Exotic Butterflies for Janie

Butterflies are incredible creatures that are in thousands of different shapes, sizes and colours... such variation - some wander for thousands and thousands of kms, others stay close to home, some live such short lives. All are extroardinary and beautiful.

I've used Dylusions paints, Jane Davenport Mermaid Markers and Tim Holtz stamps (foam and rubber) to create a magical garden of exotic beauties.

I made the journal page a bit back to front. I'd made all the butterflies to this stage before creating the background. To make them, I stamped all the Tim Holtz Flutter By Stamps with an Archival black ink pad. I was going to stamp with colourful inks, but our encyclopaedia shows nearly all butterflies have either black, white or brown outlines.

Here they are resting after having their wings inked with Distress Ink Black Soot using an Ink Blending Tool and black Wink of Stella (shimmery paint pen) added to their bodies. The antennae was made using Tim's thick cotton thread attached on the back using Wondertape. Poor things had them chopped off with the die-cutting.

The background was made layer upon layer, using acrylic paints with stencils and foam stamps. I've used Darkroom Door Fern and Blossom with Tim Holtz Flourish, Leafy, Scribbles, Tiny Trees (called something else) and Feathers. 

The first layer was Lemon Zest and Dirty Martini, smooshed all over the page then left to dry as I sifted through my stencils.

Stencil designs were added using the Foam Blending Tool with only two colours, Dirty Martini (olive green) and Polished Jade (darker blue-green).

Using the Vibrant Turquoise and Funky Flowers Foam Stamps by Tim, I created the foreground foliage.

Flowers were then added using Lemon Zest and Pure Sunshine... the fab thing about foam stamps (apart from their cool shapes and not having to cut apart potatoes!) is that you can see exactly where to overlay the colours. 

To print the whole shape one colour I dip the stamp in paint and press, but to just add part of the stamp, like the white tips of the petals, I use the foam blending tool to add the paint.

Ta da... :D I don't seem to have a photo of the whole spread at this stage.

The two giant butterflies were made using Mermaid Markers (coloured in a basic shape), cutting out the shape (I used my Cuttlebug) using the Tim Holtz Butterfly Duo Bigz Die, then embossing with the texture fades folder. I then inked over the butterfly after it was dry, using Black Soot Distress Ink.

I created the big blue butterfly the same way. Then both got coated in iridescent medium and the black Wink of Stella paint pen after having their antennae added. I may or may not have added glitter... I was doing something else with glitter and shimmer at the same time so my mind could just be messing with me! lol :)

Closeup pic of one of my faves... who am I kidding, all the butterflies are my faves. Even the red ones after I added white spots and more glittery shimmery stuff.

Above : Left hand side, all finished with quotes and words from Tim Holtz Idea-Ology Chit Chat Washi Tape and Metallic Quotations stickers.

Below : Right hand side, all finished.

So there we have it. A completed flock of flutterbies and butterflies, almost as beautiful as what Mother Nature creates :) I love moths and caterpillars too!

All treasures available at www.shop.artbyjenny.com.au :)

Hope you like it Janie <3

Thanks for reading, wandering through this blog post.

Happy Creative Day!

:)

Jenny