TUTORIAL: How to mix skin colour

I love painting faces in my art journal and even though I may not be the best it is so much fun!But what I have noticed is that a lot of my friends just use face coloured paint from the tube. I love mixing colours and I personally consider this to be part of the creative process. So here you go:

First you will need three basic colours: red(but not a pinky tinted one, just a plain bright red), yellow( not a lemony yellow, just plain yellow) and white.NOTE:WHEN BUYING PAINT IT IS BETTER TO GET A FEW TUBES OF COSTY PAINT AS THIS WILL MIX BETTER THAN THE CHAP STUFF(DUE TO IT CONTAINING MORE PIGMENT.Any way back to our skin colour mixing.

Mix a pink.Use lots of white and only a bit of red until you get a pale salmony skin coloury colour.But don't worry if its still a bit dark we will get to that in a mo.Just make sure that it is the darker version of the colour you want, this is kind of hard to explain but after playing around with mixing a little bit you will understand.Practise makes perfect.

Add a tiny bit of yellow to make it turn from a tshirt , samon pink to a skin colour pink.Compare with a professional portrait (on a postcard) if youre one for perfectness. But again after a bit of experiance you will get the hang of this.

Lastly add white until it is the exact shade youe want. Tip: Test on a scrap piece of paperthat is the same kind as your piece you want to paint on.I have a page reserved for this in my art journal and then I use itr as a multicoloured background.

Happy painting!Would you like me to do more on how to paint a face so the next step, like how to draw it and paint in the shading?Or is there another colour youd like to know how to mix.I'm sure i can help, I have been painting for 5 years.

Before I go , you may have noticed the new feautre on my blog.Below just tick what you think of my post if you havent got time to leave a comment.IT would help me so much when writng future blogposts. Remeber I can only give you advice on things you tell me you want to know.

XO MAKEALIFE

Tutorial:Cute Camera Case

This project was quiet an adventure to make.A whila ago I went to IKEA and bought this cute flower print fabric.I wanted to make something small and cute out of it, so as I hadn't came up with an idea yet, I just left it in my sewing room and almost forgott about it.But then I saw this post on daisyyellow(http://daisyyellow.squarespace.com/vividlife/creative-experiments-9-february.html) and the thing that inspired me was the go for a walk with your camera and take a photo of whatever intrests you.I think this sounds very fun and I want to do it.So I decided I would need a Shoulder bag for my camera.As my camera never had a case I decided it must be padded , so that the camera was protected.By combing these two things I came up with this sweet camera case.:)



1.First , grab your camera and lay it onto your fabric, about an inch in n all sides.Now in this photo I added a bottom, but as I sewed it together, I found myself cutting that same amount of fabric away, so you dont need a bottom.Flip your camera and trace the front.Now add a flap onto that, which can be as long as you like and it can be squared or rounded.





2.Cut out your piece of fabric and cut out a second one from batting, this will make the lining.You will also need to cut down some velcro , as a closure.



3.Mark using pins , where you need the velcro to go and attacxh them on by sewing a square shape on them twice (it needs to be sturdy).BE careful see 5.!!!!

4.Pin them right sides together and sew all the way around, leavinng the smaller end open.Turn right sides out.




5.I encounterd a small problem here.I had sewn the velcro on thê wrong side of the patterned fabric, so that when i had sewn the batting on top it was coverd.So either learn from my mistake and sew the velcro onto the batting, well only the side with the flap or you can do what I did.First cut a square out of the batting, so that the whole piece of velcro is visable(above), now just sew around the hole and voila! fixed.



5.Sew a top stich to hold the sewn sem in place and sew down the sides , closing the whole thing.male sure your camera fits inside snug.

6.Get some bias binding and after cutting to the lehgth you want, fold in half and sew.

7.Attach to your case.I sewed it doen making small squares of stiches and sewed it on just where the flap starts.




DONE!!!

This project took me about 30 minutes.Have fun making it and if you do please share photos.

Makealife

tutorial:Craft Foam Stamps

So its really fun and super easy to make your own stamps.This was my first ever attempt on making any, so i choose a really simple way to make them.First gather you supplies: an old hardcoverbook(i used my old maths book hehe) craft foam, scissors, stanley knife, charcoal pencil(or any thing else that will cut your hardcover book), masking tape and ink . oh and a strong glue

So to get started, cut the inside of your book from the cover, as shown above.




