CJS #2 - Tape

One of my favorite bloggers is Marjie Kemper. I know first hand what a generous, kind person she is, and she is also very talented. It was exciting to see her name as one of the presenters for the 2014 version of Creative Jump Start, Nathalie Kalbach's brain child. This year we are using household items. 

When I first saw Marjie's example, I had no idea it was tape--literally could have knocked me over with a feather. Here's my take on her project. 

I used the same technique on a tag, and put yet another tag on top of that. I sop extra ink, paint, whatever with tags of all shapes and sizes. They are often great additions to art journal pages or cards. 

I love mixed media art...it's so much fun!!

Hope you're finding your fun. Thanks for visiting today.  

CJS Projects - #1

I am really enjoying Nathalie Kalbach's Creative Jump Start 2014. As I've mentioned before we're using household items in new ways this year. Here's a new take on bubblewrap.

I had a blast with the technique that Andrea Gomoll taught us. Parts of the finished product are very painterly, parts of it are transparent...and its all full of luscious color. MMMMM. I made several pieces, but this was my favorite.

The colors reminded me a specific Claude Monet painting he did later in life...so I kind of went for a similar layout in my art journal.

One of the benefits of the bubblewrap process is you end up with very cool parchment paper as well, which provided most of the background for the spread.

I just glued it down and added a few splatters of ink to tie it to the white space. It made me so happy, I added a couple of little dyed tags with "Joy to the World".

Life is good today. Hope that's true for you too. Thanks for stopping by the Fun Room.

Weekly on Wednesday - No. 234

Another week, another desk check-in, thanks to our friend Julia, at the The Stamping Ground.

Kind of clean - with a few experiments I was trying - more about those later. I have fun this week. I am still on track with my "art everyday challenge" of inchies. I let myself do a twiniche once a week.

The larger one is a series of circles made of scrap paper, collage images and a new technique I learned from Creative Jump Start, which involves transparencies (sheet protectors in my case) and paint. It has real possibilities.

The "inchie of the week" is above. It's painted with my new favorite thing - Dragonfly Wing Twinkling H20 (first off I LOVE the name of the paint) - along with a couple of other colors...and of course it begged for a dragonfly on it, so who am I to disappoint?

I'm taking Lifebook again - I wasn't going to until I realized how much I had learned last year. These next couple of pictures are from a creativity exercise we did.....pretty funny.

We were to pick one of our knick-knaks and draw it with the non-dominate hand. I actually kind of like it...I would have been way too intimidated to draw it with my right hand, so it worked. I'll be doing more of this.

And finally I leave you this week with my Wart Hog and Friend creation.

Three colors of washi tape, five pieces each, randomly applied on an index card. What is it? After looking for a while I thought maybe a horse. But as we can see, much more like a wart hog!

Sorry I wasn't able to get to everyone last week - I'm more determined this week.

Enjoy - hope you have some time to be creative this week!

Art Journaling in January

After a busy and creative December I've been having a bit of a dry spell...finally got going again at the end of this week.

When I get stuck I really do go back to the folks who brought me to the party. Dina Wakley has had a huge influence...I just love her style. As I am still developing mine, I see her work in many of my pieces. 

This page used a technique from Sami Harding as part of Creative Jump Start 2014 hosted by Nathalie Kalback. What a great way to start this year...in 2013 each of the "starters" used the same thing three ways, this year it's household items. Sami's lesson was about using transparencies which I didn't have, so I used sheet protectors to paint with fluid acrylics.  Way fun. Something I'll be going back to I'm sure.

I debated whether to put this page up or not. There are some things I like  - the face, the circles, a lot of the background. Some things I don't. The darn circles need to be a smidgen higher!!!! If I didn't move so fast I would have seen that. At 57 I'm still learning that lesson! And frankly the poor dear looks a lot like house-frau. Alas.

I will say again though, the Dylusions journals take a licking and keep on ticking (okay, another way we know my age).

