Art Journal - 30 Days: Days 20-24

It's been a few days...we've been busy finishing up Thanksgiving leftovers and getting back into our routine around here!  I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday!

So by now, our 30 days of Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's 30 Days In Your Journal workshop is over.  (insert very sad face here)  What a fabulous 30 days it was.  I'm playing catch-up with my posts (and in my journal, as I skipped a few of the last days due to the holiday).  If you really want to get in the practice of playing in your art journal every single day, I really encourage you to give Julie's class a try.  I wouldn't say it's heavy on technique like some other classes I've taken - if you're looking for something with a ton of new techniques, I can recommend some other classes - but this class is more about helping you get in the practice of "showing up" every day in your journal - even when you don't feel like it (and trust me, there were days I didn't feel like it). 

This spread is a prime example of not feeling like it.  If you'll notice, my first entry is the 20th, and the next is the 23rd.  I had a really hard time getting going on this page.  And some of my journaling is about exactly that - my frustration with myself, my "missing mojo," etc.  I think we all go through periods like this, when we just don't feel like creating - and it's especially bad when there are deadlines to meet.  My fellow classmates and I had a great discussion on the private class message board about how we deal with this issue, and there were some great suggestions made as to how to deal with it.

But...eventually, I made it through the page - and in the end, I love how it turned out.  There's something to be said for pushing through the frustration and continuing to "just show up" in your journal.

Personally, I was able to clean and organize my entire studio while my mojo was missing!  LOL  

What about you?  What do YOU do when you don't feel like creating?  Do you try a different project?  Do you, like me, start sorting and organizing your supplies, hoping to find some inspiration in a long-forgotten supply?  Do you leave the studio altogether and go do something else?  

Leave me a comment letting me know what YOU do to find your mojo when it goes missing - I'd love to hear!

Art Journal: 30 Days, Days 15 - 19

Okay, it's getting serious now - only 11 days left in our class!  Yikes!  BUT I am SOOOO jazzed about how this art journal page turned out.  I've never done an art journal page over black gesso, and oh my gosh - I'm so totally hooked!  (As in, I went out and bought another big jar of black gesso this week just to make sure I don't run out!  Ha!)  

These flowers...I have to tell you about them.  Because they started off being colored with my Caran d'Ache Neocolor II watercolor crayons - which I absolutely love.  I only own 13 of them, but I adore them.  I have 2 other kinds of watercolor crayons (did I mention I'm a watercolor junkie?), and while the Stampin' Up watercolor crayons ARE pretty decent, neither they nor definitely not the Reeves ones can hold a candle to the Caran d'Ache crayons.  And I was SUPER excited to learn that they would color over black gesso and show up!  How awesome!  The first time I colored, I added water, and didn't really care for the results...so I colored over them again and just left the crayons.  It was pretty cool looking.  But they just weren't popping quite as much as I liked.

And THEN, at Aaron Brothers, I found these awesome things - I say "things," because they are sort of a cross between a pencil and a crayon - they're made by Stabilo, and they're called "Woody 3-in-1" - and they work as a crayon or a colored pencil or a watercolor crayon.  

Anyway, I got them, and I colored over my flowers again - and SHUT THE FRONT DOOR - look at how bright my flowers got!!!  These babies rock!  

How much fun is this, with all the white journaling (done with a Pentel Sunburst gel pen), and the doodles (if you haven't tried the Sakura Souffle pens, you MUST), and most of all...those incredibly brilliant, vibrant pops of color in those flowers!  (And YES, I know I spelled "believe" incorrectly...but it was so pretty, I didn't want to mess it up by trying to fix it...such is life!)  

Anyway - if you haven't given black gesso as your base a try - you should try it out!  SO MUCH FUN!

Supplies Used:

Art Journal: 30 Days, Days 11-14

Wow, it's hard to believe that we are already half-way through our class with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer, 30 Days In Your Journal.  I think I'm going to need a support group after we're through...I'm having such a good time in the class, and the accountability is awesome.  I love being able to post my pics to the Flickr group and receiving feedback from the other class participants, as well as seeing how everyone else in the class is interpreting Julie's instruction and ideas.  When I started, I wondered if I'd really be able to commit to art journaling every day for 30 days, and now, suddenly, 30 days seems like such a short time.  I find myself wishing the class was just a bit longer!

