Under The Sea

Good morning everyone, before I share my latest project with you I would like to say hello and welcome to my latest follower Marga.

The challenge this month at Art Journey Journal is The Sea, immediately the Beatles song Octopus's Garden came into my mind.

I'd like to share my page in the following challenges.
Art Journal Journey - The Sea.
The Artistic Stamper - Journalling Your Heart Out.
Rhedd's Creative Spirit - Anything Goes.
Bumblebees and Butterflies - A Visual Journey.

I started by giving my page a coat of gesso and colouring it with gelatos. I sprinkled brushos and sprayed with water. I stamped some grassy type plants on the background and stamped the mermaid, octopus and shells onto white card and coloured them in, I fussy cut them and glued them to the page. I drew some green leafy type plants and added them. I wrote the first line of the beetles song "I'd like to be under the sea, in and octopus's garden in the shade".

I used the following stamps.
Stampotique - the mermaid and octopus.
PaperArtsy/Jofy - background.
Unknown - seahorses and shells.

Song Bird Journal Page

Today I'm sharing with you the journal page that I've for Art Journal Monday on the Mixed Media Mojo challenge blog.

My page is A4 size,

I started by gluing book pages, decorated paper, pink lace and tissue tape to the page, I stamped some Dina Wakley birds but they disappeared underneath all the later.paint layers.

I scraped some white acrylic paint on the page with a credit card.

I scraped some acrylic paint and stamped some numbers using a stamp from  the Stampers Anonymous Documented stamp set.

A bit more white paint.

I added a couple of die cuts and cut out some flowers and birds from patterned paper and glued them to the page, I also stamped some Dina Wakley leaves with olive Archival ink. The dies I used are from the Sizzix Thinlits scrabbles and splat set.

The last thing I did was to add colour and shading to the images with Pitt pens, I also added some doodles with a black and white pen.

I'd like to enter my piece in the following challenge
Mixed Media World - Use Bright Colours.

The Documented Life Project - Week 8

Hi everyone, I hope you had a good weekend, I went to the Big Stamp and Scrapbooking Show at Alexandra Palace on Saturday, had a good day meeting friends and spending some money although I didn't spend as much as I usually do.

I'd like to share with you week 8 of the DLP challenge, the challenge for the week is Repeating Elements. I decided to do squares as I remembered that in 2013 I made an inchie every week for the Every Inchie Monday challenge, I never did anything with the inchies, they were put into an envelope and forgotten, the pages in my journal are A4 size, big enough to take all 52 inchies.

I'm linking my journal pages to Rhedd's Creative Spirit Anything Goes challenge.

These are the finished pages.

I started by drawing the grid and adding the calendar page.

I then coloured the squares with Inktense pencils and a water brush. I coloured the rest of the page with a red watercolour crayon and went over the lines with a black pen, I also drew squiggles on the lines but they're not on this photo.

I stamped some squares [Hero Arts] with distress ink in the blank areas and glued in the inchies.

Favourite Poems and Quotes

Favourite Poems and Quotes is the theme for this months challenge at Art Journal Journey.
I decided to use The Rhyme Of The Ancient Mariner for my page, it's a poem that I remember doing for my exams at school.

There's a very small line drawing at the end of the poem in my book, so I adapted it for my page. I drew the design and painted the sky and sun with acrylic paint. I painted the sea with acrylic paint and then sprinkled turquoise and emerald green brushos on it, then I gave it a spray of water. The ship and albatross were painted with acrylic paint and I drew lines on the sea to show that there wasn't a wave in sight. I decided to put the albatross in the picture even though by the time the ship was becalmed he'd been killed by the ancient mariner.

Here's a close up of the verse.
I was going to use the verse "Water water everywhere" but decided the one I used was more apt.

The Documented Life - Week 6

Still trying to play catch up with the DLP. The theme for February is Layers You Will Love. For week 6 we had to use as many layers as possible.

I'd like to share my pages with Bumblebees and Butterflies - A Visual Journey 12

Here are my finished pages, I tried to count the layers as I went along but lost count.

I thought I'd have a go at doing a collage.

This was my first layer, I glued patterned paper the the pages.

I scraped white paint over the pages and added my calendar.

I coloured the pages with acrylic paint and gelatos.

I stencilled the rays and hearts with gesso and coloured them with brushos. I lost count of the layers at this stage. The houses were drawn onto patterned paper, cut out and glued to the pages. I found a piece of paper that had small squares over it and some of the squares had people and animals looking out of them so I used these for the windows. I stencilled some trees with felt tips.

I used Faber-Castell pitt pens to colour and add shading to the houses I also used a white sharpie to take out some of the colour of the hearts and add a fence at the bottom. I added a cut out tree and some rub ons.

