Encaustic Poppies

I just love dried poppy heads. My favorite are the big fat ones but unfortunately that's not what I had on hand. I wanted to make something with them but I wasn't sure if I could do it in encaustic wax because they're so delicate. The wax actually helped strengthen them. I wouldn't pick at them or anything but they are stronger then when I started.

 I keep all my left over, clean up,  paper towels in the studio because you never know when they'll come in handy. I decided I would audition them on this piece. Cheese cloth was another experiment & I really love the effect.

Sheet Protector ATC

Today I felt like playing with heat.There is a technique in the Creative Embellishment book that I believe I've mentioned before on my blog. I just love this book. Apparently you can sandwich fabrics between a sheet protector and heat it with an iron for a great look. Well I was very unsuccessful with the iron. My iron and I just don't get along. So I left it and started melting some painted Tyvek for beads. Then I thought that maybe I could try the sheet protector technique again using my heat gun. So I grabbed a saved paper napkin from my basket of odds and sods, layered it between a photograph protector and heated it. I didn't want it to be square so I kept melting until the edges got really rough. I then added Citrine Lumiere to the rough edges. I didn't mind the look so I figured my little sample could be my next ATC. For the background I started with a Bristol ATC card. I had some saved paper towel with left over inks on it that seemed to match the flower, so I just started layering paper towel with watered down white glue until I thought that it was enough. I think it was three in total. I'm very impatient so I rolled my paint brush over the paper toweled ATC to take out the extra glue...put it between my teflon sheet and that's when my iron came in handy. I ironed until it was dry. I then added gel gloss medium to give it some shine....dried it with my heat gun and added Citrine Lumiere to the edges with my finger. I think I'll play a little more with this technique. I really want to achieve the look that was presented in the book.