Flame bride

flame bride, originally uploaded by Reluctant Aquarian.

In response to a prompt at Easy Street Prompts. Weird prompt = weird collage. Struggled with this one for weeks.

She dreams the future

She dreams the future, originally uploaded by Reluctant Aquarian.

My first stab at a beeswax collage. Woman's face is a sticker I found at the First Friday Art Walk in downtown Phoenix.

Financial investment

Financial investment, originally uploaded by Reluctant Aquarian.

A page in my glue book made with savings receipts from the 1920s, a vintage picture that came on a junk mail postcard, a fortune cookie fortune, and some colored foil from a candy bar.

blind date

Made for a challenge blog with the theme "in the garden". I like to take a humorous twist on things when everyone else is doing pretty vintage floral thing. The little hedgehog is cut off a birthday card I received this year and I've been looking for a fun way to use him ever since.

Money equals power

Made for the Monday Artday blog with the theme: money.

The mounds follow him around

I love this guy!

Out of her shell

As the young girl comes out of her shell, will she decide to open a bakery/coffee shop in Key West or will she head to Manhattan to pursue a career on Broadway? The sky is the limit for this young lady!

Done for Theme Thursday's "Celebrate Girls" challenge.

Shamu's faery

Little known fact: Shamu is so busy, he needs his own faery to help him keep the magic alive.

New year resolution faery

She was an ordinary woman until New Year's Eve when she set a most unusual resolution: In 2008, she would grow wings and learn to fly.

Whisper of the Beloved

the text is really difficult to read because I was fighting with my pen and still having trouble with the curly script. Here is the quote:

Let silence take you to the core of life... All your talk is worthless when compared to one whisper from The Beloved. -Rumi

This started out as a response to the prompt "eyes" for the Make It Monday group. Somehow, though, as the concept expanded in my mind, the eyes were replaced by these "sealed for your protection" things I got off some vitamin bottles. They remind me how easily the eyes lead us astray in our search for meaning. So, I guess even without the eyes themselves, the eyes are still the theme of this piece for me.

Be a great farmer

A quote from my boss that he wrote up to motivate the clinicians in our program. I'm trying to get a curly printing style worked out.

Made for the Illustration Friday "seed" challenge.

Angel

Made for the Saturday Surprise "yellow" challenge. Well, it started yellow, but then some orange and bronze and even purple got in there. There is glitter in the wings that you can't see on the scan. I really like the texture.

On the half shell

She dreams of swirls and magical underwater worlds. Done for the Flickr Saturday Surprise group's "magic" challenge.

La nuit

This is for the "la nuit" challenge at Dans ma maison il y a... . It is not beautiful and artsy like most of the entries there. It's what I could do with 5 stolen minutes at work, hoping my boss wouldn't find me gleefully pawing my stash of magazine cut outs and playing with my glue stick. The background color is done with watercolor pencils - still trying to figure out exactly how those could work better for me. Better color selection would be a good start. I may rework the background color to fit better with the blues inside the house...

hole proof hosiery

Here is a piece of ephemera for you to play with.

bionic seniors

The prompt was "metal and bone" which made me think of hip and knee replacements. Thus the metal legs on my ladies.

All Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go

Watercolor, acrylic, rubber stamping, papers from magazines and scraps from other collages.

Made for the Saturday Surprise Challenge group on Flickr. Theme was WATER.

Also for Mixed Media Monday challenge on paint.

I hate this scan. How do I get rid of the ridges where paper overlaps under the paint?

If you love someone....

Altered book spread. Ingredients: discarded book, gesso, acrylic paint and matte medium, paper from an annual report for a stock. It needs something at the top, I think, but I can't figure out what. Classify this as "probably unfinished."

Paris Garters

Here's a fun piece of ephemera for you to play with.

Nectar

Done for the 4x4 Friday challenge: floral. Background is a card I recevied for Administrative Professionals Day, the woman's face came out of a magazine as did the word. I also used gesso, acrylic paint, and a rubber stamp.

The right side of this is cut off. Click the picture to see the whole thing, including the funky purple hearts!

Super faery

Super faery flies high for accurate weather forecasting.

Identity theft faery

He's faithfully guarding your personal information.

Fun!

Done for Illustration Friday, where the theme is WRINKLES. When I think of wrinkles, I think of my skin after I'm done playing dolphin in the pool.

Workout Faery

Don't mess with her. She works out 24-7.

Calendar altered with magazine pictures, acrylic paint, and butterfly wings from a collage sheet.

Book of Faeries - altered calendar

A little pocket calendar from the dollar store. I decided to collect faeries in it and this is the cover. Do you recognize the little boy from the Universal Wringer postcard I posted yesterday?

If anyone can tell me how to make it so that the picture doesn't get cut off on the right side, I would so appreciate it. Click picture to see all of it.

Submitted for Mixed Media Monday's challenge on HATS. Submitted for Created by Hand's challenge on GREEN.

Buy the Universal Wringer

Here is an image for you to use in your collages. Post a comment here if you use it - I'd love to see what you create!

More ephemera available at my Flickr ephemera photostream.

We live in a multiverse

Every instant we have infinite choices. We create the world with the choices we make.

Background is a recycled birthday card, globes are from junk mail, word from an old magazine.

They are hard to see in this scan, but there are loads of polka dots in the background for Take Part Tuesday.

Africa ATC

Playing card altered with gesso, oil pastels, tissue paper, ballpoint pen drawing, and stamping. Made for Theme Thursday's stripe challenge.

Given to a young lady with eczema after we had compared our itchies.

Submitted for Mixed Media Mondays playing card challenge.

Beyond

This was supposed to be based on the color of my hair, but I trimmed all that color off from around the pine needles. Oh well, it started that way.

The squares are from a Jack in the Box bag. You've got to love junk food wrapped in art supplies.

The word "beyond" signifies that I want to grow beyond the stereotypes associated with my hair color.

See It

Response to a prompt on the Yahoo gluebooks group to base a page on the color or shape of my eyes.

The background paper I got free at the dollar store - they used it to wrap a purchase. My eyes are more hazel than green, but I had to use this paper!

Cover of my first glue book

I'm so excited about starting a glue book. Finally something to do with all the pictures I've been hoarding.... I also joined the gluebooks group on Yahoo." Very cool daily prompts there.