Beach Tag for Tag It Tuesday...

Hello My Bloggy Friends :) Long time no post!

It seems that the Summer season should be a time of blissful relaxation in the sun with plenty of time to do the things you want to do. However, in real life it never seems to work out that way. The kids are home from school. There are trips to take and plans to make. The list of things that have to get finished before 'normal time' starts up again grows longer and longer. My time for art is limited and time to write blog posts even shorter. But, I knew today was the day to join in the fun for 'Tag It Tuesdays' linky party over at Cards and More by Sheri and I really wanted to play! So I made my tag just in time. Here is my process for those of you who want to follow along :) 

The theme was ocean/nautical :) I wanted to make a tag that reflected the time I spent on the Oregon beaches as a child. Wandering in the sun, feeling the salt spray on my skin, and picking up shells. Here is my tag :)

I started out looking for some scrapbook paper or stamps in my stash with a shell theme...but SHOCKING...I had nothing. So instead I did a google search for some images. If you want to use just a simple line drawing in your art,  a good idea is to search for coloring pages. I found these shells and then used Microsoft Publisher to shrink them and put multiple sets on a page. I printed them out on a old manila folder I had cut in half. I wanted the lines to be a little less stark black, so I used a brayer and some gesso over the whole image. This also serves to seal up the ink which will run with wet media.

Next I got out some beachy colored inks. Tea Stain, Turquoise and White. I spritzed and blotted until I got a look I liked. The Heidi Swapp Colorshine sprays also have a pretty shimmer to them which I liked :)

I had some left over Gelli printed deli paper on my desk that I had made for my Koala collage. I used a few torn strips to at the bottom of my tag in the sandy area. I attached it with matte medium and trimmed the edges when it was dry.

Next was some drips and splatters. I used white acrylic ink and some Pebeo Dyna acrylic paint to make drips from the side of the tag across horizontally. Then I used watered down white acrylic paint and a fan brush to spatter the tag.

Once that was dry, I mounted the tag on some confetti tag cardstock and also created a hole enforcer out of the same cardstock.

Now for my top layer. I did a google search for a inspiration photo of a girl picking up shells. Then I used that image to inspire my sketch. Next, I colored in my sketch with Neocolor II water soluble crayons blended with a waterbrush and a little white acrylic. Here is a progression of the coloring of the sketch. At the end I reinforced some of the lines with my graphite pencil.

Now I needed some shells for the beach and there happened to still be a few whole ones left on the manila stock I had printed. So I cut them out and colored them with my Neocolor II crayons. Then I attached them to the tag using foam dots for a little dimension.

The upper part of the tag looked pretty plain so it was time for some words. I picked out some washi tape that reminded me of a beach umbrella and used my archival ink to stamp 'beach days' on it. However, this cheap tape has some sort of a plastic or waxy coating and the ink beaded up. So I went over the images using my black Posca pen. I guess I could have just used my own writing in the first place! 

To finish up my tag I used some sari ribbon and a piece of fiber through the hole at the top.

I hope you enjoyed my tag project :) Go check out other 'beachy keen' tags at Cards and More by Sheri. <3 Shel