New mixed media collage

 

"Believe"

I am making jewelry again after a long hiatus.

Stone, turquoise & sterling wires

Jasper & sterling wires

A Little Junk Journal

I started to make this little junk journal the other day and felt somewhat uninspired until I realized my sister-in-law was turning 50 in a couple weeks and this would make a fun present. She loves crafty crap like me and I had all kinds of things that would be perfect for her: photos of her family and pets; old postcards of her town; some inspiring sayings in the form of gift cards, journal pages and found items.

A junk journal is made with bits and scraps of things. I cheated a little and bought a plain canvas cover at Michael's because I loved the look of it.

What a fun little project that took on new meaning with the inspiration of my wonderful sister-in-law!

Loving the World of Mixed Media

I only recently discovered how wonderful working in mixed media really is. A whole new world has opened up for me. One of my favorite things is that I already owned so many mixed media art supplies. Seems I've been collecting them for years. Now I make regular trips to my storage locker to dig out old jewelry, papers, sheet music, pastels, paints and notecards. I knew there was a reason I was keeping all this stuff!

I also found that YouTube is chock full of all kinds of tutorials. Nothing like free art classes!

I worked on this piece, "Grow Gratitude," all week creating one layer a day. It was created with a placemat, napkin, sheet music, gesso, tissue paper, acrylics, watercolors, rubber stamps, old book pages, ribbon, pastels, felt pens and die cut leaves I found at Value Village in a tin container. Yes, well, the only bad part of this new hobby is that I am addicted to looking for craft treasures at Goodwill and Value Village. I have to be careful not to accumulate more stuff for the storage locker!

I started a 'gratitude journal' this year so the theme seemed relevant to me right now.

I can hardly wait for my weekends these days to see what other goodies are tucked away in storage that I can use to create something new.

News Flash! Amazing women decorate cookies!

I spent the day decorating Valentine sugar cookies at Sara's house. It was a great day. I didn't have to bring anything or prepare. I just showed up, was served brunch and mimosas, painted, sprinkled and glittered to my heart's content. Plus I got to eat all the ugly ones (yes there is edible glitter). Gotta love that. Ugly cookies still taste delicious by the way.

The best part was spending the afternoon with amazing women sharing stories, advice and experiences.

"Are you where you are supposed to be?"

"Are you where you are supposed to be?" What a great question!

I heard a professional speaker/photographer ask this at a conference many years ago. He was referring to how, as a photographer, he relied not only on his skill and his experience but on his gut instinct to get the perfect shot. Getting that fantastic photo meant that he often had to wait hours for the sun to come up so it would shine on the landscape just perfectly. Sometimes it meant that he suddenly moved to a new location after waiting for hours because his intuition told him to.

For me, it means listening to my inner voice and acting accordingly. In order to listen, I have to stop running and breathe!

This weekend, I am relaxing and starting an art book.

I have chosen an old English book that I found at Value Village. I painted a light coat of Gesso on the page and let it dry.

On these pages, I used pastels and colored pencils for the designs and rubber stamps to add the letters. I sprayed each page with matte fixative to keep the pastels from smearing.

I enjoy the process of taking an old book and transforming it little by little.

If I make a mistake or dislike the results, I can just cut out the page. Ultimately, some pages will have to be removed anyway as the gesso makes the pages so much thicker.

I am not always 100% sure where I am supposed to be but I am pretty certain that if working on a project like this keeps my undivided attention so that I have no worries for a few hours, that I must be in a good place.

Valentine bookmarks make me happy.

I tend to feel a fair amount of stress every day at work so this year I am making a concerted effort to do something creative every single weekend.

It's amazing how spending a few hours making something as simple as a bookmark can make me so happy. Ah, the joy of just using one's imagination.

I have many beautiful books and journals yet I've been using magazine inserts, grocery store receipts and used gift cards as bookmarks.

So I made some bookmarks worthy of my books.

Since Valentine's day is just around the corner, I went with the Valentine theme.

The foundation of these bookmarks is just card stock. I used glue stick to adhere various paper scraps and I also used stickers. I punched a heart shape on the top of these and glued another layer of polka dot paper behind.

A corner rounder gave these a nice finished look.

Of course I had to add some glitter because somehow I've recently become addicted to using glitter (is this an age thing?).

I laminated the bookmarks with a Xyron 510 sticker maker/laminator. I love this little craft tool.

Punch a hole, add some ribbon or maybe a button and voila...something pretty and useful!





And such a nice relaxing activity.