To the woods...to the bluebell woods, a canvas

A couple of posts ago I shared our recent walk to the woods where the bluebells were in full bloom. If you would like to see that post it's here.
Here are a couple more photos of that wonderful visit.

The woods were so beautifull and I took one particular photo of my son and his dog which I love and this is the one I shared with you.

I gave my son a copy of this photo and I noticed that he had stood it on a shelf and obviously liked it.
 I decided that I wanted to make gift of the photo to my son and rather than just buy a frame for it that I would make him a mixed media canvas. I made my first canvas last month after attending a workshop and felt confident to try one from scratch myself. You can see this here

I bought a 9X7 " canvas and a plain wood frame to mount it in. I removed the glass.

I decided that I wanted to use 3 simple words on the canvas......"To the woods". This is a family joke as my son often teases Bear and asks him if he wants to go "To the woods". Bear will put his head to one side as if to say yes please. The woods are his favourite place for a walk. He runs after his ball, chases rabbits and is so free there to run. It's such a lovely sight to see.
I wanted the words made in wood and found a great seller on Ebay to cut these words for me.
I wanted to keep some white space on the canvas, my son likes clean modern lines in his home.

I added some Tim Holtz tissue wrap and tape for texture and background wording.

I added some Ranger texture paste through 2 of his stencils. Then I started to add some colours with sprays

 I took very few WIP photos as this canvas took up a lot of my studio desk space plus I wanted to take care not to drop anything on my work. I added ink sprays, texture paste and stencilling and spent time getting a balance. I was careful not to add too much as I wanted some white space visible and I really needed a masculine look for my son.

 Here is my finished work

Plus some close ups

 Lots of inky texture

 and you remember in my journal that I didn't use the crackle paste branch, just the tree? Well here is the branch with lots of texture.

I would like to enter my mixed media canvas into the following challenges;

Paperartsy Topic 9 words I love using words in my art and as Darcy says in her introductory video there are so many ways adding them.I think having them cut in wood really adds to my canvas and theme.
Anything but cute vintage garden This is a new challenge run by blogging friend Pamellia, do pop on over and support her in her new venture.
Country View crafts simply scenic
A vintage journey spring colours
Frilly and Funkie snap, crackle, crackle
Art with heart mixed media mahem
Love to create anything goes/mixed media
The Mixed Media Challenge May Flowers
Noor!UK May flowers
Our Creative Corner April showers bring May flowers

I gave this to my son yesterday and he seemed to genuinely love it......it went straight up on his bedroom wall so I guess that says it all.
It's been a gorgeous sunny weekend here and I managed to get lots of hours out in the garden;cleaning out pots, mowing the lawn, re painting the outside of my studio and enjoying lunch and tea on the patio. Obviously that means no crafting but hey sometimes you just have to enjoy the sunshine whilst it lasts.

Thanks for visiting and taking the time to say hello.

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x