Anyway, here is my spread for days 11-14.  I am super happy with how it turned out.  The page on the right was a background I had previously completed during Christy Tomlinson's She Had 3 Hearts art journaling class...but I didn't know where to go from there.  It was really bright, and even though I loved the page, I just wasn't sure what to do with it.  The page on the left previously had a couple random stamps on it, which didn't turn out well, so I had painted some random paint over it.  Then when we prepped these pages, with Color Wash sprays, I just let the sprays cover the paint.  I used colors that would complement the colors on the right page, and then on the right page, decided to use white Golden Airbrush paint to create drippage and soften the colors.  

Once the journaling was done, I did the large writing and the doodles using a paint brush and black fluid acrylic - my first time successfully doing so!  It's really hard with my shaky, weak hands (due to my neuropathy and rheumatoid arthritis) to do detail painting, so I was super excited when I was able to successfully paint the writing and doodles!  I used fluid acrylics to paint in the painted writing and doodles.  I used oil pastels (cheap children's ones from Faber-Castell) to lighten the circles with the numbers and to darken the other circles.  

There is still plenty of time to join the class if you are thinking about it - the classroom is going to be open for 3 months.  Come on over and join us!

Art Journal - 30 Days In Your Journal, Days 6-10

Well, I finished up my second 2-page spread in my art journaling class, 30 Days In Your Journal with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer (actually...I finished it up on the 10th...and I'm close to finishing up another spread by now).  Still loving the class, though I'm not sure I love this particular spread.  But.  But.  I'm TOTALLY OKAY with that.  

Why am I okay with that?  Because I journaled all of those days.  And I used up junk tags from my junk stash...you know, tags that didn't work out when I was trying new techniques or whatever; and I used a receipt; and I used a note from a company I was doing a review for...stuff from my everyday life - and THAT is cool.  I like that.  Plus I used a couple embellishments from my always-growing embellishment stash, a couple that have been in there for going on a year or so, that really needed to be used.  

So even though the page itself isn't my favorite (I think maybe it's the colors I used on the background, because I do like the colors of the tags I used and the colors I splashed on the receipt/postcard/etc.)...I am happy overall with the fact that I did it, and with all that is encompassed on the page.  Does that make sense?

The Crafter's Workshop: "Ava" Stencil

Today over on Craft Test Dummies, I have posted my second review (here's my first) of the stencils made by The Crafter's Workshop.  You've seen me write about them here before, and I've shown you projects I've used them on...so you already know that I love them.  Today I wanted to show you one of the face stencils - Ava is her name - and just how versatile she is.  I showed you an art journal page in my last post, where I used her in her most basic form...I simply traced her lines with a Pitt Artist Pen, then went over the lines a bit with some oil pastels.  I didn't color in her face, no paint, nothing...very simple.  But today, I'm showing you my very first attempt at something completely different (no judging allowed...I just told you, this is my FIRST ever attempt...!).  

I started out in a 9x12 art journal by scribbling all over the paper with Derwent Inktense watercolor pencils, and then adding water with a brush.  I love these pencils because once the color is dissolved and dry, it is permanent and is no longer water-soluble...so you don't have to worry about it moving around on you as you work in layers over it.

Then I placed the 6"x6" Ava stencil on my page.  I decided I was only going to use the face and neck portion of the stencil, so I traced those parts with a pencil onto my page, along with just a bit of the hair as a guide for reference.  You can just barely see my pencil lines in the photo below - I wanted to keep them light so they wouldn't show through the paint.

Then came the challenging part...for me, at least.  I've *never* painted a face before.  Not ever.  Nor have I ever drawn a face.  I am clueless when it comes to shading and shadows and all of that...you know, the technical aspects of art!  (I really do want to take some actual art classes someday and learn these things!)  So I just went for it and started adding paint.  And my first attempt was a hot mess...but fortunately, it's just paint...so I added some more paint, and painted right over her, until I found a happy medium.  I knew ahead of time that I wanted to put long, flowing hair on her (though I hadn't really planned on it being *quite* so poofy...but hey...what can I say...she wanted to have poofy hair!).  So this is how she looked after I painted over the traced lines.

And then the magic happens.  I placed the stencil BACK on her, and used a cosmetic sponge with some Claudine Helmuth Black Gesso (LOVE that stuff!), and I stenciled in her eyes, nose, lips, chin, and neck lines again.  It's AMAZING what an instant transformation just that little bit gives.  That gave me a guide.  Then I used my paint brush and continued from there, adding her eyebrows completing her mouth, and filling in all the hair lines.  (I also went back in with some white to add a few highlights on her face and neck...it seemed to help.)

