2 For 1 Sale

Double dipping.

Killing two birds with one stone.

More bang for your buck.

Two for the price of one.

Two heads are better than one.

Hahahahahaha!

It's going to be one of those days, folks.

Actually, we are deep in preparation of three books right now.

I am packing and preparing for our move to Maine.

Trying to get some things ready to hand off to my son and Bobbie.

Furniture to take care of.

Closets to clean out.

Desks to empty.

About a billion boxes to pack.

My life is one big ball of stress right now . . .

but I still want to art!

This past week I was invited to participate with

a new art journaling group on Facebook:

Joggles 2016 Art Journal Adventure.

This spread is one I made for their lettering prompt this week.

I am also a member of another art journaling group.

And I am woefully behind on prompts there.

Around Valentine's Day they had a prompt

that dealt with hearts. 

Wow! This spread has a heart. Or three or more.

And it speaks to a love of art

and how it affects our lives.

Boom!

And it became a 2 for 1 sale!

Just like that!

Gotta love it!

Spring is Here in Florida

Spring just popped in to Florida within the past few days. Everything is covered in pollen. I know because I can't go outside. I can't breathe, my eyes itch, I'm congested. Ugh. And my red car is yellow. But . . . spring is certainly a welcome sight.

These are some azaleas blooming in the yard. Actually I took this photo a week ago and we still have blooms. Tons of them.

Anyway, I am getting further behind with my art journal prompts, this particular prompt was You Are an Artist. The description was - show what you are really good at. So. I love me some bright, wonderful, bold, beautiful,  in-your-face-awesome color! Here's another 5" x 7" scrap of leftover color. Dylusions Ink Sprays. Gotta get 'em all! Every color, and multiple bottles of some colors. (Bubblegum pink, lemon zest, fresh lime.) I used lots of water and played with the color till I came up with this.

Then I added my favorite - flowers. Hahaha! If you click on the color photo and enlarge it, then you can click back and forth between the two and you will be able to see how the flowers came to life. For the first time ever, the photos pretty much line up perfectly. If the flip thing works :).
Prompt #9 - √. Now on to 10, 11, and 12.

Skyward

 I'm having so much with this art journaling

Facebook group I'm in!

I'm trying new things,

but still the hardest part for me is the

"journaling' part of art journaling.

 And of course, I'm running behind.

The prompt was birds.

I struggled with this for a week,

wondering what to do.

Then I was cleaning out my stamping drawers,

trying to get organized once again,

and I came across this little steampunk bird stamp.

And I knew that was the bird I would use.

I mixed that with a couple other stamps, did some tangling, and came up with a suitable quote from Leonardo Da Vinci. And called it done.

I will probably add more to this spread, but for now I am happy with it. And I got to use a bunch of product that I don't use very often.
This was built in my Strathmore Mixed Media journal. Background color is a variety of Golden Fluid Acrylic paints,  Tim Holtz Distress Inks, metallic rub-on color, regular Pitt Artist Pens, and metallic Pitt Artist Pens. Stamps are from a company called Deep Red. I also used: Derwent Inktense Pencils, microns, Sharpie fine point pens, Uni-ball Signo pens, gelly roll pens, and Copic alcohol markers.

The Inner Critic

The inner critic. We all have one.

You know - that little voice that tells you: * you'll never lose that weight, * you'll never get that job, * no one will want you, * you aren't good enough. You know - that voice.
The art journal prompt I was working on today has to do with the inner critic. In regards to my art, my inner critic tells me that I can't draw, that I can't paint, that I'm not creative enough, that I'll never sell any artwork, that no one will want my art, anyway, that I have no talent - thus, no one would ever want my no-talent-can't-draw-to-save-my-life-non-creative artwork.

And truthfully, I hear that inner critic 95% of the time. That other 5% of the time, I try to remember that my art is beautiful - even if I am the only person who thinks so. Truth.

So, take that, Inner Critic! Who do you think you are, anyway? You certainly are not welcome here anymore. Hahahaha!
Now, onward and upward.
For those that wonder, and even those who don't, I am using a Strathmore Mixed Media journal. For this prompt I used a couple gelli prints I had on hand, stamps, copic markers, posca paint pens, microns, Pitt artist pens, Sharpie fine point, and washi tape.

Something New to Stretch My Wings

The last art journal prompt I worked on was - to spread our wings, reach outside our comfort zone, to try something new. Well. This has 'try-something-new-stretch-your-wings' written all over it!

Believe it or not - I started with this. I used the same journal I've been working in, gessoed a two page spread, then covered it in this beautiful teal Golden's Fluid Acrylic.

