Black and White and Red All Over

Dawn at d'Blogala posted another prompt yesterday ... mapping your day. I knew right away that it would be the perfect way to journal the day because Fridays are my errand day. So I brought my journal along and jotted down where I went and ended up with this page (the background was painted several weeks ago with the red and the black X's with watered down acrylic paint):
As you can see, I didn't get all my errands done LOL! Will have to finish up today. Btw, I did NOT eat at Wendy's just so that the logo would match my spread ... it just happened ... I wrote that right on the logo, too LOL!

Then last night, I sat looking at the opposite page and decided to do Dawn's second prompt, making a list, to finish up the spread. The hardest part was trying to decide what to list in the various sections LOL! Here's what the page looks like now:Thanks, Dawn, for the fun prompts!

Doodling

I've found a few new (to me) art blogs that I just adore ... and one, Dawn at d'Blogala, has recently started doing weekly prompts (you know I love 'em). The first prompt was to doodle. Simple, right? Except I'm not one for doodling ... to me, doodling is just random marks on the page ... they might make a picture, they might not. However, I tend to overthink each mark I'm going to make on anything, so to just be random and free is not easy for me. But, hey, it's the first prompt so that's where I'm going to start. So Thursday, I opened to a blank (except for green paint) page and draw a line across it (stressing over making the curves look natural ... sheesh!). Then I drew another wavy line woven around it and started filling in the spaces left between them ... after the swirls and the diamonds, I sort of stressed about what to do about the other 2 spaces so that they'd be different (see how I overthink things?!)

Then Friday night I went down to Chicago for the Women of Faith conference, bringing my journal and a few pens, of course. During the Friday night pre-conference, I started thinking about Dawn's live earth doodle page and thought that maybe I could sort of do that for this page ... just doodle about things that really stood out to me at the conference. So I tried it. It was slow-going at first, but as I got into it, it got easier. And a bonus was that I think I paid even more attention than usual because I was looking out for things to doodle about LOL! Here's the result:

Finally finished!

I finally finished my first spread in my "All in a Day's Work" journal. This combines two prompts ... an intro and a job description.I knew what I wanted to say, but I just couldn't decide how to get it on the page ... it wasn't until I thought of writing in white instead of black that I realized I could get it all on the page by writing over the top of the "MOM" and "WIFE". Love the layered look! The background is acrylic paint, the words "MOM" and "WIFE" were made by tracing alphabet puzzle pieces (thanks, kiddos!) and then coloring in with a Sharpie, and the definitions around the edges were cut from a fabulous old dictionary (it's huge!) that I got at a garage sale for a buck. A Sharpier poster paint pen was used for the journaling.

Now to think about prompts #3 and #4 ... #3 is about my daily routine and #4 is about where and with whom I work. I've got a few ideas brewing on those ... let's see if I can get them done before prompt #5 gets posted on Monday!

All in a Day's Work

I've been having fun this past week working on a project that Scrapdolly is currently posting on her blog. The project is called "All My Own Work" and each week for 10 weeks she is posting a prompt. When we're done, we will have a nice little book, album or whatever that documents our jobs. I thought it sounded like a fun project so decided to join in. Prompt #1 was to select the vehicle for this project and get it ready ... I chose to alter a board book (formerly one of my kids' books), turning it into an art journal for this project. Last week I tore off the top layer of all the pages and painted the backgrounds, just playing with color combinations.
Then over the weekend I did the cover. Love how it turned out!
The background and 24/7 are acrylic paints (I created a stencil for the numbers and dabbed the paint on with my finger ... love the texture that made), the 365 in the corner is a dymo label, and all the lettering is rub-ons, except WORK, which is wooden letters painted black. When I was done with all that, it felt like it still needed something. I ended up splattering the whole thing with diluted white acrylic and just that little thing really finished it off.

Prompt #2 was to do an intro page and a job description. I decided to combine the two and am still working on it (though you can see just a hint of it in the pic above of all the pages fanned out). I'll post it as soon as I finish the journaling. Now to think about prompt #3 which is to do a page about a typical day or week at our job. I'm thinking I'll do some variation of the journal page I did here, since it's basically the same prompt ... just need to figure out how to get all that info into a 7"x7" page LOL!

Inspiration Wood

The creative theme for this past week at Inspire Me Thursday was "wood". That made me think of the IKEA drawer unit I use for some of my sewing supplies. Here it is all painted up:









You can see other wood-inspired projects here.

Flying at the speed of sound

Whoa! I'm on a bit of a roll with these ATCA Art Journals prompts. For week #7 the theme was "super fly". Now, when I first read the various past prompts, this one was one I actually knew for a fact I wouldn't bother with. But while I was browsing through a couple magazines for images for some of the other prompts, this woman with a cape practically jumped out at me. And when I saw the speed limit sign a few minutes later, I knew I was onto something LOL! Guess it's true that you should never say never!The background and swirls are watered down acrylics. The title is stamped and the writing is a Pitt pen. The writing on the left is some quotes I found on the Internet. In case you can't read my handwriting (yeah, it's bad ... sometimes I can't read it either!), here's what I wrote:

FLYING AT THE SPEED OF SOUND
(especially those sounds that mean my kids are getting into some kind of mischief!)

