A Journal Around the World

 A Journal Around the World. What a wonderful idea!

This is going to be a rather lengthy post, chock full of photos

explaining how ~ and why ~ I made these journal pages.

My friend Karen is a fellow CZT, we attended zentangle certification training together. Karen got this great idea to send a journal around the world to various art friends and get them to each complete a 2-page spread in her journal. Not only is it traveling all around the United States, it is also making two trips to Australia and one trip to the Netherlands. 

If you have followed my art for long you will already know that I love bright, vivid color. The more ~ the merrier.

To get my pages going, I went to my supplies and pulled out some Dylusions Ink Sprays (these cute little storage boxes from Michael's are the perfect height), some ink pads, and . . .

. . . some stamps. 

I also pulled out brads, jewels, and charms, anything I thought might work on my pages, as well as two ATCs. These particular ones are from some time ago when I ink sprayed a bunch of ATCs and mailed them to some of the CZTs to try them. I tangled around the designs made by the various ink sprays. You can see this a bit better in the next photo.

I'm sorry I neglected to take a photo. I cut a piece of watercolor paper to fit the pages in Karen's journal. I spritzed some water over the surface and sprayed three different colors of Dylusions Ink Sprays onto the wet surface. I explained this process in the last post that you can read here. Once my pages were inked and dried, I  started placing some basic elements that I wanted to use in an eye pleasing manner around the two pages ~ until I found the configuration I wanted. I attached some of the pieces with brads, then . . . 

. . . covered the back of the pages with Scor Tape that I bought from joggles.com, then . . .

. . . attached the watercolor pages into Karen's book.

I wish I had gotten a better photo of this, but hopefully you can see what I did here. I took an old medicine bottle, pressed it down onto an inkpad, and stamped circles onto various places around my two-page spread. I finished attaching some of the loose elements . . .

. . . and arrived at this. I liked the way it looked at this point, but I wanted to add some more zing!

So I started looking at the page and deciding what I could add. (And I figured I could show off my fancy nails I got painted on at Kali's house. They need to be re-done. I've had this gel on for three weeks already, but I can't find anyone in my area who does this kind of beautiful detail work on nails.)

Where the stencils and ink sprays left circle patterns on my pages were the perfect spots for some printemps.

And those at the bottom were perfect for Sandy's tangle cruffle.

I kept adding details until I was happy.

And I ended up with this. So happy with this layout!

It didn't take long to make, it has beautiful, vibrant color which I love, I got to combine several medium to make the project, and I got to show off my awesome nails!!!

From here the journal heads to Connecticut. It still has 18 stops to make before it finds it way back home to Karen.

Let me tell you, Karen is going to be one excited lady when she gets this package in the mail!

I am so jealous!

Splashin' Some Paints

 
 I've been wanting to play with paints lately and today was the day!

These are the two final results. I know I still want to do a lot with these two-page spreads, but I'm still contemplating exactly what. Easy-peasy and literally about 10 minutes per spread. Here is what I did.

I started with Dylusions' Creative Journal by Dyan Reaveley. It's a large 11 13/16" x 9" journal, with pages measuring 11 3/8" x 8 1/4". The pages are heavy duty cardstock that hold up to lots and lots of water. I spritzed some water onto my paper, then I sprayed a bit of vibrant turquoise Dylusions Ink Spray onto the wet page.

To make this spread I literally used three colors. As they spread and mix, they make other colors. In addition to the turquoise, I sprayed on some Bubblegum Pink . . .

. . . and Lemon Zest. Then I spritzed more water onto the page . . . 

. . . and closed the book. I pressed down the pages with the book closed, then opened it back up again. At this point I had wet, gloppy color on both pages.

I used a wad of paper towels to blot up the water. I added bits of color in the blank spaces, and 

ended up with beautiful, bright colors.

These are the ink sprays I used.

Next, I took some stencils I also got from Dylusions. I held this one in place and spritzed some water onto the page - through the stencil.

I let it sit for a couple seconds, then lifted the stencil. At this point my stencil was wet on the top side, so I turned it over and placed it face-down on the adjacent page. 

I pressed it down, then lifted it and removed it. I let both pages sit with the water on them for about 30-45 seconds. The wetness of the water re-activated the ink and the color started lifting everywhere the water was. After that 30-45 seconds, I dabbed the wetness with the paper towel, and dried my page with a heat gun. This technique is called 'ghosting.'

I loved the pages just like this, but still wanted to add to them.

I inked a stamp with Stayz-On ink and

stamped it onto my pages in two different spots.

This was the end result. I will probably do more work on this, and at the absolute least I will tangle on these pages.

My second set of pages started off like this.

I applied the ghosting technique with some steampunk elements.

I really love this set also! I know that I will add more to these pages tomorrow. I will have to show you more photos when I get them complete. Now, off to tangle on the pink pages! I can't wait to see how they turn out!