Book of Days update

 Hi everyone,

Well it's been a busy week, painting and art journaling. I've been having a lot of fun with my Book of Days and would like to show you today how I did the cover of the book. For this year long project we are altering a book and in her comprehensive videos Effy shows us the steps to alter an old book or to make a Book of Days out of a composition book. So I scoured the charity shops and found my book - From here to Eternity. I thought the title was appropriate for me at this time in my life. Effy suggested to use your word for the year on your cover so thats what I did and with out further ado I will take you on the step by step with me.

 So, after preparing our book I covered my book with Jo Sonja Blue Lagoon and Harbour Blue in a slip slap motion with a flat brush. I just love these colours together.

 Next I found some scrapbook papers with some script on it, ripped it up and adhered to the book with Atelier Binder Medium.

 i used my make up sponge to rub the two colours of paint lightly over the papers and the book to blend them into the background somewhat.

 I then used Jo Sonja Warm White and a circle dot stencil from Crafters Workshop. This is the centre of the Peony 12 x 12 stencil. Inside that I doodled with my white Gelly Roll pen. Now I love these pens, they write over anything and they are so versatile. I love circles as you know, and these two are representing the endless possibilities that await me this year in balance from beginning to end.

 I also used the 6 x 6 cosmic bubbles stencil with the make up sponge and Jo Sonja Lilac to stencil randomly over the cover. I picked up some Warm White as I stencilled so there is a variation in colour in the bubbles.

I then found an image off the internet that really represented my word of 2012 which is Balance. i printed it out on photo paper, then sprayed it with Matt fixative spray so it wouldn't run, tore the edges and adhered it to the cover with Binder Medium.

I then did some stamping with StazOn in Midnight Blue and a Kaisercraft script background stamp and Kaisercraft saying, wrote my title on the cover with the Sakura Souffle pens and there you have it.  To finish the cover off I rubbed perfect pearls over it although it doesn't show up on the photo. It gives it a subtle shine and shimmer.

Now I know the words balance looks out of balance ( I'm not very good at spacing words without measuring) and when I sat back and looked at it I was disappointed but you know what, that is to me part of finding my balance in my life at the moment, meaning that I have to let go of the little things and concentrate on the important matters. My choice was - do I rub it out and start again(which wouldn't have been easy) muck up my cover that I loved and probably put it away in frustration and probably would still not have been finished, or do I embrace it how it is with all its imperfections. After all, that is what I love so much about art journaling, knowing that nothing is wrong, it is your expression and getting it on the page is more important than fretting about whether it will be perfect or not.

Book of Days has a huge following with over 1000 members online and over 500 members on a very encouraging and inspiring Facebook page. Do go and check it out if you would like to join in on the fun.

I would also like to share a fun video from you Tube that is going around Facebook at the moment. Is is only me that recognises myself here. 

What else can you add to the list of crafters sayings?

So I have pinched the saying from my Book of Days cover for today's post

"Remember that something incredibly wonderful is always possible"

Hope you are having a creative week

Namaste

Lee

guest posting and art journal swap

Hi everyone

I have some exciting news to tell you today and to share some things as well.

I hope the rush up to Christmas is not getting too stressful for you. I just wanted to share some more Christmas cards that I am slowing doing in my lunch hour at work.

 Of course they are featuring Tatty Teddy. I embossed all the edges of the papers with Silver Lightening and on the bottom of the cards I added some detail with the Gelly Roll pens in Clear Sparkle and Silver. I just love these pens, they write over anything and are the sparkliest pens I have ever used.

Now for my exciting news

I am excited today to let you know I am guest posting over at Your Heart Makes a Difference. It is on my favourite subject of Gratitude. Please pop over and have a read and let me know what you think. I just love the group that Louise Gale has set up over there. It is a wonderful place to share and receive kindness, creativity and positive thoughts.

Remember the snippets of this page that I shared with you here. I had to hold off on showing you the rest as it was being used in my guest post. So here are the complete pages and how I did them.

So my first theme in the swap was "my favourite word".

