mixed media

Grimoire cover

~ marjolijnmakes ~ Leave a comment

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I’ve talked about my spiritual path here before, but to be honest, I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus when it comes to witchcraft and paganism. I talked the talk but didn’t walk the walk so to speak. Since being home for a few weeks {pro tip: don’t fall down stairs… it sucks} I’ve had time to reflect. As you do, sitting on a couch with nothing to do all day, right? And what I found is that while my worldview and my beliefs have changed over the years, I do miss it. I miss the witchy feeling and the peace and confidence it brought me. So I’m back! Basically starting from scratch and trying to figure out which bits and pieces within the pagan and witch paths do fit me and which don’t.

Creativity, crafting and art have always been a big part of my life {my site is not called Marjolijn MAKES for nothing} so it makes sense that it also becomes a big part of my spiritual practice and pagan path. Something that I’ve wanted to do for a while now is make a beautiful Book of Shadows or Gimoire that’s filled with art and knowledge about a bunch of different subjects. But I’ve always been afraid to start. There are so many beautiful examples out there, how could I ever compare, right? So this was step one, making a journal fit to become a Grimoire.

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I took a blank sketchbook and went all out. Using different mixed media techniques I finally made a book I absolutely adored. Since I made the book at night {bad idea…} I had to tweak it a little bit in the days following. Because it was bright BRIGHT metallic purple with a few silver streaks, not the dark and mysterious book I wanted it to be. I added some matte black paint, some darker purple and gold. Now I absolutely love it!

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And the back needed to be fancy as well of course! Now if you’re still reading and thinking: what the hell is a grimoire or a book of shadows? Sorry, I should have explained earlier. Both are books used within witchcraft and within the pagan path. They are magic journals. Sometimes the terms are used interchangeably, sometimes a book of shadows is seen more as a magical diary, where you note the divinations, spells, rituals and prayers you used and what their effects were, where a grimoire is more a compendium of knowledge with pages filled with information and correspondences.

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I’ve already made a couple of pages about moon magic, which I’ll share with you over the coming weeks. It’s been so much fun to work in this way and I’m hoping I can fill my artsy grimoire with lots of colour and lots of different techniques. For those who want to see more, I have a pinterest board filled with beautiful examples of other people’s grimoires, and I have a witchy sideblog on Tumblr called Baduhenna’s Raven, where I also talk about grimoires and am starting a bit of a series on how to make an artsy grimoire like mine. {Though I might also start it here… If people are interested?} So check those out and tell me what you do with your BoS/Grimoire!

D&D Birthday card

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 2 Comments

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And we’re back from hiatus! YAY! As you may know by now I play a lot of Tabletop RPGs. And I do mean a lot… We have a Pathfinder game every wednesday, Starfinder once a month and then a D&D 5th edition one-shot every once in a while. You can easily say I’m a bit addicted {especially when you see my dice collection…shh!}

We usually play with the same group of friends, although the parties depend on who is the GM and which players can make it. So when one of my party member’s birthday came up, I knew I needed to make a D&D-themed birthday card!

I used the adorable BB Magical Dragons stamp by My Favorite Things and used a bunch of stamps and stencils to make the mixed media background. The D20 dice and drew and inked myself! It’s so sparkly!

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I hand lettered the “Roll for birthday fun!” quote and added a bunch of tiny accents with white and black posca fineliners. This card was so much fun to make and he absolutely loved it! I know what I can make for my other party members {make ALL the colours!} and I might even add them to the shop if there are people out there who are interested. But for now: yay for cute D&D dragon cards!

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Whimsical Girl

~ marjolijnmakes ~ Leave a comment

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Last Saturday me and my mum went to an amazing workshop where we would try and make a mixed media painting with a ‘Whimsical Girl’. The workshop was led by the awesome Miranda van den Bosch {seriously, check out her website and Facebook page!} and was held at Doe@ding {a.k.a. one of the best craft-shops in the Netherlands}.