Things With Wings

This month the Art Journey Journal challenge theme is Things With Wings.
These are the pages that I've made for the challenge.

I'd also like to link my project to the following challenges.

That's Crafty - Wings 'n Things.
The Mirror Crack'd - Wings.
Country View Challenges - Anything Goes.

I started by colouring the pages with acrylic paint, I stencilled  some flowers and doodled some swirls with a glitter pen. I stamped some butterflies with a foam stamp.

Using an old credit card I scraped some white and blue paint over the pages.

I stencilled some flowers and leaves and stamped some small butterflies and script. The Indian Butterfly Legend was stamped onto a separate piece of card and cut out.
I stamped the large butterflies with black archival ink and coloured them with Pitt Big Brush Artist Pens.
I doodled round the edges of the pages.

This is a close up of the Indian Butterfly Legend.

I used the following stamps
Innovative Stamp Creations - large butterflies
Wendy Rhodes - Indian Butterfly Legend

Documented Life Project - Week 5

Use Underpaper is the challenge for week 5 of the DLP and the journal prompt is What Lies Beneath. I'm falling behind with the project as we're now on week 10, so I've got a lot of catching up to do.

I didn't have much underpaper but I had quite a bit of kitchen towel that I use underneath things that I spray.

This is my finished page, I'm not sure I like it as I feel it needs more done to it.

I coloured the pages with acrylic paint applied with a baby wipe. I used a Dina Wakley stamp round the edges and a swirly stamp on the background, I also did a few doodles.
I drew the flowers onto the inked kitchen towel and cut them out, then I glued them to the pages and doodled round them.
I found the Thomas Jefferson quote on the Internet.

Birds, Beasts and Humans

Birds, Beasts and Humans is the latest theme at Art Journal Journey, although my entry for the challenge doesn't have any beasts in it.

I'd also like to enter my page in the following challenges.
Moo Mania challenge, the theme is Black Bird.
Bumble Bees and Butterflies A Visual Journey No. 9.

I coloured the background with Gelatos and used a baby wipe on a leaf stencil to take out some of the colour, then I use a coloured pencil to colour the leaves green and a black pen to outline them.
I stamped the figure on the page and also on some white card, I coloured her with Inktense pencils and cut her out, then I adhered her over her image on the page.
I stamped the large birds and drew a couple of lines round the page to make a frame, I used a white pen to put some dots on the branches.

The stamps I've used are
Dina Wakley - blackbirds
Doo Lally Pip - the girl juggling blackbirds and the sentiment.

Documented Life Project - Week 4

The brief for the DLP week 4 is Writing/Words With Friends.

I kept my pages simple this week.

I decided to do a secret letter to all the friends I've had since I can remember.

I started by covering the two pages with my letter and then painting gesso over it. You can see from the photo that the words still show through, some of the words can also be seen through the tissue wrap.

I covered the pages with tissue wrap and added the calendar page and some hand written friendship quotes.
I coloured the pages with Distress inks and sprayed water over them, when they had dried I coloured the butterflies with Inktense pencils and a water brush.
I used my finger to add some black soot distress ink on the edges.
I was going to stamp some butterflies, colour them and cut them out to add to the pages but then decided not to.

Here is a close up showing the water drops.

I'm entering my pages into the Country View Challenges the theme for their challenge this month is Drips and Drops.

Documented Life Project - Week 3

I'm already falling behind with the Documented Life Project, I've just finished week 3 and were already on week 5. The prompt for the challenge was The Colour Wheel, it took me ages to decide what to do, I remembered that I'd bought an Inkadinkado Stamping Gear last year so decided to use it. I think I need a bit more practice with it as the flowers are not spaced as well as I thought they would.

These are my finished pages.

I spread gesso on the pages and when dry I brushed them with primary yellow, primary cian and primary magenta DecoArt Media paint

Then I scrapped white paint over the pages.

I used the stamping gear on the pages and started to colour the images with felt tips but they didn't stand out very well so I ended up stamping them on to card, colouring them with felt tips and fussy cutting them. After glueing them to the page I covered them with a DecoArt crackle glaze. The red and oringe flowers look the same colour but in real life you can tell the difference.

A close up of the crackle.

On the background I also stamped some white circles and scribbled in them, I also used a PaperArtsy dotty stamp with black ink.

Decorated Journal Cover

It's the first of the month so it's time to post my DT piece for Altered Eclectics.
Altered Eclectics is a challenge blog for mixed media and altered projects - no cards or ATCs are allowed and the theme is always Anything Goes.

This year I'm joining in with The Documented Life Project so for my DT piece I've decorated the cover of my album.

I'm using the large Dylusions album for the project, it's A4 in size.

