New RSD Altered board book

Hi everyone! I haven't made an altered board book in what seems like ages and I had an idea that I really wanted to play out. The theme of this board book is Someone's in the Kitchen with Dinah and it's going to feature one of Rick St. Dennis' morning goddesses and some kitchen monsters/robots because that's who is in the kitchen with Dinah! How fun is that! I began with a child's board book which I sanded and coated with gesso. before applying the second coat of gesso, I glued some washi tape to the center seam of each page to prevent the gesso cracking as the book is bent. The tape stays flexible so no cracks appear.

For the first two page spread, I decided to invite Sugar Monster into the kitchen. I coloured him with a mix of Prismacolor and Polychromos pencils. Then Sugar was fussy cut leaving a narrow white border before he was matted with black cardstock and trimmed out again. Foam tape was added to the back of him for dimension when he was added to the background.

The background began with London Blue and Crushed Grape Dylusions paint brayered onto the gessoed background. Gesso was scraped across the dried paint with a palette knife. Once that was dry, Forget-Me-Not Archival ink was stamped onto the background using a cross-hatch stamp. A little while ago, a friend gave me these fabulous vintage Woman's Day magazines from the early 1950s. They are so cool, filled with wonderful old ads. I thought it was be so cool to use them as a background for these kitchen themes pages. I tore out three plus a recipe and adhered them to the journal pages with gel medium. Inktense pencil activated with water was used to shade them and black outlining was added. A little stamping was added on top in a few places to embed these ads.

Black stencilling was sponged on next using Jet Black Archival ink and TCW's Mini Texturized stencil. Using another pattern from the same stencil, white embossing paste was scraped through the circles with a palette knife. Music washi tape was adhered to cream cardstock and applied to give Sugar a place to stand. Another little section was added to the other page at the top to create repetition. Memory Box Sketchy Rings die was used to cut black cardstock twice. One was layered  onto each page...love that die! Sugar was popped up onto the left side.

The sentiment which was computer generated  and printed on white paper was matted with yellow spritzed paper and then black cardstock  before being adhered to the background. To finish the spread, a border was doodled with black pen and the circles filled in with white paint pen. Doodling and rub-ons were added and three enamel hearts adhered to the top left corner to balance out the design. Black Big Brush pen was added to the edges of the book as a final touch.

Thanks for joining Sugar and me today in Dinah's kitchen. Stay tuned until next Thursday when another character (or two) from this altered board book will be visiting.

Life is good; so is art.
Bonnie