State of Mind

I had thought The Documented Life Project 2016 was finished but it turned out December had 5 weeks so there was one more spread to go. The December theme remained: Life Lessons - a year long reflection, and the final art challenge was to use gold. I have done all my spreads for DLP16 in the 8 x 8" Dylusions art journal and this one was no exception.

 I discovered another quotation about reflection that I wanted to use. It's by Wayne W. Dyer and reads: "The state of your life is nothing more than a reflection of your state of mind". 

I used a lot of collage in the background. It includes images of a gate (from a magazine), big black lettering from a tissue sheet (by 7Gypsies) and pages from a vintage Technical Drawing book, as well as some washi tapes with lettering on it.

Rubber stamping was added with a numbers stamp by Tim Holtz, and a large window stamp by Carabelle Studio called A La Fenetre.

I added dots as well as the quotation with a white marker and then added the gold circles using a stencil by The Crafters' Workshop and gold Radiant Gel by Colourarte.

It's sad to say goodbye to The Documented Life Project after 3 years. It has been a huge encouragement towards art journalling regularly and if I look back and see how much my work has improved I am very grateful for this project and happy to have taken part in it every year. New opportunities will be just over the horizon, I'm sure, and the habit of art journalling has now been ingrained into my days.

Only a Reflection

The Documented Life Project 2016 is coming to an end and there won't be another Documented Life next year. I haven't done any spreads for the December theme yet so these pages are a combination to reflect that theme that reads: Life Lessons - a year long reflection. I have kept it very simple as you can see.

I played in the 8 x 8" Dylusions art journal with black pages and used a wide variety of spray paints to make the pages so that they are a reflection of each other. It includes some very shimmering paints although that is very hard to capture on the pictures.

Then I stamped on the quotation I found that reads: "life is only a reflection of what we allow ourselves to see". I used a gold stamp pad and then outlined the letters (from a variety of alphabet stamp sets) with a white marker.

I have enjoyed the three years of The Documented Life Project and it has made me art journal at least once a week. I hope to keep that going under my own steam in 2017.

The F Spread

 Due to all the upheavals with moving my studio indoors and also the great weather that invited walking I am combining two weeks for The Documented Life Project 2016. Both are for the October theme of: A Fresh Start - clear your palette. The two art challenges were: Repeat a Pattern, and Incorporate the first letter of your first name. In my case that was the F, and here it is in all it's glory. I cut out many words starting with F that I liked and collaged them onto the pages.

The big F itself went through many incarnations (about 6 I think), none of which I was particularly happy with. In the end I settled for this version which incorporates vintage text from an old encyclopaedia and used one of the lettter F pages.

The repeat pattern came from a Stencilgirl club stencil (see info down below). You can see the repeats quite well above.

 Techniques used: collage, stencilling and rubber stamping.

Materials used: vintage text, words from magazines, rubber stamps (a stamp from the Rust & Dust cling stamps desined by Finnabair for Prima, as well as the Gears clear stamp by JoyCrafts), large stencil from the October 2016 Stencilgirl Club.

An Ordeal of Change

We had a break from Colour Me Positive this week which was very welcome as far as I was concerned. But The Documented Life Project 2016 continued with the October theme of: A Fresh Start - clear your palette. The art challenge was: draw a line down the middle and create two scenes. For my line I used the centre of the 8 x 8" Dylusions art journal in which I'm working.  A fresh start always involves change and this is certainly a time for that at the moment here, and not all in a good sense. Hence one of the vintage text pieces reads: "endure an ordeal of change". 

