Happy new year 2011!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy new year to everyone!

I am excited to start the new year and ready to take on new challenges.

Above is a vision board that I made to help keep me focused on the things I want to accomplish and do in the coming year (I got this idea from Julie Balzer's blog; she is doing an art journal page a day - I won't be doing that but I will do them occasionally) I want to paint a lot more, have paintings in exhibitions and sell some, improve my drawing skills, do a Botanical Illustration course (in book form), take at least one watercolor workshop from a national teacher,sew some clothes and some pillows for my couch(which is somewhat similar in style to the one in the above photo, create some cool projects and layouts, knit, finish a couple of wall quilts, cook, bake (perfect my French bread), exercise, and read.

My word for 2011 is ABUNDANCE 

appreciating what I have, feeling grateful for my blessings, and

making do or doing without (money will be even tighter this year with no increase in income plus increases in the cost of my health insurance, food, and gas)

I have lots of paper, paints, pencils, fabric, yarn, and other items - 

and I will use up what I have before making any purchases.

I hope to take a vacation this summer to Seattle, Portland, and Vancouver so I am really

focused on saving every extra penny for that.

I worked this afternoon on sketching - beginning the first lesson in the botanical illustration course so that's a good start. I also finished a new painting this past week that I will have in an exhibit at the Vero Beach Art Museum the middle of January. (I will post it closer to exhibition time)

Then I played with my paints and came up with this - I have been looking at some old photos and magazines from when we were in the Bahamas, and I was reminded of the beautiful turtles there.

Just a fun little painting.

Thanks for reading and hope you have a great day, and a great new year!!!!

ttfn

Chris

Artist journal

I have been wanting a watercolor and sketch journal for some time now and decided to make one for myself. I was very inspired by Ruth Rae's book Layered, Tattered & Stitched, and used her journal as the basis for mine.  However, I used canvas for the cover and lined it with heavy interfacing and felt. I sprayed the canvas and the felt with Tim Holtz Adirondack color wash in lettuce - this goes on very well but takes a while to dry on the fabric. I then layered everything and sewed it together, creating a spine. I used old sheet music for the bottom layer of the embellishment and added some of the new Gecko Galz Versailles designs - Opulence and Let them eat cake (I printed the designs on fabric paper) for layers and also added some antique lace, some tulle, and some of the wonderful vintage Gecko Galz buttons as well as some from my collection. Everything is securely sewn onto the cover.

On the inside of the front and back covers, I added some pockets to hold pens, pencil, brushes, and a small watercolor kit.

For the insides of the journal I created 4 signatures of watercolor papers and actually sewed the signatures to the spine.  This was probably the hardest part of the project but I am very pleased with it and will be taking it with me on vacation later this week - I hope to sketch some of the beautiful scenery in North Carolina.

Thanks for reading and have a creative week!

Art journaling with wings

I got Taking Flight by Kelly Rae Roberts from the library and began to do some of the projects. I found an old book for 10 cents and cut the covers off it to use in this project. I need to look for some more books. I followed Roberts's instructions using gel medium on the page to adhere the collage pieces but in the future I will use Mod Podge. I painted over the collages and drew the self portrait and then painted it. I wanted to follow Roberts's idea but at the same time, I wanted my image to be mine and not a copy of hers. I realized after I painted the image how large and round it was, and it was kind of a revelation to me because I am fairly thin - 5'5" and 127 lbs. That's actually a higher weight for me than what I have carried most of my life - when I graduated from high school, I weighed 98 lbs and was the same height. Most of my 20s and 30s were spent between 110 and 120. The winter that we lived in the trailer I gained 15 lbs. but became dedicated to lose it, and have been pretty successful. BUT all my life I have seen myself as overweight. When I growing up, my whole family was overweight and my father who was very authorotarian insisted that we eat big dinners so I would go all day not eating except maybe a coke so that I would never be overweight. Anway, it was strange to me that I still must see myself as round - although I could say that maybe I see myself as a well-rounded individual. LOL

I added lace and a heart and then tried to write on the page - it looked nasty so I wiped it away and wrote on paper and pasted it on. The poem is from Amy Lowell (just love her poetry. I was lucky enough to pick up a copy of her complete poems for 25 cents). The lines are

"It was her wings,

Goddess! ...

I followed her for long,

with gazing eyes and stumbling feet.

I cared not where she led me.

My eyes were full of colours."

So perfect for the self portrait with wings. I drew my eyes closed and my mouth in a smile, just thinking about all the beautiful colours.

The three tags to the left are made of fabric, interfacing, more fabric scraps, gesso, paint, and stamped letters. They are meant to hang off the binding edge of the art journal.

