One More Day

Another page for the Traveling Art Journal.  This one belongs to: Paula K.

The theme is music lyrics

The song is One More Day by JD Fortune from the album Death of a Motivational Speaker.

One More Day by JD Fortune

The page:

The background is colored with pastels as set with a fixative.  The sun and stems and leaves are painted with acrylics. The flower is created from a book page and colored with stamping ink. I also used a charcoal pencil to outline the flower. The title is made with purchased precut letters.

One more note: I know my family is going to give me a hard time for using a song by JD. I can’t help it that I’m still the oldest teenage fan girl alive. :)

On Handsome Lutes

In my June 10th post, I mentioned that I, along with 20 others, had joined the Facebook group called Traveling Art Journal.  Here is my second page for that group.  This page will go into Ashley’s journal. I hope she likes it.

The “poem” is created from 3 little words taken from separate areas of a book page sent to me by my very good friend Aimeslee - Paper Paisleys blog.  If you have been a part of the 21 Secrets ning class, you know that 3 Little words is a “secret” class taught by Aimee from Artsyville.  So I used Aimeslee page to find 10 or so three word groups to play with. I worked with them until I came up with something I liked.  

It was serendipity that I found a vintage image of a girl clutching a lute. In fact, I didn’t realize what I had until I finished the page and looked up images of a lute. Low and behold… it’s a lute.

The background came out of a spray paint stencil negative scrap paper.  I was spraying through the stencil and when there was too much paint on the stencil, I turned it on to a scrap paper and pressed the excess paint onto it.  Well, I ended up liking the negative (excess) painted page better than the original sprayed page.  When I was done spraying, the scrap paper background was still white and a little too stark.  So I covered the spray enamels with clear gesso and let it dry.  Then used some yellow and yellow-gold watercolor on the white areas.  Finished the edges with brownish pastel. 

OMG, Has it been a year?

One year ago today this little guy made his first appearance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Since then he’s grown so much:

At 1 month: Here’s what I think of Skype.

2 months - A Post it, really? Sorry G, it’s tradition.

3 months - Shssh, I’m getting my beauty sleep

4 months - I love these fish

5 months - Tell Santa what you want

6 Months - Yes. I eat carrots, what of it?

7 Months - Mom, don’t kiss me in front of my friends.

8 Months - Just as long as it’s not bedtime after this bath.

9 Months - Yes Nana, I did brush both of my teeth.

10 Months - There has to be more toys in here

11 Months - The guys say I look cool in these duds.

12 Months - Finally, my own slice of pizza.

Happy Birthday Little G !!

Reaching for the Stars

Here is a new journal page using a quote I found recently. It’s the first page for the new Traveling Art Journal Facebook group. 21 people have joined the group and all will have a chance to work on a page in each others journal.

Stretching his hand up to reach the stars, too often man forgets the flowers at his feet. By Jeremy Bentham

“Big” Abstract

Because I don’t have enough on my plate, this weekend I signed up for the 21 Secrets online class and spent most of Sunday watching videos.  Then after watching Connie Hozvicka Abstract Adventure videos I tried one of the projects. 

Unfortunately I had to cheat a bit.  Her demo called for large paper, meaning 22” x 30” or larger, (thus the name “Big”).  The largest paper I had was 11” x 15” but rather than not do the excercise, I used what I had and came up with:

It’s similar to what I have done before but I enjoyed it anyway. I think I may use it as a journal cover.

Next time I’ll show you the second painting from that “Secret.” It’s almost done.

I Was Chasing Spring

 

It’s my first journal page in quite a while. It was inspired by the weather here in New Mexico.  It’s been an odd year so far (to me).  I do believe we have gone from Winter right into Summer, skipping Spring altogether. We have been going back and forth between hot weather and cold.  Just when you think you’re going to have a good day, the temperature turns cold and very windy. 40 miles per hour gusts type of windy.  Blah!

What the heck happened to Spring?  We had snow on May 1st; it was rainy and windy and in the low 60’s up until two weeks ago, then the last few days have been windy and in upper 80’s and low 90’s. I need just a few weeks of 70 degree, windless days to get over my restlessness.  Is that too much to ask?  Yes, apparently, it is.  