"The world is full of women blindsided by the unceasing demands of motherhood, still flabbergasted by how a job can be terrific and torturous." ~Anna Quindlen

"To fly, we have to have resistance." ~Maya Lin

"The phrase 'working mother' is redundant." ~Jane Sellman

"A man's work is from sun to sun, but a mother's work is never done." ~Unknown

"Motherly love is the fuel that enables a normal human being to do the impossible." ~Marion C. Garretty

"The most important thing she'd learned over the years was that there was no way to be a perfect mother and a million ways to be a good one." ~Jill Churchill

Redefining myself ...

As I said in my last post, I had an idea for ATCA Art Journals' week #14 theme "definitions". When I read that prompt the other day, I immediately thought of how my husband has been saying that he's noticed I've got more definition in my shoulders and upper arms since we've started exercising on January. I just had to jump on this prompt to document my goal of being healthier and more fit. I finished it yesterday:I love it! (Of course, it seems that my most recent entry is always my favorite LOL!) The background is acrylic paint. The border was done with a Pitt pen with some watercolor crayon to darken it. The lettering and quote are rub-ons. The figures are old dictionary excerpts, watered down acrylic and Pitt pen to emphasize the outlines.

Here are some close-ups:

Up in smoke

I just joined another Yahoo group about art journaling ... this one's called ATCA Art Journals. I have no idea what the ATCA stands for, but that's okay. I can still play LOL! They post a theme each week for the members to make a journal page about. This is week #19 and the theme is "up in smoke". Here's what I came up with:While I wait for next week's theme, I just might go back and work on some of the past themes. I've already got an idea for week #14 "definitions" ....

Outside my window ...

The current journal prompt at Inspire Me Thursday is "outside my window..." I started out by painting the background with shades of brown and green because those 2 colors are very dominant outside my window LOL! Then I added a few touches of pigment ink (pounced through some punchinella), using colors that I also see outside ... like dark red for the mulch around our plants, blue-violet for the lobelia, yellow for the swings on the swingset. Then I added the journaling with a Pitt pen. In case you can't read them, here's what's outside my window:

neighbors waving
fog rolling
flowers blooming
birds singing
steaks grilling
sun setting
rain pouring
squirrels chasing
children playing
grass growing
wind blowing
vegetables ripening
weeds multiplying

You can see out others' windows here.

Roots

This week's creative theme at Inspire Me Thursday is "roots". I got an idea right away, but as I started painting the background, another thought came to me. So I went with it. I'm glad I did ... I really like how it turned out! The background and trees are acrylic paint and the writing is done with a Sharpie paint pen. The texture in the water at the top was from pressing a paper towel into the paint and then removing it. Love it!

You can see other interpretations here.

And another one ...

This page started out as journaling about homeschooling and turned into a prayer:

More art journal pages

Maybe I am on a roll! First I worked on this hair style page ... I've been searching for a long time for the perfect haircut, but trying to describe what I want to a stylist just doesn't work too often. And it seems that when I finally get a stylist that understands, I never see her again. Ah, such is the life of a cheapskate ... I suppose I wouldn't have quite this much trouble if I went to the same stylist every time at a fancy-schmancy salon, but until I win the lottery, that just ain't happenin' LOL! So my sister suggested I get some hairstyle magazines at the drugstore and use them to get a real "picture" of what I'm looking for. I didn't even realize there were such magazines! I thought they only had those huge books that you find in the salon waiting area. So, hey, I learned something new ... always a good thing! Anyways, I started out just turning down the corners of the pages as I found ones I liked, but then realized it would be more helpful to be able to see all of them at once. So a journal page was born! In this second picture, you can see what I did when there were 2 cuts I liked that were back-to-back.Btw, it worked very well! I made this page just after lunch, then took it over to the place I usually go to and when I showed the stylist, she was very happy. She said, "Perfect! We love pictures!" I'm very happy with my new cut. Wish me luck as I try to style it myself tomorrow LOL!

Tonight I worked on this gardening page. I had done the left page last year to map out our garden, and today I journaled on the right about how it had done. I guess I just wanted to prepare myself for this year's garden adventure LOL! Which reminds me ... I need to map out the new garden layout!

The daily routine

This last week's journal prompt at Inspire Me Thursday was to describe a typical daily routine. I don't really have much of a daily routine, so I wasn't sure quite how to respond until I saw Deb's journal page. She inspired me to just look at the things I do practically every day without worrying about what order I do them. When I approached it that way, it came much more easily LOL! Here's my response to the prompt:The background is watercolor crayon that was smooshed with a babywipe. I collaged with magazine clippings and added some color with more watercolor crayons, then journaled with Pitt pens (love these pens!) In case you can't read it all, here's what I wrote:

The DAILY routine ... it never ends ...
Keeping an eye on the girls.
rush, rush ... gotta do those errands
always more dishes to wash
LAUNDRY! would these fancy things make it easier?
create something!
don't forget to homeschool!
did I remember to? [water the garden]
mmm...
thinking [treats] while doing [exercise]
feel the burn!
What's for ...
breakfast?
lunch?
DINNER?
will they eat it?
do we have enough $?
clean something NOW

You can others' routines here.

