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Saturday, March 31, 2012

Art Journaling Page: Just Let It Go and a quick tip

A lot of this page has shimmer mists on them, as I love using them for the running ink effect. It does however  make for some odd light reflections and color distortions in places when photographed.

But you get the idea anyway!

 

 

Some shimmer detail before journaling:

 

 

I generally cover my desk with unprinted newspaper paper. I’m sure you’ve seen glimpses of it in some of my photos!

Not only do I love it as a work surface, but  it keeps the desk clean by catching all the overspray, splatters, spills and what not.  I use it as a quick paint pallet, I test stamps on it, rub excess paint or ink on it etc. And then when it’s time to change it, I have these cool random patterned papers that I later reuse in my art journaling!

And no ink or anything gets wasted!

Here are some examples:

 

 

 

 

 

I LOVE artful recycling!

I used them in the trees and the “ground” in the AJ page above and I used some in this AJ Page too for the “ground.”

 

PS: If any of you readers are FEFTers you may appreciate the “Just let it go! - Peace” reference! *grin*

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Thursday, March 29, 2012

Re-growing Your Bought Produce

It’s the time of year for planting the garden around here and I thought I’d post about a couple of things I grow in our garden and in tubs, that I don’t start from little plants or seeds, but from the (organic if we can) produce we buy at the grocery store.

First off - the butter lettuce. It is by FAR my favorite lettuce and we go through extraordinary amounts of the stuff. I was delighted when I discovered that Costco started carrying the Live lettuce variety a couple of years ago, as they keep just so much longer and so much fresher, since the roots are still attached.

I don’t know why it took me so long, but only recently did it occur to me that the lettuce we keep on buying, had not only fully intact roots on them, and was grown in actual soil (as opposed to some varieties that are grown in water) and that it would stand to reason that they may regrow just fine in a pot or outside in the garden.

So experimenting I went. Here are the results.

 

1. Butter Lettuce.

 

This is how it went in. Everything completely cut off, except the root.

 

 

 

I just straightened out the roots, then made a deep hole in a pot and put it in, with the green stump staying above ground.

Here we are 4 days later. Yep, I guess it was prime lettuce growing weather around here.

 

 

Here it is at 7 days. We had some rain and a cold spell, but the lettuce kept on going.

 

 

Here we are at 1.5 weeks.

 

(I also planted some seedling lettuce next to it, which is growing well too!)

 

So at this point, I have started harvesting the largest leaves already. They are tender and wonderful and it only took less than 2 weeks to get there! Since I have several more of these growing, we’ll be in lettuce until the heat eliminates lettuce growing season, which is a while away just yet!

 

I put the first lot in a container as I wanted to see how well they do even when grown in a pot. It seems they do just fine, which means that as long as you have a nice sunny spot, even on a balcony, and enough room for a pot, you are good to go!

 

 

2. Celery.

You know that stump you have left when you cut your stalks of celery off?

 

Yes, that. Just drop it in some soil, give it some sun, water and time and you’re growing a whole new celery from it.

Here we are going in.  A regular half inch stump of celery, no roots, nothing.

 

 

Here we are a week later. It’s starting to grow! I would guess that at this rate it’ll be about 5-6 weeks before I have anything harvestable, but that’s fine by me! I will update you in a few weeks time!

 

3. Green Onions.

Love green onions but never have them around when you need them or have them go bad on you because you didn’t need as much as you have to buy? No more! Just stick them in a glass of water and set them on a sunny window sill. Harvest the green tops as you need them. They will keep on re-growing!

You need to replace the water with fresh water every now and then and give the roots a rinse, but that’s about it!

 

Edited to add:

4. Coyote squash.

 

Oh my goodness I totally forgot about my Chayote squash!

This one isn’t strictly speaking a re-grow, since I didn’t actually use it before I planted it, but since I’ve never seen chayote squash seedlings or such anywhere, I suspect it might be the only way to grow them. And they are a wonderful apple substitute for low carbers and very healthy, but usually only available for a limited amount of months in the fall. So it’s worthwhile testing the home growing potential!

I had about 3 accidently root on my last fall and thought I just plant them and see if they will grown. They did. Rather quickly in fact in the case of the one I didn’t plant quite as deep.

