all our Dear Readers - just look right!

Sweet Music, we shall dance you to the death

Even a sweet theme such as "Music" gets twisted in the Asylum of Anne's brain.
Another in the Deconstructed Art Journal page swap going on in Middle Earth this year.  Take an 8"x 8" paper, fold in half and decorate portrait angle.  For 6 people this time.  I cut up a songbook, so everyone has a different song to sing.  I did an extra one for Mr Ed Poe - "Evertrue Evermore" - the third one down!

 The front and back pages: A scrapbooking page full of toitoi "flowers" (a native pampas-type grass) didn't need much more to be done to it.   The Jester from the late Blockhead Stamps was also heat embossed.  I love his squeeze box.  Carabelle Studio have some rather different stamps.  I'm using a Seth Apter stamp to head up the front page - rather tongue in cheek - "everything imaginable is here"  and down the bottom, Rubber Dance instructs you to Go where the music takes you.

 Just before we turn the page, here's your "mood" music  The back page is rather sparse - Stampendous rendering of Danse Macabre, and a cloud giving credit to the stamps and stencils used in this piece. Seth Apter's Explore stencil was the first layer to make it onto the page, then Retro Comet and starburst now discontinued by Artist Cellar then one from the Sacred Heart series at Stencil Girl - since all the songs that were the starting place seemed to deal with love not being as satisfacory as one would wish, the barbed wire across the heart seemed appropriate. (And green is the alternate colour to pink for the heart chakra)

Then it was out with the stamps

Rubber Dance for the wee dancers

Blockhead for the squiggles and notes on the die-cut witch,

Rubber Stamp Ave for the musical bird that is the witch's alter ego.

I added diecut music notes as telephone poles, and birds on a line (presumably all singing their hearts out in 4-part harmonies)

I hope my teamies are proud of me - there's pink in the framing!!!

So if you hear what you think is wind through the trees, hearken closely, it could be Witchy breathing a new song into the skellies, bringing them back to life for one night only.

OR... it could be Evil Froggy demanding more weird stuff from you all!

Though if you carry on therough the 31 Days of Halloween blog hop, you could be rather stunned by what's already being put on offer.

Day 27 31 Days of Halloween~What's the Time, Mr Wolfie?

Welcome to Day 27 of the 31 Days of Halloween! This is an annual Smeared Ink event and we are so thrilled to be playing along as Wicked Bloggers. The Wicked Blogger challenge is to post a new creation each day during October that contains a stamped image, digi or rubber! Check out all the rules and prize details at Smeared Ink.

There is a fabulous blog roll to follow and Hop to it! Find it on the side bar :)

CT Anne, what time is it???

SKELO'CLOCK!

Sizzix clock die cut mat board and mulberry paper 2 colours, and swapped them over for different-coloured centres, glued to the matboard.  Coloured the white cut sides of the matboard with blobby red pen, and green around the orange piece.  Skeletons were stamped on cardstock, washed with colour.  The brads let them move like the hands of a clock - which they are.  Time's running away with us, bringing us all closer to being only a skeleton.

What's the time, Mr Wolfie?

SCREEEMO'CLOCK!

 Guess I'd be screaming too with a sock monkey poking through my throat...

Bones: chicken bones long-boiled. But never enough for all the projects in mind.  Mix up equal parts of Amazing Mold Putty, press bones into it and wait for it to set around them.  Remove the real bones, and you have your own mold to make more bones with clay, paperclay - and orange, reddish, maybe greenish jelly, made with only half the water, makes for awesome dessert accents - not to mention i scream for boney ice cream Bwahahahahahaaa!

http://alphastamps.com/ for the skeletons

http://www.madratrubber.com/ for the screaming child
http://artistcellar.com/ eye stencil
http://www.moldputty.com/ for 2-part silicone molding material

Day 24 31 Days of Halloween~Let's Dance into the Pumpkin Patch

Welcome to Day 24 of the 31 Days of Halloween! This is an annual Smeared Ink event and we are so thrilled to be playing along as Wicked Bloggers. The Wicked Blogger challenge is to post a new creation each day during October that contains a stamped image, digi or rubber! Check out all the rules and prize details at Smeared Ink.

There is a fabulous blog roll to follow and Hop to it! Find it on the side bar :)

Yummy orange from CT Anne today...

 I've been on a stencilling jag, and on a postcard (6x4) mission, and had this postcard left over.  And some other bits left over from other projects.  As I puzzled them, trying to make a new cohesive piece, I bethought me of my journal book. And the traditional Northern Hemisphere Halloween scene.  So we shall have a pumpkin patch in the garden of a haunted house.

But gardens have all sorts of bugs, spiders, tiny doll-people laid out as sacrifices perhaps.
A Haunted House would need Haunters showing through the windows, so I left a blank area on my journal page, where there was no "traditional" leafless tree, stamped some "webs" on it, and fussycut some stamped images to add them to the back of the die-cut house:

Mat board and halloween paper diecut and glued together, here's the front side 

Ah, did I mention stencilling the journal page?  Yep.  Yellow page, purple paint daubed over.

Something learned:  not all tissue papers blend into the background when you glue them to your page.  Oh well, some crows are flying against a cloudy backdrop, maybe that monkey swinging in the tree has escaped a circus?  UhOh!  And there are some flying monkeys in the corner too.  Noooo!
Put them together, and the full scene is revealed. Happy children, screaming children, sleeping children, tiny human insects on the pumpkins, a clown face disguised as a pumpkin - the stereotypical Halloween scene, except there are no tombstones.  Oh well, another time...

Supplies:

http://www.silvercrowcreations.com/  tiny people, baby scraps, Dresden scrap Clown. Stamps: Marionette Monkey, Spanish Moss, Mean Clown, Spiked Man, Flying Crows, Frolicking Children

http://www.madratrubber.com/  squalling child face

Third Coast RS: (small) flying black birds

Sizzix Haunted house die

TCW maple leaf stencil

http://www.vlvstamps.com/   flying monkeys across moon

http://artistcellar.com/ pumpkin/pod stencil

Day 3 31 Days of Halloween~Trials of a new camera

Welcome to Day 3 of the 31 Days of Halloween! This is an annual Smeared Ink event and we are so thrilled to be playing along as Wicked Bloggers. The Wicked Blogger challenge is to post a new creation each day during October that contains a stamped image, digi or rubber! Check out all the rules and prize details at Smeared Ink.

There is a fabulous blog roll to follow and Hop to it! Find it on the side bar :)

CT Anne presents.....

Maybe my camera, too, is haunted, as it sure doesn't like photographing closeups, nor shiny shiny foiled patches.  Someone looks terribly out for revenge against the Witch-In-The-Moon , she's going to get full blast from that shotgun, for sure.

And why?  Well who else would be responsible for reducing pumpkins to skeletons, just before Halloween???

For stars, bubble dot stamp was carelessly stamped several times at different angles with gaps, heat-embossed with silvery embossing powder, then gaps stamped and heat embossed with gold.  This is postcard sized, and cut to shape/size with the Sizzix suitcase die.

http://www.silvercrowcreations.com/ Full faced witch, Pumpkinhead sniper, bubble dots
http://artistcellar.com/ pod stencil