And lastly. I couldn't help but notice that when I'm having a bit of difficulty getting started with art, my desk is relatively clean. When I'm in engaged, it's a disaster. Happy to say I'm getting back to normal now.

Time for Tim...in January

There were so many things I loved about Tim Holtz's first tag of his annual challenge...the stamp-punkiness of it, the embossing, the colors, the composition, the....well, you get the idea! You can find all the details of the original at this post.

It was so cool, I knew I needed to give it a go. Mine looks quite like the original this month...I mean, how could I improve??

For some reason my Pumice Stone stain looked really green, so I ended up with layers of stain, ink, and finally paint. Funny thing about all that. All those layers gave it a significant depth....

I didn't quite have everything Tim did, so I made a few substitutions. I changed out the rub-ons, the tickets at the bottom and the very specialized embellishment at the top - but I did get a chance to use snaps...I just love those snaps! I love how the clock portion looks...such a cool idea Tim!!!

One product I reach for again and again is the chit-chat stickers. I like words. I like using words in my art. I love the little messages you can make with them... and I do think it's so important to value everyday...we just never know.

Here's hoping you have lots of laughs today and you discover something new.

Thanks again Tim for a great project. 

WOYWW 242

Greetings of the mid week oh fellow WOYWW'ers. Each Wednesday, the indomitable Julia hosts us at her blog, The Stamping Ground to see what's on work desks around the globe. I wasn't in the mix last week as I had to work that night and I seem to be doing other things as of late. But .... I'm back this week. Yippee!

Since I seem to be having some difficulty engaging in a long term art project, I decided to dance with the guy who brought me to the party, which is Tim Holtz, so I did the January tag. That seemed to do it...I starting thinking about a collage on a burlap panel...something about time. 

On the craft mat is a little experiment. Starched cheesecloth that I cut with a gear die, and then applied matte medium to in the hopes of making them stiffer. Hmmm. Didn't work exactly as I had hoped, so since I might have to do it over anyway I decided to paint them at the same time with walnut ink. We'll see.

On thing I have been doing is this little inchie/twinchie project. You make something everyday. The challenge from Blue Twig Studio was for 365 days....whoa. Too many for me. So I signed on for 31 days. Above you'll see the last week. If your interested in the first two weeks, click here.

I've enjoyed it tremendously. It helps use things up from my desk, on the nights I have time I try new stuff, if not, I don't sweat it.

These are the last two days...I like them both a lot.

Hope you are doing things you like a lot and winter where you are isn't too terrible. Thanks for visiting!

Thirty One Days of Art

An inch at a time

Actually the challenge at Blue Twig Studio via Art & Soul Retreats was 365 days of art...an inch or two at a time. But that seemed too daunting so I committed to January. Thing is, I really like it. I've tried some new techniques and most times use something that is sitting around on my desk so I feel kind of virtuous even.

The one in the second row has clips from an instruction booklet that came in about a thousand languages (okay, maybe a slight exaggeration) which I thought looked very worldly so I made a shrink art compass to go with it. The one in the middle has embossed page enforcers, highlighted by Tombow markers I blended together. Some days are really fun like that. Others are more like row three that was a piece of my first attempt at a Gelli print with a few additions....not my fav, but I was making something!

My favorite inchie from week two was the first one, with the two hands. I had never tried to do shadow embossing...I think it has real possibilities. I used Ranger Rust and black embossing powders .

By the time I used the twinchie it seemed HUGE!!!! It's a great challenge. Care to join us?

The other thing I've been tracking in this new year is the amazing The Documented Life Project. So cool. Five friends are hosting it. Please do visit their website. And the facebook page is so much fun to cruise through. I do Kate Crane's calendar challenge, so I decided to forego the calendar and journal part and partake in the weekly challenge.

