Time Out

Sorry I've not been around for a week or two - unfortunately, at the moment I need to take time out from my blog due to family illness which has taken priority over any crafting.  Will post again when I'm able and upload pics of the last two chakra journal pages I did - I've not got around to May's challenges yet.  

This and that

I finally sorted out my browser/blogger issues by downloading Google Chrome (not without an afternoon's hassle mind you - nothing's ever straightforward is it?) to use as an alternative browser to my old Internet Explorer (thanks to Sioux for the suggestion, which confirmed what I'd been thinking).  So the problems I was having with Blogger have gone away (fingers crossed), though (like Lindsay) I'm using the old format to put up this post.  

Yesterday, the plasterers came round to sort out our kitchen ceiling so I decided to escape all the chaos and go spend the day with Lindsay instead, taking my camera with me so that I could help photograph some of her newest creations (not for public viewing just yet *LOL*).  I was supposed to be assisting Lindsay make some extra cards, etc, for her demos this weekend, but I think I was much more of a hindrance than a help.  Here's a picture I took of one of the cards Lindsay had already made:-

The stamped image is one of Lindsay's "Off the Wall" designs (Emily) and the text stamp is one of Andy Skinner's.  I have a "thing" about harlequin diamond stamps and stencils at the moment, so I really love the stencilling on this card too.

I took some photographs of another card that Lindsay created during the day too and this, along with the one above, will be on display I believe on Sunday when she'll be demonstrating her 'arty-crafty' techniques at the Strikes Garden Centre in Weavervale, Northwich (check out her blog for details - she'll be in Leeds tomorrow as well).

 Inking the card edges

 Black card sprayed through an alphabetic stencil with Perfect Pearls Mist

 Steampunk Sarah - one of Lindsay's new stamp designs

The card completed 

Whilst Lindsay was working on her laptop, I was very honoured to have Tara (originally our parents', now one of Lindsay's cats) jump up and sit on my lap - however, I think it was just so she could get a better view of the computer screen, maybe hoping that Lindsay was putting in a big shopping order for all her favourite food treats (chicken, salmon, ham .......... for starters!)

During the day I was getting updates from home about the progress on the plastering - all sounded pretty horrendous as apparently at one point a large chunk of the ceiling fell down and (despite dust sheets everywhere) created a huge mushroom cloud of plaster dust which enveloped everything!  Lovely!!! Eventually, I could put off going home no longer (and was also feeling slightly guilty by then about not helping my menfolk clear up the mess) - and yes, dust was everywhere and it took another couple of hours to clean every surface and make the place look presentable again.  Last job of the night was washing the floor down and we'd had enough by then.  However, it was worth it - no more ceiling cracks, now we've just got to get it all re-painted - more mess and disruption (I can't wait)!

I've still got to finish off the last two chakra pages for my journal, don't know when I'll get round to doing them, but will post pics here when they're done.  Thanks for the kind comments I received all ready about the pages I posted last time.

April Journalling ...... etc

I've been in trouble with Lindsay this week for not "blogging" for a while - guilty as charged, but the days just seem to fly by and merge into each other at the moment - so I thought I better do an up to date post, only to discover from reading Lindsay's blog last night that Blogger has changed (!) - as a result it looks like I'm going to have an almighty problem posting too, never mind uploading pics.  Everything has changed, the screen I'm using to type out my post is too small but is also covering up the Blog toolbar so it's making things very difficult.  Part of the trouble is because Blogger apparently no longer supports my Browser - so even more hassle.  Aagh, why do they have to go tinkering with everything all the time!!!!  Grr !!!

I hope everyone had a lovely Easter break.  Life was a bit more eventful than we'd wanted around that time though - we had a big leak in the bathroom which resulted in a cracked kitchen ceiling and lovely soapy water (courtesy of Max having a shower at the time) dripping down into the pan of eggs I was cooking at the time!  As a result (and due to the "cowboy" job done on our bathroom some years back) to find and cure the leak, our plumber had to remove the toilet in order to remove the fascia in order to remove the cupboard in order to remove the bath - what a job!  Thankfully, we were covered by insurance.  So now we are waiting on the plasterer coming (Thursday) to re-plaster the ceiling.  Will feel a lot happier then.

This is what the ceiling looks like at the moment!

I've been working on my journal pages for April and have found them quite challenging - they are the seven Chakras and I've created five so far (with much struggling, so I'm not altogether happy with them) - only two left to go.  Here are my five chakra pages (fingers crossed I can upload pics):-

Root Chakra

Sacral Chakra

Solar Plexus Chakra

Heart Chakra

Throat Chakra

Typing this post has been an ordeal and I'm giving up on it for the time-being.  I may have to look at downloading another browser before I post again, what a pain this is!

March Journalling

I've finished my journal pages for March with days to spare (that's a minor achievement for me at the moment!).  I created four pages, each with a separate theme around the word "dream", as instructed - with mixed results.  Not altogether happy with what I've done, but there you are, never mind - it's all about the playing with colours and words, images and inks, getting messy and losing myself for a short while.  I hope that, as spring is upon us and we head off into summer, I might lose some of the gloominess that's been hanging around for far too long and have some fun instead.

Dream Definition

On this page we had to add a definiton of the word "dream" - I know what I was trying to do with this page, add random images all over to illustrate the bizarreness of our dreams, where nothing is linked but then again it is - I used water-soluble wax pastels, inks, Glimmer Mist, stamps, Stickles, Dimensional Pearls - ended up far more fussy looking than I intended.  Plus I'd written all over the page as well and toned it down with some gesso, but still not happy with how it shows through - I don't like my writing (must do better next time!)

