Book of Days

My Book of Days morphed this week into a cross between a Smash Book and a Remains of the Day journal when I was once again inspired by Lelainia Loyd and her Fragments of Me 2012 Sketchbook Project.  That's OK -  Effy Wild at the Book of Days journalling project finds her journal morphing into something new and I'm practising my composition and collage skills.  Some of the Christmas cards I received this year were too nice to  toss into the recycling bin and now I can enjoy them all year long.

A couple of weeks ago, just after the snow melted here in Vancouver, my heart turned to spring:

Pan Pastels

Heidi Swapp and Plaid stencils

Prima Christina Renee and Rusty Pickle stamps

What Will the New Year Hold?

New Year's Day is what Effy calls a 'big calendar day'.  Other examples would be Christmas, your birthday, or  other days that you celebrate or are important.  These days get full spread in your Book of Days.

Pan Pastels

Heidi Swapp stencils

Octopede Factory images

Slab Book

You may have heard of Smash Books, released at CHA in January. They are kind of a "junk drawer" journal by K & Company designed to hold ideas, pictures, memorabilia, -- all the stuff that goes in a junk drawer. (Here is a cute, short video all about them.)

I'd heard of them but didn't know much about them, when I saw a video on Journal Artista about her trash books and stash books. These are journals she makes out of papers she would otherwise think of as "trash", and scrapbook papers she has in her "stash". Hmmm. I've done trash books (Papers of My Life), and I certainly have a small stash of scrapbook papers. It occurred to me that some of them were purchased in "slabs", so all the papers are nicely coordinated. The one I used is a Creating Keepsakes slab from Provocraft that I bought at Michaels.

I created a cover and put it all together with my Bind-it-All.

Here I did some stencilling......

and some stamping.

This will be a fun journal to work in. It is 6" x 6"

When an Independent Store Closes

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!

Step on the Scale

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:

Creation of a Journal Page

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.

A Taste of Something Different

After some encouragement from my sister, Dianne, I thought I'd share with you a page from my Art Journal.  This is where I experiment with different techniques and don't worry at all about perfection.