Now the page is all ready for me to add some other elements and do some journaling.  While I know she's no masterpiece, having never painted a face before, I am pretty happy with how she turned out...and I owe it all to my friends at The Crafter's Workshop!  

For more details on this and other great ideas for using the face stencils, be sure to check out this great post on stencil designer Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's blog!!  And make sure you hop over to Craft Test Dummies to check out all the other things I did with these great stencils for my review!

Are you a fan of The Crafter's Workshop stencils?  I'd love to see links to projects you've made using them!

Supplies Used:

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Art Journal Pages

I mentioned in my last post that I'm taking Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's online workshop, 30 Days In Your Journal.  What's so awesome about this class is that she really focuses on showing you how to fit art journaling into your life every single day...for just 10 minutes.  So you don't do a page or a spread a day - you work on a two-page spread for several days, adding a bit at a time.  In the past, I've usually done entire pages (or more) in one setting, though I have sometimes gone back and added layers - and I do have multiple pages in multiple journals that are in various stages of work.  But this idea of really limiting myself to 10 minutes a day is new to me.  And I think it could work, and I think it just might be the key to actually being able to art journal more frequently - because finding chunks of time to sit and play is usually what prevents me from doing it as much as I'd like.  So we'll see how this goes.

At any rate, after the first 5 days, I've completed this two-page spread.  It's much busier and fuller than most of my art journal pages normally are, but I'm okay with that.  I did a lot more actual journaling than I often do, which I like, and less time-consuming processes than I've used on other pages...which I'm torn about.  I really do like playing with new mediums and trying new techniques in my art journals...but maybe those should be saved for the times when I have bigger chunks of time, and my "10 minutes a day" art journaling can be a bit more basic.

I *love* the black stamped hand on the left side.  That was done with a Styrofoam stamp I made by tracing one of the hands from the Henna Hands stencil (also designed by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer) from The Crafter's Workshop and then using a technique I learned in the Random Creative Scrapple Doodle workshop by Stephanie Ackerman.  I used Claudine Helmuth's Black Gesso to stamp with, and then journaled on the hand with a white Sakura Glaze pen (new to me - totally in love!).  I also used the Punchinella stencil from The Crafter's Workshop (another one designed by Julie) to add layers of color with Distress Ink and Paint Dabbers randomly over the pages.  I am absolutely addicted to The Crafter's Workshop Stencils...I use them ALL THE TIME - seriously!  If you haven't tried them, you definitely need to check them out.  (I reviewed them earlier this year on Craft Test Dummies, and will be writing an updated review in a few weeks, covering the newer releases.)

The remainder of these pages were done some time ago - back in July/August, I believe - when I was taking Christy Tomlinson's She Had 3 Hearts workshop.  (Can you tell I love taking online workshops??  That's what happens when you're a stay at home, home-schooling mom of four children ages 6 and under!)

I did an image transfer (the row of scissors on a shelf) on this page, and played with melting some crayon wax.  I really like how the green wax blew across the page in little droplets when I used my heat gun to melt the crayon!  I also love the stack of hearts - canvas, glassine paper, fabric, and a rusty metal heart that I dipped into melted UTEE (which I had colored orange with Pan Pastel).  I used a little clip of some kind that I got in a random assortment of trinkets from this way cool store Zinnia to clip the hearts together.

I used another stencil from The Crafter's Workshop on this page - Ava - to create the girl's face.  There are SOOOO many ways to use this stencil - check out this blog post about the face stencils to see just how versatile they are!  I also used another of their stencils for the journaling.  I dripped acrylic inks on the page for drippage, and used acrylic inks to color the scallops around the edges of the page as well.  To make the scallops, I just punched circles from vintage music paper, vintage book text, vintage dictionary pages, old map pages, etc., and glued them on the page hanging off the edge and then trimmed the excess.  I love using vintage papers!!

This is another fun page.  I used Adirondack Colorwash Sprays and - surprise - The Crafter's Workshop stencils on the background (along with an alphabet stencil from...???).  And then I played with wax.  I used clear beeswax at first, and then added some blue crayon to the wax to color it a bit.  I stamped into the wax in the upper left hand corner using Unity's Giving It All Meaning stamp - what awesome texture that created!    And I love Prima's Chickenwire stamp, which I used to add texture over the wax and around the edges.  I was happy to discover that the Pitt Artist pens from Faber-Castell write easily even over cooled beeswax!  

