2014 - A New Year, a Fresh Start

Happy New Year everyone. Are you looking forward to 2014?

After a very hectic, up and down 2013 I am looking forward to 2014, a fresh start, a year filled with love and laughter, a year of new beginnings........ and to that end I thought I would share some of the projects I have in my diary this year.

Firstly I am so excited and thrilled to share some exciting news. Last year I guest posted on the blog "Your Heart Makes a Difference" hosted by the lovely Louise Gale, which you can re-visit here. Well Louise has asked me to be a regular contributor to this wonderful uplifting blog on a monthly basis. I am delighted to be included in this group of awesome people and can't wait to post my first offering. In the meantime head on over to Louise's blog to read my intro and to find out more about the beautiful heart-centred musings that make up Your Heart Makes a Difference. My first post goes live on 26 January.

You know that I like to keep busy, trying out new ideas, participating in group art projects and learning and sharing as much as I can so here are the other projects that I have signed up for so far. Click on each title to be taken to the appropriate websites:-

Book of Days 2014 Session 1- hosted by Effy Wild

Well before the last BOD session of 2013 finished I signed up for the first session of 2014. I love Effy's processes and the whole Book of Days community are a welcoming, generous and loving group. My Book of Days has become my constant, my way to look back on my year/s and reflect on where I have been and how far I have come. With weekly videos and connection with the group you can't go wrong with this one.

Life Book 2014 - hosted by Tamara LaPorte

This is my first year in Life Book and to say I am excited is an understatement. I have heard so much about it that I can't wait to jump right in. With so many lessons from so many different teachers I know I will learn so much this year.

Big Dreams, Small Wonders - hosted by Louise Gale

This course is all about finding out what your hopes and dreams and ultimately your goals are for the year or years ahead. It runs for 6 weeks and is a lovely process of letting go of the past year and moving forward with love and grace.

  Your Heart Makes a Difference - hosted by Louise Gale

As I mentioned at the start of this post, This is the website where you can be inspired by Louise and the other contributors to live a heart-centred, creative life.

The Documented Life Project

This is another new project I have signed up for. It is free and it is a planner but so much more, with weekly prompts and a lot of inspiration for keeping a diary/planner/ art journal all in one.

Creative Jumpstart - hosted by Natalie Kalbach

A month long course which is full of videos and prompts to start your creative year off with a bang.

• 23 videos from 21 artists, or over 3 1/2 hours of videos
• A chance to win giveaways from the CJS sponsors
• Participation in a lively community via the CJS forum
• Access to all videos and CJS forum until November 2014

I am so excited and looking forward to everything that presents itself in 2014. Let's get going....

30 Days of Gratitude - my guest post

I have some exciting news today - I'm guest posting over here at Your Heart Makes a Difference blog for their 30 days of Gratitude. I have added a badge on the right hand side so you can easily find your way there each time you visit me so please drop by and visit and show this lovely blog some love.

It's been a busy couple of weeks here and I haven't had much time to really dig my teeth into any of my art projects ,but Louise's 30 Days of Gratitude has prompted me to make a little Gratitude journal and keep up with it for the month of November and then beyond. I was fortunate enough to participate in a dreamboard workshop with Louise when she was visiting Australia some time ago and I love everything she does on her blog. She is a beautiful soul and I am grateful for our connection.

If you are a long time reader of my blog you will know that Gratitude is a BIG part of my life. Being in a state of gratitude has changed my outlook on life keeps the positive energy flowing through me and those around me. This outpouring of gratitude that seems to happen each year in November concentrates that positive energy and spreads around the world. It has been a long held belief that the earth energy as a whole is changed when there is a global outpouring of positive energy and by sharing our gratitude this month it is sure to have an impact, which hopefully is ongoing.

Today I am sharing my thoughts on my gratitude practice in my guest post but I really encourage you to  follow the whole 30 days on the blog. Louise has wonderful prompts everyday to get us all in an 'Attitude of Gratitude'.

 

 My little Gratitude journal was inspired by the greeting card journal made by Jennibellie. Here is the link to her tutorial on her blog and there are links in her blogpost to her youtube videos showing you how to make one. I made my with a a little box  that I had lying around and now I have started collecting old coffee sachet boxes and my cereal boxes to make more journals.

I used plain kitchen twine to bind it with and then plaited the ends. I really like the way it looks and it is small enough to have beside my bed to record my grateful lists, thoughts and ponderings.

For the pages I used pieces of white and black cardstock and also some offcuts of watercolour paper.  I even have a little pocket on the inside front cover that I have tucked in the printed list for Louise's 30 days of Gratitude. 

Yesterday was Melbourne Cup day and the weather was glorious so I sat outside and doodled on the front cover with my collection of Gelly Roll Pens, my Signo pens and my glitter pens. What a lovely way to spend the afternoon. 

I enjoyed making this one so much that I also made one out of a cereal box. More photos and a info on that in a later post.

So, what is on your Gratitude list today? My 5 things that I am grateful today for are:-

** the sun shining brightly heralding the forthcoming summer months **
** my health **
** my friends who listen to me when I am down and always cheer me up **
** this beautiful land that I live in, the lucky country **
** my family safely tucked in their beds tonight **

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