Her Hopes - Playing with Sandra Evertson's Relics and Artifacts.

A warm welcome to Magpieheaven! Being a magpie by nature I just love collecting things and anybody who has ever visited our little cottage will tell you how crammed with shiny things it is! I was really excited when I discovered that Sandra Evertson, a collector of the most intriguing artefacts, was going to share her own magical magpie treasures through a collection of archival casts marketed by Prima. I'd already had fun embellishing one of the ex-voto hearts from this collection and next I decided to accept the challenge of creating with one of the beautiful eyes that look as if they might have been part of a classical statue. Maybe this doesn't suggest spring-time to you, but stick with me and I'll try to explain!

 Sandra's incredible pieces make wonderful jewellery, and I've seen some stunning examples of brooches and pendants using them; but I wanted to create a tiny canvas and make the eye the focal point. I wanted lace to feature so I began by attaching some from my stash with transparent gel medium.

Now the next step might not seem terribly significant at first - just two little words from some book text fixed to a glass nugget! These words, though, provided the inspiration and the title for my canvas - 'Her hopes'. I expect you can see the page is torn from an old copy of Pride and Prejudice - don't worry - we have other copies! Hope - what the spring-time is all about.

Lace, hope, classical statues - the project was beginning to form in my imagination! I could hear birds singing outside the open window and sense the spring awakening like young eyes opening on a fresh new world. I painted some card with Frescos in Blue Oyster, Lake Wanaka, Wisteria and China and used the 'bumping' technique with a Prima stencil.

I die-cut my card using a Tim Holtz tattered florals die and then gave the flowers a coat of UTEE. My lovely, generous friend, Lucy had very kindly given me a gift of some pieces of leather, which also cut brilliantly with the flower die and I painted this with a layer of Little Black dress, one of PaperArtsy Crackle Glaze and then a top layer of Blue Oyster.

'Her Hopes' were to be in the form of a flower opening and at its centre, an eye that sees and takes in all the beauty, all the possibilities that the spring has to offer. Over at 'Our Creative Corner' the challenge this month is to 'Colour Your World' and to portray the colours of spring-time 'where you are'. To me spring time is a time of hope and the colours that speak of spring to me are blues and lilacs. My heart always sings when the skies turn from grey to blue; birds' nests glint with treasures of blue speckled eggs; bluebells appear in the woods and the lilac starts to bloom. I decorated the eye with washes of Frescos and then Treasure Gold in Lilac and Rose Quartz.

Time to paint a background for 'her hopes'!

I wanted to merge the Rebekah Meier stencil with the lace and some Sara Nauman script.

3D transparent gel medium by Prima, some tiny beads and little resin flowers helped to provide more texture and I highlighted this along with the lace, using Treasure Gold. I photographed the canvas on a little wooden easel to give some idea of its miniature size.

You can see the addition of curly, copper wire, a peacock feather and this half spool, decorated with stamped and painted tissue.

I like the different effect from different angles! I wish I had the skills of animation because as I looked I could imagine the eye opening and closing with a camera shutter sound as the flowery hopes took in everything in the garden!

The butterfly was coloured with Distress Inks, spritzed with water.

Thank You so much for stopping by Magpieheaven today and taking a look at my miniature canvas. Whatever your hopes and dreams are for the spring-time, may they be fulfilled beyond your expectations!