I am ME!!!

First of all (a belated) Happy New year!!!!

Well after a dreadful end to last year I think (at last) I'm starting to feel a little better.  I've got another appointment at the Pain Clinic tomorrow for a Lidocaine infusion to see if it'll help on the new medication the same way it did on the old.  Fingers crossed :-)

A couple of years ago I got my craft room set up and on New Years Day 2011 I used it for the first time to create this journal page which helped me focus throughout the year.  Last year I did the same with this one.  When my depression hit really badly late last year I printed out pictures of my 2012 page and stuck them all over my house to remind me of how positive I felt when I was creating the page.  I just kept saying I want to get back to my Dita page!!

So now a tradition has been born and on New Years Day this year I did another page.  This time I started with a background I had made the day after I went to the docs and talked about how I was feeling.  I used my Moleskine to 'spill' out all of the c**p that was inside.  I used a dipping pen and some colourful acrylic drawing inks and wrote til I filled the page one way, dried it with a heat tool, turned the journal and carried on writing.  It ended up creating an almost tartan background.

I knew I needed something positive to got over the top but I really didn't want to cover all of the writing up but at the same time I didn't want o be able to read it.  So I used a Crafters Workshop stencil called Ringlets and sponged Claudine Hellmuth paint in Altered Orange, Landscape Green, Yellow Pastel, Sky Blue, Modern Red and Purple Palette through it.  These are not the colours I would normally used as they're a bit pastel for me but I'd already chosen an image to go on the page and they matched perfectly.  I then outlined all of the painted areas with a black Promarker using the fine tip.

As I wanted something positive on the page I sat and wrote out a list of all the good things about me.  At least what I consider good things anyway ;-)  I started with the words 'I am' and just added positive words after that.

I wrote all of these words around the curves of ringlets with the same black Promarker.  I stamped the words 'I am me' in Black Archival but they didn't show up too well so I went over them a couple of times with the Promarker to make them stand out.  The image is from a Sunday newspaper magazine and sort of summed up what the page embodies for me.  She looks so content in her own skin and I need to feel that and this page will help me, I'm sure.

Happy New Year!!!

After my relapse I decided to take it easy for a few weeks to get myself pulled together.  I finally feel ready to craft again and that was exactly what I was doing yesterday - huddled in my craft room with my new Slanket on, listening to an audio book and getting painty!!

I got 2 craft books for Christmas ( along with a lot of other stuff) from Jo - Surface Treatment Workshop: Explore 45 Mixed Media Techniques and Art at the Speed of Life.  The Surface Treatments gave me the kick I needed to start creating again and I started to read the the second one on Christmas Day.  For once I am taking notice of what the author is telling me to do to try to save precious time in our crafting habits.  So yesterday I created most of a journal page and loads of backgrounds for a journal (or smash book) that I made last winter out of recycled packaging.

First of all I gesso'd the journal page as it had some Krylon ink coming through from the previous page and while my sponge brush was dirty I gesso'd all of the pages of the recycled journal.

You can great texture on the page by pressing the end of the sponge onto the page.  The bubbles that come from the sponge stay raised when it dries too!

Next I dripped Golden paints Pthalo Blue (Green Shade) and Pthalo Green (Blue Shade) onto the pages and used a Speedball brayer to roll the colour around and blend it.

The names of these colours always make me smile.  Why is the blue, green and the green, blue??  I'm sure there's some rational explanation but I don't really care so much cos I *love* these colours especially together!

I wanted a complete contrast to the image I'd chosen for the page.  Its a picture of Dita von Teese from one of those glossy magazines a neighbour gives to my Mam and I rip up!

For anyone who doesn't know who she is, she's a Burlesque dancer and if I was fit and well, I'd love to try Burlesque. 

The gold on the outside of the page is Golden paints Irridecent Gold (fine) and is sponged through small hole sequin waste.

The page isn't finished yet and I'm sure how its gonna end up, but I love it so far!

And here are some of the backgrounds I did.  You can see that I used the same colours a couple of times meaning I only had to wash my tools once.  Its common sense but Art at the Speed of Life has really brought it home to me.  Bit dense you see ;-)

And I'm intending to keep my baby wipes and use them in art too. Here are my first 3!

So here's to a new Year that is Happy, Healthy and Crafty for all of us!!

Elements of Art Journaling final pages

Well its been a long time coming but I've finally finished The Elements of Art Journaling course.  Not that its been a chore, but I've just not felt like doing any crafting for a while.  It happens every now and then and I say I can't be bothered but its more than that.  It usually means I'm too tired to do anything.  And that's how its been for most of this month.