I painted the cover with gesso and then painted it with acrylic paint, I stencilled some orange flowers but it was too much so I used a credit card to add more acrylic paint leaving some of the orange showing. I stamped some script and used the edge of the credit card to make lines.
I stamped the leaves and coloured them with Inktense pencils and a waterbrush.
The title and year were done on the computer and glued to the cover, I did attempt to write them by hand but I'm not very good at lettering and it looked awful.
The flowers were stamped onto white card and coloured with Inktense pencils. I fussy cut them and glued them to the cover.

This is a photo of the front and back cover.

The flowers and leaves were stamped with Sheena Douglas stamps.

The rest of the DT have made some wonderful projects so why not pop over to the blog to take a look.

The Documented Life - Week 2

I've just finished my week 2 for the Documented Life, this week we had to use gesso on the pages.

I started by painting the blank pages with gesso and then I adhered my calender page.
I use a baby wipe to apply the DecoArt acrylic paint.
I used an Impression Obsession stamp and rose madder Archival ink on the background and then stamped some black crackle with a Kaisercraft stamp.
The Woodware clematis was stamped onto paper and coloured with Inktense pencils and a waterbrush, I cut them out and adhered them to the pages.
The dates and lines on the calender had disappeared under the paint so penned them in.
I stencelled the dragonflies with gesso and let them dry then I coloured them with Inktense pencils and a waterbrush then I went round the edges with a black watercolour pencil and waterbrush.
The last thing I did was to write the Mary Shelly quote.

This is a closer look at the dragonflies.

The Documented Life 2015

The Documented Life 2015 project started last week, here is a link to the project. I failed miserably last year with the project as I started half way through the year and couldn't catch up so I hope to do better this year. I've managed to get week one done, the prompt was Be Your Own Goalkeeper and to use book pages.

I'm using the large Dylusions journal for the project, the pages are A4.

This is what I came up with for week one.

I covered the pages with music, crossword, dictionary, shorthand paper and book pages, the blue tit picture came out of a bird book that belonged to my dad, he'd written blue tit in pencil on it so I was very careful not to cover it with paint. I used a scraper to apply the acrylic paint rather than a brush as I didn't want the paint to be very thick, I also used a stencil and a couple of stamps on the background. I've written some of my goals for the year on a tag that's in the pocket, I may add more goals later on.

If you can see the journalling you will see that I've had the lurgy since Christmas - not a good start to the year, I wasn't very happy that I had to cancel a trip to Sadler's Wells to see Matthew Bourne's Edward Scissorhands. Although my head still feels like it's full of cotton wool and I still have a cough I'm feeling a lot better now.

Inspired By Rene Magritte

I  did this monochromatic painting of Rene Magritte's The Great War in 2002 when I use to go to watercolour classes, we had to find a painting and choose one paint to paint it with.

It was too big to go in my journal so I printed it and cut the image out but then I had to do a background so I decided on another Magritte painting The Empty Picture Frame. This is the result.
I'm linking it to the Art Journal Journey challenge - Inspired by the masters.

For the background I used watercolour pencils and a waterbrush.

This is a photo of The Great War

and this is a photo of The Empty Picture Frame.

Inspired By The Masters

This month at the Art Journal Journey the challenge theme is Inspired By The Masters.

For my page I took my inspiration from Salvador Dali's Sleep. I decided that I didn't want crutches holding my head up but pretty butterflies that would let go of the strings as I woke up. In my sleep I'm dreaming of the countryside in the Summer.

I used acrylic paint and coloured pencils to colour my page, I think that if I ever did it again I wouldn't put the tiny flowers on.
Below is a photo of the original painting.

Halloween Journal Page

Today I'd like to share with you my Halloween journal page - I had great fun making it.

I'm linking it to the following challenges
Artist Trading Post - Halloween.
That's Crafty - Spooky.
Order Of The Opus Gluei - Ghostly Goings On.
Make My Monday - Halloween.
Haunted Design House - Hellacious Halloween.

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I started by painting the page with gesso and then I used an Andy Skinner skull mask with some modelling paste. When everything had dried I sprayed it with different colours of Dylusion ink. I used an orange Zig felt tip pen to make some flames at the bottom of the page. The bats and web were stamped straight onto the page, all the other images were stamped onto tissue paper and glued to the page. I made a wash with black acrylic paint and water and painted it over the skull, when I mopped up some of the  wash it took some of the inks away and I rather like the effect it had on the skull.

The stamps I used are
Stampotique - the spider.
Inkadinkado - the two graves at the bottom of the page, on says "I'll be back" and the other one says "Holy smoke, it's hot down here.
Cherry Pie Art Stamps - bats, skeletons, gravestones,