Another painting for InkTober, but this one is more simple in its design. However, it’s ALL done in drawing inks. Even the colours are drawing inks.
You can buy drawing inks from various places and from cheap as chips to a years salary. The inks I have are on the cheap as chips scale but, as you can see, if you know how to make them work for you then they’ll work for you. And, since I was, for the first time, joining in with Inktober, and wasn’t sure that I would take this form of art up as part of my crafty loves, I didn’t want to invest in expensive equipment.
The drawing inks in the above photo are the coloured inks I bought to try, and which I used for this inking. I bought this whole set of glass bottles of coloured drawing inks, 6 bottles of Black, Brown, Green, Blue, Yellow and Red, all of them in screw top bottles with an ‘eye dropper’ set into the lids, so that you can lift as much or as little ink out as you need. The whole set cost me just £6.00, and (so long as you’re in the UK) you can buy them from The Works<–Link to these inks, opens up in a new window for you.
It’s quite a thick looking ink and not the thin runny stuff you might be used to. It’s not the sort of stuff you can use in an ink pen. But you can, to some extent, manipulate it and dilute it with water a little. I would strongly suggest that if you buy some, you play with it first on some scraps of watercolour paper so that you get accustomed to how it likes you to play.
I also have some Rose Gold, Copper and Light Silver Drawing Ink, made by Ocaldo. Again, I found these as a set of three for £6.00 at The Works <– link opens in a new window for you. The link takes you to the set of three inks, but they are available as individual inks for £2.50 each. (in the search bar at The Works simply type ‘Drawing Ink’, and it should give you the various selections it has).
I used the silver for the central rod of the umbrella, and tiny touches of it for the silver bits inside the umbrella which make it hold its shape when it’s open. (I have no idea what those silvery bits are – possibly, maybe the ‘frame’ – perhaps?).
#Inktober2017 – Taken with the flash on to make the silver ink show up – but the flash has dampened down the red of the umbrella. It looks more like the first photo at the head of this post
The blue of the raindrops was made using the blue from the Crawford and Black set of inks, and the pinky red of the umbrella was created using the Red from the same set.
And that’s about all there is to it. A simple little ink drawing. It was about all I could come up with as ‘inspiration’ has apparently taken a sick day.
For those who are singing the song … (and for those who like a little movie nostagia now and again) … the song and clip from the movie ….
I hope your Tuesday is or has been a truly lovely one. May the rest of your day be blessed.
Well I did say yesterday that I’d be hard pushed to not, at some point, break open a coloured ink during InkTober this year … and I didn’t last even a quarter of the month. How dreadful am I?
There are gazillions of the InkTober Artists around the globe all pushing their black ink pens loyally and here I am being the bad girl. Oooooohhh but it’s so delicious to be bad sometimes! 😉
And .. I’m not really bad. Not really … for I still used ink. I used Brown Ink instead of black, and I used it straight from the bottle. A proper glass bottle too!
Aw anyhoo, enough of my bad … let’s crack on and talk about todays inky offering…
This drawing (with some painting) was inspired by a handmade card which I made for Beverly of More Ink Please, – no the name of her blog isn’t made up for InkTober, that really is the name of her blog. Ha! I sent her the card just over a week ago, and she emailed me to tell me that it had arrived. YAY! I’ll blog the card probably tomorrow as I have to re-size the photo’s still, but for today I’m sharing my offering for the 4th day of InkTober2017, which was inspired, as I said, by the card I made for Beverly.
Autumn is a much-loved season by me, so it made sense that I would have to do some sort of nod to Autumn, and here is the inking I created…
#InkTober2017 day 4
I started with the acorns on branches, on the upper left corner, and pencilled in where I wanted them to be before using ink straight from the bottle and a fine paint brush to ink up both the branches and the cups and acorns themselves. The ink used is called Chronicle Acrylic Dip Pen Ink, in Sepia. (I’ve had this bottle of never ending ink for years, and I’m not even sure they still make it). I also used a Kuretake Zig Memory System Ink Pen in black, (size 005) to give some dark shadows to places where they would normally fall. Those two things were the only colours and items used to make the acorn branches.
#InkTober2017 day 4
The Autumn leaf wreath was first drawn out lightly in pencil, then lightly again using a Zig Memory System Pigment Ink Pen, in Chocolate. I then used Kuretake Gansai Watercolour Paints to add Autumnal colours to the leaves. I added the twisted vine to the ‘wreath’ using the same Chronicle Ink I’d used on the Acorn branches, and also added some twisted tumbling vines too.
Using the Zig Memory System Ink Penin chocolate, I added the ‘Autumn’ word, and that’s all there was to it!