This last page was super fun.  I can't claim credit for the idea of rolling the paper - another student in the workshop did that on a page in her journal, and then Christy actually did a piece of art on her blog inspired by it, which is when I saw the technique.  Anyway, it was my idea to roll them up and glue them to the base, then cut them out in a heart.  Then I actually did my journaling - using the Pitt Artist pen - right on the rolled paper heart!!  It wasn't anything I really needed anyone else to be able to read - and I know what it's about - and that's all that matters...so I was okay knowing that the writing was going to get covered up.  Unfortunately, my heart has gotten rather smooshed from my journal being closed - I should have taken a picture right when I made the page - not several months later!

And then...came the string gel.  Have you ever played with string gel?  Well, I hadn't, prior to this page...and boy oh boy, was it ever fun!  I fell in love with the stuff!!  Basically, it's this polymer stuff, and it starts out clear, so you need to add some paint (or acrylic ink) to color it.  And then you let it sit for a while - I want to say like 2 hours or so.  Then you take a spoon or a palette knife or whatever, and you scoop some of it up, and you basically drizzle it all over your project.  It's SO fun - makes you feel like a kid!  It's totally messy and awesome and fun.  When it dries, it still looks wet, and it's glossy and dimensional - and did I mention it's FUN?!  Seriously.  {Just don't make the same mistake I did.  I had some extra string gel - which of course, I didn't want to waste.  So I drizzled it on the page facing this one, figuring I'd play around with that page too.  I wasn't thinking...now I have to keep a piece of wax paper in there all the time, or the pages stick together because the string gel on the two pages wants to stick to each other.  Live and learn.}

Anyway, hope you enjoyed those.  If you want to learn more about art journaling, you really should check out Julie's class - she really tells you exactly what she's doing and why she's doing it, every step of the way.  It's great for beginners or for more advanced artists who just want some inspiration.

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Out of the Box Art Journal Page

Over on Craft Test Dummies on Monday, I am posting a review of this adhesive tape runner, Glue Tape by Plus.  It was new to me - I had never heard of it - and Jenny had sent it to me after Summer CHA to give it a try.  Make sure you go check out my review - I was pleasantly surprised by how it performed, especially since it is lower priced than many of the tape runners on the market.

Anyway, while doing my review, one of the "happy accidents" I discovered (I almost ALWAYS have accidents while arting - some are happy, some not so much...) was that this stuff makes craft foam stick really well to itself!  Why, you might ask, would I care about this?  Well, I had just seen, a couple days prior to playing with the Glue Tape, THIS tutorial, and had picked up a pack of thin, cheap (as in Dollar Tree) craft foam in the hopes of doing the same thing. The foam was super thin, and one layer wasn't going to work for the stamps - so I needed to double it up - so I was happy to find that the Glue Tape would make it easy for me to do this.

So, anyway...on my shopping trip...which was a LOOONG one...picture this: me, all four kids (my 6-year old, my twin 3-year olds, and my 10-month old).  We've already been to the bank and the post office (where I had to drag all of them inside, to stand in line, to mail 2 packages - all because I only had cash to pay for the postage...normally I print Priority Mail labels online and do Carrier Pick-up).  I was in search of miniature rolling pins, or else cheap regular-sized ones.  I called Jo-Ann's - they said they had none.  I called Michaels', and they said yes, they had them in the dollar aisle AND that they were on sale 40% off!  Score!  So off we went to Michaels.  We searched the store up and down and found ONE miniature rolling pin.  One.  And it wasn't on sale.  So we got it and headed for the Dollar Tree, in hopes of finding some regular-sized ones for a buck each.  Do you know that they carry every kitchen utensil you could possibly need at that store EXCEPT  rolling pins?!  Sigh.  

At that point, the kids were tired and hungry and getting cranky.  Or maybe it was me who was getting cranky.  It takes a lot of work to get 4 kids in and out of car seats at every single stop.  Anyway, I stopped to think for a minute.  Or five.  I wondered if perhaps I should think outside the box.  Why did it have to be rolling pins?  Wouldn't pretty much ANY long, slender cylindrical hard object work?  