Once that was dry, I started adding elements. I used Liquitex matte medium,  coated the back of each piece, stuck it in place and covered the front and the edges with the same product. Basically just glued all this stuff in place. (That piano music is from an old Broadman's hymnal that my grandmother gave to me when I was about ten. I used a page that had fallen out of the book.)

Somewhere I read that Dylusions Ink Sprays spread well if you used your finger and just rubbed them on the page. Whoever wrote that comment needs to be fired. Immediately. I still have pink stains on my fingers and I started this project almost a week ago.

And, as much as I love dylusions, I hated the way this looked. So I used a baby wipe and removed as much as I could. A shame the same doesn't work on your hands. I did like the coloring I was getting then with the teal/blue background and the hints of pink here and there.

I still wanted that crazy pink look - just not the one I got with dylusions - so I took some Jasmine Inka Gold and rubbed it around the two pages. Then I sprayed some Sparkle Shimmer over both pages.

Now I was getting somewhere. I added some texture by smearing texture paste - I actually used modeling paste because my texture paste is MIA - through a stencil, which gave me flowers and cool little circles. Then I brushed a line of dylusions Funky Fuchsia across both pages, tilted the book, and spritzed water, allowing it to run down the pages.

I liked the way the dylusions adhered to the modeling paste. I used my finger to remove modeling paste from the top of the butterfly,  and used some London Blue and Crushed Grape dylusions to rub on the butterfly wings.

I just kept adding color with cheap WalMart acrylics . . .

. . . and Golden's fluid acrylics, until I got a look I was happy with.

I added doodles here and there and tried so many products,  trying to find ones that gave acceptable coverage. I used Derwent's Graphik Line Painters for the black circles. That is a mistake I won't make again anytime soon. Smear. Smudge. Skip. Spit. Not happy. I traded out and started using Posca Paint Pens. Happiness in a paint pen. All the instructions are in Japanese, so I just winged it and did what seemed right.

Then I added some gloss to the butterfly and the box on the left page using some gloss gel medium.
I learned a valuable lesson - even though I still like the way this looks. I forgot that Dylusions Ink Sprays are not waterfast. When I used wet product on top of them - like the posca paint pens - the paint picked up that lovely funky fushcia  and turned the white posca to light pink :).  Ta-da!!! But I'm totally ok with that cause I love pink!
Outside my comfort zone? For sure This is something I've wanted to try for a long time. And I love the way it turned out. Warts and all.

Stepping Outside My Comfort Zone

Here we are at week 4 of our  art journaling journey for 2015. I never thought I would make it to week four and still be interested and involved. So many other times I am have participated in online classes, online projects - just to find a couple weeks in that I was bored to death. That isn't happening here. Thank you, Cherryl Moote, for putting this together!
With that being said, week four's prompt was to step outside our comfort zone and try something we had been wanting to try but might have been too unsure - AKA scared - to give it a go.

I had several ideas running rampant through my brain. Hahahaha! You know how I am! I figure I may get a good 4-5 pages done this week. And they may all look awful,  but that's okay, cause I have been given permission to step outside the zone.
So for today, I pulled out my little box of awesomeness that is called Brusho Crystal Colors.

The Brusho® website describes them as:
brilliantly intense paint powder that comes in little pots of magic!
Hahaha! So true! They are little jars filled with crystals of beautiful, lush color. My started kit came with 12 pots of color. I started by making a color chart. Literally all I did was make a drop of water from a mop brush, and shaked (shook???) a little color into the wet drop and waited. The brusho is a fine powder. Those little spots you see here and there on the paper are fine little bits of color that didn't make it to the water. And I think I was a little stingy on the color, these could have been much brighter and intense.

I played with the color on a couple zentangle® tiles to start with. Those are going to mail out in an ATC swap fairly soon. For this week's journal project, I used this paper for the first time. I wanted to keep the paper a little lighter weight, because I already knew I wasn't doing this project  directly in my journal, but building it elsewhere and glueing it in place. I'm willing to step outside my comfort zone - to a degree. Haha! (On the other hand, I wouldn't recommend this paper for a project with a lot of water. Warping was an issue, but nothing a bunch of heavy books couldn't handle.)

And this is what I did. I found a YouTube video that walked me through it. I loosely sketched out a tree trunk with a pencil. With a wet brush I picked up some brown crystals and filled in a trunk. Then I sprayed water around the top of the tree, and sprinkled three different colors of Brusho crystals into the water and let it sit and mix. I had one spot where there was too much water - who knew, right? - so I blotted that with a paper towel, lifting what I didn't need. Then I let the whole thing dry. Ta-dah!

