The problem with not thinking things through

As I was working on my ARTifacts visual journal for Seth Apter's challenge/collaboration, I had to rethink the entire process.

Let me begin my tale with a sheet of blue (yes, it's light blue, but the lighting is bad) copier/printer paper that is standard U.S. 8.5 inches X 11 inches.

Now I'll fold it in half width wise.  That makes it 5.5 inches X 8.5 inches.

This is an image I sewed to the inside of the four page spread.  It was then I realized that the page I was working on would have to include images for June, since this was for January.

Have I confused you?  I hope not.  Perhaps it will become clearer as we proceed.

I've decided to start January with a beautiful cardinal.

This is the back side of the cardinal spread, or page 2 in my journal.

This is the front side of the blue page I folded earlier.  I'm paying homage to Chinese New Year.  This is page 3 in my journal.  The Chinese lanterns, made by ARTchix were gifted to me by Cindy at Pink Bird Studio.

For page 4, which is the reverse of the Chinese New Year, I added a holly die cut.  For the first time, I glued this to the page, as I did the lanterns on the reverse side.

Now is where it gets complicated.  This page must now represent June, even though it is opposite the January page. 

For the bottom, it reads Time to spread your wings.

I am fairly sure you can't read my chicken scratches, but at the top, it reads School's out.

For the reverse of the fairy winged girl is "Honor Thy Father" to represent Father's Day in June.

This is opposite page 2, which is the pumpkin bread recipe.  I tried to represent June with flowers and summertime pie.  The postage stamps came to me from Valerie.

For the reverse, I used some lily stickers and a page that includes a dragonfly and flowers.

Does this help?

Here it is without the page numbers.

See how complicated this has gotten?  I've decided to only use four pages for each month, because this took even more time to figure out and create than it did to explain it.  I'm hoping by the time I get my new scanner installed, I can scan them, and there won't be an issue.  But for now, this is all I have, because I spent an entire day making these four pages that turned into 16 spreads for my ARTifacts journal.

For now I'm headed to my sick bed and covering my head.  I'll be by to visit when I feel better.  Stay tuned and thanks for joining me.