So off to Home Depot we went.  I grabbed a 1" diameter, 10-foot long piece of PVC pipe off the rack, and asked a worker if he could cut it down.  He said sure, and asked how many pieces and how long.  I hadn't really thought about it, so I quickly said, "Uh, how about ten 1-foot pieces?"  He agreed, and I asked how much it would cost for the cutting.  "Nothing, just whatever the pipe itself cost."  The pipe?  Cost me a whopping $1.49 plus tax.  Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!  I was so excited about my score that I completely forgot I'd been wanting to pick up some washers and a few other trinkets to use for stamping as well...ah, well...I guess we'll need to get out of the house some other day.

For this one, I went ahead and used the ONE miniature rolling pin we did pick up.  (However, I have already made a stamp from one of the PVC pipes, and it works great!  And I'm SO glad I have 10 of them - because this is totally addicting!)  After I cut a bunch of squares and rectangles, I used my hot glue gun to glue them to the rolling pin.  I used a brayer to lay down some paint on my journal page, and then used a paint brush to put paint on the rolling pin before rolling it across my journal page.  This is how it started out:

And after many, many layers (don't you just LOVE layers?!  I can't get enough layering!) - this is what I ended up with.  I had no idea where I was going with the page until almost all of the layers were on the page and I had worked on it over the course of almost a week.  

And then suddenly, I was inspired by the squares and rectangles to journal about how much art has changed the way I look at life and approach life.  I used to be such a "color inside the lines" kind of person, such a rule-follower.  I lived such a constrained life.  But I feel like art has freed me in so many ways - is freeing me in so many ways.  So that's what the page is about.  And I love the way the circular journaling looks in comparison to the boxed-in title.  I wasn't sure I was really loving the page until I finished the journaling, and then I loved it!

What have you been up to lately?  Leave me a link - I'd love to see.  And don't forget to come visit at Craft Test Dummies on Monday for the Glue Tape review...I'd love to have you visit over there!

Keeping it real

I've been thinking about writing this post for quite some time now...but life just keeps getting in the way.  But that's sort of the thing.  I used to write about my life on this blog.  I mean, I've always posted about my art too, but I used to include more...me, I guess, too.  But then I got this thing in my head that I just *had* to be on a design team, and in my quest to do so, I read a blog post somewhere about "how to get accepted on a design team."  And in that post, I read that basically, your blog should only contain posts about your art.  Not family, not kids...basically, not real life - just your art projects.  So I quit blogging about those things.  I started a separate blog, with the idea that I could blog about family and life there...except I didn't.  

A year has gone by now.  I was accepted to a design team.  I did my time.  I quit the design team.  I no longer have the "design team bug."  I really just want to do my own art, to learn as much as I possibly can as an artist, to grow, to take classes, to develop my own style.  I do still write product reviews on a GREAT blog - Craft Test Dummies - and love what I do there.  But here?  I miss being real.  I miss being authentic.  Because while I *am* an artist, I am also a mom, and a wife, and a friend, and a child of God.  And I don't care what anyone else says...this is MY blog, and I'm done editing myself for the sake of being accepted by some "unknown" out in the blogosphere!  

I've started art journaling.  It's helping me a lot, because reality is that I'm going through some tough stuff right now.  Some of that "makes your stomach hurt just thinking about it" stuff.  The kind of stuff that demands a LOT of praying, a LOT of reflection, a LOT of trust in God's almighty plan.  

And I'm dealing with a LOT of physical pain.  Everyday, severe, debilitating pain.  The kind that sometimes makes me want to just crawl into a hole and hide.  Rheumatoid arthritis is no joke, and I've spent the last several months working my way through a lot of anger and grief and frustration in trying to accept this new life.

Art has been my outlet, my source of expression for the angst inside.  Besides my bible, it's the one place I feel at home, the place I am soothed and comforted.  Art stretches me in new ways all the time, and I see God's beauty all the time.  I find myself thanking God daily for this gift of art, and I worry sometimes when my pain is too great to allow me to do any art.  I wonder when the day will come that I won't be able to make art anymore, and what I will do then.

And through everything, I am constantly striving to find the blessings.  Because I know, without a doubt, that I am SO blessed.  I want to live a life filled with gratitude, no matter what.  I want to drown out the "noise" and just be quiet when things become overwhelming...so that I can hear the Truth.  

