Dream of good things, art journal spread

Hi

This is something I made last year but couldn't add it to Instagram because I couldn't successfully show the 'before and after' so I thought I'd add it here.

Below is an art journal spread I completed last year.... I think for the product release....  but there's something about it that I just don't like.

I'd flip past it (quickly), or clip it shut and was seriously considering sticking the pages together so I didn't have to look at it (I've done that before on pages!)... 

So, I decided to take drastic action - I painted the whole art journal spread black.  Oh it felt good to do that!!!  There's something about a page covered in black gesso! It looks so lush!

I remembered I had some sample flowers left over after teaching my 'Bloom' online workshop (sample below) - the flowers would look stunning on a black background!!   It would be really interesting to have two versions of the same project in dramatically different colour schemes.....

So that's what I did! I used most of the same flowers and foliage die cuts, & used the same stencil to add background detail using Arteza' Pearl Space Gray' metallic acrylic paint (it gives a really lovely shimmery grey/almost black finish).

LOVE LOVE LOVE this journal spread now!  lol

I really like that the 'history' of the page can be seen - the black paint didn't completely cover the embossed white flowers of the original spread, and I don't mind that at all - it gives interesting texture to the back ground.

I think its a gorgeous transformation... (I've already painted several other journal spreads that I didn't like.... NB I always take a photograph of the original pages because I think there is always something to learn from things that go wrong, or that are disliked)

I'd recommend covering up pages/spreads you're not happy with - cover them with paint or papers - alter them in some way.. part of the fun of art journaling and you'll learn something along the way... I know I did.

Thanks for stopping by

PS: The 'Bloom' workshop is still available as a Facebook Live class, please contact me on FB if you'd like to join.

Art Journaling.. No' 2...

... another journal spread with touches of neon paint (and why not!)... 

I wanted to create a spread using one of my new word stamps (JOFY68) and one of the reasons I chose these particular words is that they can be used at other times than christmas (except for 'christmas' obviously!)

This spread is a bit 'motivational' -  and I like how all the different fonts mix together..

Paint splatters, die cutting, flowers (JOFY62) and some Tim Holtz Small Talk stickers make for a nice less-is more-spread - well, I say less is more but the background is made up of layers of writing (painted over), stenciling, a splattering of stamping, painting around the edges and then the main images.... 

Thanks for stopping by...

Art Journaling....

... is a great way to 'play' in a constructive way... I use the Dylusions small journal a lot - I have a couple of the other Dylusion journals but the size of this one seems to suit me - in the same way as my thinking/planning journal (yes I have separate ones for that) is a 25x25cm spiral bound journal - I think the square shape fits my 'thinking' - not portrait or landscape... (and it obviously works for me  as I have a shelf holding 30 sketchbooks of that size - so it must a good fit! lol)

I think some of you must know what I mean - when you try a new journal, a different shape, or binding and it just doesn't feel 'right'... I once tried a rectangular journal where the binding was on the short edge.. shudder - that one just felt sooo wrong - I think I got about 5 pages in and gave up... it was stifling...

Aaaaanyhoo back to the small Dylusion journal - the thing I like about it is when its closed it is quite small (book pages are 5x8 inches) & rectangular but an open spread basically looks square - now you understand why I like it - its SQUARE!!!

#easilypleased

You might've started to wonder why I'm telling you all this... its just leading into showing you a spread from that journal...

look - no stamping!! none whatsoever.. not even a little bit in the background!

Its all sketches and doodles - and I think there's a little bit of stenciling under all the doodling and painting...  I worked on it (on and off) over the space of a week because each time I opened the journal and looked at the pages they seemed wrong... unfinished... unbalanced...

So I just kept working on it until it seemed 'done' - another set of doodles around the flowers... another flower.. just kept going.. and now its done.
I love the neon pink and 'Mermaid' blue colour scheme - and the black makes it pop!...

So, here's my 'advice' for the day - if I can call it that - try not to give up on a page: add something new, remove something - paint over something that bothers you and replace it something else...
If all else fails take a photo of the page (for reference - learn from what you did) and then glue the pages together! lol  I've done that several times because I don't want to keep seeing the spread when I look through the journal.

I'll post another page tomorrow.. with less waffle! lol

Thanks for stopping by

Size doesn't matter...

... when it comes to art journals... this one is at the smaller end of the scale....

This is my mini midori style journal, made with off-cuts left over from when I created a batch of leather bound journals for christmas 2017.

I've added a pencil to show the size of the journal - pages are approximately 5x5cm - not as mini as some journals out there but mini enough for me! lol

Its really a tiny junk journal created with 'HappyScraps' - those discarded pieces that are too nice to throw away...

(this is a flower from JOFY61, and I've doodled around the edges to make it larger.... nice!)

 ooooh doodling in white rather than black

Still enjoying working with watercolour paint - and I really like how different they look on different surfaces  - above is on canvas and below is on Smoothy card...