My favourite word is Grateful and here are the two pages, front and back. I decided to art journal on the front page. I used bubble wrap, reverse stenciling with the Mums stencil, some border stamps, sentiment stamps, stamping on strips of ribbon that had a satin border, and then I embossed some butterflies on the page. I then wrote why I chose that word and what it means to me.

 here is a close up of the butterfly. I used a sparkle embossing powder and I liked the way it picked up the colours underneath. It then acted like a resist when I rubbed the inks over the top.

I then doodled a Mandala on the back.....

this page looks a bit lighter than it actually is but I think you get the idea. I rubbed my 3 favourite Impress ink colours on it, Pansy, Indigo Blue and Aqua and then rubbed the whole page with a wet baby wipe to blend the colours for the background. The doodling was done with a black Copic marker.

Yesterday was my birthday and I just had to share the beautiful bunch of roses that my husband and two boys gave me. Aren't they just gorgeous!

 We all went out for a lovely Thai dinner and then some yummy Chocolate mousse for desert.

I hope you are all having a sparkly week.

My quote today comes from one of my favourite authors, Sarah Ban Breathnach who actually started me keeping a gratitude journal as mentioned in her book, Simple Abundance. 

Be grateful for the home you have, knowing that at this moment, all you have is all you need.

Sarah Ban Breathnach

Namaste
Lee 

I love Butterflies...

I wanted to show you parts of some pages that I did for a swap that I have signed up for. Soon I will show the whole pages but here they are for now.

Each of the participants has set a theme for their pages and then we do a round robin so that we do a page for each participant in their chosen theme. I really liked the way that we are doing this one as we are not posting the whole journal all around the world (which can be very cost prohibitive) but we have taken our journals apart and are just sending a page at a time. Over the year each recipient will receive 16 journal pages which we will then re-bind (that is the beauty of spiral bound journals) and have a finished journal. We are using a Strathmore visual art journal 300gsm.

I then found a post about a page that I did late last year that I thought I had posted but was sitting there as a draft. So here it is..

I was inspired by Paula over at Journal Artista when she showed a ghosting technique on her you tube channel. Paula used Alcohol inks under the white but since I didn't have any I tried with ordinary paints mixed with Atelier Liquifying Medium so the paint would thin in consistency but not in strength of colour.

I started with Jo Sonja Carbon Black

 .. then used a butterfly and flower stencil with Jo Sonja Napthol Crimson and Pthalo Green to pattern the background. I had quite a bit of water in the sponge so there would be the bubbled pattern as below.

 ... here it is dry

 .. with a stencil I sponged on shapes with Titanium White

 ... then misted with water

 ... and wiped away excess with a baby wipe. I like the ghostly moon-like appearance I ended up with. Until this stage I didn't know where the page was headed but the moon gave me some direction

 I found some ribbon and butterflies I had die cut out of red cardstock

 ... stuck them down with Mod Podge

 ... and floated Napthol Crimson around the outside edges of the flower shapes with an angle shader brush

 Next I chose a stamp and the Cloud White Vera Magic stamp pad and stamped over the top of the ribbon and in some other places

... I then found some other butterflies I had die cut and embossed with the Spellbinders range, rubbed black paint over them to distress them, and doodled on them with a silver gel pen. I stuck them down only by the body part so they would be 3D.

I then stamped the word butterfly on the right hand page..

 and journalled around the page about transformation, freedom, change and the colour red. I also rubbed silver paint around the outside edges of the pages to frame them.

A butterfly is the symbol of transformation, change, soul and transition. You can go here to read  a bit more about butterfly symbolism.

My quote today

"Happiness is like a butterfly: the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. 

But if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder"

- Thoreau

Have a lovely day everyone, tomorrow is the Melbourne Cup which means a nice day relaxing at home with friends and family watching the race that stops the nation,  so pretend we are all together and have a glass of bubbly with me.

Namaste

Lee

Buddha's influence

Thanks everyone for coming by

I've been out and about this week but now have another journal page to share with you.

I was inspired for this page by a serviette with a Buddha and some other lovely serene photos on it. I started with another page of leftover paint. I think it is Jo Sonja Yellow Deep. I then got out a new Crafters Workshop stencil called Tie Dye and rubbed Impress Chocolate ink over it and let it dry. I softened it a bit with a baby wipe and gesso.