So I'm still here.  I'm still making art.  And I'll try to post a little more often.  But I'll most definitely be more authentic from here on out.  

Un-blogged Inspiration Journal pages

You've probably noticed that I haven't posted an Inspiration Wednesday post in a couple of weeks.  Why not?  Hmm...I don't really know, other than I've just been playing more with shipping tags and paper rosettes and distress inks than in my inspiration journal, I guess.  So it's not that I haven't been playing creatively, it just hasn't actually been in the journal.  

I did actually do a page, though, last weekend (Oct. 2), that was based on Donna's Sept. 29 video.  I just never got around to posting it!  Ha!  So...here is that page...you'll notice that again, I did almost the exact technique that Donna did.  I still don't have the same watercolor crayons as she does, so I have a very limited color palette in mine, but they still let me have the opportunity to play.  And I must say, I do love them every time I play with them...there's just something SO cool about watching those crayon lines turn into paint right before your eyes!

I did not, however, use black and white india ink for my twisty line, like Donna did.  I used black and white Galaxy markers (by American Crafts) for my line...for the finishing of it, I mean.  I started off with a charcoal pencil like she did.  I love my main quote - taken from a Tim Holtz stamp - "Not all who wander are lost."  I don't think I even own that stamp - yet - but I love the quote.  Around the twisty line, it says, "Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life. ~Picasso~  Be...Create...Risk....  Creativity is an endless journey where we should always take the scenic route.  Explore...Journey...Art."

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This second entry which I never posted was one I did back in August, during a weekend when I was on bedrest for several days due to an injury.  I have spent many months on bedrest in the past - during each of my pregnancies, I was on bedrest for 3 months, due to preterm labor - but it was much easier to swallow then, given that I had a LOT at stake!  This time, with 3 young children to care for, and to be honest, a GIANT need to be downstairs in my crafting studio - NOT upstairs in bed! - I was most definitely having a pity party for myself!  Donna was on vacation that week, I believe, and had done her Inspiration Wednesday video on the road, using her india ink/pen and watercolor crayons or pencils to paint flowers in a book.  I didn't do anything that day, but over the weekend, I realized there was no reason I couldn't take MY fountain pen, watercolor crayons and my Stampin' Up! aqua painter brushes upstairs to my bed.  I already had this page in my inspiration journal with book text embedded, using gel medium, and a light wash of paint over it.  I figured it was the perfect page for me to draw some flowers and color/paint them in.

I also colored the inclusion page next to it, which happened to be a yellow envelope...and found that they tend not to take watercolor paint very well...as you can see by the muddy-sort of color.  I used my india ink to write my self-pity over it, "Bedrest sucks!  [especially when you're not even pregnant!]  Is there a flower to go with that?!"

A few days later, once I was cleared from bedrest by my doctor, I added the ribbon to the main page, as well as the black die-cut fence, since I felt like it sort of went with the pity-party theme much better than, say, a white-picket fence would.  I also added the journaling note-page with the caution, "Warning: Pity party up there."  I added a few black line-drawing rub-ons and painted them in too.  Ahh...well, it IS supposed to be part art, part JOURNAL, right?!

Inspiration Wednesday 09/22/2010

Oh my - I'm actually posting my Inspiration Wednesday post ON Wednesday!  And well before midnight!  LOL!!  That would be because A.) I started my page before Donna posted hers, and thus, B.) did not wait until so late in the day to start; and C.) did a more simple page this week.  That said, it was a VERY difficult page to photograph (although it does seem like MOST of my stuff is hard to photograph well with my camera)...indoors, the flash shone off the Glimmer Mist and acrylic paint of the leaves so brightly, yet outdoors in the natural light, I couldn't get the Glimmer Mist to sparkle hardly at all.  So I did my best to share some of both...so hopefully you can get a feel for just how shimmery and warm this page really is!

I was glad I didn't wait for Donna to post hers this week, since I don't actually own any Pan Pastels (or any pastels, for that matter)...so I wouldn't have been able to do that part of the technique anyway.  I just did a simple coat of Ochre Yellow fluid acrylic paint (Golden brand) for the background.  I literally just put a couple drops of it right on the page, sprayed some water on the page, and used a wide brush to spread the paint over the entire page, letting it lighten toward the left part of the page.  Then I took 3 leaves I had previously cut from book text, using my Cricut (the Wild Card cartridge), and glued them down on the page.  I painted over them using Nickel Azo Gold fluid acrylic paint, building in layers, so that it is darker on the outer part of the leaves.  I love that you can see the brush strokes and the layers in some of the pictures - and that you can still see the book text through the paint - the leaves almost seem to have a 3-dimensional look to them.  