It was such an amazing and fun-filled day. I learned a lot from Miranda about portrait drawing and shadowing, which was exactly why I wanted to follow this workshop. I also got to work with materials I’d never worked with before, like the Distress Crayons. All in all, it was a fun mother-and-daughter-day and I walked out of there with a new addiction… Expect more of these paintings really soon! But first, some W.I.P. pictures:

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General sketch and added tissue paper to the background
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Filled in the background with Distress Crayons and Gesso
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Finished her face! Now all she needs is hair and eyebrows….

Mixed Media: Flowers and Secrets

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 1 Comment

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So in last weeks post I promised you guys that I’d show you something else you can do with your colouring pages. Well, here she is! A mixed media painting using you colouring page as a beautiful centre.

This picture is again from Jasmine Becket-Griffith‘s amazing Fantasy Art Coloring book. Her name is Flora! First I coloured her with Spectrum Noir markers, specifically the Pastel set. I added a bit of sparkle to her belt with the Spectrum Noir Sparkle set – Metallics.

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Next I took some really tiny scissors and cut out the figure from the colouring page. Then I grabbed a canvas, painted on some colours that I liked with my page and had some fun with stencils! Next step: Mod Podge. I glued my cut out colouring page onto the canvas and waited for it to dry. Already looking good!

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Last but not least I painted the borders with black acrylics, contoured my colouring page with black Posca marker and added the handlettered text. It was still missing something, so I took my white Posca marker and added the scribbles and the border. And there you go! A pretty mixed media painting using colouring pages!

I’m totally hooked now, and already working on the next one. These are just so much fun to make! So tell me, what fun ways of using colouring pages have you found?

Mixed Media: Rust

~ marjolijnmakes ~ Leave a comment

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The absolute best thing of working in a craftshop is hearing: “We’ve got a new product, will you make something with it so people can see what it does?” I get to craft and get paid for it, which is of course the dream! This time we got a new Rust Effect spray by Edding and it worked like a charm.

First I took one of the wooden book-boxes we have in our collection and started sticking things on it I thought would look nice together. Don’t bother looking at the colours, go for texture! I added a layer of what we call ‘spiderweb paper’ {the closest thing I could find in English is fiber paper, but spiderweb is even more open} and a lace ribbon. After that I started adding flowers, buttons, crocheted flowers and rhinestones until I got the composition that I wanted.

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Then it was spraying time! I must say, I was amazed by how easy this was to work with. It covered everything in one easy coat and within a few minutes it was touch dry. It took longer for the glue to dry than the paint… Covering was good and it gives the entire piece a little bit of texture and shine, just like something completely rusted over. Love, love, love the effect!

The only thing left to do was drybrush a bit of bright turquoise acrylic paint to strengthen the aging/rust effect and tadaa: easy peasy awesome rust book-box. I totally fell in love with this product and can’t wait to use it for other stuff…. Like D&D or Warhammer terrain… {which I will of course show you guys when I’ve made them!}

Get Happy Art Journal Page

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 2 Comments

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Last week I was having a not-so-happy day, so instead of writing {what I should have been doing} I decided to play around with paint and happy colours! I’ve tried my hand at Art Journaling before, but after seeing the amazing Miranda van den Bosch in action and after practising on my Cattitude painting, this is the first page that looked and felt like an Art Journal page.

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I first made the background with a couple of happy colours applied with makeup sponges. After that I stencilled the star patterns and the two different bubbles. All new stencils that I got at the Doe@Ding dagen, a fun craft-fair, a few weeks ago. The butterflies are all from the Flutter stamp set by BoBunny.

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The white bubbles didn’t come out white enough, so I traced them with a white Posca pen. I added the quotes by first writing out the words normally, and then adding triangles to where the letters needed to be thicker. The black bubbles and butterflies got a few fun accents with metallic markers.