Then i used Stazon Timber Brown stamp pad and a flower stamp to stamp randomly, then added more gesso where needed.

so this is the serviette which i cut up and then stuck to the page

once it was dry I rubbed Titanium White around the edges with my finger to soften and help it blend into the page. I love also how the paint picked up the rough creases of the serviette to add some texture.

 I then stamped a script background stamp over the page with Impress Spring Green

 at this stage that green was looking a bit bright and gaudy but it is one of many layers so I knew it would be alright in the end...

so out came some stamps......

and some papers....

my trusty White Signo pen and an orange Staedtler fineliner....

to outline some of the stamps

more stamps, can you tell I have a fetish for stamps?

I needed some softening of the page but with a bit of colour and I remembered I had this set of soft pastels in earth tone which are perfect for my page so i rubbed them around the piece of paper that I had stamped the saying on

journalled with my fineliner

I also doodled a bit of a loose border and ended up with my finished page. I really like how it turned out and will have to get those pastels out more often I think.

I am always drawn to Buddha's and I do love reading about the beliefs, philosophies and, as you know, from meditating daily, I find my peace and serenity from this practice.

“Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.” ~Thich Nhat Hanh

Namaste

Lee

Hi Everyone

Well I am back from the weekend at the I Can Do It in Melbourne. As with last year we were treated to lectures by some of my favourite authors including a short introduction by Louise L Hay herself, the founder of Hayhouse publishing company and author of "You Can Heal your Life"  I tell you that if I look that good and am that positive, energetic and full of life at 85 as Louise is then i will be a happy woman.

My two girlfriends and I decided to spend the whole weekend in the city instead of driving in and out each day, and it was a great decision. After attending the conference each day it was so nice to just relax and reflect on the day we just had, listening to inspiring speakers, motivating us to be the best we can be. 

So, I am back into the swing of things today and wish to share with you a page I completed before the conference when i was feeling at a bit overwhelmed by the lack of time I have at the moment to do any sort of art. I am happy to say that the conference gave me a few tools to deal with this so this weekend will hopefully be quite productive in the studio.

Anyway enough talk, let's see some art

I started with scraping on some Jo Sonja Orange and Napthol Red Light..

 The next step was using the Crafters Workshop Stencil called Flutterby in the 12x12 size. I sponged some Jo Sonja Yellow Orange over the stencil.

to end up with this...

I then used a Kaisercraft butterfly stamp and Jo Sonja Napthol Crimson to stamp randomly over the pages

 to give this...

now at this stage it was really bright and I wanted to tone it down a bit so swiped the whole spread with Distress Stain Antique Linen

 See how it sat on the stop a bit because the page was no longer porous. I let it dry like this so I could retain some of the textured pattern produced by the bubbles.

 So my next step was some background stamping. I used the Timber Brown Staz On with another Kaisercraft musical stamp

 Then with the same ink pad and a couple of flower stamps

 Plus another butterfly stamp. I think I got this off the Craft Stamper magazine.

 So here I am with the background and stamping done.

 Some ribbon and pieces of torn patterned paper were added

 and then the quote. I inked it with impress inks in Tangerine and Lemon yellow with my cut and dry foam. Highlight some words with gold gel pen....

 cut out some butterflies I had printed on photo paper from the Graphics Fairy blog. Then inked the images before sticking down to the pages...

 added some journaling in gold gel pen

and voila, here is the finished page

My journaling talks about how sometimes I feel as if I am treading water but I just have to trust and take a leap, believe that all these steps are necessary on my journey, and instead of thinking that they are setbacks or stagnation, look for the purpose in them, like time to tweak ideas, time to relax and regroup, time to just be.

Robert Holden said something poignant on the weekend

"We didn't come here to play it safe. The purpose of your life is not to arrive safely at your own death."

So what are you waiting for? Where are you playing it safe? Grab life with both hands and take that leap into the great unknown, take notice of now and just be in the moment

Have a blessed weekend everyone doing what makes your hearts sing..... 

Namaste 

Lee