Quick peek inside my altered book!

I absolutely loved getting into the textures and sprays today. I hope you enjoy!

A delightful return

I love days like this - where the sky is grey and looks so cold but I set out to do something creative and productive. I dug out my art journal supplies and loaded them into a box I had and brought them downstairs to the kitchen table. Then I started on a page with splatters and streaks of colour.

It felt so good to dive into the stencils and textures, and get my fingers into gesso, and sprays. And so the name of the page - Return. In hindsight, I did notice a little something on the page that might be an alternate title. See if you see it as well.

Did you notice the title that popped off the page? Return Ticket. I thought that was kind of fun. I had no intention of that going together but they did.

This page really is like a return to art journaling for me. A return to my roots of journaling with textures, sprays, stencils, inked canvas and cardboard. I definitely live for the grunge when it comes to journaling.

I hope you enjoyed looking at this and get to journaling too sometime this week. It's a great way to clear your head after a week of craziness.

Some weekend fun with friends!

I recently went to a fundraising crop just outside of the city with friends whose company I adore. It was a very productive day for me. I made some mixed media bookmarks and a total of 5 layouts. Of course I brought my favourite Lindy's Stamp Gang sprays with me, including a couple of the sprays from the November challenge, Sweet Violet Purple Teal and A Bit o'Bubbly, and some Red Hot Poker Orange. I did add a few splashes of orange and teal as well to most of my projects. Take a look!

I spray my wood veneers with Lindy's sprays. Love the effect!

One of my favourites ever! Not sure if I can give this one away!

Yes, you do!

I love the combination of the purple with teal and some dashes of dark colour.

I painted the burgundy flower with Lindy's sprays to get it to match Natalie's coat. 

I struggled with the design a bit, but I love how it turned out!

One of the last photos of my grandparents that I have. Love this layout.

This is such a fun kit - Ahoy There by Carta Bella, that you can order from Tina's Scrapbooking

Another maritime layout, but this is a work in progress. Still want to embellish it!

I hope you enjoyed these! Have a productive weekend!

Latest projects

Seems like it's been a while since I've posted anything that I've been working on here on my blog. Time to catch up. These are just a few of the projects I worked on recently this past weekend.

I have to say, I still love Prima for my mixed media layouts. Hope you enjoyed these and if you have any questions about the projects, just comment below! Have a great week!

Mixed media bookmark fun

Up until last night we finally got some glorious sunshine and warmth again and it completely lifted my spirits. I decided to get into my craftroom, open the roman blind, and let the sun pour in to inspire me. 

I've been a collector of paint chips from just about anywhere I can get them, from the time I started doing art journaling. Not only do I love the colours, but they make an excellent journal strip if you need something colourful and practical at the same time. But a couple of days ago, I decided on another use for them....mixed media bookmarks.

Whenever I go to Chapters with my husband, I'm always looking for unique bookmarks and I came up short last week when I went to get one. So it was time to make my own, I figured. I created one using a pink chip, some Prima paper scraps I had that I love, and some canvas and Prima embellishments and stamps. I adored how it turned out, so I made three others to give away to friends.

If you want to make your own, I would highly recommend that you reinforce them with some strong scrapbook paper glued to the back. That way you know the bookmark will last for a long time without becoming ratty and torn (unless of course you like that look).

I hope you are inspired by this and have fun with your scraps to create something similar. I'm going to make many more of these in the near future because they make me happy.

Have a great week!

Strong silent type

I really felt the need to do a layout that's about my hubby's strong silent moods sometimes. He makes me laugh a lot but lately I've been needing his strength, and he's given it to me in spades.

I used lots of Prima flowers and embellishments from the Engraver line.

Who says you can't have flowers on a masculine layout? :) The final touch was using the Lump of Coal by Lindy Stamp Gang. It's a black pigment with gold glitter.

Hope you enjoyed this, and have a great weekend!

We are family

Hi everyone. I thought I'd show you my layout today that I created for the Creative Embellishments August Challenge, and Lindy Stamp Gang's August Colour Challenge. They really went hand in hand when I sat down to create. Everyone knows I love my Lindys so I pulled out the Hydrangea Blue, Sweet Violet Purple Teal and Whale Watch Blue to create my background and colour the frame and chipboard from Creative Embellishments. The inspiration I used from their challenge was the circle theme, dots and music. So I used bubble wrap to create the background and used flair and gems to really pull the theme together.

Here's the inspiration photo:

And here's the Lindy Stamp Gang Challenge photo:

My husband said he liked this layout so much, he wants me to frame it. I love it when he says that. You can click on the photos to see more detail.

I used lots of Prima flowers and embellishments that I had in my stash, which are always fun to use.
And now for some fun closeups.

