Not All Who Wander Are Lost - Journal Page

http://www.etsy.com/shop/artsycreations

So I played around with one of the stencils I made  :-)

This is what I came up with.  I really like how it turned out and will be making more stencils to play with.  If you are interested, I uploaded several stencil and mask templates to my shop.

I've been printing mine out on inkjet transparency sheets which I believe I bought at an office supply store (can't remember! 0-0).  Not too much thinner than some of the actual stencils I bought, so not bad!  A cheaper option for me and I can make all kinds and save some money...

So this is another journal page I've done...I'm on a roll this year!  I haven't been all that great in journaling the past couple years, always felt like I had to spill my guts and fill my journaled pages with my emotions - which honestly, I don't have any time to do as often as I've tried.  I think I really prefer this style of journaling, a fun image and just a line or two for text.  Fast and simple...Hopefully I can keep it going throughout the year, but with a toddler and an infant and a full time job and and and....hopefully I can keep my muse happy!

Hope you're all having a fabulously creative day!

Leila West - SDC81 - Stampotique Challenge

I recently bought myself some Stampotique stamps and have been having fun creating stamped journal pages.  For this one I submitted to January's Stampotique Challenge, SDC 81.

The challenge:  "Stampotique is challenging you to create a Journal Cover or Page, Diary Page or Calendar page."

So I did a journal page based on the saying "What happens in Vegas, Stays in Vegas."

I had fun mixing up stamps and I love this Stampotique guy and the sign he's holding.  So many different  words  you can put in there.  :-)

I used stamps from Stampotique, Ranger, and Claudine Hellmuth in my Dylusions Journal using Dylusions ink.  This is one of the pages where the ink seeped through, boo!  ...but it doesn't look too bad.  :-)

Hope you're all having a fabulously creative day!

No More Adventure - Dylusions Journal page #3

Continuing on in my Dylusions journal. Used Stampology, Ranger, and Stampotique stamps. Had some fun with the ranger inks and ghosting, although I don't remember which stencils they are....

Used the book pages to cover the center mess from when the inks seeped through at the seams. I like how this one turned out!

...This post is done on my cell phone, so I will have to add links a little later. :-) ...

Hope you're having an art-tastic day!

XoXo ~Leila

Inspiration is Everywhere.... Dylusions Journal - Page #2

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Continuing on in my Dylusions Journal....here is page 2 that I completed.

I used stamps from  Ranger Ink, Stampotique & Donna Downey.

This has definately been a learning process as I was happy with the page and now I'm not.

Mostly I'm not happy with it because the ink smeared EVERYWHERE.  For pretty much everything I used Staz-On permanent ink, but I had a design that ran along the curves and looked pretty cool, but the ink was not permanent - which I didn't realize until the smudgy smudginess, blech.
Have you seen the Sew Stampers?   They're pretty cool and have interchangeable heads and I like the designs...but they'd be even cooler if the ink stayed where I put it.  So that was a tad frustrating.  I did learn tho that I cannot use them if I've put mod podge down on my page, that was the reason the ink kept smearing.  I tried, cleaned, tried again...tried about 4 times and even tried to dry and use fixative.  Nope, Just didn't work and it is the reason my page looks a bit messy.

That's ok tho, after all it is a journal page, and anything goes in a journal!
I still like the design I did, just wish it wasn't so smudgy and dirty looking, and I really would've liked to have the finishing touches of that sew stamper design, but ahhh well.
Lesson Learned!

Hope you're having an art-tastic day!
xoxo

Creativity Is.... Dylusions Journal - Page #1

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For Christmas I got myself some Stampotique stamps and the Dylusions journal.

I was torn between what I wanted to put in this journal but ultimately decided I want to stick as much as I can to using stamp images.  I have a lot of stamps, but not many of actual figures.  I bit the bullet and bought several of the Stampotique image designs (credit cards are grrrreat!! ;-)  ) because I'm really drawn to their quirky and sometimes "dark(er)" feel to them.  

I guess you could say I identify with the stamps...

I used several stamps on this page, I suppose you could say I threw in everything but the kitchen sink, but I've not been a huge journaler, so I mostly just played around with stamps I was drawn to for this layout.  I made a mistake with the flower stem, initially everything was supposed to stay on the book page, but I wasn't paying attention and the stem went down to the bottom border .  As I sat and contemplated wiping off the staz-on ink, knowing full well it was going to be impossible and my thoughts were pointless... I stared at it a few more minutes to see if I wanted to leave the mistake or go with it.  I decided to go with it and did the rest of the stems in the center grouping the same way.  I actually kind of like it, lol.  I may or may not extend the rest of the stems - the ones on the outer edges.  I can't really decide, so for now I will leave as is.

