Valentine???? Mate, yer Dreamin'

Ah Poe, what did you start??? Those @#!!#* ravens quothing "Nevermore" all over the place, then less than a month later all those pink-loving "romantics" are running round saying...

The mdf word is Kaisercraft I think.  The raven/crow is part from another Paper Whimsy Crow stand.  The squishy floppy skellies draped over the "sentiment" are from ali express, started yellow, were painted brown then some of the paint rubbed off as it should be.

The mdf has several layers of paint dabbed around, plus 2 of crackle paste.  I love interference paints.

We still need to see a few more of your dark dreams on display to the right of this, before we can award someone with happy mail.

May is the Word

Well, well, spring has finally arrived at the northern part of globe...

Less snow, much more light, temperature rising ...

and that seems to get elf's cranky

I got this senselessly cool stamp set from happy mail (hugs Anne),

and totally wanted to create with it. So I got some watercolor paper,

my H2O colors and start coloring - enjoyed truly making these.

So beware of Elf's this time of year - Hope they go to sleep or

in these cases: someone will but them to sleep ....

Pick a Word

Asylum Anne's main "social media" contact is facebook.  There, quite a few people are not so much making a New Year Resolution, as picking a word for the year's focus. If you did, how are you getting on with it?   OK, so this piece says "create", and appears to be giving the lie, but my "word" for this year, if I must have one, is "use up"  This is NOT the same as "do not buy anything new this year" (*wink*)

But there are various things I've bought in the past that haven't grabbed me perhaps.  Or people have given me bits & pieces that are still on my desk needing to be released from that bondage, by imagination.  And there are things I've bought for my retirement when I expect to have a lot less "discretionary income".  But why wait until then?  Especially when I've discovered the odd thing that doesn't keep too well... like the TH Distress crackle paint - in one, the brush has hardened to the paint, so much so that when I opened the near-full jar, the brush stayed in the paint!

This is how I feel about stash that behaves like that:

Kaisercraft chipboard/mdf off-the-page thingies will always keep, but I've used a plaque to act as a supporting background to the bulk of the additions and "create" which is probably also Kaisercraft, but I'm not swearing to that (don't like the taste of soap in my mouth).  The TH distress crackle paints were clumped & smoothed onto the word.  The plaque was first covered in black gesso, then several layers of Stencil Girl stencils - the Sea urchin used several times.
This angel, and a tree elsewhere were sent me by Teamie Granne/Sari.  They (and a 3-layer  diecut cog) got heat embossed three times to build up a thicker layer of glossy goodness.  The angel was then stamped into whilst molten with a Seth Apter alphabetic stamp (stamp it into an embossing pad first so it will release cleanly after the embossing powder has cooled)

I've been playing for a while with making my own colour mixes of embossing powder, or using multiple colours on one item.  The cog had layers of oil rubbed bronze, then part-damped for Lindy's Gang Terra cotta rust, and Byzantine bronze.

There are diecuts, bits of wire also cluttering my desk, so here goes:

And everything comes together, to remind me of so many stash themes and techniques to be re-used, as:

Doesn't that skull (a spectacle lens) look different from this angle. I've got another one to use up too...

How's your year starting up?  Done anything dark, gruesome, or off-beat to share?  here, would be a great place...

An InLinkz Link-up

Death

It's inescapable.  And after hopping on my soapbox in mid September, but not published until end of October as Halloween Mojo, I have really been tested.  Heading off to Auckland (3 hour drive) for a 3-day weekend with Andy Skinner (UK) & Tracey Weinzapfel (USA), I detoured via the Emergency Dept to catch up with dad, who had been admitted that morning after many chest pains.  Turned out some of it had been another heart attack, and he died Saturday night.  At 94 he was still driving, greeting nurses by name every shift, and discussing articles I read to him out of NZ National Geographic.  I got to do the Friday and Saturday classes, but skipped the evening ones, and Sunday class.  Then mum took a turn for the worse, and we were expecting a double funeral.  But no, she rallied somewhat.  In the meantime I also had a hectic period at work, so my time and inclination to make art was minimal.  I did NOT lose my mojo, nor did I do much creating, I was immersed in other aspects of Life.  Mum died 5 weeks after dad, and I am creating this journal spread between death and funeral, a week ahead of this publication date.

So I apologize that I didn't visit and comment on all the pieces entered in October's challenge.
And here's a reminder that run fast, fly high, but seek immortality in other ways, because the Grim Reaper will get you.

One of those ravens diecut for the last post has carked it.