It was quite quick to make, the majority of the time seemed to be waiting for parts to dry before moving on.
I’ve told myself that I have to be a good girl for a few days now and not dip my brushes or pens into the blue ink. So … fingers crossed…. I might be able to do it without falling off the wagon. (to borrow a phrase from somewhere else. lol)
Autumn has really arrived to the South of England. It’s so heart stoppingly pretty here right now. Green is beautiful .. but ohhh.. the yellows, reds and oranges, those stunning sunburst shades that only nature can summon up from her paint-box … those colours just make me want to lie down in those leaves and do the snow angel thing. So yummy!
Hot meals have come back onto the menu, and my soft pashmina type scarves have come out and are enjoying the odd outing now and again.
Did you know ….that today, in 1883, it was the first run of the Orient Express.? Well, you do now! You can go and impress someone with your new-found knowledge and watch them as they try to work out why you’re so amazing!! You’re welcome. 😀
Have a wonderful rest of your day! And … when you get there … Sleep well, for tomorrow you will be gifted with another 24 hours (if you’re lucky enough) and you can join the rest of us as we do it all again … with some differences.
Sending squidges, from me in my corner to you in yours.
Happy Monday! I hope your week gets off to a great start and continues in that fashion.
I’m here to share a little, easy to put together card today. Although I have a plentiful supply of ready folded and scored craft (Kraft) cards and I absolutely love cards which are made using them … I very rarely seem to make a card with them. It’s the strangest thing. I always reach for white card! Why is that I wonder? Bugs the life out of me!
Anyhoo …. I made this card... consisting of some hand painted (by me) folksy style roses on black card, matted and layered onto some die cut white and pink card, then fixed to a 5.5″ square Kraft/Craft card, and with the addition of a warm pink grosgrain ribbon.
The central ‘picture’ of the single rose, is an enamelled brad, which I fixed onto a circle of die cut white card, and then attached it to the inside of the card. (with the addition of some bakers twine tied into a bow)
Finally, I added some pink enamelled dots to the corners of the front of the card and VOILA! A circle of roses on a card …. which will fit into a regular envelope!
And that’s all there was to it!
Mondays can be really miserable days …. but only if YOU let them be. Make up your mind to have a great day today. It’s a choice. Make the choice.
I wish you a truly lovely day. Please . . . share a smile with someone. Your smile could make a whole lot of difference to someone’s day.
Sending you love and squidges …. and sharing a smile with you 😀
About three years ago Mr. Cobs and I were talked into having a kitten by our (grown up and married) daughter. She knew someone who was desperately trying to find homes for kittens and we agreed that we’d have one.
We chose the most adorable little black and white bit of fun and mischief, got her home, and within about three hours we knew we’d made a mistake. We shouldn’t have just had one kitten. We should have had two. She needed a little playmate. We were fine, but we weren’t kittens. She’d come from a big ‘brood’ of kittens and we felt so mean taking her away from them all. It was decided. We contacted the lady and asked if we could have another kitten.
So back we went the next day to pick up the tiniest little black boy kitten; huge big blue eyes which melted my heart and the tiniest little white diamond on his chest. Ohhh, he was SO adorable that there should be a law against being that cute.
We got him into the house and his little girl sister instantly jumped on him and battered him with play. Mr Cobs and I both agreed that we reckoned the young lady was going to be the boss out of the two of them.
We weren’t ‘new’ pet owners. We already had two dogs, and one very elderly cat (whosenow 20 years old). So looking after little rascals wasn’t in the least bit of a surprise. We knew what we were letting ourselves in for.
But …. we didn’t quite reckon on Alf. Or … Alf Capone; to give him the full, respectful name he requires.
(I call him ‘Alfie Pops’ – but don’t let him know I told you because I fear that he will tell me I’m dead to him if anyone else knows about this affectionate monica I’ve bestowed upon his head). :o)
Photograph taken by my lovely neighbour, who’s way better at capturing a photograph of this almost all black chap than I am.
Now I’d like to think that Alf Capone Esquire is more James Bond (cue Live and Let Die music in the background) – because he is so sleek. So dashing. So, SO handsome, and he truly looks like he’s wearing a tuxedo. The white diamond on his chest simply looks like a pure white shirt, beneath his black tuxedo jacket. However, I’ve never seen a Bond film where James attempts to assassinate his sister whenever he’s ready for dinner and none is being served at the exact time he requires it. (more about this distinguishing character ‘trait’ in a moment)
I’m not saying that any mafioso would assassinate his sister – however … we are dealing with the Cat Mafia here and so I think the rules are very different.