I tried to do some research on the web, since I wasn’t’ familiar with Chayote squash growing at all, but I couldn’t find very much at the time. The two sites that were at all mentioning planting them, said to basically just set them on top of soil, hardly covering them at all.

Since I had three, I tried various degrees of coverage.

In retrospect, the not covering didn’t really work so well for me and I suspect won’t work in even harsher climates!

 

But then we had several night frosts and storms and I thought I had seen the last of them. But not so.

 

 

One looks a little worse for wear, but it keeps on growing, the other is looking pretty well, probably because I planted it so it was covered with soil, so it started growing later and wasn’t as big when the storms hit. And sheltered in the pot. 

The third one didn’t make it however. That was the one I had just sitting on top of the soil. The frost got it pretty quickly!

So, if you are going to do this, plant them deeper and cover them with soil. 

Now let’s see if they’ll survive the Phoenix scorching heat!

 

I’m linking this to:
UndertheTableandDreaming

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My Latest Art Journaling Page

I finally finished another page.

I seem to go through phases where I just do backgrounds and then I just journal for a while. However, this is a page I did from beginning to end - even though it spanned over several days!

 

 

It doesn’t really show so well on the photo, but there are various areas that are shimmering and sparkling in rainbow colors all the way up and down the page.

 

 

And the area under the umbrella was written on silk, which I then mod podged on the page. I left the edges raw, which is causing a fun little fray for added texture.

 

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Tuesday, March 27, 2012

More Art Journaling Tips and Tricks

... and some “make it yourself” too!

Last time I covered the Shimmer Mists, Mod Podge, Alcohol and Spray Inks and today I’m going to cover a few more things that come in handy when you are art journaling, stamping and/or scrapbooking.

1. Organizing the stamps.

I’m sure we all have our systems, but as much of a system as I might have had, I found that I always ended up missing some stamps, mostly because they were buried in the drawer under a bunch of others, or too small and got lost in the crevices of my stamp drawers. So just recently, I got pretty radical with my rubber and acrylic stamp collection.
First, I pulled my most used rubber stamps off their wooden blocks. I am mostly a collage type of stamper, so I prefer the more messy and uneven way of stamping anyway.
The wooden blocks took up so much room and really weren’t helping me.
Not only are my rubber stamps so much easier to organize now, but they are also much easier to handle! For the odd occasion where I do need a tidy image, I stick them to my acrylic block with a couple of repositionable glue dots.
So, now I have all the big background stamps, that used to take up several drawers in my craft room in one little drawer the size of a letter tray! And they are so much easier to access and flip through now!

But that was just the beginning. The second step, and the one that has made looking for a particular stamp SO much easier, are these things of beauty.


Yep, they are baseball card sleeves, but the pockets are just the right size for the dollar stamps (Michael’s, Joanne’s etc.) and other small stamps!


Now you can also put them into a 3-ring-binder and store them that way. Personally I prefer to have the sheets loose in the drawer of my art cart.


Either way - you can flick through the pages of your stamps quickly and easily and no more small stamps getting lost or forgotten!


2. Make your own stamp cleaner.

I’ve been making my own stamp cleaner for years, but since I have only returned to my stamps very recently after a rather long absence due to children and well, digital scrapbooking, I had forgotten about that.
Until I ran out and saw the price of the refill liquid! It’s so easy and inexpensive to make your own and if you have one of those dauber bottles handy already, you are pretty much set to go!


I usually make up just over an 8 fl oz. batch and refill my 2 fl oz. dauber bottle as I go.
2.5  tbsp. liquid glycerin (available in any pharmacy department usually)
8 oz. distilled water
1 teaspoon baby wash
Stir together or gently shake together and you are set to go!

3. Inexpensive Mini Misters.


I use the Mini Misters a lot, but at $2-$3 per bottle, they are a little on the expensive side. Recently I came across a set of mini misters on the Oriental Trading company website and ordered them. I’ve been using them for about 2 weeks now and I have to say, they work as well as the brand name mini misters, but at a much lower price ($0.83/ bottle.)


Oh, and if you need an inexpensive way to store them, get a piece of floral foam at the dollar store. Cut the foam down to a manageable size with a large kitchen knife, then push the bottles in to make mini mister size impressions. I also place the foam inside a similar sized box to catch any stray foam crumbs as you handle the stand!



And there you have it!

