Art Look Back-Part 2

Hi everyone. Happy first Friday in January.  

My daughter's been on vacation this week and visiting, and I knew there wouldn't be much time for art or posting, so today's post is scheduled.  And some of you asked how I had time to make art and visit with my daughter. I haven't made any art, but I did have a pile done already.

 I thought  as we wrap up the work week I would do another Art Look Back to 2021. If you missed the first post and are curious, you can find it here:Art Look Back 2021 part 1.

My first 2 pages are an ode to DNA day in April. I had a lot of fun using my few science themed stamps to make these. They were also a way to celebrate my first DNA day of retirement when I didn't get to teach about it in school.

My next 2 pages have an Asian theme.  The top one was me playing with the vertical page and the second one was me playing with the horizontal aspect of the page.

No matter whether you are going horizontal or vertical, you need a bit of both to balance the page.

Elizabeth has asked me if I would recycle something for her April bearthday  month, and I had this opportunity to do something with the plaster fish my husband found for me at the "dump". I covered him up with printed tissue paper and paint.  That got rid of his rather garish tropical colors. Now he is sitting proudly on my living room bookshelf!

And since I am a water lover (maybe because I am a Pieces), here's a couple of water themed pages I made. 

On both of them I used my hand carved seaweed stamp. Note to self: make some more hand carved stamps. I love more "rough" quality.

And another technique I should remember to do more of is to use some white modeling paste over a colored background.

And I should use more book print for a background too!

Stitching and especially using my forgotten embossing folders (back from my card making heyday), as well as stamping on tissue paper,  need to be used more often. 

For these next 2 tags, I used a paper clay item. I have a  shoebox with items I made with one or two packages of paper clay early in 2021.  I need to dig them out. They make interesting embellishments.

Probably the biggest thing I need to work on is that simple can be better, as this next page demonstrates.

But sometimes simple is not always what works.

I need to think about  keeping the balance and not thinking I need to keep going on every page. Let the art speak to you, right?

This cow page is in my top 10 if not my top 5 of all the pages I made in 2021. I just love that cow face stamp.

Stamp Diva was an online stamping store and when it's  owner  Susan retired, she closed down her shop. I think it was one of the last independent shops online that limited most of their inventory to rubber stamping. (Sigh-There used to be so many.) Stamp Diva was one of the few places left where you could find a big selection of metallic paper trims and images, and when the shop ran a 30% discount for about 6 or 7 months before it closed, I would make a small order for a few of these metallic paper items each month.

You might have noticed a lot of them in my art since summer.

And the last piece for today is a salvaged piece that turned out to be a favorite. I made this last summer for a Try It On Tuesday challenge.

That's enough for today. I have enough art left to squeeze in one more post of 2021 look back pieces, which I will probably/possibly  do another day this month.

Hope your first week of 2022 is going well, and enjoy your weekend ahead.