tea bags on a journal page

I've really enjoyed this month's challenges from the Documented Life Project where the theme has been translucent papers.

The final challenge was to use tea bags or dryer sheets so I emptied out a teabag and trapped a leaf and some coloured papers inside using wax.

The scratch sheet from my recent play with my gelli plate had an excellent array of colours and texture, providing a number of options as the background for my tea bag.

I decided on the darker blue and stitched it to the page.

I have a fair collection of leaf stamps and chose these lovely oak leaves to add to the page.  This may or may not be finished - I might add some words cut out of a poetry book!

15 min art journal challenge

I've seen the idea of a 15 minute creative challenge on a few blogs so decided to give it a go.

I'm not great at planning out an idea for my journal pages; I journal intuitively... but all my inks, stencils and favourite stamps are within easy reach of my desk so I figured I'd see what happened!

I even managed an action shot within the time!

Time's up!  I was pleased with how much I got done - which included cutting out a couple of stars from underpaper that I ended up not using so they'll go in another project.  Have you tried giving yourself a 15min time limit when working in your journal?

doodling on an art journal page

For aaaages I've wanted to make my art journaling more portable.  I tend to do a whole spread in one go rather than work on previously prepared backgrounds.

I've also been on a mission to include some of my own 'marks' rather than always relying on rubber stamps.

Well, I've found that I'm quite happy doodling on brusho backgrounds!  They have so much texture anyway that adding a few pencil marks is quite therapeutic.  

I made a pile of brusho backgrounds, chose some to add to my journal, packed a little bag of scraps of brusho background paper, scissors, a pencil, a fineline pen, a white pen, a pritt stick and a couple of coloured pencils and was able to transport my art journaling to different parts of the house and beyond!!

back to my art journal

Been playing in my journal again :)

I used some 'scratch paper' as the background for my page then played with my Stampotique stamps.

This is in my 'paperback book' sized journal which I got from Paperchase aaaaaages ago but love for it's different size.

Stampotique stamps used:

2 nuages (fr)  #9248 by Janet Klein

row of numbers  #7213  by Amy Wilson Wellenstein

numeric  #7164  by Amy Wilson Wellenstein

barcode  #10019  by France Papillon

raindrops  #5820  by Magda Polakow

dog  #2433  by Roc Nicholas

rain text  #12022   by Linda Peterson

daisy, daisy  #3002  by Jo Capper-Sandon

luxuriant moustaches

I mentioned in my last Stampotique post that I was itching to colour in these cheeky monsters, so that's exactly what I did for this week's project.

I love the idea of boring beige coloured monsters sprouting (or maybe they dye them, maybe it's all a ruse?!!!) fantastically coloured moustaches.  The inspiration for the background came from a paper gift bag ...

.. so I started by pasting down strips of brown paper then added some simple pencil lines.

I used watercolour paints to add colour to my monsters ...

... and created some coloured strips of watercolour paper whilst I had the paints out.

After colouring my monsters and cutting them out, I stamped them a number of times so I could cut out the moustaches.

There was a lot of fussy cutting involved with this page, but then, that's ideal when you've got your feet up post op!!

Stampotique Stamps used:

Alphabitties  #6010  by Jill Penney and Daniel Torrente

Smitten Moustache Monsters  #4040  by Kira Nichols

French Journal Page  #10015 by France Papillon

"French Journal Page?!!!!!" I hear you ask?  Yes, it's on there, can you spot it?

smitten moustache monsters

I just LoVe Kira Nichols' smitten moustache monsters so decided to have a play around with them in one of my journals.  They have so much potential though that I know I'll be using them again!! [I so want to colour in their moustaches but decided this page had enough colour!!]

I appear to have a good collection of love-themed stampotique stamps!  After spraying my page with Dylusions inks, and splashing some water on them and dabbing it off, I stamped 'metal love' three times, thinking of the Beatles song 'all you need is love'!  I then repeatedly stamped the heart from the top of 'Oh...Tree' because I couldn't find my 'Daniel's hearts' stamp ...

... then found it and went to town with looooooooooooooads more hearts!!  I had a good time colouring some of them in with my watercolour pencils.

The smitten moustache monsters have been stamped on top of the words and then I stamped them onto paper too and cut them out - it's just a good way of keeping the little details that are impossible to cut out (like the curly ends of moustaches!!)

For those of you in the UK, the new release stampotique stamps are on their way and you can pre-order smitten moustache monsters, amongst others, at The Stamp Attic.

Stampotique Stamps Used:

Smitten Moustache Monsters  #4040 by Kira Nichols

Metal Love  #7234 by Amy Wilson Wellenstein

Oh...Tree  #6152 by Daniel Torrente

Daniel's Hearts  #6109 by Daniel Torrente

Barcode Text  #10020 by France Papillon

Barcode  #10019 by France Papillon

PDCC68 better late than never!!!

Apologies for the late appearance of my play date cafe colour challenge piece - I had to respond to a statement yesterday from one of the drivers that hit my car back in November and it sent me all of a wobble, and I ended up not being able to do anything!  The statement wasn't correct, and thinking it through so deeply took me right back to spending all that time in the centre of the M6, in the dark and wet, and on my own. :(

Julie picked our colours this week and I just LoVeD using them, especially that pink!  I made a journal page using Adirondack paint dabbers, a doiley and a white gel pen.

I then added paper hearts, stitched downt he middle, and tiny crocheted hearts, one of which I sprayed with pink Sticky Fingers ink.  These were so cute to do; I was out with my crochet bag and intended to make some more hearts for my heart garland but I'd brought the wrong crochet hook, so I made miniature hearts instead!!!

Think I'm going to be making some more of these!!!

This journal page is A5 in size and the hearts are about the size of a 50p piece.  Fiona's been crocheting with this week's colours too - the most gorgeous pair of baby sandals!  And this week we have our first guest designer of 2011 - the talented Kazan Clark (who co-owned 2sketches4you).  So please take a look at our designers' wonderful work over in the cafe, and visit their blogs to show them some love.

Kazan Clark - this week's guest designer

Savannah O'Gwynn 

Ruby2Shoes 

Andrea Ewen

Fiona Schultz

Jaclyn Miller

Jinny Newlin

Libby Hickson

Michele Gross

TRacey Kuzniak

Colleen Dietrich