Both pages were originally treated as one and I did exactly the same things on both sides. Then when I was happy with how the spread looked I grabbed a Fiskars Ovals stencil and outlined ovals on both pages. On the right hand page I filled in the area around the ovals with a black marker while on the left hand side I filled in the ovals themselves with black. I must say I had a lot of trouble finding a black marker in my stash that would work on the many layers of paint, but eventually settled on the Zig Scroll & Brush one from Kuretake

 Techniques used: rubber stamping, stencilling, ink dropping, outlining with white marker

 ools used: art foamie Ring TicTac designed by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer, Kaffee Klatsch cling rubber stamp set from Nathalie Kalbach for Stampendous, and French Journal Page rubber stamp designed by France Papillon for Stampotique. The following stencils were used: S314 Entangling Threads, medium stencil from Seeds and Pods February 2014 Stencilgirl Club and S226 Small Mod Ovals and Circles all from Stencilgirl Products and the TCW458 Coffee Splotch stencil by The Crafters Workshop as well as the  Fiskars Ovals 1 plastic stencil.

As you can tell, it's not all doom and gloom, there is a glimmer of light on the horizon.

Let's Doodle

If you are very observant you may have noticed that I didn't do a Documented Life Project 2016 spread last week. I simply didn't have it in me at that time and in a way it was good to give myself permission to let it me. I should do that more often! The new October theme didn't help either. It is: A Fresh Start - clear your palette. Our art challenge this week is: start with a doodle.

I have no idea why I didn't start doodling in my art journal straight away but instead I grabbed the nearest piece of paper from my bin (it had some typing on it already) and doodled a mandala-like shape on that. That meant I had to cut it out to apply it to my page but it also meant I could photocopy it first and use it again on the opposite side.  The palette was cleared by using metallic paints in the background as well as on the art foamie I used.  The quotation as seen below was also about making a start.

 Techniques: painting, stamping, collage, doodling.

Tools: art foamie (I used Ring Hopscotch designed by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer), rubber stamp of small circles (from a sheet from ImpressMeNow), gel pens

Decisions

I'm far behind in posting finished art on this blog and I will try and catch up this week. This spread in the 8 x 8" Dylusions art journal was done for the last week of our September theme on The Documented Life Project 2016 that was: Roll Call - Being Accountable. The art challenge was to add stripes. The spread itself was completed not this weekend just passed but the weekend before that. As you can tell I went a wee bit mad with the stripes.

 I  used two quotations on the page. They read: "Without personal accountability we cannot grow nor can we ever improve ourselves", and the other one says: "You are not a product of your circumstances. You are a product of your decisions". 

Materials: acrylic paint, deli paper (previously printed on a gelli plate), collage with tissue paper, photographs and a self-portrait printed from my Instagram account by Social Print Studio, as well as a striped postcard from Paperchase, washi tape and a postage stamp..

Tools: stencils from Stencilgirl Products: L439 Stripes and L435 Ancient Marks (on the deli paper)

One Person Accountable

The theme of Roll Call - being accountable is continuing on The Documented Life Project 2016 while our art challenge told us to use mark-making in black and white over colour. I managed to find yet another saying about our theme that says: "There is only one person who can be held accountable for the results we get in life". 

 I went looking for a suitable image to be my focal point and was originally going to use the figure as a mask but when I cut her out (from a fashion magazine) and put her on the page for size I decided that I wanted her as she was as she toned in rather well with the vintage paper I had collaged on previously.

 Techniques used: collage, rubber stamping and stencilling, as well as that mark - making with black and white markers over colour.

 Tools used: rubber stamp (from Impress Me Now, so pleased to have re-discovered their stamps that were hidden somewhere in my painting shed!) and stencilling. I went a bit mad with the stencils on this spread and here are the Stencilgirl Products stencils I used: L402 Verdant Moon in the background, S264 Doodle It Tornado Flowers, S376 Hash Marks, S306 Text and Texture Explore and finally the smallest stencil from the October 2014 Stencilgirl Club

We are Accountable

As the tropical weather hasn't reached Scotland (although it is quite warm for here, no sun though) I thought I would go straight on and share more art. And tomorrow is my day as Guest Designer for Stencilgirl Products so you can expect even more.  On the Documented Life Project 2016 we are continuing with the September theme of: Roll Call - being accountable. The art challenge was to add stitching but the project means you to do it onto a card. As I'm working in an 8 x 8" Dylusions art journal this is not too practical so I'm ignoring it this week.

 I found a quotation by Moliere that spoke to me. It says: "It is not what we do, but also what we do not do for which we are accountable". 