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I stamped the wings on the page itself, using the Flutter stamp set again. Then I stamped the Gorjuss Collectable no. 15, the Black Star, on a piece of cardstock and coloured it with my Flexmarkers. I cut her out and stuck her to the page using foam tape, giving her a bit more depth. Then it was time for the black lines around the page and the black corner-dots, all made with Posca pen. The final touch was a bit of white drops splattered all over the page, made with white Ecoline ink.

So that’s it! My first “real” Art Journal page! It really helped lift my spirits and made me happier with every layer I added. So this might be a new coping mechanism, expect more pages in the future!

Cattitude painting

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 3 Comments

Hi guys! OMG another post so soon? Yeah, it’s a new thing I’m trying, I hope you like it.

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I made this adorable painting for my mother-in-law {who is secretly a crazy cat lady}. She is just awesome and helped us remodel our kitchen, which is now so pretty! I wanted to make something for her to thank her. I found this art journal page through pinterest, made by Nika in Wonderland. I loved the design and wanted to make something like that, but more in my style and in her colours.

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First I painted a gradient in turquoise and purple and added the cat sillhouette. Then I added some texture to the page using stencils, which was for me a first time using this technique.

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I looked at some art journaling pages for ideas for the edges, wanting to do something that was more ‘me’ than the original page. Then I added the quote, which I printed out on normal paper, and added the decorative borders. She absolutely loved it and couldn’t wait to hang it on the wall. It was my first try in the ‘art journal’ style and it was so much fun to do! I’ll definitely be doing more in this style, whether it’s in an actual art journal or on canvas again. Fun!

Writer Canvas Card

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 4 Comments

Wow, you guys! It’s been a while… Time just ran away from me, mostly fun things, luckily, and work has been hectic. I plan on having more time to blog, write and craft in January. Until then I’m splitting everything into smaller posts. So yay for a new post! {finally}

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So my sister-from-another-mother/writing buddy turned 30 last week and I couldn’t let that go without making something spectacular for her. Last year I made her a Edgar Allen Poe’s the Raven themed card {or see below} and in the comments she stated that she set a goal for me, to make her a more beautiful card this year. Well then, I couldn’t just let this challenge go, now could I?

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This is the first time working with mixed media for me, so lots of hours scouring pinterest and looking for styles and techniques that appealed to me. Above is the work in progress, just before I added the Gesso and really got the party started. Since we’re both writers, and my presents were writer-themed, I wanted the card be about writing as well. I used the Marianne Design cutting die quill and ink (COL1375) and one of the Spellbinders for the plaque where I put the quote on. The rest is stuff I had laying around, like buttons, watchparts, charms and an actual pen-nib.

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After that I Gesso’ed {is that a word? It is now…} it, painted it black and then drybrushed it dark red {her favourite colours}. We’d been sending each other quotes on writing for weeks now, so I wanted to incorporate one of the quotes here as well. It’s from William Wordsworth and reads: “Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart.” I printed it out in the same typeface as her tattoo, that we got together when we had our 25 year friends anniversary. She had “write” tattooed in this typeface {Jane Austen} and I had “create” which I handlettered myself.

She absolutely adored it and called me crazy because this apparently doesn’t count as a card… {It’s card-sized, so it counts, right?} It was loads of fun to do and I think I’ll be dabbling in mixed media more often from now on. Now to think up something even bigger for next year…

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{Last year’s card, which is still on the dresser… yay!}

Catching Dreams and Falling Feathers

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 2 Comments

One of the biggest trends in the craftworld right now is dreamcatchers. So many new stamps, cutting dies, stencils and other fun crafty stuff are coming out right now and being a fan of dreamcatchers myself, I’m loving it! One of the best things of working at a craftshop is that part of your job is to actually be crafty and make a bunch of stuff that inspire customers to make stuff themselves. So, with the dreamcatcher craze going on, I figured I’d show you guys and gals some of the fun things I made for our store!

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{crappy picture is crappy, I know, I’ll update it soon…} The first thing I wanted to show you was an actual dreamcather! I was the only one who’d actually made one before so our manager asked me to make a big one to hang on the wall. She also brought the idea to use the paper feathers in sweet mint and lilac, and I chose the other colours to match those. It’s a lot busier than the normal dreamcatchers that I make, but this seems to be the boho trend right now, so why not combine all of those. I do love how it turned out!

