My sister is coming

Here is a tag I created with a picture of my sister and I when we were little girls.  Such happy faces.
I love my sister and I can't wait for her to come visit.  It's been five years since I've seen her.  Wow, where does the time go.  I am planning to have an art play day for her.  Should be fun!

time book with a steampunk slant

I bought some cool watch parts on ebay a while back.  I finally found the right place to use them.  I just love the tiny gears under the watch crystal.  I don't know if this is really all that steampunk but  whatever.

more time

I love the quote on this page. 

You have to allow a certain amount of time in which you are doing nothing in order to have things occur to you, to let your mind think.

I so agree with this! 

more time

I'm really liking this book.  I used a piece of mica on this page and I think the color really suits.

another time book page

Here is another page from my time book.  I really like this book.  It's been fun to make it.

bead journal project

I'm not overly thrilled with the way this bead journal page turned out but it's not terrible.  Hopefully, I will learn and improve.

On the bright side, yesterday I was in Toronto and went to the John Bead Corp. outlet store.  Way cool!  Vials of beads for twenty five cents!  I stocked up.  I also bought a very pretty tiara.  Fun!  The magpie in me was over the moon happy.

mixed media monday wings challenge

I love winged things!  I also enjoy participating in the Mixed Media Monday challenge when I have the time and inspiration. This week the theme is wings.  It worked out perfectly with this page.  It is another page from my time book.  Thanks for looking!
/http://mixedmediamonday.wordpress.com/

time book

Here is another page from my book about time.  Don't you just love the feathers.  I love collecting quotes about time.  There are a few in this book.

More Journal Spilling pages

My friend Nancy was truly inspired and has continued to work on her journal pages.  Do you recognize the bottom picture?  The start of this page is pictured in my last post.  She did this page in a beautiful journal she commissioned from a local artist.  She will be taking this journal to Fiji, New Zealand and Australia next week.  How I wish I were taking that trip!  Some day I will!

Nancy made a pocket in this same journal from the dyed coffee filter.  Clever use for the filter!

Journal Spilling play day

My friends and I got together to share art today.  What a blissful way to spend an afternoon!  Oh my, what fun!  The four of us play together really well.  

Each of us took a technique from Diane Trout's Journal Spilling book and shared how to do it.

The top picture is from Lois's journal.  I shared the crayon resist technique.  We did crayon rubbings and then painted over them.  Lois did her rubbing over a journal page that already had some lettering on it.  Cool.
The next picture down  is a page from Nancy's journal.  Mary Lynn shared the glaze pen resist technique.  You draw with glaze pens and when they are dry you do a watercolor wash over them.  Fun.
The next picture  is a page from Mary Lynn's journal.  Nancy shared the watercolor crayon and gesso technique.  You lay down some color with watercolor crayons and spread the color with water.  You then apply gesso over top of the color.  The gesso adds great texture.  Cool.
The last picture is my coffee filter colored with food coloring.  Lois shared this dying technique.  Any absorbent paper will work.  You can then add these papers to your journal.  Fun.

time book

Here's another page from the time book.  It was kind of fun to work with the beiges and browns.  I don't normally use those colors.

book about time

Making books is a real passion for me.  I love when I can really run with a theme.  The theme of this book is  time.  I will post more pictures of this book tomorrow.

art fun

I have said it before but I will say it again.  I love my art friends.  They are the best.  Yesterday the Royal City Calligraphy Guild hosted a play day.  Wendy brought paste to make paste paper and of course she shared the paste with all of us.   Mary Lynn brought shaving cream and ink to do marbling.  Of course she shared it with everyone.  Mary Lynn also brought in an eight page book made from one piece of paper that was gifted to her.  I wanted to copy it as it is a really cool book.  I was having a bit of trouble figuring out how to do it so Marta helped me figure it out.  She's so smart!  Stayed tuned and I will post about that book later in the week. 
There was heart felt sharing and caring, laughing and smiles throughout the day.  I am truly blessed to be a part of this warm and generous group.

top picture 
Carmen on the left
Carol on the right

middle picture
Barb on the left
Marta on the right

Bottom picture- Lois  doesn't she look happy!
Aren`t they all beautiful!

Oh yeah, there was some shopping involved in the day as well.  Wyndham Art is within walking from the church where we meet so at lunch a number of us walked over there.  I bought some beautiful Pebeo iridescent paint in orange and pink.  We also made a stop on our way to a small craft store.  I bought some fibres and really sharp scissors. 

I told myself  I wouldn't post anything of a personal nature on this blog but I today I will break that promise.  As I want to brag about my husband.  He made supper for us so it was about as perfect of day you could have.  Any day that I don't have to spend time in the kitchen is a good day!

The journal page behind the pop up page

This is the page that is behind the pop up page in my last post.  It's interesting that you can see the sequins better in this picture.  The sequins dangle from the pop up if you look closely in the last picture.

Have a sparkly day.

art journal page with a pop up

This is a really big journal and I can't get everything in one picture.  This is the best that I can do.  I hope you get the idea.
I absolutely adore pop ups.  Check out Robert Sabuda's books.  He does amazing pop ups.  I'm not in his league, yet.  But I still loved to make pop ups in my altered books and journals.

Iridescent Stainless Steel (Coarse)by Golden and soft pastel pencils on an art journal page

I promised I would show another use for Iridescent Stainless Steel (Coarse) by Golden.  So, here is a journal page with that paint and Giconda soft pastel pencils.  The coarseness of the paint feels gritty almost like sandpaper because of that it really grabs hold of the pastels (probably any soft pastels will work).  I have not used any fixative on top of the pastels and yet I cannot rub the pastel off.  It works really well.  Let me know if you give it a try!

Here is a close up.