The one thing I am bothered about and will just have to live with is a major mistake I won't be repeating.  When I got my  new journal, I  went through and added ink to a BUNCH of pages - at the same time.   I sprayed, moved spray around, and then sorta kinda dried.  

Well, the ink seeped through the binding because I was using so much liquid (mostly puddles of colorful water!) and so on my pages that should be one set of colors, there are now other colors in the center of the page.  At first I was super annoyed, but what's done is done...  I resolved the problem by deciding those pages would have book pages on the inside.  At least that way it hides most of the color that shouldn't be there.

Lesson learned!

I used my dylusions journal and ink sprays

Stamps from Stampotique

Stamps from Ranger's Tim Holtz line

Stampology stamps

Claudine Hellmouth stamps

Hope you are all having a fantastically artistic day. 

Happy New Year!

xoxo

Finally Finished Collage

I had started another paint over collage and posted a few WIPs.

But now I'm finally done, yay!  I'm glad I was able to re-work the colors to something I liked.  The pink just wasn't cutting it.  So here's the end result and now I can move on to something else.  :-)

Scavenger Hunt Journal Page

This journal page was created for an Art Geeks Challenge, the topic being Scavenger Hunt where she listed a number of items to include.  We had 2 weeks to complete and I barely got it done in time, lol.  Living with a toddler is quite challenging while also working full time and then trying to squeeze art in where I can...but I did it!

Hope you like it.

Art Geeks is a closed journaling group, but you can click here I believe to sign up.

The text is from Josh Ritter's Open Doors song.  Click the link and on the left side you can click to listen.  :-)

Never Look Back - Journal Page

This is the 1st page of my journal, a reminder to myself to quit looking in the past.  (The Woulda's, Coulda's, & Shoulda's)

Created for Art Geeks, I lost the email so I don't remember if it's for week 1 or 2, but it's for the prompt "tell a story."  I was already working on this page and had the layout down when I thought this fit the theme.

Not quite sure if I'm done with it.  I really like how it currently looks, but I may add some doodling...
Used acrylic paints, magazine cutouts, and collage sheets from Deviant Scrap & Etsy sellers: Nancy from Crowabout Studios, Tangie Baxter, and Marsha from Tumblefish Studios.

More Journal Pages In Progress

Right now I've just been having fun with putting together journal pages.

Next I'll get some text and quotes or whatever, but that requires more thought than I can muster right now with Xmas around the corner, so I'm staying in my own little zone, playing with paint, and putting the collage together.

Here are a few more pages I have put together, scroll down to the previous post to see more.

Hope you all are ready for Christmas!  ~*~ Happy Holidays!~*~

Journal Pages In Progress

Been super busy with a VERY active 3 year old, but wanted to quickly post a few journal pages I'm working on.  Managed to get the below layouts down...next is text and doodling, yay!

It's funny, I was never super into journaling, but I changed up the style and I think I like this process a lot better.  Don't know what it was about it before that didn't click for me, but watching this video and how she put her page together really helped me!

Christy has other pretty cool videos, click the link to go to her channel.

So here are my pages I'm working on....still in progress, but I'll post the finished pages as soon as I can!  The main pieces are cut outs from a magazine, acrylic ink, and random borders from Etsy & Deviant Scrap digital art sellers.

Made my own ink sprays!

Bet you're wondering what this is!

Would you believe me if I told you it's my new master piece?

Yea....

I wouldn't either, lol.

Actually, it's a spray sampler...why?  Because I didn't want to pay $5-$8 a bottle for new inks. Economic times are hard, maaaan, and I'm getting stingy with my money...

So I happened across a few youtube videos and learned to make my own.

I watched vid#1, vid#2, vid#3 and vid#4 - - -and realized it's surprisingly easy.  Whodathunk?!

I hit up Micheals for spray bottles, but they only had 4...so I ran over to Target on the off chance that they might have some spray bottles...which they did, so I bought 15 more. 

Next I grabbed a random mix of acrylic colors, metallic colors, and glitter colors that I already had and then dumped each one into the bottle, filled just under a quarter of the way.  Put a little glue in...don't know if I really need to, but it seemed like that's what some people do so the paint will stay put, and then filled with water leaving some room to shake.

Then I shaked the hell out of them so everything would mix, and then I sprayed my paper to see how the paint would look.  Everything looks really cool with the exception of the 2 glitter ones I did. I wasn't surprised though since I got the same result the girl in the video got, but we'll see, I may use in my art journal for a little glitter here and there...cuz you know I love glitter!!