Anyhoo, here are my final two pages.  The first is the fire page.  For this page Effy told us to art to music.  This is not unusual for me, as anyone who knows me will attest to.  Then she said to just enjoy ourselves and make a 'hot mess'.  Now this is more difficult for me as I'm a perfectionist and messes just don't come easy.  So I started with red Ecoline ink and blew it around the pages.  Good basis for a messy page....or so I thought.

I then painted Stewart Gill paints in cerise on one page and orange on the other.  This is when I realised my mistake.  Ecolines are water based and they just ran and mixed with the paint.  Ah well...lesson learned.  Once I got the pages painted I closed the journal and squished the pages together and it gave a lovely texture.  This is where I stopped and thought about the words associated with fire.  One of them is anger.

I realised I am ANGRY!!! 

I've always said I was frustrated or irritated but now I know that all this time I have been angry.  I'm angry at my MS for what it has and is doing to me and there are other things I am angry about too but this isn't the time or place to go into them.  So I wrote it all down and burned the paper.  And as I watched the pieces of ash float away into the sky I started to feel calmer.  So to symbolise this I charred the edges of pieces of book pages and arranged them into a 'fire' on the pages and drew tendrils of golden smoke coming the from the fire.

The last page is the Spirit Page.  This was all about celebrating which virtues we possess now or would like to possess in the future.  Again, being British, I struggled to admit what I possess.  So my Mam got out the drinks coaster her and my Dad had bought me a few years ago and between us we decided my virtue is inner strength. 

I did a search on line for the Goddess of Inner Strength and it kept coming back to Sekhmet, the Egyptian warrior Goddess but she was also the Goddess of healing.  As I adore Egypt and everything to do with it she seemed to be an appropriate Goddess for me!

I drew a face using instructions I got from Art, Heart and Healing.  Its definitely worth checking as its a FREE course!!!  As I liked the face I'd drawn and didn't know if I'd be able to do another one I photocopied it and used the copy for the journal page. 

I first dropped spots of Golden Pyrolle Red and Hansa Yellow Medium paint on the pages and smooshed them about with a Speedball brayer.  Once they were dry I used the yellow paint on a clear stamp of bubble background and stamped it randomly around.  I then added drops of Golden Titan Buff paint and smooshed that with the brayer.  It ended up looking almost sandy.

I bought some papers a while ago which feature Egyptian images and used the black one with golden sarcophagi all over it, cut into strips, for her hair and a one with pyramids in neutral colours, with a little more Titan Buff over it, for her dress.

To bring both pages together I sponged Golden Iridescent gold paint over the whole thing.

I used a dipping pen to write the wording.  Its the first time I've done this (as you can tell by the big glob of ink on Sekmet's name), and I'm really pleased with the results.

I got the Ankh that I used on her head from a Zuzu, a blog buddy of mine, and coloured it golden with the same gold paint.  If you get a chance stop by her blog Zuzu's Petals Altered Art 'n' Stuff.  Her work is amazing!!

So there you have it.  The Elements of Art Journaling course.  It has been a revelation for me to do this course as it has helped to open my eyes to who I am and to make some decisions I would ordinarily have shied away from.

For anyone who would like to do this course it will be available as a Self Study course on Wild Precious Studios.  You have to join the Studio but it such a welcoming, nurturing and inspirational place to be part of.

Legs and cool boots!!

My spasms have stopped (YAAY!!!) but I have really painful legs at the moment (UGH!!!).  They feel like lead and walking is really hard work for me.  I can get relief from pain killers but they knock me out so I'm trying to get by without them.  Its a different pain from the neuropathic pain that I'm using my TENS machine for.  This is like toothache from my hips to my toes on both legs!

I decided last night I had to journal about it after cutting some more bits from magazines.  So I cut out loads of pairs of legs and used Golden matte gel medium to stick them down.  Then I used a stencil and sharpies to write the word 'LEGS' and just spilled the rest of it.  It really helped to take my mind off the pain!!

Jo was here for a cuppa one day last week and we had a look at the Clarks shoe shop website sale.  She was looking for boots with higher heels than I can manage but I spotted these little beauties and, of course, I had to buy them!  Would have been rude not too!!  They're the original desert boot design with retro animal print suede.  The suede has a texture like real animal skin and is just FAB-U-LOUS!!!

I can't wear my Dr Martens boots anymore as they are too heavy for my poor legs to cope with, but these little babies will do just fine instead of the Docs!!!

Yumminess and journaling

I ordered some yarn from Flamboyance Yarns last week as Carrie has offered to knit me a scarf.  I needed to get some 4ply or sock yarn for the scarf.  When Carrie tweeted that Flamboyance had 20% off all yarn for one day only I rang her and we chose the yarn.

The one in the right of the picture is for my scarf and the one on the left is fibre for spinning.  Carrie has a spinning wheel and I'm gonna try and do it myself and is I can't manage, Carrie will do it for me.  This is gonna be fun!!!