4. A few of my latest Art Journaling pages and Backgrounds at various stages of completion:















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Friday, March 9, 2012

Homemade Gyros (Restaurant style)


Ahhh, Gyros - one of my favorite meat dishes! I was pretty much raised on Greek food and I love it so!
Don’t you just love the type of gyros you get at the restaurant, with the ridiculously crunchy edges, shaved fresh off the huge loaf of meat rotating away on that spit! The fine mingling of flavors, the unique texture of the “meat loaf” - so yummy!
Well, here’s the spit-less (that doesn’t sound quite right!) way of doing it at home! And the flavor and texture are SO CLOSE, that I tend to prefer making it at home these days.
The “secret” is not so much in the ingredients, they are pretty much standard fare, it is in the method of preparation.
There are two ways to go, the high-tech/electric way or the low-tech/get-rid-of-your-pent-up-anger way!
I will share both with you and you decide which way you want to go!

Ingredients:

1 lb. of ground lamb
1 lb. of ground beef
1/2 cup of Italian bread crumbs (or it can be regular bread crumbs, or gluten-free, or low-carb bread crumbs - it all works)
2 tsp onion powder
2 tsp dried oregano - if you use plain bread crumbs, use 3 tsp
1 tsp garlic powder - or 2 fresh cloves
1 1/2 tsp salt - if you use plain bread crumbs, use 2 tsp
1 tsp pepper

Preparation:

High-tech way:
Place everything in the bowl of an electric mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment. Start it off slowly, to mix the ingredients together for about 1 minute. After that, turn it up as high as it will go without your meat flying out everywhere. The paddle will “slap” the meat against the sides of the bowl. Let it go for 3-5 minutes until your meat looks quite emulsified and even.

Turn it out onto the counter, knead it through like a loaf of bread for one round in order to get everything into a uniform loaf. Form a rectangle about an inch or so high.

Then proceed as described below.

Low-tech way (personally I think this works best: )
Mix all the above in a bowl, really getting your hands in there and mixing it thoroughly.
Then take the loaf of meat and SLAM it down on your counter top. I mean really slam it. With some force!  Scrape it up, knead it like you would a bread dough, then slam it again. Keep doing that for about 10 minutes. We are trying to emulsify the fats here and it’s crucial to the texture we are trying to achieve. And it’s a good work out too!
You can use a dough scraper to scrape up the fat/meat that sticks to your counter as you go. Put it back in the loaf and carryon.
Once you did this for 10 minutes, form a flat rectangle loaf, about an inch high.

Please note that I’m using a half sheet.

Place on a non-stick jelly roll sheet and bake at 350 F for about 45-50 minutes.
Make sure you place it on something that has raised edges because there will be a fair bit of fat and juices dripping out.
Let it sit for 10-15 minutes before you slice it. If you have an electric knife or deli slicer, I highly recommend you use that and slice everything as thin as possible. Think shaving kind of thin thin!
I usually cut the whole loaf and store it in a container. Then before serving, I heat a non-stick pan really hot, drop the gyros slices in just to randomly crisp up some edge. Stir the strips around for about 1-2 minutes, letting it crisp and brown, then serve on Greek Pita with Tzatziki, onion, lettuce and tomato!

Or serve it my favorite way, just wrapped in butter lettuce leaves with Greek cabbage salad on the side! YUM!
Enjoy!

PALEO/GAPS/LOW-CARB VARIATION:
Replace the 1/2 cup of bread crumbs with either eating plan legal bread crumbs, or 1/4 cup of almond flour and 1 tbsp of coconut flour. Follow the recipe as written.

Linking to:
 UndertheTableandDreaming

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Tuesday, March 6, 2012

How to make your own Alcohol Inks, Shimmer Mists, Mod Podge and more


As I mentioned in my last post, I’ve been experimenting with some more cost effective alternatives in the crafting/scrapping/art journaling area and I want to share some of those with you.

1. Alcohol Inks and Spray Inks.

They are easily and cheaply made with every day ingredients. They may not be of the highest ingredients, but they work for what I need them for!
The first one I want to show you is the cool aid spray! Yep, cool aid is notorious for not coming out once spilled, so that’s just what we need.
Get yourself an empty small spray bottle either from the dollar store or from Target (Pharmacy department.) Get the Cool Aid powder of your choice and dollar store rubbing alcohol.