 Techniques used: collage which included the figure, the vintage map pieces as well as the black circles and squares that come from a piece of hand made paper. I also used rubber stamping and stencilling as well as outlining with black and white markers and water soluble oil pastels.

Tools used: rubber stamping with pieces from the Marks stamp set designed by Nathalie Kalbach, I used the following stencils from Stencilgirl: the large stencil from August 2014 Stencilgirl Club, M081 Rows of Triangles, L316 Rembrandt's Words and S047 Mandala #6. I used acrylic paints and for the mandalas Radiant Gel in red.

The text as well as the pages themselves were outlined using a dark blue stamp pad.

Being Accountable

In contrast to the pages for Colour Me Positive that I posted yesterday the spread for The Documented Life Project 2016 came together much more easily. Our new theme for September is: Roll Call - being accountable . The art challenge was to add an organic element. At first I was going to add an actual organic element but in the end and for the sake of keeping the journal archival I went for stencilling imagery of trees.

 As I was starting work I found a sheet of collaged postage stamps that was made for a previous project and added them to the pages to give them a good home and I also put to good use one of my birthday gifts recently, comprising of a clear stamp set featuring herbs around the base of the trees. They were just the right size!

 Techniques used: painting, collage, rubber stamping, stencilling, outlining with markers and pens.

Materials used: acrylic paint, postage stamps, rubber stamp featuring herbs from Craft Emotions and pieces from a cling stamp set called Rust & Dust designed by Finnabair for Prism. An alphabet rubber stamp set was used for the text. I also used the following stencils all from Stencilgirl Products: the large stencil from March 2014 Stencilgirl Club, the medium stencil from July 2016 Club and stencil S329 Trio of Trees. I also used a sparkling green gel pen to outline the trees.

The quotation reads: "Life is about being accountable for your actions". 

Make No Count

This is our last week of saying no, at least as far as the theme on The Documented Life Project 2016 is concerned. Our art challenge was to highlight our favourite number on the pages. I'm going to do these posts about art journalling slightly differently from now on, giving you lists of the techniques I used as well as the supplies.

My posts were getting slightly boring, always going on about the same things as truly I don't do much that is revolutionary on my spreads. I will however continue to do step by step tutorials for my projects as Guest Designer for Stencilgirl Products and you can find all of them on the Stencilgirl Talk site (search for me by name). In fact, I highly recommend this site for information and tutorials about art journalling and stencilling by all manner of very talented artists.

My favourite number is 8; who could resist a number that has two circles?! It's spread liberally over the pages as you can see.

 Techniques used: painting, stencilling, rubber stamping, collage and outlining

Materials used: acrylic paints,  Tim Holtz Tissue Wrap Postage, Tim Holtz diamond shape stamp,  large stencil from the December 2014 Stencilgirl Club, stencil M100 Stencil Font 4 x 4and stencil S396 Make It Count, black and white markers, self-adhesive numbers.

The quotation I wrote on the page reads: "Say no to the demands of the world. Say yes to the longings of your own heart" by Jonathan Rockwood Huie.

Not Saying No Soon Enough

We are still Saying No on The Documented Life Project while our art challenge for this week was: document a happy thing. I still had plenty of  NO quotations left and settled on using the one by Josh Billings that says: "Half of the troubles of this life can be traced to saying yes too quickly and not saying no soon enough". I wrote it by hand in the large white circle on the right hand page.

I started  this spread in the 8 x 8" Dylusions art journal by collaging some pieces of a vintage map onto the pages and then stencilling using the medium and small stencils from the August 2016 Stencilgirl Club. I then used a rubber stamp which I think comes from an ImpressMe set (designed by Sherrill Kahn). I could be wrong as the packaging has long since disappeared, but it looks like her design work.

I then added some of my happy moments in the shape of images of previously made art work and stitching, and punched circles from these pictures as well as cutting out the heart shape you see on the right. The circles were outlined using a Stabilo All black pencil as well as water soluble oil crayons.

 I like how the map peeks out here and there.