This is week 4 - where our challenge was to write and leave one word exposed. I have been puzzled as to  what happen to my mojo.....the little guys are fun, but I haven't really wanted to do much more. That's not the norm. Maybe it's coming back.

Hope things are good in your neck of the woods.....

First WOYWW of the New Year

There are a lot of things I like about January - all the Christmas things which I so look forward to are over, it's a time of new beginnings AND there is time in the Fun Room. This is the first time in three weeks I have been able to join in the trip around the world, curtsey of Julia at the Stamping Ground. I hope all my fellow WOYWW'ers had happy holidays and are also finding time to create.

Here's what my desk looks like now.

I finally broke down and purchased a Gelli plate as a Christmas present to myself and last night I tried  it for the first time....my first attempt was a real disappointment. Apparently it's not magic, and you do have to play with it. You can see my attempts in the upper right corner. I was so bummed I used my tried and true methods, and made this sheet. It made me feel much better.

It used a lot of the same colors as the disastrous Gelli print, but then I added a lot more layers. The double circles are made from an empty scotch tape roll. 

This little tin is holding pieces and parts of a challenge I'm partaking in. The challenge was for 365 days - which totally freaked me out - so I signed on for 31 days of January. Every day I make art. In the form of an inchie....a square inch. So far, I have 7 of them. It's pretty fun. I might actually sign on for the rest of the year!  I've made it part of our whole day - "I have to go make my inchie now" and everyone says, "okay", and once I'm in the Fun Room it's much easier to stay there!

I've made a couple of recent posts showing my favorite projects and my favorite journal spreads. If you have a moment, take a look!

Hope you have a lovely week ahead and a HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Top Ten Art Journal Spreads

I had such fun looking back over all my projects (2013 Favorites) I decided to review my journals. These are the top ten "entries" in no particular order.

I return to these colors again and again.

A lesson in white space, from Dina Wakely's Art Journal Freedom a great book!

Doodling at its finest - from 21 Secrets.

The tragedy at the Boston marathon stayed with me for days. 

Finally I made several journal pages that helped. 

A prompt from France, and her Journal on Mondays videos. 

Springtime

Everyone is different....

A summertime trip down memory lane. 

Ah yes, the Book of Troubles....

That day I was thankful for the man I share my life with, but in general I'm just thankful for my life.

January 2014 Calendar

Goodness Gracious. Time is flying by...zip, zip. Three years ago this month (also rather alarming since it certainly doesn't seem that long ago) I stumbled upon Kate Crane's calendar challenge and fell in love. Each month we make a calendar page - no theme, just the month - and use it how we want. I jot down little notes about the days.

This page turned out a lot differently than I had imagined. And I am sorry I don't have a better photo because it does look pretty cool in person. I knew I wanted to use the moon and the stars. We're all about lots of night time this time of year, and I was a bit tired of the snow theme. 

I made a background by fan folding wax paper and laying it on a piece of Bristol paper and pouring severly watered down acrylic paint down the page. I was hoping for water but what I got was ice (you know, in my mind) so I've been keeping it handy since October. I gave it a good spray of Perfect Pearls Mist in Pearl to add a little - okay - a lot of sparkle. That's one reason it was hard to photograph. 

Next I cut some large stars out of a Tim Holtz die and colored them with alcohol inks. Inside my container of alcohol inks was these bits of plaid paper I had made on glossy card stock a couple of years ago. 

I decided to use the blue, white, and pink plaid which took me in a whole other direction. 

I found a smaller sheet of of a pink plaid - so I made some more pink plaid and combined the two in the title. The journaling squares started as very light pink Dylusions spray but the fact of the matter is I'm not really a pink kinda girl. Out came the purple and turquoise along with the amazing white Dylusions ink and after about 7 or 8 layers I had something I liked AND something that reminds me of the arctic sky.

I'm happy to have had a fun and restful December, and be moving onto a new year!

Best wishes for a Happy New Year and thanks so much for stopping by the Fun Room!