Seek immortality in celluloid - aided and abetted by a Lego packet with a batman character in it.  It was on my desk, need I say more!

You can tell I used plenty of die cuts - from Seth Apter, Spellbinder, Sizzix, Elizabeth Craft.
 The soulful face came in a package from Teesha Moore,  stencils from Andy Skinner (seems discontinued) and Kaisercraft.  The flying pig is from Silver Crow Creations, and various other stamps in the background from vivalasvegas stamps, Third Stone stamps.  I guess I've been buying Treasure for too long - some of these are no longer available.

Leave us some love below, and show us your dark makings here

Drip Drop Drip Drop

• Summer Rains or sweat in the South?
• Melting Snow in the North?
• Hero-ing Seth Apter's Drip Drop die?

• Life is full of rules
• Long lists of them
• Bullet-pointed
• Going on forever
• and ever.

🌟 1   From my Not-PC journal/altered book:

Heroing the "surrounds" of card after cutting the die out. The yellow is the page underneath.   They look like bullet points as each makes a different point.

Also used Billboards stamp set, Spinners  stamp set (Word Spin), Unfinished stencil
And from Rubber Dance stamps, the zebra rhinoceros, who is telling us we must use Butterflies in our work, not zebras!  Yeah, right... who's he fooling???
The lowest "bulletpoint" was covered in Goosebumps, and the texture seems to have gravitated to the ink of the stamp underneath:

🌟 2  Jar Labels:

Must be time to go fishing to pickle some more!

Used the DeMengted Derma technique over the DripDrop die cut (tinted the crackle medium red first), and used Kroma Crackle the trad way (tinted yellow) for the inner label which was glued to the back of the diecut.  A light layer of pouring medium over the yellow crackle so it stays on, and a dab of gel medium behind the cabochon, and it has survived whereas the newt eyes have all been eaten.

🌟 3   Name Badge:
I actually started doing several to take to a class to share, but it didn't eventuate.  One side of the card had metal foil glued to it then over-stamped using Thunderstorm.  The other side had stamps, stencilling and random painting.

 After cutting dies, the inner one was turned round, so each "tag" shows both sides of the card at once.  Since I'm not handwriting names after all, I've used Spellbinder Art Nouveau font dies, cut then glued together 5 layers of  each letter, then added several layers of embossing powder over them:  They stand very high above the surface, and stand out well.

🌟  4  Spider's nest:
Converted to a spider's nest by wrapping a fluffy yarn round the ring part to cover it completely, with a few criss-crosses to later glue the cabochon with spider to the front, and a label to the back.  The drips have lilac flowersoft glued to them.  This could be turned into a brooch if you glued a fixing across the back.

🌟  5  David Bowie's Comet

Is there Life On Mars?  

It rather flew off on me into a Fat Book page (6" x 6"):  The front & back pages started with a layer of black tissue crumpled down, then a layer of blue tissue lightly crumpled, with some stamping using all 3 stamps of the Faded Fragments set, and Spinoff in the Roundabouts set.  Some Robo stars diecut out of the "paper" florists use these days.  Some stardust (kindy glitz).  David Bowie is framed in a comet of Golden's Pearl mica flake medium, and the skully one done in kroma crackle.

🌟   6:   The Inside pages:  NASA sent a robot in a spaceship, and apparently found enough "evidence" for Martian Life, that as Comet Bowie whizzed  past us headed that-a-way, David must have hopped aboard to check it out.  Of course, he doesn't need to wear a space suit any more, just a gauzy shroud.

Blue tissue paper was stamped as for the other side, before crumpling onto the page spread - without any black paper underneath.  Looks rather different than with the black under.
Once I saw Seth's pieces in facebook using the CHA releases (drool), I completed the page without text, until the new Alpha Drips stencil could get to me from Stencil Girl (along with some others haha) - and then I used the wrong colouring agent (pen) for the text so it's not as crisp as I would like... maybe star nebula dust got in the way 😄

🌟   7  The quick-witted will remember this picture from 1 February's post - and realise it changed once the pieces got onto the page:

Layers of dies can give quite a different effect to using pop dots in random places on a cutout.  The left-hand one has two layers glued on top of each other, then heat embossed with 3 layers of embossing powder, then another layer of reds and blues along the drip line. Under it is a skeleton leaf.  Why?  A veil over a mystery.  Under that are 2 more layers of the die glued together with the edges painted yellow, and glued offset, ie not aligned with the edges of the upper layers.  That gives more dimension to the frame.   A bit flamey all round, and the leaf/veil floats above the surface, giving more depth to the face underneath.