I coloured this page with Tombow brush pens (I like those A LOT) and then added some neon gel pen marks - it all looks quite subtle and 'normal' until its placed under a UV lamp!!!!

Here is the same page - left is daylight, right is UV light - crazy!!  Love it!
(could easily write secret messages only seen under UV light....... lol)

Working in this book was a lot of fun - no pressure - the pages are a bit 'goldilocks' - not too big, not too small - they were just right!

Have a go at working small - its fun - trust me! 

Thanks for popping by!

Art Journaling: scraps but not scrappy...

.. at the end of a workshop or demo day I often have bits a pieces left over that are too nice to throw away and so I put them in a box on my desk to use later... (I decorated A LOT of my Flow Calendar book pages with bits and pieces from such a box!)

I came home from my classes at Birds in the Barn on saturday inspired & I wanted to do something with the days 'scraps' and so I put them together on this journal spread..

I'd painted the background during the class with left over demo paints this means that everything coordinates.  I added some DoCrafts rose gold foiled washi tapes that I'd recently bought - they really toned well with the Fresco paint colours as did the 'Fools Gold Embossing Glitter' by WOW! that I used with the compass background - such a lovely sparkly finish which is a nice contrast to the matt paint.

I used a white gel pen to add journalling to the centre of the page - I like how it fills the space but is barely visible.

Keep those 'scraps' - you never know when they'll come in useful!

EDIT: ooh I just thought: making nice things out of scraps makes me happy so from now on I'm naming projects like these 'HappyScraps' - sounds much nicer than just 'scraps' don't you think!


Thanks for stopping by

ALBOTAT: Do It Now

A spread in my small Dylusions journal to 'document' what I've learned from the events of the past 18 months and that is to..

'do it now' 

ie don't put it off 'til tomorrow because you never really know whats going to happen tomorrow do you - whether its good or bad... so {try to} do it now, today... free up tomorrow by doing it today.

 This spread started off like this...

... a sketched page that had been in there a while and I wasn't sure how to progress it - but the empty space in the bottom left hand corner was perfect for adding words to!

This was a relaxing spread to create - lots of sketching and pencil colouring (Faber Castell Polychromos), the black pen I used is a Posca.

ALBOTAT: Spring is blooming!!

This journal page was inspired by the garden and the arrival of spring and, hopefully soon, summer! (fingers crossed lol) Our garden has been getting more colourful by the day and I love the surprises it throws up.

I like to keep some white space on my journal spreads but on this one I scribble wrote all over the page on top of the original sketch

I really like how it looks when you paint over it - just about visible but not legible.. its not interfering with any added layers...

Once I'd finished reinstating the design with paints and a Posca paint pens - love those A LOT!!) I scanned it on the computer. I cleaned up the scan by removing any background marks leaving only the scribble flowers.  I printed it out on my toner printer onto a vintage book page - ooooh that was a good print!  such a great image it was hard to cut it up!! lol

I carried on sticking and colouring- I'd originally planned to stick the printed flowers over the matching ones on the journal page but decided the spread needed more flowers (are there ever enough flowers!) - and I also kept thinking 'its needs more colour'  - until finally, with the addition of swipes of neon pink gel pen, I was finished!

I really like that the pages are bright and colourful but also still have a lot of 'white' space.. space to 'breathe'.

Thanks popping by

JoFY Bingo Wk.6

Welcome to Week 6 of Jofy Bingo - lots of great flower elements this week (which seems ironic as this week there aren't any christmas/snowy stamps but its the week we have snow here in the UK!)

I chose to create another spread in my art journal this week... (you can find my short process video at the bottom of this post!)

and LOOK!  I used YELLOW!!!  (and I recently bought a yellow top and a yellow handbag!!!)  I am FINALLY FULLY embracing yellow!! (it might be because I really want spring to arrive and bring warmer weather with it!)

aaanayhoo for this project I wanted to use paperpiecing - the flower head on JOFY35 really lends itself to that technique.
For the paper piecing I stamped the same images several times onto different scrapbook papers (I use 6x6 pads of paper for this as the designs are smaller/daintier..) and set about cutting them out.

I've laid the pieces out in the photos below so you can see how I put them together and get the most amount of flowers out of them.  The green/teal flower has its centre cut out and is reattached on top of the other layers - noone can see the hole that's created and it doesn't affect its structure/stability... the centre of the yellow layer could also be removed (and used elsewhere) as it is covered by the white layer..

Here are the finished pieced flower heads..  they are all the same but different - complementing each other..

I added shading around the layers to add a bit of depth, a touch of white gel pen (everything looks better with a bit of that doesn't it!) and some glitter glue to contrast with the matte grey background.

I made a quick video showing you how I created the spread... enjoy!

Right, I'm off outside to build a snowman....


ha ha ha

who am I kidding - I'm staying indoors where its nice and toasty warm!

Stay safe and warm everyone.