You should play along too! It's so much fun to find inspiration that pushes me to use my stash instead of just using kits. I'd love to hear what you think of this layout. Feel free to leave me comments. 

Have a great Sunday!

Live life as you have imagined

Yesterday was a pretty productive day overall for me. Some days I have a lot of energy and so I try to use it wisely. And once I was done with the day's chores, I sat down to play a little. I looked for a fun challenge, and found the July challenge for Creative Embellishments and Paper Wings Production. It's an inspiration challenge and we had to emboss something, either dry emboss or heat emboss. I've not done a lot of either, so I thought it high time to use my new Lindy Stamp Gang embossing powders I had won a while back, and used some of their gorgeous sprays as well, to create my background. Here's the picture that was used for the challenge.

I was definitely inspired by the tropical feel of this layout, but also what it meant for me... vacation. So I scrapbooked a photo from our vacation in Quebec a while back. I loved the feel of the building behind me, with its bright windows and its old stone.

I used quite a bit of Prima materials in this layout, including the old brick stencil, flowers, butterflies and chalk ink, and Creative Embellishment's chipboard flourish and greenery.

I love when I can dip into my stash and find a whole bunch of items that will work together on a layout. So here are some closeups so that you can see some details.

The chipboard flourish is heat embossed with Lindy Stamp Gang embossing powder

Chipboard with Prima chalk ink. I love how opaque it is

I thoroughly enjoyed working on this layout, and it's been good to get back to a scrapbook style that is so free and fluid. I hope you enjoyed seeing it.

Have a great weekend!

On an art journal train

When I cleaned up my craft room I found my Train CD that I've been missing so much. And then saw a quote from Drops of Jupiter, and figured it was time to do a Train inspired art journal page.

I sang this once with a band of friends at a large party. Was really fun! Those were the days!

Now that she's back in the atmosphere

With drops of Jupiter in her hair, hey, hey, hey

She acts like summer and walks like rain

Reminds me that there's a time to change, hey, hey, hey

Since the return from her stay on the moon

She listens like spring and she talks like June, hey, hey, hey, hey

But tell me, did you sail across the sun?

Did you make it to the Milky Way

To see the lights all faded

And that heaven is overrated?

Tell me, did you fall from a shooting star?

One without a permanent scar

And did you miss me

While you were looking for yourself out there?

Now that she's back from that soul vacation

Tracing her way through the constellation, hey

She checks out Mozart while she does Tae-Bo

Reminds me that there's room to grow, hey

Now that she's back in the atmosphere

I'm afraid that she might think of me as

Plain ol' Jane told a story about a man

Who was too afraid to fly so he never did land

But tell me, did the wind sweep you off your feet?

Did you finally get the chance

To dance along the light of day

And head back to the Milky Way?

And tell me, did Venus blow your mind?

Was it everything you wanted to find?

And did you miss me

While you were looking for yourself out there?

Can you imagine no love, pride, deep-fried chicken

Your best friend always sticking up for you

Even when I know you're wrong?

Can you imagine no first dance, freeze-dried romance

Five-hour phone conversation

The best soy latte that you ever had, and me?

But tell me, did the wind sweep you off your feet?

Did you finally get the chance

To dance along the light of day

And head back toward the Milky Way?

But tell me, did you sail across the sun?

Did you make it to the Milky Way

To see the lights all faded

And that heaven is overrated?

And tell me, did you fall from a shooting star?

One without a permanent scar

And did you miss me

While you were looking for yourself?

na na na na na na na na na na na na na

And did you finally get the chance

To dance along the light of day?

na na na na na na na na na na

And did you fall from a shooting star?

Fall from a shooting star?

na na na na na na na na na

And were you lonely looking for yourself out there?

 

Gelli print background with stencils, hearts cut from previously inked paper,
paper towel, canvas, lace, Heidi Swapp heart, Dina Wakely stamp and a little Prima heart button.

And for the first time ever, I played with some embossing powder from Lindy Stamp Gang to give this heart some purple shimmer. I love the effect!

And I'm back to loving my SEI sprays in neon colours. I just can't resist that neon pink.

Have an amazing weekend!

Back in my journal

I had so much fun today getting back into my art journal. I used my altered book that I've been using for a couple years now and just sat down to play. There are so many layers in this spread that I really don't know how to explain where the pages begin and end. But there are a few gems that are tucked into the pages, like the seed beads that I adhered, and the music paper, as well as yummy texture paste.

It felt really good to sit down and play with my Lindy's sprays and stencils, along with my stamps and texture pastes. I had almost forgotten how much fun it could be. You'll be seeing more of my art journal pages in the future for sure.

Have a great weekend everyone!