The last 'rule' for this week was this - after we stepped out of our comfort zone and tried something new, then we were supposed to go back and use some of our favorite tangles, our mac and cheese tangles, to complete our project. Well, I love how my first little tree turned out. I didn't want to mess it up. So, being the rebel I am, my thoughts went straight to The Pirates of the Caribbean. where Captain Hector Barbossa said the Code (of the Pirate Brethren) is more what you call guidelines, than actual rules. So. I added that quote and called it done. Hahahaha!
And because I had this blank page next to my week two page - which also sported some trees - I thought it to be a perfect fit. Last, I adhered the new page in place with some score tape.
Week Four √

Must Be Snowing Somewhere

I had this nice little blog post almost finished,

I had even saved it a couple times,

then my computer went Boop! 

and the whole post went swoop! 

and try as I might I cannot find it anywhere.

Ugh.

The third week of our art journal journey is coming

to a close. Actually it should have closed late last night,

but don't tell anyone. I am almost on time :).

Cherryl's prompt this week was to fold a snowflake.

Much like I used to do as a child,

and then with my children,

and to trace your initials on it

being mindful of the fold.

(My initials are A, D, and H.)

Being mindful of the fold so that when you cut

your snowflake out, it doesn't fold up

and fall apart on you. 

That fold is mega important.

I call the above photo my

spaceship taking a bath photo.

Hehehehe.

Here is my snowflake cut out.

Nothing fancy. My initials are mostly straight-leggers.

Doesn't lend to very much roundness,

but that's ok. Just gotta work with it.

(Save.)

Then I started prepping my pages.

Since I am working in a journal and I didn't want my blues to spread onto other pages,

I placed a scrapsheet of computer paper under each side.

(Actually, I consider myself a bit of a rebel. 

So, I used new, unused sheets of computer paper.

Hehehehe.)

Background color comes from Prima's 

Color Bloom Spray Mists - I used two colors.

I also spritzed them with water when they didn't move like I wanted them to.

I am so impatient when it comes to artting.

I sprayed a darker blue onto some bubble wrap

and placed it face down into the lighter shades of blue.

(Save.)

Totally must have deleted the photo I took of the salt,

so you are going to have to imagine it.

I sprinkled bits of sea salt across both pages of the spread

while it was wet and left the whole thing to dry.

Once the pages were completely dry, I used an old Disney Room hotel key -

resembles a credit card -

and scraped it gently across the top of the pages

to remove the salt residue.

You can rub your fingers across the surface 

to feel where you need to work a bit more.

Ta-dah!!!

(Save.)

I am sorry I didn't take more photos.

I have a date stamp that has letters on it, 

in addition to numbers, leftover from the old scrapbook days.

Everything old becomes new. Yep!

I used that to stamp the wording.

Noticed I misjudged my distance and got one too many B's on that first page.

Joy.

Then I took the snowflake and traced parts of it onto

the adjoining pages. 

Color added to the flakes are from Derwent Inktense Watercolor Pencils.

I love them! They were the first big expense I made

in my art journey and I've never regretted the cost.

(Your art is precious. Get the best product you can afford. You are worth it.)

Then I added a few tangles,

and a sweet little crocheted snowflake that my mom

made for me back around 1980. 

Thirty-five years ago.

I had just build an old farmhouse style dollhouse

and mom made me some rugs for the floors.

I had this one in the living room.

She will be so surprised to see I still have it.

Stuck this beautiful little treasure down with

some glue dots.

My pages still needed something more to tie them together.

I took the two Derwent pencils I used inside the snowflakes,

and used a waterbrush to flick/spatter

specks of juicy color across both surfaces.

Still it needed some little pop.

And I still have that extra letter B to contend with.

Wal-Mart to the rescue.

Actually I got the jewels from Wal-Mart awhile back on sale -

even better.

See how I totally covered up that bad B

with a stone? And to balance I added

one to the right-hand side by the don't,

even though I didn't mess that part up.

I feel like the jewels were the right touch.

All done.

Two page spread of snowflakes.

Did I mention I live in Florida where it's been in the 70's here in early January?

Hahaha!

Thanks to Cherryl for another great journal prompt!

(Save.)

Fanciful is My Mantra

Getting ready to walk out the door and head to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. Can not wait! And I have decided to leave my camera at home, and just enjoy the park with my cellphone and Instagram :).
Before I leave, let me tell you about a new endeavor I am part of. A group of CZTs (Certified Zentangle® Teachers) are each working on a year long art journal. Many have never worked on an art journal before, so it is a learning process for all.
This week we were to designate and journal a word that either describes us, or describes the journey we want to travel this year. Honestly, the word I picked can fit both bills.
Fanciful - I love it! So. Before I head to Orlando, here is the first week's page. I may add some more to it when I get back home, but here it is for now.
I used: Strathmore Mixed Media journal Peerless Watercolors washi tape gelly roll pens, various styles stamps and ink a sticker a smattering of tangles with a sharpie