Mermaids and water babies

My tag this week takes you on a journey to another dimension.  Dive into an ocean of dreams and swim through the portal that will take you to the world  where  mermaids roam free.   Sometimes we get glimpses of other worlds, times and places and in the same way this tag gives a glimpse of another world.  To start with you cannot  see much more than the shimmer of water.   As you turn over organza overlays, more and more of the mermaid’s world becomes reality. Alternate layers of blue and green organza shimmer and glisten as each overlay gives way to reveal more of the world of mermaids. 

 

Turn the tag over and another mermaid comes into view. The mermaids remain incomplete, keeping the secret of their existence far below the waves.

  

The base tag is craft vylene, coloured with silk paints.  There are 4 layers of organza folded and stitched to the top of the tag. Some layers of organza are cut on the bias and some on the straight grain which is what makes the layers shimmer and move with changes in the light.  The mermaids are made using glitter glue, shells, and  sequins.  The tail on the second one came from an old Ariel Barbie; she had no head or arms either!

The background has bubbles made from sequins and glass.    

The tag is finished with coordinating ribbons and threads. 

  The tag is photographed against one of  the July pages of my Tag Book (volume 2)

Here are all my July pages, I hope you like them. 

One last thing!

Just had to share this with you - I'm defrosting my freezer today  and this piece of ice is the last to disappear.  Could it be an Ice Mermaid?

Sorry this was such a long post I had trouble deciding what pics to include, they were all so pretty.  I have loved the themes this month.  I think I'm a bit of a water baby myself!  Can't wait to see all your mermaids, see you all later.  love Jane xx

Mermaid

I found the mermaid online, added a quote from T.S. Eliot and some images from Crafty Individuals, then threw pearls and beads at it.


I'm absolutely loving all the wonderful mermaids that I'm seeing....:)

Mermaids

Hi everyone. What a clever bunch of taggers, Is it me or does that sound slightly rude? Ha ha! I LOVED looking at all your mermaid tags. I have a thing for mermaids. In the early days of my digital art passion I produced quite a few.
The one I have photographed here I printed off intending to cut her up and use , embellish or something for this weeks challenge. I have to come clean, I have been ill again, I have Rheumatoid Arthritis and some weeks I have trouble using my hands. Which brings me to my point Do you mind me sometimes producing digital images? Or should I wait until I'm better and stick to 'licking and sticking'

Fond Regards Pat x

Mermaids and Water Babies.

When Kezzy (my youngest) was 5, her big sister took her to have some photos taken by a professional photographer for my Christmas present.  As she had very long hair she was dressed up as a mermaid, so, as I couldn't find anything else in the house to use or adapt for this weeks theme, I scanned the photo and printed it onto canvas. The background is another page from a very old music book I have, which I coloured with my TH Distress Inks.  The 'rock' is sandpaper that I had coloured with a copper spray paint to make some teaching resources for work, so took a scrap of it and added extra colour to it with wax crayons.  'Seaweed' is some synthetic silk distressed with my heat gun.  After cutting out the photo and a few pearls stitched on, I attached it to the tag with some sticky pads to add dimension. Other embellishments from my stash.
Thank you everyone for all your kind comments, off to view this weeks creations. 

 .

MERMAIDS AND WATER BABIES

Hi everyone,

I found this sculpture of a girl standing in a beautiful pond at a local arboretum.  When I saw her I just knew she was going to be the subject of this weeks tag!

The background of the tag is Moonshadow Mist (walnut ink with green pearl shimmer in it).  The grasses were cut out of a duplicate image of the girl and added on top and underneath the image for a 3D effect.

What a fantastic collection of tags last week - and thank you to everyone who stopped and left a comment.  I am now off to look at all your tags!

mermaids and water babies

 As usual I found inspiration for my muse over at The graphics Fairy where I find so many images to use. I layered the mermaid onto vintage music paper aptly titled Sherman's March to the Sea and then glued it to a blue sparkly tag I made to have the feel of sunlight on the water. I found the MOP pendant at the thrift store and stamped dream onto vintage paper and glued on. I used text from the vintage Bobbsey Twins book I have. Some ribbon and fiber from my stash finished it off.
Hugs,
Ivy

Mermaids and water babies

This tag is inspired by a game that I used to play, as a child during the summers, called "Lotería," which is the Mexican equivalent to Bingo.  I also introduced it to my daughters, when they were young, as a means to develop their vocabulary and cultural awareness.

All Lotería sets have 54 cards, which are named and numbered.  However, instead of calling out the numbers for the players to fill their boards, cards are drawn one at a time and called out by their name.

Anyway, one of the cards is "La Sirena," or the mermaid, which is card number 6.

