Okay, so it is done.  The stress and fear have lifted from my body because there is now nothing I can do from this point but hope and pray.  Yes.  It is official.  My summer fair submissions are in for the fine art competition.  I have been pouring over a couple different (five to be precise) fine art canvases for the past few months, but seriously digging into them for the past two weeks.

And they just went in.  There is no work I can do on them now.  The first tear of judging

starts, and all I can do is wait and see.  I had a canvas up last year, and I REALLY want to see my stuff hanging again this year.  Last night when I decreed to my husband that I was officially done, he went and pulled out the submissions I put in last year (there was only four last year) and lined them up next to the ones for this year.  And like the sweet guy he is, he kissed my head and said “look how far you’ve come in only a year”.

And you know, he was right.  I am a much better artist this year then I was a year ago, and the quality of the work I’ve submitted is significantly better.  That said, the quality of work that hangs at this fair is extraordinary, and I am not that type of quality yet.  And well, art is subjective.  There is no saying who is judging and what they like.  Do you they get me, understand what I’m saying, or in my case even recognize mixed media as a serious art style.  Time will only tell.

But it is submitted, which means that we may now resume our normally scheduled program.  Which means I’m back to the card challenges.  Yeah!!!

---

While we may be back to our normal program, we have a little wrench to throw in the machine.  Sandy Allnock, an artist and crafter who I am a very big fan of challenged us this week to a little craft challenge.  So apparently Cochella was or is going on, a music festival in Cochella California, and Ms. Allnock was inspired.

She challenged all of us to turn out regular stamps into musical instruments and out critters or people into rock stars.  Fun, right?  I thought this was cool, so I did it.  Well, twice.  And since there is still a few days left, there might just be a third.  Yes, I’m a dork.  That’s fine.

The first card was a tree and an Angel from different My Favorite Things stamp packs.  I turned the tree into a harp (very rock and roll, I know) and turned the angel into a harpist by trimming her arm a bit and relaying it.  I painted the harp in my Pearlescent watercolors and colored the angel with my copics.  Because she seemed so sweet and innocent, I added a snarky reply from Dylusions.  What can I say, I’m snarky deep in the core.

The other card was a little more rock and roll.  I pulled some woodland creatures from Hero Arts and some cocktail stamps from Paper Smooches and constructed a second card.  The little badger just looks like he is playing a keyboard, so I used the drink stirrer from the set and made it a keyboard.  Then I snagged a martini glass and made it a guitar (yes, i know, now a huge stretch).  I colored everything in with my copics and spectrum noirs and added metallic paper to the back of the card.  I added the sentiments from the same Paper Smooches cocktail stamp pack, and was pretty pleased with how things turned out.

---

This week the designers over at Inspired By All the Little Things have tossed out an inspiration challenge consisting of a princes tutu cupcake.  It was so decadent it gave you a tooth ache.

I am not a natural pink girl, but this photo is so girly, you just

have to go for it.  So I pulled out a C.C. Design stamp of a little cute pixie and pink, pink, pink her up with my alcohol markers.  Even her skin is tinted pink.  I added a piece of printed card stock that had a glitter embossing on it and added it to the back of the pixie.  I stamped a sentiment from Stampendous in Memento love note.  Finally I added a shinny sheer ribbon and tied it to leave it loss. (I didn’t have a tutu material which is what I really wanted).  In the end, I think she ended up almost as sweet as the cupcake.  Yes, I went a little dark with the pink, but you are just going to have to give me that.

---

Next up is a clean and simple theme challenge from the crafting crew over at The Paper Players.  This week the theme was butterflies.  Now who doesn’t have like a million different butterfly stamps.  You should go see all the different post people put out.  There are some really cool butterfly stamps out there.

I however, did not use a stamp.  I used a die from My Favorite Things.  It has three different sized butterflies that are kind of cool and I die cut them out in both a gray paper and a piece of crazy watercolor printed card stock.  I used the same watercolor printed card stock for the back ground of the card.  I added a bit of floral vellum and stamped with my Stazon a sentiment from Stampendous.  I layered the butterfly die cuts, only adhering them with dimensional tape at the butterfly bodies.  The card has a nice pop up feel to it, and while the paper is not clean and simple, I still feel the card is.

---

Finally today we have a sketch challenge from the sleuths of design over at Can You Case it.  This is one of those challenges that I find really hard because there is so much going on and so much you can do, and so little wiggle room and etc, etc, etc.

So I did when all else fails when I’m lost, I embossed a pretty little flower embossing folder from Darice to some white card stock.  I had originally planned to use a butterfly stamp since I had not stamped butterflies on the other card, but my butterflied did not fit.  Okay, so I started digging into the bin-o-stamps and found an older one I hadn’t used in a while.  It is a cute little bug stamp set from Recollections.  I stamped out three of the little guys and colored them in with my collections of alcohol markers. I added a few dot drops to the card in three different colors and sizes to finish off the sketch and added a sentiment from an Avery Elle stamp pack (it is my favorite thank you stamp).  I finally add black card stock behind everything and called it a day.  I think it can out, and you can’t see where I had to add white acrylic paint to cover up a boo-boo.  Ha, take that universe.

---

Okay, so I am off to go take card of stuff that has been neglected while I finished the art, like vacuuming and laundry.  I don’t want to do it, but I also want everyone have clean underware, so I am at a stale mate.  Ugh, why does house work have to be so boring.  And constant.  Why is it you finish laundry and suddenly there is more?  Ugh.  I do not look forward to the day my kids move out of the house, but I do look forward to the day that their dirty laundry does.  Seeing as that is probably least fifteen years alway, I’m going to let go of that dream, for now.  On that same note, it is the dog’s hair I have to vacuum up, why can’t we train the dog to do the vacuuming?  (it might be wise to note, I may need a little more sleep now that the art is in)  I’m off.  Hope you are making stuff you are proud of.