I absolutely love this fascinating creature to the moon and back (plus tax) and he tickles the heck out of me with some of the things he does, and has done, in the time since we’ve had him.
I’m rather ashamed to tell you this but … well, … Mr. Alf is a kleptomaniac. He’s stolen things from other people’s houses; cat toys, food – corn on the cob, a fried egg, and even bread rolls which, by the look of the contents, came from someone’s barbecue. He’s delivered looong lengths of silicon sealant at my feet which he’s obviously freshly pulled out from goodness knows where; a sock; a tiny rubber bouncy ball, and … oh, an assortment of other weird and odd stolen things. Along with the usual cat ‘gifts’ of birds (both alive and those he’s personally ‘delivered’ to the Rainbow Bridge) and mice (those are more often than not alive and running at speed when he drops them, with me chasing after them, squealing: “eek, eeeeeek, EEEEEK!” as I try to catch the darn things but stop him from catching them again – sigh).
But his most favourite thing to do is to accompany me to the craft room, where he sleeps either under one of my desks, on a big, soft red with white spots comfy cushion, which my (now passed on) eldest dog used to sleep on, or he will curl up on one of the chairs pushed under the table at the back of the craft room, and sleep there for as long as I’m crafting.
If I haven’t gone to my crafty hidey hole when he feels I should have, he will come into the living room where I’m sat and, standing on his two back paws, he’ll put his front paws on my knees and tap me gently, over and over, until I look at him, and I can clearly see the ‘nag nag nag’ in his eyes, asking me to “C’mon…. get a move on, I’m waiting!” LOL.
However …. in the house, when he gets tired, …. aw, that’s when he becomes a baby again. He loves the blankets we have for our dog (she likes to clamber under the blankets and put herself to bed). Mr. Alf loves these blankets too, so much so, that they’ve become his version of a childs ‘blanky’. He HAS to have a few minutes with the blanky before he’ll go to bed.
You see …. he likes to suck on the fluffy side of them. Yes – you read that correctly.
We’ve tried to stop him – to no avail. We’re aware how bad it is and I won’t bother to tell you how worried I am that he might be taking bits of fluff into his system. (I have checked these blankets and haven’t found any bare patches, or parts where it looks like bits are missing).
The photo above shows you how he drapes himself over the edge of the dogs wicker bed, and once he’s got the blanket in just the right place, he begins to pad, pad, pad it, – just like he would have done to his mummy’s tummy when he was a kitten and wanted to feed – and then he’ll begin to suck it. Audibly. Noisy little slurpy, sucking noises. I kid ye not dear reader.This is really embarrassing when we have visitors and he does it, because it’s quite loud.
Once he’s had his blanky time, he then gets himself into position to sleep …. by making sure that he drapes himself half on the bed, and half off. (see the above photograph). Doesn’t matter which of the numerous beds we have dotted about our little cottage, – he has a choice of:- two wicker beds with comfy cushions; a large, rigid plastic bed with a big squishy cushion inside; a firmly padded tartan with matching cushion cat bed, or two lovely, roses printed Cath Kidston pet beds – he makes sure that he drapes himself in such a way that at the very least one whole leg is draped outside the bed. We have no idea why he has to sleep this way, but I’m figuring that it must be a Cat Mafia thing. One foot always ready to pounce while the other three are sleeping.
However … when hungry, that’s when this adorable little monster becomes the naughty little devil and gets a telling off. If we take just a nano second too long in dishing up his hearts desire, he will turn his annoyance at being made to wait, into a reason for his killer instinct to show up and he will attempt to kill his sister, so as to get us into action pronto.
He chases her around our cottage: – up the hallway at breakneck speed and back down again; over the high-backed chair in the living room (with claws out, which makes it sound like he’s ripping the fabric), over the sofa, both the back and the seat parts, into and around the conservatory, up the 5 feet tall cat scratching post/bed/climbing frame combination, and, eventually , if the door’s left open, he’ll harem scarem through the bedroom, at a gazillion miles an hour – which he KNOWS he’s not allowed to do – over the bed, onto the windowsill – disturbing the curtains and making the lovely little yacht I have on the sill there rock back and forth. If by chance he manages to actually catch his sister, he’ll make her squeal by grabbing her by the scruff of her neck – which gets him a real old telling off, – which in turn makes him sulk on the sofa until he finally gets what he wants …. dinner, in his favourite dish. (Please God don’t anyone give him the wrong dish!)
