faux leather folio

 

 Latest paper fun. I used a cereal box for the cover. Using the back side (no print), I used brown liquid shoe polish on that side, 2 coats, letting first application dry between layers. On the printed side I used YES paste and adhered a piece of ledger paper from an old paper stack.  Then I just added a 15 page, 3-hole signature junk journal and an eyelet hole for some black elastic. Very easy!  

I am using this for ideas that come to me in dreams. Do you dream of crafting? I do! When I first wake up, I like to jot down the dream or idea that often comes to me in a dream. I can't seem to turn off my brain! But some of my best ideas have come to me in the form of a dream. So I keep writing them down. One just never knows!

Happy crafting!

Foiling on Cricut Maker

 This is a game changer- foiling on my cricut maker. Woo hoo!  This is my first foiling. This will go into a junk journal for a 9 year old girl who loves unicorns. It is pink and shiny- just what a 9 year old girl loves!

Cricut has just released the foiling tip- can't wait to experiment!

 

I painted this a few years ago in my art journal. 

Its from the Commedia dell'arte. 

This is my interpretation of the character. He is at a circus and has had too much to drink. He is napping leaning up on the side of a circus tent. There are many ways to the actors are portrayed. I used acrylics to paint this.

in my art journal

Experimental Bird

I meet weekly with some art friends. Each week we do a challenge. This past week was a bird of our choosing. This is what I came up with. I was trying for a very lose painting. I struggle with lose! I tend towards realism.  

Happy crafting! (or painting)

Hand lettering is a true art

I am not a fan of my own hand writing. It's sloppy and messy. Lately, I've been thinking of improving my hand lettering. So I watched some online videos about hand lettering and created this page in my Disney art journal. It's watercolor paper and watercolors and ink.  What do you think?  

Disney Magic

I recently attended a workshop that was fabulous. I highly recommend it! It's Art Journaling the Magic run by Tangie Baxter. We all met in Disney World and met up each day to do art journaling.

It was 5 days and all around the parks. Each day we went to a park to practice lessons and techniques that were shown that morning. It was a great fun to meet other women who love art journaling and Disney as much as I do!
Here is a page from my sketchbook. I will share more in the next days.

This is a "tip-in" I added to my journal. It was a practice piece and I added a sticker and a silhouette of the iconic Walt and Mickey statue from WDW.  A tip-in is an added page. I used washi tape secure it between pages of the actual journal.  The journal is fantastic...hand made my Tangie's husband. I just looked for a link for it, but the Etsy shop is 'taking a break' at the moment.

Happy crafting!

Creativity takes Courage

I spent the day crafting with a friend yesterday and she gifted me several rubber stamps she no longer wanted. I will never say no to rubbah...lol

Last night I used two of the stamps in this spread in my art journal. First I used Distress Oxide inks for the background, then used embossing powders to make it all grungy. The butterfly is just from my stash and I mounted it on to paper covered chipboard. 

I am pleased with the result.

Happy Crafting!

Urban Sketching at the beach

Beach from the boardwalk by the clock.

watercolor in my 5.5 x 8 journal.

This week was a bad weather week, but just before all this rain and wind, I went to the clock on the Bethany Beach boardwalk and set up my travel sketch one early evening.  I sat at a bench and painted this. The angle was interesting because the sand dune in the front hides the actual beach and you just see the water. I hope I was able to convey that. I find drawing and painting the ocean HARD! So I keep drawing and painting it. I admire those on YouTube who, in a few swishes with their paintbrushes, create a realistic ocean painting. There is a lot of time and practice behind that seemingly fast painting.

art journaling with attitude

attitude

in my art journal

I was on the beach recently and had my lunch. This guy landed and obviously wanted in. So I shared my bread with him. He just stood there, staring with such attitude!  So he is now in my art journal. I sketched him with color pencils and watercolor. 

more ancient and old acrylic painting

Here is another experiment I finished today in aging paper using acrylics and gesso. I added a crackle medium as a top coat to really age it. Again, I then rubbed in burnt umber. I love the diamond shape. I use that a lot in my art work. That and nickle azo gold...love that color!

 old looking journal page

using acrylics, gesso and image transfer

(click to see larger)

 

 close up of aged paper

(click to really see!)

another close up of aged paper

 



Scapino

 

Scapino, collgae and acrylic

8" x 5" in my art journal

 



Scapino is another character from the Comedia Dell'arte. I am having fun doing the research and then a collage/painting of a character/clown. This is all in the attempt to improve my drawing-of-people skills. I am also fairly obsessed with Anne Bagby's process and how she makes her own papers and then uses them in collage. I really admire her work.  In this collage/painting, the background was done first. I used a photo reference and painted it in acrylics and then collaged it on top of the background. I then did a very faint black outline around the clown. then I added shadows etc. Great fun!

Pierrot or Peridot ??

I am reposting this, because I completely changed it- I wasn't happy with my first go-round...

Last year I started drawing faces and trying to incorporate them into collages ala Ann Bagby...this is my second attempt. I drew the face first. (yes, I know the lips are crooked, sort of like that imperfection). Then I scanned my drawing and resized it and then printed it out. I then made the background in my art journal (love the Strathmore Mixed Media journal books- they take lots of abuse!!) 