Then, I used a mask that I had cut on my Cricut (also Wild Card cartridge), using the Tim Holtz cut-your-own-mask sheets - that's the tree branch you see near the top of the page.  It's self-adhesive, so I stuck it to the page, and used my Tim Holtz distress inks in Orange Marmalade, Barn Door, and Vintage Photo over the  mask and around the edges of the entire page, before removing the mask.  I also went around the edges of the page with a little Walnut Ink distress ink.  I stamped the clock face using an acrylic stamp I made using the  cut-your-own-stamps acrylic stamp sheets for the Cricut (using the Graphically Speaking cartridge), in brown Staz-on.  I then used the same cartridge to cut clock hands from cardstock and glued them on top of the stamped image, and covered them in Glossy Accents, and glued the Tim Holtz metal "cherish" charm in the middle.  I stamped "gratitude" at the bottom of the page, and glued down two pieces of ruler ribbon on the page.  I spritzed the page with Tiger Lily Glimmer Mist - a gorgeous shade of orange with beautiful golden shimmer to it.  Finally, I added my quote and doodled a few lines around the edges using black india ink.

I love how this last photo shows the texture of the leaves!!  They were so simple to do, but I just love them!!  They make me happy!

Inspiration Wednesday 9/15/2010

As usual, I'm posting my Inspiration Wednesday work on Thursday - because by the time Donna gets HER video up, and I take care of all my homeschooling duties, children who need feeding, household stuff, etc...I just can't manage to get it all done (or posted) by the end of Wednesday!!  LOL  I suppose if I just did my own thing and started first thing on Wednesday mornings, I could...but what fun would THAT be?  I wanna try whatever technique Donna is demonstrating...so I wait for her to post her video and then I get to play along!!

So this week, we painted the background with fluid acrylics using a palette knife!  Totally a cool look!  I love the lines and texture it gives the background.  I didn't have the color of green I wanted, so I had to mix up some Hansa Yellow Medium, Phthalo Green (blue shade), and Yellow Ochre (all Golden fluid acrylics) to get just the right shade I was aiming for.  My pictures don't quite show it right - it's a little bit more olive-colored in real life.  My inspiration for the color was actually the shade of green in the patterned paper I used to make the flower at the bottom of the page (more on that in a bit).

I love this quote - it came from a women's devotional book I have.  I have been working with my 5-year old a LOT lately on focusing more on others' needs than on his own, and on paying more attention to giving than to getting - so this thought has been on my mind lately.

This twisted paper swirly thing - not exactly sure WHAT to call it - was something that Donna Salazar taught during her Tuesday Tutorial a couple nights ago (you should definitely check those out - free online video classes - live - every other Tuesday - there's a link on my left sidebar).  I tore three pieces of book text into about 2.5 inch-wide strips, coated them in Liquitex Gloss Medium & Varnish (she used a Beacon Fast Finish Decoupage, I believe), then gently twisted them one at a time.  I formed a peak at the top, and a sort of flattened part at the other end.  After forming all three and having curved them the way I wanted, I gently twisted all three together and smooshed the flattened bottom ends together, then laid them on my non-stick craft mat to dry.  Once they were dry (I used my heat gun to sort of speed up this process), I spritzed the now-one-piece swirly with some Tiger Lily Glimmer Mist and some homemade magenta colored shimmer mist.  It's hard to catch just how shimmery it really is, in photos - but let me tell you, it really shimmers!  I adhered it to the page using Beacon 3-in-1 Craft Glue (love that stuff!).

The bird, I cut out of the same patterned paper that I used to make this beautiful rose.  I outlined the bird using my dip pen and black india ink, just as I used for writing my quote.  Notice the eye of the bird - I added a drop of Glossy Accents to give it a dimensional look.  I also added several drops of the Glossy Accents to the flower petals to make it look like drops of dew or rain on the flower.  The Accents go on a little cloudy-looking, but dry crystal clear and very glossy, giving a very cool look.  Glossy Accents can also be used as an adhesive and will even adhere paper to metal.