Aren't the colours just yummy!!

As I've not been feeling too well I've ordered loads of crafty books and have a little bit of mojo reappear!!  My spasms have all but stopped now, but I'm still so tired so I've done a little bit of journaling to cheer myself up.  I still can't sit at my craft table for too long so I've pretty much done these pages in fits and starts.  But that's the beauty of journaling - you don't need to do it all in one go!

This first page is my first attempt at layers.  I originally wrote a letter to Martha (my gorgeous cat who died in May last year) and it made me so sad each time I saw it that I wanted to cover it up.  So I started with a couple of layers of gesso, followed by some watered down yellow and ultramarine Golden paint.  Once that way dry, I used torn book pages and used gel medium to stick them down.  Then I used white acrylic paint to make marks over the pages with bottle caps, credit card edges, the lid from a large Malteser tube and a texture stamps that I found in the kiddies section of an craft store.  I'm really pleased with the result.

The next page is something that just popped into my head one day when I was walking (carefully) downstairs.  I'm really pleased at the way it turned out.  I used music paper behind Darth Vader as I can't look at that picture and not here his music from Star Wars!!!

Journaling weeknd

I spent an amazing weekend last weekend with 8 incredible women.

I attended the Journaling Weekend at Graphicus in Barnard Castle with Jo, Lou, June, Janet, Lillian and Sue as well as Glenda and Lynn.  It was actually 2 workshops, but we all attended both so it seemed like a weekend workshop.

Glenda lead us during the Saturday and we began making a loose-leaf watercolour journal and colouring it with Golden paints.  During this time we each talked about why we wanted to journal.  This lead to very intimate and revealing circumstances for each us.

For the covers for the journal we scrunched copier paper, spritzed it with water and painted it with metallic paint.  The paper ended up extremely wet and had to dry til the afternoon.   We then stuck the paper to grey board using book binding techniques.  The board will eventually be stuck back to back with bookbinding fabric between to make the spine of the journal.

The pages for the inside of the journal were made from hot pressed heavy watercolour paper and coloured with Golden acrylic paints and lots of water!  We used stencils and spritzed the stencilled image with water to make it 'bleed', like the flower in this picture.

On Sunday Lynn lead us through writing in different styles in our journals.  We made another watercolour journal, but this time we folded the pages and stitched together in a very simple style.  We all used this as our practice journal.

Lynn had us draw circles free hand and then draw horizontal lines to make a circle.  We then had to write on these lines and draw circles round the writing in pen, then make some of the words stand out.  I found this exercise quite difficult as I hate my writing.  I used to be able to do calligraphy, but MS but paid to that. 

She then asked us the write in a circles so that the letters filled the whole circle.

Then we started to write in spirals.  Once I'd finished this one, in Lou's words, I found my writing.  I am so chuffed that this worked out so well.  I just want to write in spirals all the time LOL!!!

Next we looked at alphabets and how we could change them for different page layouts.  I chose the draw capital letters with hearts on the end of each line (the top alphabet) and dots on the each line (the bottom alphabet).  Now I am more confident on what I can do I am going to practice other forms of alphabet.

When we'd finished this we started on drawing letter and decorating it.  I chose to do zentangle-ish patterns.  As I've only just started to do zentagles I couldn't remember most of the patterns so I just doodled.

The whole weekend was an amazing experience.  We all became so close.  We laughed, we cried and we encouraged each other.  I doubt I will ever experience another weekend like it.

Thank you to all you lovely ladies.

The big 'D'

As many of you know I have MS and with that can come depression (the big D).  I have been suffering from depression for a few years but it came back with a vengence last year.  Its been under control, but at the moment it seems to have reared its ugly head again.  I am seeing a wonderful counsellor who has really helped me put things into perspective.

One thing that has really helped is art journaling.  Lynn (from Graphicus in Barnard Castle) showed me all about it last year and told me how much it has helped other people with depression.  So I set about giving it a try.

This is one of the first pages I did.  I started off writing everything down about how I was feeling.  I then gessoed over that.  It took a few coats of gesso to obliterate the words.  I didn't want them to be completely obliterated as I still wanted to see some peeking through.  I then used black chalk to scribble over the top randomly and used a tissue to rub it in a little.  The 'what lies beneath' wording and maze were both from magazines.  Most of the stamps are Tim Holtz, stamped in versamark then embossed in black.  I wrote words over the top to express how I was feeling.

I found doing this page VERY cathartic and although the big D is back, its nowhere near as bad and this page shows me how far I've come.  I feel that because I wrote out my feelings and covered all the bad stuff up, I can move on without that weighing me down.

Art journaling can be done in any kind of book or just on paper.  Its only for you to see so it doesn't matter what it looks like.  I've only posted this on here in case someone who may need a little help uses the idea.