Our Next Adventure (and a look into my Jan. calendar)

Wednesday wonders is on hiatus while I bring you one final entry I created for Erika's theme New Year, New Adventures at Art Journal Journey.   Erika has been a fantastic host this month, and many, many of us have loved her chosen theme.

As this month draws to a close,

we are off to

our next adventure.

This time we'll be flying high.

I created this spread in my Challenges altered book.  I laid down two colors of blue water soluble crayons (still love them, Cindy).  While the page was drying, I fussy cut the airplane image I found in a book, then colored it using silver and lavender metallic crayons.  I added red metallic gel pen to the tail and one of the windows, and used it to write the sentiment, too.  Because I was afraid I might mess up when I wrote the words, I colored, then cut printer/copier paper in case I made a mistake.

Since it's the last day of the month, I wanted to share my continuing monthly calendar with you.

Here is my January calendar complete.  I actually gave Sally her gift yesterday, so I was able to fill the page completely.  It's a puny calendar, but it fits my purposes and I can look back on years past to see how well or how badly a certain month went.  You may enlarge to read the minutia of my very boring life.

February is ready to write in, but undecorated, which I will do after I see what the month holds.

Speaking of calendars, Seth Apter just posted the ARTifacts calendars that I, along with many others, participated in.  Please check them out on his blog.   The second link goes directly to the ARTifacts wrap up post.  My wrap up post can be found here.

I am simply thrilled you joined me today.    Thank you beyond belief for your continued support of my art and my puny calendar.  You will find me today at Art Journal Journey.  Hope to see you there, too.

December Artifacts: a review

Seth Apter, the host of ARTifacts, asked us to

send 2 images from your ARTifacts project for a final online exhibition on my blog. 

It could be an image you have already used or a new one. You can take a new photo of several pages and/or submit a pic of the outside of your journal (if applicable) if you like. Anything goes.

As  you can see, for my first photo, I created a mosaic of my 11 pages I shared, along with several photos of my journal cover, both empty and filled.  For those of you not familiar with it, the rocking horse cover was sun printed using fluid acrylics and some of my flat rocking horses.   The spine decoration was one inspired by Seth from a tutorial he created at Make it Artsy.

For my second page, I included this one I made for my September ARTifacts.  I believe it is my favorite because I used some of my rust colored paper and found objects on the left side, and my handmade shimmering mists, a real leaf, and colored pencils on the right side.  All items were sewn into these pages and all pages were sewn.  No glue was used in this book.

I want to thank Seth again for hosting this fun collaborative.  It was a really different way for me to create a monthly calendar.  I also want to thank each of you who joined me in this monthly journey.  I am truly grateful beyond words.

November ARTifacts

I'm once again joining Seth Apter in his ARTifacts collaboration.  Here is my November entry.

This is the photo Seth will share on his blog.  The rest of the photos are detail shots.

For much of the month of November, it felt like the end of summer, not autumn.  Then autumn arrived and quickly took on a wintry blast.  

November's autumn was represented by trees changing colors.

I really didn't have too much to decorate winter with, so I went with a gifted snow embossed piece of card stock.   I added the gifted snowman and one of my die cut butterflies.

For the left side, I began by sewing the two snow inspired images together.  I then sewed the black cardstock to the assembly and added the trees.  I sewed three sides to each of the images so I could add tags I made for this spread.

For the right side, I wanted to show I am playing all month in Art Every Day Month or AEDM.

I tried to represent a few of the things I did during the month, including

bringing my plants inside and planting seeds, making and cutting lye based soap,

creating pages in altered books,

creating die cuts, and hosting T Stands For Tuesday parties.

For my Second Thursday tutorial, I created various backgrounds, including the one I used for this spread.  

I also dyed some baby wipes and used the last of them here.

Since this is the final month we will show our monthly art (next month is a review and view of our book covers), I wanted to sign our names

and the year.

For this page, I sewed together various pieces, including magazine images, die cuts, and stamped images.  I also used the last of my dyed baby wipe and wrote AEDM in white ink using a gelly roll pen.  Although I normally cut the strands from my thread, this month I intentionally left them long to show sewing was also a part of my AEDM posts.

Thank you for sticking with me through this collaboration.

Once again, I want to thank Seth for creating this collaboration.  I have really enjoyed this project and am delighted beyond words that I decided to join this group of amazing artists Seth features.

This is Day 26 of AEDM, and I joined a collaboration of mixed media artists with a monthly journal page.

And thanks go to each of you for visiting today.  I'm very grateful for your visit and your support of my art and this collaboration.  