The right-hand one is a layering of 3 different dies:  in red the Robostar die, then a white dripdrop, then a robo ring with blue embossing powder.  On top of them is Kaisercraft's Nutcracker die, looking suitable robotic.  After putting this piece on the page, the robot was too busy and indistinct, so I cut another one, painted it gold with Jacqurd's Lumiere paint and glued it on top of this one..

🌟   8   Robo star dies frame the starburst stamp from the Faded Fragments set - made to measure!  For other subtle texture, stars were diecut from florists "papers"  I suggest you try a heat gun on each first before glueing down and heating to hurry the drying!  One melted, one evaporated.  And the mesh-like sheets need to be sandwiched between two sheets of paper if they're to cut through.

🌟   9  You can get all of Seth's goodies direct from him.  If you're mad about stencils, they are made at Stencil Girl.  Dies, embossing folders and some stamps are at Spellbinders.  Others of his stamps are at Paper Artsy (did we mention he has a line of Fresco chalk paints with them too?) and still more stamps with Impression Obsessions

🌟   10  FINALLY...... (last bullet in the brain)  As I sweat in nearly 30-degree (C) summer heat, I see quite a few of you "northerners" have thawed out enough to put up your dark, weird, off-beat, definitely not-cute projects on our challenge.  There's space for more of course, add yours here and one of the darkest, creepiest, most off-beat pieces will win something from Seth's generous gifts to us.

The Finale is Here!

Sob! It is a happy time as we have found CT Anne, Evil Froggie, and it is Halloween!!  But, alas, it also is the end of the 31 Days of Halloween for 2016!  How we shall miss seeing all the faboolous makes this wonderful event brings!  Just remember, at Dream in Darkness we are the home of Halloween ALL year long....it never really ends!  So dry your tears and start thinking how you can creep, weird, odd, plain old mess up Thanksgiving projects!  Here we go with our last makes for the event but never our last makes for Halloween!  NEVER!!

CT Anne says Hooray!!!!  She has corrupted her teamies over the pink issue, or worn them down, made them use up all the pink in their stash, got it all out of their system - see, Nan can barely produce a digital pink watermark MWAHAHAHAHA!!!

I don't know if I'm thick-skinned or thin-skinned, but I do know that I need something to protect my fabulously awesomely inventive brain from the Slings And Shafts of Life, and this is something like what you'd find twixt skin & brain... bone!

Even DH got a bit of a fright when he came home from work to be met by this apparition!  But he still likes it - bless him :)  And my dentist says there's nothing wrong with my teeth apart from a few aged fillings 

(as he hands me a bill for $583 for replacing just one!)

The papier mache skull is from Silver Crow Creations.  It sucks up and holds black gesso then paint much better than a plastic skull. They also have the centre headpiece "wings" which colour up well with alcohol inks, or rub n buff, or any paint really.  The jewellery came from 16kg  in a banana box I acquired very very cheaply some years back.  A lot of it was earrings, with many duplicates, so the stalk for pierced ears pokes through the paper mache to help hold the pices on while glue dries. The mdf cupcake stand is a Kaisercraft kit- got as far as priming it with black gesso.  The crochet veil/mantilla... can't remember where the pattern came from, but the handiwork is all moi

The painting techniques came from various online classes (and 2 books) 

from Michael deMeng including his currently-running Skullduggery class. 

I've edited the photo to exaggerate the colouring.

And the test tube... is for catching all the ideas that 

still keep dripping out of my brain moi-mwahahaha

CT Kim has this...

"FIN"...

or is it?

MDF Skull to Celebrate the Day of the Dead...layered up with more DecoArt treats!

CT Granne has modest offer of a card, using mainly DI's and Tim Holtz stamps and dies.

Well, there was a stencil, few other stamps and fabric tape together

with torned piece of paper involved also...

Happy Halloween!!

CT Nan is ending the 31 days with a beginning?  Yes, November and December will be sponsored by the awesome Grumbacher Art!  So she has a partial reveal of the inside of a book that has a lot of Grumbacher goodness on the outside so be sure to come back tomorrow for a peek at the front!  She will also be showing some more pics of the inside of the book as November moves through with a chill in the air and the smell of paint in the house!

The book includes products by Tim Holtz, images from Mischief Circus, and some of the vintage images I have in my Etsy Store "Odditiesdigitalstamps.  If you want to grab any of these images free, just run over to my blog and download them for free!  Happy Halloween!

Remember, two months of Grumbacher fabulous products and projects and the winners of November and December will win Grumbacher products!  So get those painty hands ready and those ideas churning for a chance to be a winner!