Mermaids are mythical aquatic creatures that are half-woman and half-fish, and have appeared in various cultures throughout the world. According to a myth, they used their singing to lure sailors to catastrophe.

For my ginormous tag, I worked on Daler-Rowney 100% Cotton paper.  I used Faber-Castell artist India ink pens and Sakura micron pens for the drawing, lining and lettering.  I designed a miniature corner embellishment on a seaside Art-C tile scene using sand, a shell, faux pearls, wire, a metal seahorse, a star stamp, a scrap of greenish paper, and a Tim Holtz blank charm.  I also used a Tim Holtz grungeboard number "6" and a K&Company frame to complete my mixed media collage.

As a finishing touch, I added a tassel made with greenish ribbons and a shimmery fiber wire.

By the way, my mermaid is nice and has just come to the seaside to invite you to enjoy the ocean - LOL!

Arnoldo

Mermaids (x2)

I was really looking forward to this weeks theme as I love the thought that mermaids might exist almost as much as the possibility of fairies!

I made a mermaid tag a few weeks ago now as you all know and ever since I have wanted to make more along the same lines.  So first I made this pink mermaid enjoying the last of the evening sun.  I really enjoy being able to go to town with glitter and sparkles!   I had so much fun that I couldn't help myself and so I made........

Another one!!  This one was inspired by the quote on the first one.  I found a fab Mermaid Lullaby and quoted one of the verses on the top tag and so I decided to make one of those 'Mermaids Fast Asleep' on my second tag.

I took a few pictures as I worked so you could see how I made my tags but thought that would make for a long post so if you want to see how I did it then follow this link back to my blog for more detail.  I did want to share this last photo with you all and am wondering what your desks look like after you finished this weeks tag!!!!

Who knew how much mess two tags could make!!?  You'd think after using all those pretty sparkles it would have looked a bit prettier on my desk.  As you can see in time honoured crafting fashion I had all this space to start with and ended up working on a postage stamp sized work area!!

Guess what I am off to do now?! ........ Probably should be tidy up, but it is going to be Lunch then Tag Tuesday to see what fab things you have all been making ......oh and then just maybe, tidy up!

How cool to finally be a fully paid up member of the Tag Tuesday Team.  I love all the creative challenges but mostly I love that it is a place full of inspiration and mutual encouragement.

Have a fab week everyone - can't wait to see what next months themes are.

MERMAIDS AND WATER BABIES

Hi everyone - sorry I couldn't come out to play last week!  I did look at all your wonderful beach find tags though and they were fantastic!  My mermaid this week was a free image download from this month's Cloth Paper Scissors magazine - trying to stretch myself to try new things I had a go at creating the whole tag digitally, following their instructions,  but I failed miserably!  Rather relieved,  I went back to my usual inks etc.  I embossed the card then sprayed it with Cosmic Shimmer mist in two colours.  I collaged the mermaid and made the title, edged it in gold pen then finished off with lace and beads.  Will come back and look at all your tags later.  A bientot!  Carolyn x

Mermaids

Here's my mermaid tag. I wanted to see if I could keep it really minimal, so I used a black gel pen, with highlights in green and blue. I didn't really have a design in mind, but wanted to use shell shapes, hence the curved edge at the top and the lines round the border inspired by shells. I was keen to have a mermaid with blue and green hair, and she ended up being a rather curvy mermaid. I felt the sky looked a little bare but I didn't want to make it all blue so I added the words Siren Song and some music notes. I hope she doesn't lure to many sailors to their deaths!
Apologies for no tag next week, I got distracted making an embroidered bag! (See my blog http://joscreativeblog.blogspot.co.uk/ for more details!)

Mermaids

Hi everybody!  When I thought about "mermaids" for this week, I thought of the movie "Head."  The opening scene has psychedelic mermaids swimming in all these 1960s colors.  So... I actually found an image of that scene.  I painted the ends of my tag with watercolors that kind of blended better than I really wanted.  The lyrics are from "The Porpoise Song" by the Monkees which plays over the mermaids scene in the movie. You can watch the scene on youtube if you're interested; just search "The Porpoise Song." Have a good week!!

MERMAIDS & WATER BABIES

Hi All at Tag Tuesday, I thought I would use this fun little image today.. The little Mermaid is on her shell phone.. For the background I inked up with dylusion ink sprays ..Vibrant turquoise & London Blue.. the stamps on the background are a assortment of crafty individuals.. the little image was coloured with promarkers..I am looking foward to seeing all your fabulous tags this week... Hugs May x x x

Merdoodly the Mermaid

Merdoodly the mermaid sat like Piffy on a rock bun waiting to see if her one love Derek the Duck would bring home the Gold Medal from his Olympic efforts in the diving.

