Where is your soul's compass leading you?

Hi everyone, 

I hope you all have had a great week and weekend. To my friends in the US I hope you had a great Labour Day relaxing and enjoying your long weekend.

So today I want to share with you another page in my journal. I was inspired by some great new stamps I have and some papers. 

It is titled "Where is your Soul's Compass leading you?"

My journal page already had washes of green and red which were leftovers from a previous page.
I used a Tim Holtz mask called Concerto randomly over the page

I sponged over the mask with Jo Sonja Pearl White

To give this nice shimmery effect. I wanted the base to show through.

Next, out came the Kaisercraft clear background stamp called Sheet Music and the Black Staz On ink.

I then got my hands dirty by finger painting on some Jo Sonja Titanium White, streaky down the pages

The papers I wanted to use today were from a Kaisercraft mini papers pad called  Black and White Timeless

I tore and cut out images and stuck them down with Atelier Binder Medium.

My next layer was using stamps from this great Stamp It set. I love the detail in these stamps and you get so many stamps in one set that there are endless combinations.

So here is where I am at this stage, not too busy but starting to convey the message that I had in my head.

Out came the obligatory Crafters Workshop stencil. This one is called "mums" and I have wanted to use it for a while now, so I softly sponged on Permanent Alizarine.

A border was called for so I drew around the pages with my Sharpie, Zig black pens and Signo white pen.
and wrote the title on another page out of the mini paper pad which had gridlines on it. I rubbed some of the red paint on it too after tearing it apart.

Here is the final page. The pages always look a bit bright when they are scanned but they are clear so I hope you get the idea.

Do you feel guided by your soul or are you mainly in your head? 

Do you take time to connect with your soul and what it really needs?

Or are you influenced by what everyone else wants you to do or what you think they want you to do? 

Do you make decisions based on your true nature or do you base your decisions on outside influences that don't really satisfy your soul's needs? 

Sometimes we feel anxious when making decisions, we jump from one answer to the other, being influenced by others comments on what we should do, then we go over and over it in our head, constantly swinging from yes to no, to where and when. We feel scattered and full of worry. Then after we have made the decision we still feel anxious and still have an empty feeling and wonder why.

When you connect with your soul on a regular basis, through meditation, art journaling, doodling and writing you are touching base with the wisest part of you, the part that has your best interests at heart, the part that knows you best. We are then able to calmly make informed choices based on what we need. When we make decisions based on our soul's compass we may still feel butterflies in the stomach, but they are butterflies of excited anticipation, of taking a leap, fully trusting in the universe and where you are being lead.

Have you connected with your soul and listened to its message today?

Have a great day everyone.

Namaste 

Lee

PS. I have come down with the flu so I am a bit slow it getting round to visit everyone but I will see you soon.

Exciting news...

Hi Everyone

Thanks so much for all your lovely comments, and thanks for taking the time to come visit me. I am grateful.

Well, I have been a busy bee over the last few weeks and have a few things to show and tell.

First my exciting news that on the 10th September I will be teaching my first art journaling workshop at Scrapper's Warehouse in Hallam. I will be initially be teaching a couple of technique classes to initiate the first timers and then we will let loose on our creativity. So if you are in the area please come by and see what we are up to or join in with us.

Here is a photo  of my first class which will ease them in with a little painting and stenciling and stamping. The page is called Dream, Inspire, Create. I have used the fancy frames Crafters Workshop stencil and the Darkroom Door Artist stamp set in a tin.

 

I also have a second workshop planned for October the 8th called Be Who You Are where we will be doing a bit of collage with serviettes and scrapbook papers.

The stamps are from a StampIt set and the papers are Kaisercraft Chapter One.

Last week I also helped celebrate my friend's 50th birthday. We had a great girl's day out,  shopping, then lunch and then seeing Jane Eyre at the movies. It was really lovely to spend a day with my friends just doing whatever we please, time to chill out and celebrate our friendships. When I first moved to Melbourne from Sydney 25 years ago, fresh out of the family home, this friend was the one who took me under her wing and we have been firm friends ever since through babies, moving house, celebrations and commiserations. We may not see each other every week but we just pick up from where we last left off each time.

Anyway here is her card

I had a lot of fun playing with the Tim Holtz die called Tattered Florals and an embossing folder called Damask. Add a touch of silver pen, perfect pearls, some floral ribbon, stamping and some layers of patterned paper and I was pretty pleased with how it turned out.

In the same week the other friend that I was with at the movies, had her birthday too, so I made her a card as well. A simpler one but I quite liked this one for a quick one.

I have also joined networked blogs so if you prefer you can follow me on Facebook.

My studio is all but finished too so I will post some pictures in my next post. 

Until then I leave you with a quote from Rumi

"When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy. "

Rumi

I hope you are all having a great week, 

keep on creating

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