Tag It Tuesday - May Flowers

Hello Friends :)

Today is the Tag It Tuesday linky party over at Cards and More by Sheri blog.. This is a fun day for linking up your altered tags to her blog for sharing with everyone :) I hope you have made a altered tag and are ready to play along with us! Here is my official May tag in the theme of 'flowers'. Some of your may have seen the other flowery tag I made on this post . I couldn't decide which should be the 'official' one so I posted them both :)


To start out my tag I cut a 3" X 7" piece of manila stock out of an old manila folder. You could use a #10 size shipping tag...I am just reusing something I already have. I collaged the piece using some tissue paper printed with music and text. I also added a couple strips of washi tape I pulled off of packaging people have sent me. I can't bear to waste pretty stuff...and because washi tape is so low tack..it comes off easily. I used matte medium to glue everything down and seal it. Note: even when washi tape is new..its a good idea to seal it with matte medium or the like because it IS so low tack :P


Next, I rolled over my tag using some gesso and a 2"brayer to mellow out the black a bit.


Now I sketched on some sunflower shapes using a graphite pencil.


I wanted to protect the text looking areas of the insides of the shapes..so I painted over it with some 3D gloss gel to make those areas resist color I applied later. Then I dried it..and went for the magical resist action with some Dylusions ink sprays. Wait....IT DIDN'T WORK. Sigh...I guess I didn't think about the fact that I had covered the whole tag already with matte gel medium...which also resists..so now the whole ground is equal. Oh well..mistakes just mean you change your plan and move on!


So next I painted the negative space using my watercolor tray from Japan :) I tried for a ombre' look..red to orange. Then I brayered some clear gesso over this layer to keep the colors intact when I use more wet media over the top


Now to paint in the leaves and centers of the flowers using more watercolor and a small brush.


Once that layer was all dry, I went around my flowers and leaves using a brown Posca paint pen. That seemed pretty dull...so I went around again with a white. Much better.At this point I set this tag aside and went back to working on the other one. 


When I picked the tag back up later it seemed BORING. What it needed was a girl on it. You know the saying from the show Portlandia 'put a bird on it'...well I say 'put a girl on it' :) So I took a scrap of the manila stock that happened to have a folded edge already and made a sketch of a girl and some stems. I cut it out and them made some flowers and leaves to glue on the stems.


Then I painted the girl and her flowers using my trusty Japanese watercolors. I used Posca paint pens in various colors to draw around her.  I had to use a .005 micron pen for her face because it was sooo small. 


Now I needed something to say on my tag. I printed up some sage words on my printer and cut them out. Then I attached them to the back of the girl (oh I decorated it with some stamps first) and on to the tag using matte gel medium. I went around the 'like a flower' part with a stabilo black pencil and blended it with some water.


To finish up my tag I mounted it on dark green cardstock and added some ribbon and fibers to the top.


I hope you enjoyed my tag and will play along with Tag It Tuesday :) I would love to see what flowery things YOU come up with!
<3 Shel




Comments

  1. Oh Shel, you are so talented! I enjoy when you show the process like this so very much!!!
    It makes me feel like I might be able to attempt something close.
    I really like the color choices. GREAT FLOWERS!

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    1. Thank you Heather :) Sunflowers are the only thing I liked about my time living in Kansas..lol

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  2. Love it! Don't you love when your best laid plans go sideways?? Fantastic recovery and use of the Japanese watercolors. You had me at "sunflower" anyway! ;)

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    1. Thanks Sheri. My plans go sideways all the time..just have to not panic!

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  3. Wonderful tag, Shel - yes it did need a girl on it, and she was the perfect one!

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    1. Thanks Win. Lately everything seems to need a girl LOL

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  4. I love your drawings Shel- I have said it before, you are so talented!! Beautiful tag! ")

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  5. Fantastic tag and thanks so much for showing the process. Does dawing pretty much come naturally to you or was there a point had to work at it? I can barely draw a stick figure :-)

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    1. Thanks Becky :) I guess drawing started to work better when i really made a effort to see shapes in things. However, I don't think I draw that well..very childish looking. I think I am best at color choices...and drawing is very much farther down the list.

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  6. Love this altered tag, Shel. I think it is very clever that your girl is mounted above your background and can be opened, like a book, to discover thought provoking words to think about on the back of your girl. So creative! Your girl was a perfect addition to your striking background. Wow!

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    1. Thank you :) The background was fun to make but kinda boring until I added the girl.I think.

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