Dreams of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

We had to add the words Dreams of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow to our page and then write about something for each one.  I began my page with a coloured background using the water-soluble wax pastels again (a new acquisition that I'm enjoying playing with at the moment).  I adhered some torn out sheets from an old diary to the page and blended the edges with more wax pastels; I could then write about the dreams on these.  Added some stamps for illustration and a silvery moon with a sponge dabber.

The Dreamcatcher

Ali asked us to create a dreamcatcher on our page plus add an image to represent the dreamcatcher.  I cheated a bit (well, a lot really) as instead of drawing out or beading my own dreamcatcher, I dug out an old earring I had in the shape of a dreamcatcher (the other one has also been used in another art journal I worked on).  I've been wanting to use this image for quite some time as she looks to be such a wise old woman and thought this was the ideal page for her.  I love the colours on this page.

Dream Song Lyrics

We had to choose and illustrate some lyrics from any "dream" song we liked.  I chose these words from "Dream a Little Dream" by the Mamas 'n Papas as they kept going round and round in my head - seems this has been a popular choice for several others too.  I painted the background with acrylic paints and I've tried to keep it very basic to echo the Sixties style.  I'm much happier with my writing this time, even though my spacing was a little out here and there.

For April, we're going to be working on seven pages to illustrate each of the Chakra energies of the body, so that'll be a bit of a challenge!

Mia loves being in the spare room with me when I'm crafting or on the computer (actually, she follows me virtually everywhere around the house - no use me trying to hide from anyone, they've only got to spot Mia to know I'm not far away).  When she's not curled up on a cushion on the floor or rooting behind the computer after a ball of paper she's pushed underneath it, she's sat like this on the windowsill staring out and chunnering at the seagulls sitting on the lamp-posts and rooftops.  It's so funny to watch her.

February Journal Pages

Well, it's been a busy month one way or another, but I finally finished all of the journal pages for this month (with one day to spare!).  The idea is to spend around 30 minutes each day working in the journal, but that was never going to happen for me - still, I managed to keep up and get them done so I'm really pleased with myself.  (The number of UFO's - unfinished objects - I've got lying around is quite scary!).

Having made all the backgrounds (pics posted in previous posts), Ali gave us a list of titles which we had to add to whichever background pages we wanted - after that, there were a series of instructions to add images, stamping, words, journalling, until this is what I ended up with for my pages ......... see what you think ......

Enjoy the Journey

I Followed My Dream

The Art of ..........

Life, Etc

Potential

What If?

Time For ......

These were great fun to do and now it's time to start on the four pages for March - the theme for this month is "Dreams".  Will keep you posted with what I do!

Just checking in .....

.... to say I'm still around, not quite hibernating as we've had a few sunny patches and blue skies mixed up with all this cold and windy weather.  My sister Lindsay is at the big Stitches trade show in Birmingham this weekend, demonstrating P.I. products and her new range of stamp designs, so we were again earlier in the week making more samples for her stand.  Here's a few photos of what we got up to:-

Here's Lindsay - in the frame!

Lindsay again, all smiles, painting this frame - ended up as a lovely "steampunk" piece

(check out her blog for a picture of it and other canvases/tags she made)

A messy-ish worktop - you can see some of the canvases I worked on (thankfully, you can't see me)!

Lindsay's "Terrible Two" weren't particularly impressed I'm afraid - here they are, looking rather disdainfully at the camera - wouldn't catch them getting their paws all covered with that yucky paint!

Thomas

Tara

I'm still working on my journal pages for February, but will let you see what I've done with them as soon as they're finished.

 

Getting messy with Backgrounds

Today I've been messing about with backgrounds.  It all started earlier in the week when I was helping my sister Lindsay out creating samples for the "Stitches" trade show in Birmingham later this month, along with our crafty friend Joanne.  I was allocated the task of painting up some canvas backgrounds; being given a free rein with colours, etc, it was a bit daunting at first but I soon warmed to the task.  So I thought that as I had a few free hours today, I'd spend them completing the rest of the (seven) backgrounds I'm meant to have already done for February for my Art Journal 2012.  There were specific instructions for each one and here are the results of my messing around (I showed you the first of them - Blue - in my last post) ......

Background No 2 - Seeing Stars - my background was painted using acrylic paints in grey, periwinkle and blue.  I stencilled some tiny stars on with midnight blue ink, then stamped some larger stars onto old dictionary paper, cut them out and adhered to the page. 

Background No 3 - Splatter, Splodge and Running Paint - I painted and splodged orange and magenta acrylic paint onto my background then watered down some purple paint and dribbled it down and across the page for a runny effect.

Background No 4 - Watercolour wash using shades of green and yellow brushed and blended across the page.

Background No 5 - Used yellow, orange and purple acrylic paints randomly daubed onto the page, then swooshed with an old credit card - very dark and messy looking at the moment, but it will no doubt look quite different when it's finished!

Background No 6 - Dry Brushing Technique - applied a dark shade (wine) of acrylic paint to the background, dried it completely, then dry brushed over it with pale aqua and white.

Background No 7 - Aged Page - for this final page I had to apply brown ink (used Distress Inkpad Vintage Photo) direct to paper, then daubed on Black Soot in several areas, spreading it a little with a damp paper towel.  Stamped a couple of circles in dark brown ink to look like coffee stains, plus a few blotches of  tea dye ink (all I had) here and there.

At the moment they don't look very much, but now I have to follow instructions for the next stage - adding text to each one - we've been given a list of seven phrases/words and have to add one to each of our pages.  Quite intriguing as I didn't read what we had to do next before I made the backgrounds so that I wouldn't be influenced by knowing.  Will show you what the finished pages look like at the end of the month (if I get them done)!