When I went to stamp the clowns name, I found two spellings. Now, if it were 1 pm instead of 1 am, I might of picked what I believe to be the correct spelling: Pierrot, but at 1am in the morning, after a day watching my 11 month old granddaughter, Peridot looked just fine...ah well...

The diamonds and head are collaged. the rest is acrylic painting and stamping. size is about 5x8.

ruling pen experiment

I've been having difficulty with writing in white in my art journals. My white sharpie pens start to leak, the oil pastels ruin my micro pens...nothing seemed to work well...so I started thinking about how I could do this better. That's when I remembered my old ruling pens. I watered down some fluid white titanium Golden's paint and it worked really well! In this picture the white paint is still wet so it looks a little shiny here. Anyway...if you are having the same problems with your art journaling- get yourself an old fashioned inking pen. I found a place here to buy them.

Inking pens were used in drafting once upon a time...along with a ruler to make wonderful inked lines. I have one that I purchased from Jonathan Talbot and I have another one that was my father's when he was in college, as part of a set. He went to collage when they used a slide ruler. to do the calculations..which I have no idea how to use.

fantasy watercolor

a peek in the forest

watercolor and pan pastel on 140# paper

(click to see large)

This is a fantasy watercolor. By that I mean I made it up in my head. I love the fairy paintings of make believe places and this is a glance into such a world. This weekend was a pajama weekend. I pretty much spent the entire weekend in my pj's painting. This is the result. I love the Chinese lantern plants and I knew that would be the focus of this little painting.

I painted it in my Strathmore watercolor art journal I bought for an online art journaling workshop of which I am participating. I wasn't sure how this paper would be, as the entire book cost me less than the usual sheet of Arches watercolor paper I buy. But I have to say I really was impress with the paper. It held up well. I even scrubbed a couple of areas to give it a test and it held up well. No tiny spit balls (what usually happens with cheap watercolor paper!)

I also love those round flat dollar plants- I don't know the name of them, but I think they will be in my next art journal painting.

old journal page

Histories of ages past

Unenlightened shadows cast

Down through all eternity

The crying of humanity.

'Tis then when the Hurdy Gurdy Man

Comes singing songs of love,

Then when the Hurdy Gurdy Man

Comes singing songs of love.

This is an old journal page I did a few years back, based on an old song that I loved when I was a kid- The Hurdy Gurdy Man by Donovan. (yes, I am old). I brought the scanned page into PS to alter it a bit. I 'defocused' parts so the center figure is now the focal point. That's the amazing thing about PS- you can make those kinds of changes on the fly. This page is about childhood behaviors of mine during a hard time in my life as a small child.

Do You See What I See?

a star, a star, dancing in the night...I've been humming this all day...so I made a journal page about it. Christmas is a wonderful time of the year. I am feeling this year like I would like to keep it very simple. Sort of 'The reason for the season' and not all of the hoopla.

This journal page- I was reading last night about the artist Bruegel. I cut out the wise man from the painting in my book I was reading and used him as the starting point for this page. I just loved how he looked- loved his boots and outfit.

more faces

I drew these yesterday. I will draw faces over and over and over until I like them. These postings may not be pretty but it's a work in progress!

a second face today

I like how this one turned out better than the other one I posted. I think I got the proportions better in this one. I could draw the human face all day...it just intrigues me!

And the "just start" message is to me...I've neglected exercising and it shows in my blood work that I just got back today. I hurt my leg awhile ago and just stopped exercising because of the pain- and now I am paying for it! So...I'll start up on my stepper machine starting tomorrow- if the leg still hurts too much to step I will address it and go to the doctors instead of ignoring it and not exercising. That is a promise to myself.

working on my travel journal

I like how this page is coming along. First I painted a page of my travel journal with gesso. Once dry I added several layers of acrylic paint, letting layers dry between application. Then I added a photo transfer by printing out the photo onto clear transparency film and transferred it to the page using gel medium. The second image is one where I ran the image through a filter in Photo Shop.

The image is of an old metal fence that my sisters and I found at an abandoned graveyard on St. Helena's Island, SC. Inside this fence, underneath the leaves and the dirt my sister found the grave of one of our ancestors, Benjamin Chaplin who died in 1851. We were specifically hunting for his grave and we were very excited when we found it! The church was called "White's Ease Church" and it burned by a forest fire in 1888. Only the remains of the tabby walls and the old gravestones (and this fence) remain. It felt like we were on a mystery hunt and the little girl in me was both entranced and scared to be grave hunting in the middle of no where!

Now I need a good quote for the image. I am thinking about travel, family, roots...anyone have any good quotes that would fit?

travel journal

Each time I take a trip I usually keep a diary/journal of the trip. I love doing this, as years later when I read what I wrote again, it all comes back. It's as if I just took the trip. My latest trip to the south with my sisters will be a combo diary and art journal. I just completed the cover- I collaged maps and images of the areas we visited on the cover along with a painting I did in the middle of the hanging moss on a tree in Savannah. Looking forward to some fun art making with this journal!