Her heart beat faster with growing anticipation of their meeting again after so long apart. That morning she had heard rumours that he had been seen nestling upto a buxom clay pigeon.  So she quickly booked herself in at the local hydroponic shop and had a makeover.  Hope he hasnt done the dirty on her. FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE ROTTER HERE

Ocean's Daughter

There are a couple of things I have to admit to for this week's tag. One, I've already used this image (from Graphics Fairy) once for Mail Art  earlier this year - but I just love it so using again...Two, I am an outrageously HUGE fan of Electric Light Orchestra (there, I've said it in public) and there are a few of their songs I can be caught frequently humming...

Including Can't Get It Out of My Head which includes the words on my tag. Seriously what other song has the lyrics "Robin Hood and William Tell, Ivanhoe and Sir Lancelot. They don't envy me" - Classic (LOL). Enjoy. Jewels.

Mermaids and Water Babies

I have chosen Water Babies by Charles Kingsley as my theme for this weeks tag.

I have covered an oblong of cardboard with cream canvas material and added an assortment of lace, ribbons, beads and threads.



The image is a digi collage  download and can be purchased from Nicecrane Designs.

I resized on the computer and then printed out. Adhered to white cardstock and then did a random stiching around the edge. The canvas had been frayed before gluing and the threads were used to weave through the stiching leaving the ends showing. The picture was then glued on top of the lace and a ribbon and button added at the top.Below is a close up of the digi, lace and stitching.

Mermaids & Water Babies

Thank you all for your wonderful comments again last week. You are all such a caring, encouraging and inspirational group of artists.

Here is my tag for this week's theme of Mermaids & Water Babies. I have written an acrostic poem, using the word 'Mermaid', over the top of a silhouette of a mermaid that I found via Google and the embellishments are from my stash. I was lucky enough to catch some nice sun/shade for this photograph, and even a little rainbow on the shell from a crystal heart hanging in my window.

The poem reads: 

Magical these creatures thought to be

Ever living in the sea

Rumoured to lure the unwary sailor

Mythical singer, banshee wailer

Amongst the rocks, in foaming waves

In and out of deep sea caves

Dreamy nights in watery graves

I used to write a lot of acrostic poems for different themes and I also did a few for people I worked with using their names. One was for a couple who had just got engaged, he's French, she had just turned forty and found she was pregnant. Ooh-la-la, that was a fun one to do, he-he.

There were so many incredible pieces last week and each one so influential and unique. I can't wait to see all of this weeks offerings. 

Thanks for looking. Have fun & have a great week! :0) Mo x

MERMAIDS AND WATER BABIES

WOW!!
 The Rock-pools and beach finds last week were Fantastic!!
Thank you Carolyn for prompting the most fabulous themes
-oOo-
 Oh, I do LOVE a mermaid theme....

For my tag this week...

I decided to alter another one of my mini cabinet cards..

...with lace, trims, shells, beads, crown, wings, heart button....

...and the mermaids tail is created from snippets of lace, which I've painted the edges with gold paint to define the scales...

Then I added a little chain of shell discs, gems , beads and charms as a finishing touch.

Can't wait to see all your enchanting mermaids and water babies.

Thanks for peeking!

Jan x

Mermaids and Waterbabies

I have a feeling this week is going to show some beautiful mermaids and I have always loved mermaid art work! However I am going out on a bit of a limb here, or should it be fin? I am totally mad about Harry Potter and in the goblet of Fire he has a run in with some fearce merpeople that are very scary with lots of teeth, green hair and spears! If you are not a fan there is a photo here that will give you a good idea! I also have in my stamp collection Shmushallaum, a Stampotique mermaid who I felt would fit the bill nicely! Here she is, wooden spear in hand, guarding her chest of jewels and pearls.

I distressed the background, added some air bubbles and spooky heated grey and blue chiffon, then added two cloissone fish beads and the chest to which I added gold bedazzles and pearls and crystals. I mounted her on foam pads in and out of the seaweed and coloured her with twinkle h2o's. I think she looks suitably fierce, I wouldn't cross her anyway! I can't wait to see all your lovely tags, hope you all have a great week. x

Mermaids and Waterbabies

I enjoyed this month's watery themes so much, I had oodles of fun creating the tags. This week's tag theme of MERMAIDS AND WATERBABIES is the perfect end to a lovely series. I chose an image which I had used before in collages and cards. It is one of my favourite mermaid images - 

I filled the mermaid's shell with jewels found by her in shipwrecks on the ocean floor, rubies, diamonds, aquamarines and saphires as well as many gold and silver coins -

( micro beads and tiny sparklies )


There are more jewels lying on the ocean floor amongst the sea shells, just waiting to be picked up by the mermaids -
 

The image is framed with a small piece of dyed scrim on one side and a tiny bit of silk sari ribbon on the other side -
 

I finished the tag off with a bit of lace, which Kimberly had used to wrap her package of ATCs in ( mermaid swap, see this post ), and a little silver seahorse charm -

Thank you so much for all the comments you left on last week's tag. It really makes my day when I read your kind words.


