Did Dinosaurs Lie

You know, I always walk around with the Cheshire cat talking in my head. He knows so many fascinating things. I wonder what really happened to the dinosaurs. I thought I'd ask him but Absalom said he's not available.

My concern, you see, is what if dinosaurs incurred the wrath because they couldn't tell the truth? Even if you're a big dinosaur, you still have fears of lava, limited food choices, and no fizzy water.

I mean...we even get trepidatious if we have to share an unpleasant truth. Sometimes we feel like we are the littlest prey item out in big jungle. Stick fast to the truth. I'm going to tell you the truth right now. This page was a blast to make and God intervened to make sure the message was perfect. Here are some stepped out images so you can see it. I don't video all of these because it takes a while to develop. It gets to a certain point, then I have to set it aside until I hear it whispering again. You don't get that? Uh oh. Maybe that's too much truth! I'm weird!

My process starts with slapping on acrylic paint and adhering paper text, different fiddly design items, like archival ink on a random word or background stamp. It looks very chaotic and unnatural. So I take out my stencils and some white acrylic paint to push the background, um, to the back. I'm sorry - it's hard to explain, but light paint colors with a random pattern actually calm everything down and promotes cohesion.

While that is resting, I pull out some gel prints that were left-over from another project I added white gel pen marks, black pen marks, and liquid pearls. I cut them into this shape because I knew I wanted flowers. I set these aside to cure.

I love a grungy brayer. The background was a still too assertive so I added light colored acrylics paints to push it back a little more.

I test fit the letters and flowers. The large letters are Stampin' Up! dies, and the smaller ones are by Mama Elephant. I cut them out of Very Vanilla cardstock. [All supplies will be listed at the end.] I added Dylusions paint to the stems of the flower trees. I love this type of art. Nothing has to make sense or fit with reality. Kinda like me! The leaves are die cuts from SU! botanical builder.

A little more paint love, it really needed grass. Here's where God took over. There was an amazing hop with great artists and I was reintroduced to My Favorite Things. I fell in love with this dinosaur set. When it arrived, the journal was just sitting in one of it's quiet periods. God said put a dino on it! Make it scary because that's how the truth is sometimes. I had no idea where this was going until those dinos arrived. Hence, grass. You'll note the chicken wire stamped over TRUTH, and some shading going on at this stage.

Now, I often seal or "freeze" my work as I go. There are 2 good reasons. The cat is an arse, I frequently mess up. I use Mod Podge matte paint-on sealer if there are few things the wetness of the MP will react with. I use Mod Podge matte spray-on sealer if there are lots of waterbased mediums in play. I use Matte Gel Medium (Liquatex, but many brands are just fine) if I'm too lazy to reach for MP, or if I have it out on my table already.

Here we are. I've glued down the leaves and flower petals. I've added one of my favorite dies from Botanical Builder - the centers of the flower. I cut those out of glimmer paper just for fun. The butterfly is just resting there. He decided to move on to a later project. You can see that I've added some shading around the flowers and black ink (Versafine) around the edges of the pages. Back on the shelf.

Lady Pi just helped herself onto the blog. 

This is where the dinosaurs just took over. You have to watch these - they will eat all your Cheetos, or Beaver Nuggets. I watercolored them with  my Pebeo kit. I added some texture to the background with SU!'s hardwood background stamp and Ranger Archival ink.

This is where I thought it was finished. But that upper right corner bugged me. Nothing I tried looked right up there. I went back and talked to God. He was the one with the dino plan, after all. Yes, I firmly believe you can talk to God about anything. And He does answer.

He asked me to remember how speaking the truth felt. How it felt when it was easy and no one disagreed. How it felt when you were unsure about how it would be received. And especially how it felt when you knew no one would agree with you and attach ugly labels to your name. I realized it was possible to be anywhere on that spectrum - easy to very frightening. This is how that corner became significant.

That's the final item. Complete with additional shading, random added white gel pen accents, a splattering of black and white acrylic paint, random liquid pearls, etc. I added the flower centers (gold faceted gems and a custom color enamel dot) and some glitter enamel dots. I darkened the edges again because that really frames things and pulls your eye inward.

Aren't they scary?

It would be hard to take them seriously.

Distress Oxides and Concord & 9th Hope set.

Here's the project where I used those leftover leaves. I just couldn't bring myself to throw it away. By the way - there's a group over on Splitcoast Stampers that does Bible art journaling. You're welcome to swing by. I don't bite. Meet some nice people. Get ideas. Have some fun!

Hey - I want to thank you for spending some time here reading my crazy posts. I hope I've given you a little laugh - I mean, you know someone who's worse than you, right? LOL Thanks so much for stopping by. If you have any questions or comments, please let me know. You're important. You're perfectly imperfect. You matter.

Ta for now,
~ky

----- Supplies -----

Dylusions journal
Dylusions Cut Grass paint
Acrylic paint - various colors Dina Wakley and Liquitex
Gel Press
Brayer
Liquid Pearls - various colors
Versafine ink
Ranger Archival Ink - various colors
Circle stencil - SU! retired
White Gelly Roll pen
Pebeo watercolor kit
Copic 110, C5 pens
Copic Multiliner
Grass die - the Cat's Pajamas
Glimmer paper - SU! retired
Botanical Builder framelits dies - SU! retired
Large Letters framelits dies - SU!
Hardwood background stamp - SU!
Chicken Wire background stamp - SU! retired
Glitter Enamel Dots - SU!
Gold Faceted Gems - SU!
Inline Letters - Mama Elephant
Khaki QuicKutz letter dies - retired
My Favorite Things Delightful Dinosaurs dies and stamps
General's carbon sketch pencil