ARTifacts for October

I'm once again joining Seth Apter in his ARTifacts collaboration.  Here is my October entry.

This is the photo Seth will share on his blog.  The rest of the photos are detail shots, some of which are far better than this spread.

The close-up color of the pink paper turned a lovely salmon when I got in close.  The color of the page is very similar to the page above.

I had not honored Breast Cancer Awareness this month, so now was the perfect time to do so.

The statistics are startling, especially since we've been fighting this cancer for decades.  For this side, I used pink paper for the background.  Somehow I didn't feel the need for anything else.  I added the boxes by sewing the computer generated text to white glossy card stock.

I only had a small amount of this, so tried to cut it accordingly.   I added stickers I received for supporting the Breast Cancer movement.  The variegated thread was a shiny silk pastel.

Those of you who have been to my blog this month, much of what I wrote about was the war in Vietnam, which began the first of the month when I visited with a few of my friends who were discussing the Ken Burns series.  I considered adding a bit of pattern to the lime green background on this side, but decided it had enough color and movement already.

In case you missed them, these are the stories I created of the brave Vietnam veterans I interviewed.

I thought changing the thread might help my tension problems I'm having, but it unfortunately didn't (Picture is from the Mekong Delta, thread is variegated cotton).

All photos are from various travel magazines I sent for.  Seems Vietnam is a hot spot to visit lately.

This picture shows items you can buy in a Hanoi market.

This picture is from Haiphong Bay, which is located in the "old" north Vietnam to the east of Hanoi.

I'm so glad you could join me today as I shared my October pages for ARTifacts.

Once again, I want to thank Seth for creating this collaborative.  I am really enjoying this project and am delighted beyond words that I decided to join this group of amazing artists Seth features.

And thanks go to each of you for visiting today.  I'm very grateful for your visit and your support of my art and this collaboration. 

ARTifacts for September

I'm once again joining Seth Apter in his ARTifacts collaboration.  Here is my September entry.  You can see this has not yet been added to my Rocking Horse Journal, because I need to figure out a way to keep these two pages together.

This is the spread that Seth will show on his blog.  As with previous months, everything else is detail.  However, this month I plan to keep these two pages side by side.  Unfortunately, I couldn't figure out how to make the sentiment Circles of Change, fit between the two pages.  Although they are both very different in feel and meaning, they both relate to change.

Those who visit my blog regularly, know I have a love affair with rust.  Rust is the change that occurs when iron and oxygen come into contact with moisture of any kind.

I tried to keep with the circle theme when I used a rusted can lid and the metal fitting.

It took all the strength I had to cut that very heavy fitting, but I was determined to use it because of the circles.    On one of my rusty papers, I found a nearly perfect heart, so outlined it using a gold metallic gellyroll pen.

To some, this may look very similar to my Autumnal Equinox I created a few days ago.  

This leaf, however, is just beginning to change colors,

which leads to nature's changes that occur each season.

Even though September is nearly over, I am really loving this very different and fun way of looking back on the month.

It's a great way to determine what is important each month, rather than the day to day events I write about in my monthly calendar.

I hope you can see why I call these two very different spreads Circles of Change.

I tried to show the shimmer I got from my handmade shimmering mists, but, as many of you know, mica doesn't show up well in photos.

For the substrate, I began with a sheet of pink copier/printer paper, since I have such an abundance of it.  For the left side, I added a page from a foreign book I rusted, a metal lid I rusted, and a piece of pipe fitting I found in my rusty stash.  I used E6000 to hold the assembly in place.   The heart was part of a larger page I rusted, too.  As I mentioned earlier, I outlined it using a gold gellyroll pen.

For the right side, I began by spraying a piece of heavy yellow card stock with several of my handmade shimmering mists.  You can find how I make these mists any time on my Tutorials page.  For the circles, this time I used both colored pencils and several metallic gellyroll pens.  This time, instead of using a previously pressed leaf from last year, I used one I found in my neighbor's yard that had just fallen from the tree.  Before I added it to the page, I tried to spritz it from a toothbrush with some black acrylic paint.  I colored the month using pigment ink and added the sentiment I cut from some of my rusted paper.

Both sides were sewn with variegated thread, but for once, I supplemented the sewing on the left side with E-6000 because the page holding the rusty assembly was quite heavy, 

Once again, I want to thank Seth for creating this collaborative.  I am really enjoying this project and am so glad I decided to join.

And thanks go to each of you for visiting today.  I'm very grateful for your visit and your support of my art and this collaboration.