Place the cool aid powder in the bottle, fill it up almost to the top with rubbing alcohol. Shake to dissolve and that’s it!








Of course you can add more or less powder, depending on how intense you want the color. I used orange cool aid in this example and I needed the whole package to get just a hue of orange. Since that is what I was aiming for, it’s fine. Other colors are more intense, so start with about 1 tsp and work your way up if you need to!

The other option is the RIT dye alcohol inks. Basically the same as above, but you use the RIT dye, either powdered or liquid. Here you will need a lot less dye, as they are quite intense!

And of course, food coloring, egg dye and re-inkers can be used too!

And then there is the Gelato way! Faber Castell has these cool little gelatos, that also make lovely sprays! I basically cut an 1/8 inch off the gelato stick, and dropped it into the spray bottle. Then I filled it up with half water and half rubbing alcohol and let it sit for a bit. This gives the gelato bit time to dissolve. Then shake, shake, shake and you have a vibrant ink spray!





Incidentally you can also use the gelatos to color modeling paste. Just shave a little off, spritz with some water, make a paste and then add to the modeling paste. More on the gelatos a little later in the post.

You can also easily make your own acrylic color mist by adding some acrylic paint (the kind in the small tubes) to rubbing alcohol in a mister bottle. I got a cheap variety pack at Walmart for $6 and they work just fine. Depending on how deep a shade you want, start with a little paint, and add until you reach the shade you like. Shake vigorously to dissolve the paint.

2. Mod Podge.

Love the stuff, but after a while it can get quite expensive. So for years now I’ve used Elmer's School Glue. I buy it by the gallon and make up the Mod Podge recipe as I need it in a mason jar. Just add half water, half Elmer's glue, replace the lid, shake it up and you’re ready to go. If you need it thicker, use less water! My preferred rate of dilution is 3/4 Glue, 1/4 water.




3. Faber Castell Gelatos.

Love those little things! However, they run fairly expensive. There is however a seller on Amazon that sells the “kid’s” version and calls them gel sticks. And wouldn’t you know it, they are the EXACT SAME as the Artist’s Gelatos. I mean identical!

Here’s the link to the regular gelatos: 12 Ct Gel Sticks With Brush
Here’s the link to the metallic gelatos. Faber Castell Metallic Gel Sticks

Again these are marketed towards kids and are listed in “toys and games” but they are identical to the gelatos!

If you need some ideas of what to do with the gelatos, look here.


4. Homemade Shimmer Mist.





Here’s something else that’s so easily made at home: Shimmer mists! There are lots of recipes for this all over the internet, but here’s the one I like to use.

I bought one of those Pearl Ex Powdered Pigments variety packs about 10 years ago and they are still going strong! I tend to only use them in the shimmer mists now, so a little goes a long way!
I usually make two kinds of mists. The one that is much like the kind you buy in the store, which just has a hint of color and is really just meant to add some glimmer to everything. And then I also make the one which is a regularly saturated spray ink that I add some glimmer to as well. Both work for different applications!

For the glimmer mists that are pretty much the same that are available in the stores, like the rangers and tattered angels mists, you will need:

Travel sized spray bottle (dollar store or target again)
Water
Means of color (acrylic paint, re-inker ink, food color, RIT dye, alcohol ink you made above, water color etc.)
Mod Podge/School Glue


Fill the spray bottle about 3/4 of the way with water, add about 1 tsp worth of school glue/mod podge. Add a little color (or a lot if you want it a little more saturated) and then add Pearl-Ex powder. The amount is up to you, but I find that about the equivalent of 1/8 tsp is plenty.
Shake well to mix and dissolve everything.
And that’s it!

Now, remember to shake up the glimmer mist well before every use. The Pearl Ex pigments like to settle on the bottom of the bottle. If you find that you have difficulty shaking the stuff lose from the bottom, add a small marble or a very small, smooth (and clean) rock to your spray bottle. It will help with the shaking up of things!


Yes, the Pearl Ex Powdered Pigments are a bit of an investment initially, but considering that the ready made Shimmer mists usually run $7-$9 per bottle and you’re going to be able to make probably something like 60 + spray bottles worth of glimmer mist from the one 12-pack of Pearl Ex, it’s really not much of an investment and a huge savings!


So, that’s it for today. I hope you found some of these tips useful!
Happy creating!


Linking to:
 UndertheTableandDreaming

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