I've been inspired by the Vancouver ATC Group, (a new, bold "join" for me), to create things. Not ATC's, as you might think, but handmade books. It has been quite some time since I created a book, and I'm on a mad tear. One I'm making for a gift, so you'll have to be patient to see that one.
This is a prototype of a waterfall book. One of the ladies brought a much larger version to show us, and I adapted it to a smaller version.
This time I made a bookmark out of a coloured pencil image. Because bookmarks get a lot of wear, I covered this one with some cheap sticky laminate you buy to cover books with.
And I've got lots of coloured pencil images left yet!
Here is another ATC I made from a coloured pencil image.
I hope everyone is having a great weekend! I'm getting in some bike riding, working on a couple of book projects, and contemplating the purchase of a Zutter Bind-It-All.
Remember this?
This journal page was inspired by one of my favourite Vancouver collage and art supply stores, RubyDog's Art House. Leanne, the owner, has to close, and I am sick about it. Sick and owning it. Every time we shop at those big US chains (we know who I mean, don't we), we knock another nail in the coffin of our neighbours' stores. Well, unless we have an unlimited supply of cash and storage space, that is.
If you live in Vancouver, go down and check out RubyDog's before you can't anymore!
Inspired by a technique I learned while visiting my sister, I've been playing with pencil crayons lately, particularly on dark coloured backgrounds. I've coloured a lot of images, but as usual, I'm slow in finishing up the creations.
Here's an ATC I managed to complete:
The Design Challenge for the Vancouver Artist Trading Card Group this month is "Nebulas, Nails & Noodles". I could think of no way to combine these items, so I went simply with "Nebulas".
These are done with alcohol ink and they are all unique because that's the way the inks behave!
I had a great time at the swap yesterday, even if it was a somewhat smaller group than usual. It was a chance to get to know some of the ladies a bit better.
I've got lots of nebulas left if anybody wants to swap!
One of the things I try periodically is carving my own stamps. These ATC's use some of the stamps I've carved:
These were all stamped on sanded scraps of discarded book pages.
And here is a notecard:
Some of you may have heard me say how much I love alphabet stamps. How much do I love them? Well, let's just say that I have a few of them.
Michelle Ward at GPP Street Team is challenging us this month with size. Here are a few different size alphabets:
I like working in my journal because it answers the call of inspiration without the pressure to "complete". Sometimes I'm inspired to do a background, sometimes to work with patterned paper, sometimes to stamp, and sometimes to write. I work on many pages at once to provide these various inspirations with outlets.
Some of you may like to see the "progression" of a page:
First I do a background, and I may add some borders either glued or painted onto the page. This one is just plain watercolour with some borders cut from an old book:
One day, I grabbed a piece of sponged scrap from my "red" baggie, and stamped out two new stamps:
I cut these out, glued them on the page and added some journalling and white doodling. Thinking the page was finished, I included the date. But a few days ago I added the masks, spelling out the name of the store where I bought some of these lovely things.
So, I think that journal pages are never finished!! Another part of the attraction.
This card for my sister, Dianne, was inspired by some native art at displayed at the Vancouver Art Gallery.
Painting tissue paper with gesso and acrylic paint toughens it up so that you can easily punch, cut, glue or otherwise manipulate it as a collage item. Try it in your journal, before putting using it on a more formal piece. This was inspired by Michelle Ward's GPP Street Team: Complete instructions can be found here.
For those of you interested in more ways of using up that white tissue paper, this one is courtesy of Violette's Creative Juice, from her book Journal Bliss:
First you cut a shape from cardstock, and glue it on your substrate. (This happens to be a journal page.) Next, wrinkle some tissue, smooth it out, and glue it to the substrate. (Use the glue most appropriate for your substrate.) When dry, paint with acrylic paint. (Note: the above was coloured with Pan Pastels rather than paint.)
Yesterday was real playtime - getting messy with paints. Michelle Ward's monthly creativity crusade inspired these:
Hop on over to Michelle's Crusade site for complete instructions.