 

Just Playin’

It’s been a while

It’s been a while since I blogged. It’s not a self imposed stoppage, just been so busy with other things that I haven’t gotten around to it.

Here’s what been keeping me busy 8 am to 5 pm most days:

However, last weekend I was asked to help out at booth at the Oasis Gift show, a wholesale show. It was a 2 day show with set up the day before.  The booth next to ours was one named Poetic Earth and they sold the loveliest leather handbags and journals.  Well, I’m not one to turn down a good deal on something I love so I bought this, at wholesale no less. It’s a 7” x 10”, 220 pages of handmade paper, book full of Awesomeness! Regular retail price is $79.00 and I paid $35.00, making it even more wonderful.

I also scored a walnut flute for My Guy.

So in an effort to get back in the groove of creating art I worked on this background page.  I figure if nothing else, I can work on some background pages. I’ve got another one in progress but not so far along that I want to show it.

The journal paper takes paint well, without tearing or pilling. My last journal, while I loved the feel of the paper, it didn’t hold up under scrubbing or erasing. This one appears to be much better. 

24 Years and Loving it

This weekend I had a wonderful excuse for not creating art.  This weekend my guy and I celebrated our 24th wedding anniversary. We drove to Santa Fe for the weekend and stayed at the La Paloma Bed and Breakfast, visited a lot of wonderful art galleries and ate some great food, and just had a wonderful time in general.  Having two whole days alone with my husband and best friend was simply awesome. We have already planned on visiting again on our 2nd 24th anniversary. (our 48th) LOL. 

365 Creativity - Day 8

Well I’m so far behind on my 365 creativity art journal it’s not even funny.  I haven’t had any creative play dates in quite a while.  Too many other things going on to be make art.  Oh hell, that’s a lie, with the exception of the busy weekends, I just haven’t felt like working on art.  I’m feeling stifled and I can’t concentrate on it.

I’m feeling like the person in the anecdotal story told by Julia Cameron about the artist she knew that couldn’t create because he didn’t have a large art studio and the space he did have was too small for him to paint in. And a year later when he finally got the studio space he wanted, he started painting tiny works of art. And yes his original space had been large enough to create the tiny works -- had he found the motivation to actually work.  

I’m very much like that. Half of my art supplies and my office equipment are sharing a room with my precious grandson but if I don’t get the supplies I need from that room before 7 pm, well, I’m out of luck. When I feel that I may get stuck without the supplies I need, I think ‘why start if I may not be able to use what I need?’ It’s a damn excuse and a lousy one at that. I’ve moved enough of my supplies to the dining room to make due and yet still I can’t work.  Why? Another excuse -- The dining room is not “my room”, know what I mean? 

Damn it, I miss my California studio. It was tiny (8 x 10) but it was mine. It was messy but the mess was mine and I didn’t have to clean it up immediately if I didn’t want too. All my art stuff was where I could see it. Now some is still packed away in boxes in the garage, some is in the Nursery/Office/NoLongerStudio and the rest in the dining room hidden in the buffet or desk.  Everything all put away so it looks neat and tidy.. Choke, choke ARGH !!! 

And yet the following pages say everything I need to know in a few words….If only I would really listen to the message. I need to start seeing my flowers again.

These flowers are a rubber stamps on math book pages, colored with watercolor pencils. The colored circles on the left and right side of the pages is also a rubber stamp on math book pages and colored with gel pens. The challenge was to transform an old book into something new. Obviously I didn’t use a whole book just enough to get the spirit of the challenge. Some of the flowers were stickers from the $1 bin at JoAnn’s. 

What excuses are you using for not being creative? I want to hear yours.

365 Creativity - Day 7

Oooh I’m really falling behind. Day 7 is creating a stencil to use in your art.

My stencil was made using my Cricut cutter and Make the Cut software.  Love them. The reason I actually bought the darn Cricut was to make stencils and I’ve used for everything but. 

Feeling a little quiet today so I will show only the journal page.