More art journal pages

A couple weeks ago, I tried my hand at making some stamps with foam meat trays. After trying out the stamps on scraps of paper, I cut them out and glued them into my journal for future reference. They were really fun and easy!More recently, I did this page about my love of reading. It took me several days to think about my favorite authors for the right side LOL!

Back to my art journal

For some reason, I was in a bit of a slump with my art journal ... I kept pulling it out and thumbing through it, but just couldn't seem to get in the mood to actually do any journaling. I had ideas in my head to write about, but I was paralyzed at the thought of actually marking up any of the pages. Was it my perfectionist side rearing it's ugly head? Was it fear that what I wanted to say was too trivial? What? I don't know, but I was getting very frustrated. I kept reading ABOUT art journaling, but not DOING any ... ugh! But recently I discovered Inspire Me Thursday. It's a neat blog that inspires you to think and create art. I spent a few days checking out the archives, while thinking about the prompts for last week ... circles and dreams. And then Donna Downey posted about her new Art Journaling 101 online class. I immediately signed up ... and I'm so glad I did! I had a few ideas from all that thinking about circles and such, and her class gave me some ideas on how to actually put those ideas on paper. So yesterday I sat down and did this page:Too fun! The background was done with watercolor crayon, using a babywipe to smear it. Then I added the fruit stickers and journaled around them with a Pitt pen and used watercolor crayons to embellish the journaling.

Next, I carved my very first wine cork stamp to make the shape of the blocks we used to border a flower bed in the front yard, and used it on a page to journal about what we did to that bed:More circles LOL! This background was done with torn bits of masking tape and acrylic paint. (I'm so happy with how this page turned out! When I did the background a couple months ago, I really didn't like it at all ... the color was so weird. But it works well for this gardening page ... now I love it!) The stamping is also done with acrylic paint.

And finally, I got up the courage to mark up this page:Oh, hey, I just noticed ... another circle LOL! I actually had done the collage stuff months ago and just loved it, but then I didn't know how I wanted to journal on it. But I finally just let myself write and write. It's not perfect, but I'm glad it's done. I love doing the journaling this way ... so much more fun than my own boring handwriting!

So, am I on a roll? Well, we'll see ...

If you want to see some more circles, check here.

My new bag

I've been crocheting this bag for a few months now and it is finally done ... yay! It's called "Blooming Granny Squares" and I got the pattern out of this book. The only problem I had was finding handles for it ... I couldn't find the kind the pattern called for at any local stores and I didn't want to pay shipping on just one little thing. I finally had to settle for the round ones. Took a little creative maneuvering to get them to fit, but that's okay ... it's done! Now it's filled with my next crochet projects ... totes for my girls' dance class stuff. They're getting this bag done in yarn they chose. Hope I'll be showing you pics of them soon LOL!

Close-ups are below.

A baby quilt

I've been so focused for the past few months on trying to organize my studio that I haven't had time to do any actual sewing. Of course, it doesn't help that my plans keep changing as I try to fit several types of craft and art into it LOL! But a couple months ago at a quilt guild meeting, a lady had brought several "kits" for baby quilts to be donated and I thought that'd be a great way to get me focused on clearing off my new sewing table and really giving it a spin. The kit included the front and back fabrics and a piece of batting. The lady just wanted them to be quilted and bound, no need to do more, but if you wanted to get creative, go for it ... can't beat those rules! I chose one that had a cute blue sky/cloud fabric with little purple, yellow and pink stars. When I got it home, I opened it to find that the other fabric was a simple white-on-white with stars. After a little thought (which I had plenty of time for, since I had a ton of stuff to clear off the sewing table before I could even start LOL!), I decided to make the sky/cloud fabric the back instead of the front, and have fun on the white-on-white side. Here's the result:

More art journal pages

While taking pictures of the Florida pages, I realized I had a couple random pages in there that I hadn't shared yet, so I snapped their pics, too.

Florida gluebook pages

My family went to Florida to visit family in February ... we are blessed to have family on both coasts so we get to see the ocean and the gulf ... love it! I brought along my art journal and did gluebook pages of the bits of ephemera I picked up along the way to document our trip (as you can see, most of the stuff centers around food ... hmmm ...)

Calendar journal -- February

I went a different route for February ... I didn't use any Post-it notes to mask the squares before doing the background. Instead, I did the background, then drew a grid with a Sharpie. While I liked the slightly bigger squares for journaling, I found, as the month went on, that I didn't have much room for the little bits of embellishment ... guess I can't have both LOL! The background is done with Sharpies used in a blow-pen contraption.