Yesterday I read a great book The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. It's a YA book but really brilliant. I am so glad that many of the fantasy, SF books have feminine heroes. The book was so enthralling I ended up staying up till midnight to finish it.

TTFN

Art journal and venting

I did this art journal canvas yesterday afternoon after reading Lucrecer's tutorial on the year of color blog about doing a monochromatic art journal page. So much fun and so stimulating, forcing myself to use only green. This is a great exercise in creativity.
And now a little venting - I have to admit I am getting pretty tired of entering challenges with time limits on them and then because someone whines about not finishing in time, the person running the challenge extends the time and invariably someone wins who was late with regard to the original deadline. My son who is a teacher told me that students today always ask for extensions and he is one of the few teachers who will not extend unless there are extreme circumstances. Aren't we teaching our children and ourselves that deadlines don't matter?
I am also pretty down on swaps as I entered a Valentine swap on a blog, corresponded with my partner, made her several items, mailed them off, and then nothing for me and she does not answer my emails. I finally emailed and told her to consider the items a RAK. And then I entered some atc swaps where the deadline is 4/1 and all of a sudden after I mailed my cards, people are cancelling.
I am not entering nearly as many challenges as I did for a while and actually I'm pretty down on challenges and swaps right now. I read a quote by Bruce Mau who said not to enter competitions as they are not good for your creativity and I am beginning to think he's right. (But I have to admit I plan to enter the Memory Makers Masters contest - I'm so glad it's via email this year and you don't have to mail layouts to them.)
Anyway, on to happier stuff. I am going to a luncheon today that is a thank you for the library book store volunteers. Should be fun!
Be back tomorrow in a much better frame of mind. LOL

A pink day!

Guess what? My little cream colored felt and button dress made the Catwalk at SIS! I am thrilled, and as promised, here is the little pink 60s sheath with its own Barbie hanger. These are so fun and easy to make.

This is the newest page in my art journal (for the Art Journal 102 class) and it's all about texture. I gessoed the page and just couldn't wait for the gesso to dry to begin so I stuck the buttons in the gesso, painted the green paint on, stuck the paper pieces on(torn from a watercolor practice page that I did yesterday), and suddently the page became a rose garden so I made roses from paint, tried to stamp on leaves but basically they became embossed, wrote on some journaling about reading Amy Lowell poetry, and used a pencil to draw a stem and leaves in the gesso. What fun! To tell you how obsessed I became with the garden theme, I even sprayed some rose cologne on it. It is amazing how these pages are helping me become less editorial and critical of my work - after all, this is fun and what if it is awful: at least I learned something and it's only paper and paint supplies, and I have a big trash bin in the garage. LOL

Sunday art time

Today I did another art journal page. I am so inspired by some of the pages done by my classmates - so beautiful and filled with brilliant colors, tantalizing textures, and deep thoughts. So happy I signed up for this class! This page has 13 layers and was inspired by the piece of the Publix flyer for their Italian foods week (I used the other part of that ad for the scrapbooking layout that I posted yesterday). Then I found the wine tops and added some tickets and ribbons. I listed lots of my favorite Italian dishes and then painted some and finally added the eat pray love letters.( I loved the first section of that book but got bored in the second. The third part was okay. I guess I am one of the few American women who didn't really groove on that book. It continues to retain its popularity at the used book store.)
I started another little felt and button dress yesterday afternoon - pink this time - sort of 60s sheath chic. I have a hot pink Barbie hanger for it - so cool!
I am so grateful that I live in a society and time when I can do frivolous things like art journal pages, and felt and button dresses. I have been truly blessed in my life to have been born in the US into a middle class family, to have found a wonderful and loving husband, and to have such a loving and responsible son. Through this blog I hope that I can share my love of art, fabric, paper, food, books, and life with others. I know that a lot of what I write about is so frivolous compared to what is happening in the world at large and to the economies of many countries but we also need a release from the stress of that reality, and I hope my blog inspires readers as much as it provides a release for me. And now - off the soapbox...
Have a great day!

The early bird ...

Good morning! My DH is volunteering at the Honda Classic golf tournament in West Palm this weekend so he had to get up at 5am to go down - unfortunately or fortunately I also woke up and actually got up then so I have been webbing and creating this morning. I actually made this little felt, lace, and button dress yesterday afternoon. I was totally inspired by Ranjini Manhoti 's(sp) tutorial on button dresses in a year of color blog. I can see myself making these for presents this year. I have lots of buttons for lots of color monos or combos.