Now - the flower!  This is my newest fun technique!!!  And SO easy it's ridiculous!  I still can't believe I never knew until now how to make these!  Can I just say how much I adore You-Tube?  You can really learn just about anything there - I've learned how to sew, how to knit, and many many other skills by watching videos people have posted on You-Tube.  Anyway, apparently this technique was originally a flower that Tim Holtz made using a Sizzix flower die; however, a very creative woman figured out a way to make them even faster using her Cricut and the George & Basic Shapes cartridge - which is the cartridge that comes with the orginal Cricut...the one I just happen to have.  However, I would imagine you could find a flower shape on MANY of the Cricut cartridges that would work with this technique.  THREE cut flowers is ALL it takes, a few snips of your scissors, some curling of the petals around a pencil or paintbrush, and a hot glue gun - and you've got yourself a GORGEOUS, 3-dimensional rose!  

So...that's this week Inspiration Journal entry.  I hope you enjoyed it...and I hope you do something to express your own creativity this week!  I promise you that the more you take the time to practice being creative, the more you will find your creative impulses exploding in your mind!!

Inspiration Wednesday (er...Thursday...9/9/10)

I really thought it was just me...so I was really relieved to hear Donna say in her video this week that she often  thinks she's going to hate her Inspiration Journal pages in the beginning, but at some point during the process, she starts to love them.  Because that almost always happens to me, it seems.  I started this weeks' technique late last night, and continued early this morning...and stopped when this is what I had:

Don't hate...I can tell you are as enthusiastic about it as I was!!  LOL  Isn't it BEAUTIFUL?!  So let me back up just a bit and explain how I got there.  I started by using matte gel medium to basically decoupage the entire two pages with pieces of torn book pages.  The look was actually pretty cool - I should've taken a pic of THAT!  I left that to dry overnight (partly because it was after 1:00 a.m. when I finished, but mostly because my hubby would've been pretty unhappy with me for running my heat gun at that hour).  This morning, I woke early enough before we had to leave for Bible study that I was able to work some more on it.  Now, in Donna's video, she used Tattered Angel's new Glimmer Glaze.  I don't have any, and I don't have any money to buy any.  BUT, I do have this: 

AND...

So...my thought was that I could attempt to create my OWN version of Glimmer Glaze.  See my experimenting?  I was definitely getting shimmer!!

Donna did drippage with hers.  She used a paintbrush...which I tried, but I didn't really get the effect I wanted.  So I decided to try something different...after all, that's what this whole Inspiration Journal experience is about, right?  First I tried sponging it on.  It didn't really give the effect I wanted either.

So then I went to the kitchen and found a frosting bottle.  I put a couple buttons in the bottom to use for mixing "balls," then poured in some of the pearlized paint, some re-inker drops, and some glazing liquid.  And I shook and mixed.  And I tested.  And I added more color.  And finally I had the color and consistency I wanted...and I did drippage.  And I sprayed water.  And I heat gunned.

And after all of THAT, my paper was falling apart...leading me to have to add some packing tape to the middle of the centerfold...and fortunately, the paint mixture adhered over the packing tape.  And all of THAT is what got me to those pictures you see above...and where I left things when I went to Bible study, wondering what on earth I was going to do next!!

But by the time I got home, after spending a wonderful time in the fellowship of true friends and in God's word, I knew exactly what my pages were going to be about.  You see, my Inspiration Journal is not just about art or about me learning new techniques.  It's also about me, as a person, and where I am in my life.  It reflects my soul, my heart, the inner parts of me that sometimes simple words in a written journal just can't do.  And over the past few months, one of the toughest things I've had to deal with and one of the things that has caused me more tears and gripping heartbreak than just about anything else in my recent past is struggling with broken friendships.  I was upset just yesterday about something, and one of my dear friends reminded me, "A true friend loves at ALL times."  (Proverbs 17:17)  Not just when it's convenient.  Not just when it's easy.  And I am SO thankful for the friendships I have with genuine, authentic women, who put forth their true selves, who DO love me all the time, who are real and authentic, who don't wear masks or put on falsehoods.  And that's how this page evolved.  :)

I don't remember where I found the quote, but I have it written in a journal where I jot down quotes that I come across that I love.  The flowers are some discontinued Prima flowers that I received in one of Donna's recent grab bags.  The quotes are cut from a Nicole Nordeman book (can't remember the name at the moment).  The writing and drawing is done in india ink.  The stems are of various ribbons and twines.