rusty the invermere moose august 2012

For those of you who have been following along in my adventures you know that the family (Alex, mr. everythingshetouches, Baba, Dyeda and myself) went on a fabulous road trip to Fairmont, British Columbia last summer (bavarian mining railway north star school august 2012).  Invermere, B.C. is 37km north of Fairmont Hot Springs and is a summer destination to approximately 36 000 visitors on weekends throughout the summer (population 4000).  Invermere is also home to Rusty, the Moose, a large Canadian roadside attraction.  I'm a sucker for (a) large Canadian roadside attractions and (b) moose which equals photo op.

I layered a stitched piece of material, packaging, wooden moose, washi tape, metal sprockets, chipboard gears, distress inks and acrylic paint onto Hot Off The Press Steampunk paper.  The moose trio are wooden cutouts that I found at Walmart for a dollar (a dollar for a package of three moose and three moose heads!  The moose heads are a bit too odd for me and so they may be migrating to another happy home.  I'll have to see if I can come up with an art piece which incorporates moose heads.  If you want them let me know.  I'm sure we can get moose to travel without much hassle) to which I applied gesso, white acrylic paint and weathered wood distress ink.  I gave them personality by adding washi tape and, from Tim Holtz Visual Artistry The Journey, the phrase enjoy the journey.  I love that statement.  Simple and yet so meaningful.  The argyle stamp (Tim Holtz's Stampers Anonymous) behind The Dude (the largest moose on the right; the other two are Walter and Donny for all you Big Lebowski fans) was added with white acrylic paint.  Yeah, I named the moose.  The enormous gear photo was actually taken on our trip to the Bavarian Mining Railway in Kimberley, B.C.  It's a bit of a cheat but it fits in nicely with this layout and I just couldn't resist.

I love the little Steampunk-esque hat on Donny.  It is from the Dylusions Couture Collection set stamped onto watercolour paper and coloured in with markers.  The feather was drawn free-hand.

The sprockets are Tim Holtz sprocket gears.  The gears were cut using my Silhouette Cameo.  You can't see it but I'm grinning.  I painted some of the chipboard gears with Martha Stewart Crafts acrylic pearl paint (aquarium) and others with FolkArt metallic acrylic paint (antique copper).  The large gear at the top in the photo below was painted with antique copper and embossed with black embossing powder.  I added the powder to the very wet paint and heat set it.  The bubbling drying paint created a bit of a crackle effect which I absolutely adore.  The gear has an incredible texture now and really sets up that corner of the layout.

I added more argyle and numbers from an eye chart stencil in white acrylic paint to the top right of the layout.  The hexagons are Tim Holtz distress ink peeled paint, applied with a stencil and doodled with my black and white gelly roll pens.

The gauzy material was doubled over and stitched free-hand with grey embroidery thread.  I also added the packaging from the Tim Holtz sprocket gears set which I randomly tossed about the page (somewhat randomly.  Perfectionist Pam only permits a calculated amount of randomness.  I found more freedom in doodling than I have in "random" placements).

I created a Rusty Moose tag to tuck away in the back of the layout.  I love making tags.  I recently purchased my first art journal and I have yet to crack it open.  Perhaps once I create my first page the trepidation that comes with new blank pages will lessen, however, at the moment I feel incapacitated.  I need to transfer the tag and doodling joy to the pages of the art journal somehow.

I am entering the Rusty Moose layout in About A Boy's mid-August Challenge: Anything Goes.  I am so honoured to be In the Spotlight for About a Boy August 1st Back to School Challenge.  The design team is incredibly talented and the entries are very beautiful.  You should definitely check them out.

I have a few more posts lined up for the end of August, including PJ September New Technique Challenge and a craft outside of the world of paper.  Be sure to come back and visit.