I'm still here!

Sorry it's been a bit quiet around here lately. I had to have some surgery and it has taken me a bit of a while to get back on track. There hasn't been much going on in the craft department apart from my crochet as I haven't felt like sitting at my desk. In the meantime though I have managed some crochet and made great inroads into another blanket for a Christmas present which is already nearly a third done which is great! I have also bought a kit for a beautiful Waterlily Crochet Along blanket project designed by Jane Crowfoot. Although the full design cannot be seen yet, there are some stunning teasers, certainly enough to tempt me to buy the Stylecraft kit from the Wool Warehouse. The patterns will start to be released on 7th April and I have started to collect pictures of the elements revealed so far on a Pinterest Board here. I just hope my limited crochet skills are up to the challenge!

Today I am sharing another couple of pages from my art journal. These were done a while back, but I am pretty pleased with the way they are coming out. Not my usual style, but experimentation is the name of the game!

I am continuing some common threads between the pages. The backgrounds are initially coloured with gelatos and stencilling is added, usually by taking colour off through the stencil with a baby wipe. All my pages also feature butterflies.

The pictures on both pages are from a cheap paperback book of Pre-Raphaelite paintings I bought especially to use for cutting up for art projects. It is great not to have to feel guilty about destroying the book as it is a mass produced cheapie. The second pages also has some added flowers taken from a serviette and both pages feature some stencilling in glitter paste.

I am very excited because next week will be my last week at work. I have decided to retire quite early and concentrate on things at home. I am looking forward to spending much more time in the garden, cooking, walking and generally living a simpler more carefree life.  It might also mean a bit more time for my arty endeavours, but we will have to see! There are lots of cupboards and things that need a good sort out first!

I hope you are enjoying the early spring weather, we are champing at the bit to get some of our vegetables started now I am feeling a bit brighter and tomorrow may see me in the greenhouse with my hands in the compost for the first time this year!

Have a great weekend!

Elaine

Art journal page

I am trying a bit of art journaling as a way of being a little more experimental and playful with my art work. I am not good at letting go of my perfectionism, but I seem to be giving it a go! This journal is a A5 sized hardback notebook and I am gluing pages together to give them more body. So far my backgrounds have all been made with my newly acquired set of gelatos. I find they work best on a gessoed background.

The thing I like best about starting with a layer of gesso is that you can take colour off through a stencil as I have here, with clouds and a small circles stencil. I finish off with a spray of fixative spray before I start gluing images on top.  In this case I used an image from a photographic magazine and butterfly die cuts. Finishing off with some mulberry paper daises that always make me feel happy when I use them as they are such cheery little things!

My words are chosen from my Pinterest wise thoughts board. I felt I was collecting loads of thought provoking words that should be given an airing some how. I typed a load out and have them to inspire my pages.

I was so pleased with the way this page came out. I really doubt myself having any artistic ability sometimes, so it is nice to just have a play and not worry too much about things being perfect all the time!

Whatever you are doing I hope you are having a nice weekend. I am off to a craft show tomorrow which will no doubt offer me plenty of temptation!!!

Elaine

Happy New Year - a chance for a new voyage of crafty discovery!

Happy New Year everyone! I always find I am amazed and slightly daunted when we reach the turn of another year so quickly. Despite the fact I know I don't really stick with new year resolutions, I always try to have some ideas of things I will try to do improve myself, both in life in general and on the crafting front!!!!

On the crafting front I really want to try to relax more into experimentation and art journalling is the territory I want to explore more. When I was on holiday in September, I found this old ledger and it seemed perfect for my plans. It is a little battered and has been used a little to keep records of sea voyages, but only on a very few pages. It it indexed and has lovely marbled end pages.
 

I started my first page yesterday and found it very daunting. I was led to my first theme by some words on the first page. I was about to paint them all out when I realised how appropriate some of them were to my plans and this led me to think about making a wave and ocean themed page to reflect my journey into journalling.
 

Now I know journalling is supposed to be very spontaneous and in a sense being led by these words was pretty spontaneous for me! Last year I took an on line journalling course Embellishing Edges and Text  and one of the things Valerie Sjodin uses to shape projects is a set of French Curves, so I used these to help me draw my waves and then colour them with my Peerless watercolour paints, adding some shading with Pan Pastels and my Prismacolour pencils. I added some ocean themed words with my Pitt pens. I did make a bit of a botch up and ended up patching a bit onto my page to cover up some lettering I didn't like much. My little perfectionist imp gives me a hard time sometimes.

I felt something was missing and made some little fish out of metal tape put through an embossing folder and coloured with Vintaj Paina inks and Treasure Gold paste before being stuck into place. I finally added some Imagination Crafts sparkle medium with my finger for some shine and I was quite pleased with the watery effect it gave and it dried beautifully flat too.

Anyway, this page is the end result, which I was tempted not to share at all as it is so far from what I consider to be an acceptable standard of work to open up to scrutiny, but then I would have failed at the first hurdle with what jounrnalling is all supposed to be about really.  
 

 

So I have at least started in my journalling voyage. I have been building up to it over the last few months with this book which takes me completely out of my comfort zone.

 

 

I think this is because I find the the ready coloured "blank" pages to inspire intereaction quite messy!

 

 

However, the book does have some useful prompts to get you to think about what you want to get out of journalling and get doodling in a relaxed way which I tried to do here!

 

 

 

Above all for me the point is to enjoy the freedom to experiment and play and I did feel a bit of that at times when I was playing with my different colouring mediums yesterday which is what this is all about for me, building confidence and letting go.

 

 

I have also ordered the first 4 Kate Crane art journalling DVDs which have been on offer over Christmas at a bargain price and I am sure I will get some great inspiration there too.

 

Whatever you have planned in your crafty endeavours for 2014, I hope you really have a great and fulfilling journey and  enjoy every moment.

 

Elaine x