He can be a troublesome bug to our dog too. He major time loves our dog (‘Maybees’ – say it sort of singy songy and you’ll see how it sounds. lol) sooooo much, that he wants to love her and love her and love her. He rubs his chubby little cheeks around her face, scent marking her and making her ‘his’. He cleans her ears for her with his raspy tongue, which tickles her and makes her shake her head so violently that I think it’s going to fly off one day. He clambers onto her bed and snuggles up to her – which drives her nuts and she pleads with me to get him off. Ohhh he loves Maybees soooo much that it’s pitiful to watch. Maybees does love him too. But she just wishes that he’d leave her alone to snore when she’s asleep and not climb all over her, trying to wake her up.
But he’s adorable. For all his funny things, annoying things, rascal ways … we all love him to pieces. My Daughter and Son-in-Law have both said that they’d have him in a heartbeat. He’s just brilliant.
And … when he finally finds a spot and settles down …. he’s just the little boy he always was when we first brought him home.
He’s just my Alfie Pops. Soft, with fur like you’ve never felt before. Thick, deep and luxurious. Sweet natured (really – most of the time). A little baby who loves ice cream, drinking chocolate (I dip my finger into it and he licks it off my finger) and scrambled egg. His favourite treats are cheesy puffed cat crunchies, which I keep in a little glass jar and shake them when it’s time to come home and stop playing outside in the woods. He’s a beautiful, massively heavy, big (much much bigger than he looks in these photographs) gorgeous, sweet thing and I love him to pieces. And no, dearest daughter, if you’re reading, I’m not going to give him to you … but I’ll share him with you when you visit.
Before signing off …. I know this isn’t one of my usual crafty posts and I know I’ve been Missing In Action for a couple of weeks (or so), and my blogs been very quiet. I had to have some surgery. I found some lumps about four weeks or so ago and the surgeon said that rather than simply take a little biopsy and wait to see what turned up, he felt it would be more prudent to remove all the lumps and, hopefully, all the surrounding cells, and then get a biopsy done on all that tissue. He doesn’t think there’s anything to be worried about but I won’t get any results quite yet. I’m not worrying until there’s something to worry about, because that’s just a waste of days and the older I get, the faster the days seem to go, so I’m not about to waste even one day worrying when I’ve got so much crafting to do!
Normal service will be resumed ASAP, as I get back to my crafty stuff. However … I will continue to introduce you to the fur babies I have here, who accompany me to my craft room, so that you paint a picture of who’s under the desk with me as I craft. :o)
Thank you so much for coming to have a read. I love that you visit to share a few minutes with me. Thank you.
If love is blind … then why is lingerie so popular?
I had so much fun making this card. It’s a large 8″x8″ card, made on white cardstock. The pink, rose and printed papers (at the two corners) are all papers which came free with magazines a while back; and the gold mirror board and flat gold card (die cut into a rectangle doily) were from my scraps drawer!
I’m very much a thrifty crafter and won’t waste great papers if I can save them – so where I knew I wanted to curl back I simply used a large triangle of paper to cover the corners of the base white card. ↑
The sentiment was stamped onto gold card and embossed in black.I felt that it needed more importance, so choose to use one of a selection of light-weight wooden frames – this one is warmer to look at than the photo shows.
I stamped out the basque ↑ onto the same colour of pink paper as the backing paper, embossed it and then attached it to a little hand-made, wire coat hanger. I punched a hole in the rectangular doily and ‘hung’ the basque from it.
If you look closely at the basque in the photo above ↑ you might be able to see that I used a white pen in places. This was to place ‘light’ in the places that natural light would have fallen on parts of the basque in real life. The ribbons, the seams, bits of the lace, etc etc.
I stamped peacock feathers ↑ over the paler of the pink backing pages, and embossed them with a pale pink, twinkly embossing powder. In the photo above you can see the embossed feathers. (I was checking the page for placement of the basque on the doily to make sure that it would look right.) ↑
Added roses in three shades, and some sprigs of a lilac type flower in white and pink. ↑
Close up photographs ↑ of the corners ↑ which were curled back so that you can see the patterned paper underneath and the two different colours of pink papers.
Although I’d curled and glued corners I wasn’t entirely convinced that the glue would hold, so I chose a large, warm pink brad for each corner to pin the paper in place.
I attached the rectangle doily, which I’d die cut on my Ebosser,to a piece of gold mirror board, then cut around the doily so that the mirror board fitted the doily exactly. Everything was then fixed in place, andvoila! One more card added to the pile for charity.
I had lots of fun making this card and loved the way it’s turned out. Hope you like it too.
Have a truly lovely Sunday all!
Sending love out into the ethernet – so grab some as it flies by!
The Art of Cobwebs 