Above you can see the next step, cut the spine out.Next cut out a square from your bookcover using a stanley knife.Now put masking tape around any raw edges.




Design your stamp, as you can see it took me a while to get the heart shape right.




Once you get it right draw it onto your craft foam.Next cut it out.






Lastly glue to your cardboard back, aka your old bookcover, and try it out using ink.

Soon i will post more photos of what other stamps looked like(which i also made) so stay tuned.

HOW TO USE: in your art journal, who wouldnt love personal stamp in their art journal?

TUTORIAL:Last Minute Pressie:Collaged bookmarks

So just incase you have still got to get a few lastminute gifts but you have no idea what to make and acctuly you really feel like art journaling , why not make these cute collaged bookmarks?5 or 6 of them in a little set make a lovely gift along with some choclats.

1.Start off by cutting out some bookmarks from cardstock, they can be any size you wish!

2.Using watercolour crayons or pencils colour the whole bookmark

3.Using water paint with it

Now...

4.Either collect some pretty papers and stick them on or doodle a design on top of the painted surface

5.Now go over it in any colours you like, i picked black and whit, and sponge them, drip them , use handcarved stamps, use wine corks to get the round shape....

6.Write a quote on a piece of paper, either all in one block or in seperate lines...

7.Now you may want to outline the text boxes with a pen(I used artists pitt pens, brush)

8. glue the quotes down

9. add stickers and embellishments

10.Done!!!

Now this is just one way of doing it and i not saying its perfect or anything its just ment to inspire you!!!

Merry christmas!!!

PS:I found this really cool website , its got a tutorial for toiletroll angels, felt cookies....http://alisaburke.blogspot.com/

Tutorial: Felt Bookbag with free style applicate

Okay so sorry the pictures are not in the correct order , but its hard uploading on blogger.:)Anyway here comes a cool Tutorial:

1.Cut out a circle of felt and get some random felt scraps handy

2.Arrange them and sew on

3.Draw round a book and add a few inches on another piece of felt

4.Cut out some 2 inch wide straps

5.Sew bag(sew straps to sides and sew 3 of the four edges of the main pieces)

6.Add buttons to felt circle and sew on

7.DONE!!!!

This would make a great gift to any book lover on your giftlist or you may want to make one for yourself.It took me about one and a half hours.

Merry christmas!!!!!!

Tutorial: Felt smelly Lavender sachet

You will need:

Scissors

Felt

Felt scraps

Dried Lavender

Needle

Thread

Smelly socks

Funnel

1. Pick a basic shape like a square, circle, heart ... and cut it out twice.

2.Now cut out coloured circles or squares and handsew using a whipstich them onto one of your main shapes.

3.Now whipstick up 3 of the 4 sides( of your two basic shapes)

4. Using your funnel fill it with lavender and sew closed

5.Now tie the threads and pop it into your basket of smelly socks and voila the smell fresh!!

Tutorial: Mini Top Hat on an Aliceband

So you can see what my finished hat looked like.I thought you may want to make one to so here is the tutorial.

1.Cut out a circle from felt , that is the size you want the brim to be.Cut out a smaller circle from the middle , this is the top(lid).For the longy bit between(the strip on the picture), just worry about the width and not about the length(you can trim it later).

2.Sew the top to the sidey lony part like in the photo.


3.On the other photo you can see the side is sewn up to.Do this.

4. Now sew the brim to the topy part/tube like on the photo.

This is your basic hat finished!

5.Time to decorate.You can do this how ever you want.I used lace,buttons and sequins.

6.Cut a piece of paper out of cardstock that will fit in you hat as shown.Roll it and place inside.

7.Last but not least its time to attach your hat to your aliceband.To do so , cut small strips of fabric and cover in glue.Then lay the aliceband where you want it to go and lay fabric over as you can see on the picture.Now all you have to do is to use pegs or hair clips to hold it in place.Leave to dry over night and VOILA(!!!!!!!!)youre done!!!!!!!!!!!!