Princess Bubbles Creates

I have a one hundred page journal that contains one hundred mandalas.  It occured to me that I have posted very few of those mandalas.  Pictured above is one of those mandalas. My fascination with mandalas seems unending.   I will be on the radio this evening talking about my  Indiegogo  campaign.  I am so grateful to Marinus de Groot for hosting me.  Marinus is a great host!  

 This silk is becoming much more interesting to me.  It was a failed experiment so I have nothing to lose and am enjoying stitching it.  Even though I consider the fabric a failed experiment I love the texture and the colours.  I am manipulating the fabric so that we don't see as much of the fabric that did not accept the colour.  Where will this piece take me next?  I am not sure at the moment. I definitely want to add more circle shapes.  I want to cover a bit more of the pale peach areas.  I am confident the right ideas will come. I had an interesting email earlier this week.  A young woman who likes my work reached out and asked about doing an apprenticeship with me.  We are making plans to get together to talk.  I am happy to help her along and think it could be interesting.  I always thought it would be fun to have a minion in my studio to help me.  Now that it is a possibility I am not sure what it is that I would h...

LeeAnna  comes up with such interesting questions for us each week.  Thank you! This week we are asked: are you a morning person or a night owl? what do you like about being this way? Would you prefer being different? I am the sort of person that needs a lot of sleep.  So I don't consider myself to be a morning or night person.  I am most productive in the afternoon.  I prefer a leisurely start and end to my day.  Let's see, what do I like about being this way?  I guess I am rather neutral on it.  It just is that way.  I make it work for me.  Would I prefer to be different?  No, I feel no need to be different.   At this stage of my life, I feel it is best to accept myself as I am.  It would be great if we could do that at every stage of life but it seems to take time.  I can honestly say I Like myself.  I like that I am an artist. I like that I am honest and reliable.  I like that I am compassionate and...

 More floofy book pages.  The weather was so beautiful yesterday that I just had to go outside to stitch.  These book pages are small and the perfect thing to take outside.  I added a few stitches here and there.  While in progress they don't really look like much.  I have every confidence that they will come together though.   Since these pages are small and they are all in similar colours I am considering taking a few of them on an upcoming holiday to Italy and Switzerland.  Some train rides will be involved, which would be a good amusement.  I wouldn't have to pack a lot which is a good thing.  

 The top photo is the cover of this journal.  It is created from a box that a book was shipped to me in.  This whole journal is created from recyclable elements.  I have used old calendar pages, old artwork, book pages, scraps of fabric etc.   For the cover, I applied quotes from a page-a-day type calendar.  I added a stencilled motif, ink and paint.  It still isn't right though.  I am definitely struggling with it.  I will try to make it better.  I don't think I can make it worse at this point! I am much happier with the journal pages inside.  They are just fun explorations with mixed media and colour.   I am linking to https://creativeartistemixedmedia.blogspot.com/ and https://art-journal-journey.blogspot.com/2023/04/recycle-reuse-repurpose.html?sc=1680447591141#c3886550480421496344

 Playing in my art journals never gets old.  A journal is a joyous place to experiment and create with abandon.  Sometimes I set a goal to use an art medium that I haven't used for a while.  I used gelato crayons to create a messy background for this spread.  I then covered over most of it but masked out two areas with paper kirigami shapes.   I then set out to turn those two shapes into mandalas.  Mandalas are also something that never gets old, at least for me.  The challenge from  Colorful Options  this month was to use pastels.  I enjoy pastel colours but do find them a bit more tricky to work them.  They are not my go-to when it comes to colour.  They definitely require adding some darks to make them interesting.   Back to the gelatos, they are soluble in water.  In some areas, they remained a bit thick but I hadn't realized it.  That caused issues with my pen when I drew over top in those are...

 My free-wheeling self is enjoying these mini-stitched projects so much!  I am calling them my floofy book pages.  I haven't counted but there are probably twenty of them on the go.  I am using scraps of fabric to create the base.  Those tiny bits of fabric that are too precious to throw away but too small for much else.  I can sit for hours putting them together! Then I add some embroidery and embellishments.  The two pictured above are still in progress.  Each page is simply created for the pleasure of stitching.  Eventually, I think each page will be stitched together to make a long scroll-type book.  That is my thinking at the moment.   That could change.  In the meantime, I let the stitch take me where it will. I am linking to https://kathysquilts.blogspot.com/