Toodlepip xxx

Mermaids

Another week has sped by and it's Tuesday, and time for our tags again. This week the theme is 'Mermaids and Water Babies'. This made me think of one of my fave poems from the time before I went to school, 'The Forsaken Merman' by Matthew Arnold. I was often at my Aunt's, and she was always willing to read this epic poem to me, over which I always cried copiously, and then begged her to read it again....Time seems to change tastes! It tells the sad tale of a merman who marries a human, and then she deserts him, and goes back to her world, with the little church on the shore, and leaves her children and husband sad and lonely...

Come, dear children, let us away;

Down and away below!

Now my brothers call from the bay,

Now the great winds shoreward blow,

Now the salt tides seaward flow;

Now the wild white horses play,

Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.

Children dear, let us away!

This way, this way! ....

Children dear, was it yesterday

(Call yet once) that she went away?

Once she sate with you and me,

On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea,

And the youngest sate on her knee.

She comb'd its bright hair, and she tended it well,

When down swung the sound of a far-off bell.

She sigh'd, she look'd up through the clear green sea;

She said: "I must go, to my kinsfolk pray

In the little grey church on the shore to-day.

'T will be Easter-time in the world—ah me!

And I lose my poor soul, Merman! here with thee."

I said: "Go up, dear heart, through the waves;

Say thy prayer, and come back to the kind sea-caves!"

She smiled, she went up through the surf in the bay.

Children dear, was it yesterday?....

Okay, I won't bore you with the whole story, just say, it doesn't have a happy end - sob, sob!If you want to read more you can do so here.
For my tag I chose a painting from an Art Nouveau painter Howard Pyle.  (Photo courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)I have mounted the image onto some turqoise cardstock, and added some simple embellishments, which I think fit well to the picture. The picture shows a mermaid rescuing a shipwrecked man from drowning.  The theme shows opposing forces in nature; strong versus weak, land versus sea,  human versus mermaid etc. The painter died before he could complete the painting, but I still like it!

Have a lovely day, take care, and thanks for visiting! Valerie

Mermaids

Since it has been a while since I have done anything with fabric and sewing, I decided to sew a mermaid for my tag this week. Fortunately, I had all sorts of odds and ends that were put to a good use in making her. Her body is muslin on which I painted her face, while her fins are pieces of a shimmery blue fabric that I bought just because the color mesmerized me. I quilted her fins, stuffed her body (trapunto) and then dug in my yarn basket and found her hair, long wavy and blue. I braided one side accenting it with a pearl and one tiny, tiny starfish and embellished the other side with strings of tiny green rhinestones. I used more of the rhinestones, plus some larger blue rhinestones and pearls to create some modesty to cover her human assets. The background was painted by my sister, also a Tag Tuesday participant, Mary Ann, who has so much talent!

Rock Pools and Beach Finds

http://www.king-designs.blogspot.com/

I made a little rock pool scene with some fun ocean stamps that I have.  I love the seahorses, although I am not sure if they actually live in rock pools.  I put them with sea urchins and a sea fan coral that I stamped on acetate. The gold coral is actually some lacy ribbon that I cut into strips.  The tiny bit of sand is from this beautiful beach in Turks and Caicos, where we vacationed last week.

Loved all the great tags this week, will try to get around to comment on them.
Barb

Rock Pools and Beach Finds

Ocean's treasures left on the shore,
Nature's gift to adore  .... hastily put together to meet this week's deadline.

Tribute to Carolyn

I wonder if Carolyn will recognise one of her beads that I have unravelled and attached to the piece of driftwood I had in my box of finds.  The sari string is also a purchase from Carolyn.  

As her work is coastal based I thought that it would be nice to make my tag as a tribute to her for the fantastic job she has done for us all on creating and running TAG TUESDAY.  Thanks Carolyn.

 www.etsy.com/shop/CAROLYNSAXBYTEXTILES

The flat bottom buttons recently arrived from Elizabeth of BUTTONS & BADGES in the USA.

www.etsy.com/shop/buttonsandbadges

Thanks for all your lovely comments last week

Lynn and the Doodly Birds