I made this layout this morning - for both the Category Stories blog (precious) and the Lotus paperie blog (format) - I used a paper towel that I had used to blot glimmer mist, a doily I had used as a mask for glimmer mist, part of a Publix flyer, 7 gypsies words, and Heidi Swapp old rub on letters (the ones that don't work very well) The totally awesome flower came in the RAK that I won from Flotsom and Jetsom blog - so cool!

This is my assignment to do layers for the Art Journaling 102 class - it has 11 layers: gesso, green and turquoise paint, blue paint on bubble wrap, lavendar paint on cardboard, living planet sticker (from some new capris), dictionary pages, image stamping, writing, yellow paint (I used a Heidi Swapp old old star mask but it didn't stick so I just smeared the paint), letter stamping, and charms. What a fun project - I ate breakfast and did some tasks while letting the paint dry between coats.

Looks like it will be a beautiful day - it's 9:30 am so I'd better get dressed and make a pot of tea - with getting up at 5am, breakfast seems a long time ago. LOL!

Lucky day! Lucky week!

On Monday I won a RAK from the Flotsom and Jetsom blog as it was her 100th posting and I received the wonderful prize today (see photo). The vintage buttons are stunning, the flowers just call out to beused as an inspiration for a project, the valentine is so cute, and the book is beautiful. I feel so grateful to Stacey (owner of F&J) and this prize has really made my week!!

Yesterday I spent the day at my BFF's house and we made tote bags (see photo). Mine is finished (and the only thing I had to purchase was 1 fat quarter and a piece of interfacing) except for a little decoration on the flap. We had so much fun - her sister and niece were visiting from Pennsylvania and we ate lunch out on the lanai in the sun. Later we met our DHs at a barbeque restaurant and had baby back ribs. What a perfect day!

We are in the second week of Dina Wakley's Art Journal 102 class. I finished this altered self portrait last night and am ready to start on the "layers" for this week. I have been very busy doing ATCs - I made the mistake of signing up for several exchanges and I am now discovering how much time is necessary to produce the cards. At least I have 4 sets finished. I need to finish one more set this weekend.

A page a day (LOL)

In this journal page, I am trying out a method in which you alter a self portrait - not quite Frieda Kahlo. I used a craft knife to scratch the photo and then painted it with acrylic paint and wiped off most of the paint. What remained rested in the grooves.

Art journaling con't

I am learning so much in the Art Journaling 102 class - I am doing things that I have never attempted before, like image transfers. I had no idea how easy they are to do: the middle page is an ink jet transfer and the bottom is a laser copier transfer. I am using Omni Gel as I purchased a bottle a couple of years ago when I took a BPS class with Carol Wingert. We did one image transfer and it didn't come out very well so I never did any more. These two came out just great. I am also quite pleased with the gessoed and painted background on the bottom page - I was trying to do something that looked sort of old like patinaed brass. I used the painted and sprayed silhouettes from yesterday's pages on the top page along with a poem I have had laying on my desk for a while. the cardboard is what I used to create texture on some of the other pages and then it just seemed to need the flowers and stitching. Dina Wakley is such a great teacher and I am really looking forward to the next 2 weeks of classes.

Art Journaling 102

I am so loving my Art Journaling 102 class with Dina Wakely. I really should have taken 101 but unfortunately we have only so much money for frivolous pursuits. Anyway, today our lesson was on motifs - picking a motif and using it in many different ways - we were to use paints (acrylic and all I have are cheap mm and Michaels so they are way too thin) and spray inks (all I have is glimmer mist and it doesn't work very well with gesso as you can see in the middle photo; the top photo is glimmer mist sans gesso and it worked so much better!) This is great fun and I have to admit I am tired after painting and stamping most of the day. I am full of ideas right now but I think I need some energy - a pot of tea is steeping as I write.

Yesterday I got several great books at the used book store including a 1920 copy of the Blue Book to London - you should see the incredible maps and floorplans - oh such love! I was devouring the floorplans of the British Museum - how many books have I read where the characters go there. I also went to the library and on display were 2 young adult books that I checked out - the Tree Shepherd's Daughter and Into the Wildewood. I've already read the first one - a fun easy fantasy set in a permanent Renaissance festival site. What's really weird is that I recognized the site as one that we used to go to in Colorado; however, the author relocated it to Fort Collins and that bothered me a little as FC is not exactly in the foothills. Oh well, I just pictured it as I knew it (actually the site is Larkspur, between Denver and Colorado Springs) and it brought back memories of Brian who always insisted on wearing a brown hooded cape (he was a thief in D&D gaming) and who always had to eat one of the huge turkey drumsticks. Such fun!