Now for about $20 I have 19 different sprays...if you did the math, at $5 a new bottle that would be $100 or more, right???  Yeah, I saved some money, I have fun bright colors that I can use in my art journal, and I don't have to be stingy with the color because I didn't pay $5+ or more for it.

The magic of you tube....

Here's what they look like...although upside down for now so I can get it to mix better....

3 words to describe me...

Wake Each Day w/a Smile on Your Face

Came across a new challenge site called Journal Journey's the other day.

Just like with all the other sites I participate in, this site provides a word prompt and you have a month to create something in your journal based on the selected topic.

This month the topic is

PINK & ORANGE.

 

So here is what I've created, hope you like it.  :-)

 

xoxo

Leila 

Loves Me, Loves Me Not - Journal Page

Another journal page I had in my mind.  I'm quite happy with the end result, altho I will have to go a little lighter on the ink used for the text.  Seems a little hard to read.  Ah well, that's what a journal is for right?  Practice, yup!

Ok....on to the next one!  :-)

Used watercolor paper, acrylics, paper collage, paper flowers, lace

Stop & Smell the Roses - Journal Page

Here's a journal page I just finished, it's part of a series I'm starting and I figured I'd work on it in my journal before moving it to canvas.

I really like how it turned out!  I will definitely continue working this series.

What do you think of it?  :-)

I used water color paper, acrylic inks, printout, stencils, paper flowers, & ephemera.


In other news, little man is growing up SO fast.  I blinked and he's now in (pre) pre-school, complete with "school" pictures.  Here's one of my favorite ones we just received.  My little cuddly teddy bear.

2.5 years old

Grow - Journal Page

Just finished another journal page.  Hope you like it...

Prints will be available in my shop later this week :-)

It's OK to Dream - Journal Page

Just finished another journal page....

Here's the original one that I created:

[Click on the image to view larger]

Then I scanned it in and played around with color hues and contrast...

...and yeah, I think I really love some of these other versions, lol.

What do you think? Which one do you like? I love the bright colors, but I'm really diggin the muted toned one as well...Hmm.....which one to choose....

I think I'll have to just print them all to see how they turn out.  If they are all great, then rather than toss them, I will mail them to some Milliande RAAK members that I mentioned in this post.
Sounds like a plan to me...and now I can go nite nite.
Hope you're all well!

Fly Free - Journal Page

Journal I made for myself.

I really wanted a landscape journal that is 8 x 10 with watercolor paper.  So I  made my own!

Journal page I had on my mind, deciding where I wanted placements.

Adding color using Neocolor Watersoluble Crayons.  (I love these!!!)

More color and stamping text...

Adding embellishments.

Working on the face color...

More....color...more stamping...more text...

All done!

I started working on this journal page out of frustration with my job. Some days I just wish I could fly fly away from the stress and frustration that it is. (I blogged about it briefly here.) Since I can't do that at the moment, I zoned out when I got home and created this journal page.

I'm actually quite relieved that I finally have a journal I'm happy to work in. My moleskin was just too small for me and I found that after a few pages I just stopped bothering and went to digital. ...but I don't always want to do digital, I want to touch, feel, get messy and just create. So now that I have a bigger journal in the size I want that will lay FLAT and not flip close, well, I'm happy with that, so now I can do more. Hope you like this journal page. I should have more to upload soon enough!

Mama Lily Journal Page

Well I turned my Lilian sketch into a remembrance page for my grandmother.

I had done a digital remembrance for my mom's mom back in March when Grandma McHugh passed.

I felt it only right to do one for my dad's mom since I hadn't had a chance to do one and she passed back in Jan of 2009.

She never liked the word "grandma," said it made her feel old...for as long as I can remember our family called her Mama Lily.

A petite, but oh so strong woman that I loved visiting in Haiti.  The funny thing about Haiti is every time I go back, the scents that hit me as I leave the plane, every single time my spirit feels like I'm at home. 

I belong.

And every single time we depart, it never fails, I don't want to leave.

Haitians are such a beautiful people and I loved observing the cultural differences in the years I had with visiting Mama Lily.  I especially loved visiting with my grandma.  She gave us the biggest bear hugs she could and was always so interested in our lives and what we'd been up to.  I loved listening to her chatting away, even if it was in a language I never understood.  Thankfully she knew a bit of English so we were able to communicate, but when she got kiddy she switched back to Creole and I would watch her face light up with laughter.

I miss Mama Lily, and even with the year that she's already been gone, she's always in my thoughts.

WIP - Sketch - Lillian

Another work in progress of a sketch in my art journal.  

I like how she's turning out so far, she reminds me a little of my other grandma that passed last year.

I'm working off of a memory of a long ago photo...

So I've named her Lillian, after her.

Not sure how I plan to do the whole scene, but that's the fun part...

:-)