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Marianne design also hopped on the dreamcatcher bandwagon and brought out an amazing collection of a cutting die (CR1373), a beautiful clearstamp (CS0975) with a bunch of texts about dreams and a bunch of cute feathers (CA3129). This one I wanted to make with sweet pastels to match the feather colours.

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This one I wanted to give bright, summery colours to match the fashion trends right now. Summery, ibiza style brightness!

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And something completely different, but still made with the same die and stamps. The purple feathers are the feathers that are supposed to be on the bottom of the dreamcatcher, but I had this idea of a calm card in purple shades with falling feathers on the side and a quote next to it. This is what came out and I have to admit, although I *love* the dreamcatchers, this is my favourite.

So this was my creative debauchery for the past weeks. I’d love to hear what you think and hear what you’ve been up to! ‘Till next time!

Birthday Cards Galore!

~ marjolijnmakes ~ 5 Comments

January is always a busy month, birthday wise. We’ve got a bunch of friends and family who celebrate their birthdays in January and the beginning of February, then it’s sort of quiet all the way to September. Last year I started making personalized cards for everyone’s birthday and I loved doing it! So even though it’s kinda hectic in January with so many birthdays, I made everyone a personalized card.

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The first one is for my friend Nikki. She loves the Gorjuss girls as much as I do, so it needed to be something with a Gorjuss stamp. This was the first time I tried paper patching, I stamped the image again on a patterned paper and cut out the dress and boots, which I then glued on top of the image stamped on white paper. I loved the effect! I need a bit of a busier pattern next time though…

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The next one is for my friend Marlon. She loooooooves to crochet and makes the coolest things! A while ago I picked up the Marianne Design cutting die with yarn, crochet hooks and knitting needles and knew I wanted to do something fun with that one. This quote is one I knew she loved, so I thought, why not make the yarn and needles into a sort of skull-and-bones? The background is stamping ink through a masking stencil and the quote is a combination of stamping and hand lettering. I adore this one and she absolutely loved it!

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Mum was up next. She has a washi tape addiction {like me…} so card needed to be something with washi tape. Through Pinterest I found a washi tape and stamp card which design I adored and blatantly copied… {sorry not sorry} But then I needed a fun quote, which proved a bit more difficult. I came across an artwork with this quote and absolutely loved it in combination with the already rainbow colours. The tiny unicorn is a hand-embroidery design from Urban Threads that I picked up a while back. Check out her site and sign up for the newsletter, not only are the hand-embroidery design amazing and cheap digital stamps, she has awesome sales that make the designs even cheaper!

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Last one {for now} is the card I made for my Grandpa. He loves birds and when I was younger we used to spend entire afternoons just sitting in the garden and watching the birds flit by. I made the little birdhouse by taking a normal A6 sized card and cutting the corners off of the top. The heart was taken out with a cutting die, strips of scrapbook paper for the roof and bottom et viola! We have a tiny birdhouse. The little birds are cut from jute paper using a cutting die and embellished with promarkers. I doodled the hearts and swirls and added a ‘happy birthday’ sentiment inside. He loved it!

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Okay fine, one more then {hihihi} Although this one is a little bit older, from the end of November. My amazing friend Chantal had her birthday. We both share the same passion for literature, writing and all things dark and Gothic. I wanted to make an awesome birthday card for her that show all these things. The card is in ‘her’ colours: black and bloodred, with one of our favourite poems, the Raven by Edgar Allen Poe. {seriously, you need to listen to this version, told by the amazing Christopher Lee} The ravens and the quote were handdrawn on vintage style paper. I added the feathers last minute, feeling that the card was missing something. They complement the card perfectly! I absolutely loved it and it’s still on her dresser, so I must have done something right *grin*

See you in about two weeks with another batch of birthday cards!