Mirror, Mirror On The Wall

Hello blog visitors, thanks for stopping by.  It's a bank holiday here in the UK & true to form, the weather is terrible.  The rain & wind woke me before 4a.m & I've been up since 5.  I do feel very sorry for all those attending Jubilee events, after last week's glorious sunshine, this weather is a real letdown.  If you are feeling a bit miserable, perhaps this post will make you smile.

Today's photos are from Lisa's class last Friday, June 1, which was a continuation of May's brayer techniques class.  This time we had a mirror to decorate - gulp!  There was a high level of trepidation amongst the attendees & an even higher level of concentration once we got started.  But by the end of both classes everyone seemed delighted with their mirrors & happy that they had pushed themselves a little further past their boundaries.

Lisa took us through the various steps, one by one & it was a very interesting process.  We used Distress inks & Adirondack dye inks & it turns out that it's much easier to use a brayer on wood, than on paper.  (Lisa had prepared the mirrors with matte emulsion paint beforehand)  No matter how we used the brayer, we didn't get any streaks, or lines & the painted wood absorbed a lot of the ink, so we were able to put  lots of layers of colour on.

The mirrors in this post are two of Lisa's samples, using pink & blue shades, with black Archival ink for the over-stamping & stamps from Lavinia Stamps.

She made a mirror in each of the two classes & I definitely want you to see them, especially the one from the evening class.  For that Lisa used Antique Linen, Walnut Stain & Tea Dye distress inks & it is GORGEOUS.  Keep an eye out for it in a future post.

I struggled with my background, first because I couldn't decide on the colours I wanted & then, once I got started, everything was very symmetrical & balanced, which, no matter how hard I try, I can't seem to avoid.  Lisa came to the rescue & I watched in awe as she created mountains & shadows where I had just blocks of colour.  I hope to finish my mirror in the next day or two, I'll let you know when it's on my blog, in case you'd like to see it.

 I think n the above picture you can really see the different levels of stamping, as well as the grain in the wood, which gives the images great texture.  Watching a picture being created using just stamps & inks is something I never get tired of.

That's it for now, I have to go see a man about a dog - I'm dogsitting for friends at the end of the week.  I hope to be back tomorrow with another mirror from Friday.  In the meantime, thanks for visiting, enjoy the rest of the holiday weekend and

Keep Crafting!

Kirsten