And now some happier pages

I love this colour scheme - red, black and neutrals - and I also have asked for it in my new deco book which is about to go into a deco journal swap on atcsforall.com.

Again I was planning to use some Cuttlebug bits and pieces - Tim Holtz dies again, the steampunk cogs and wheels and slide die, and used them to cut out stark black, red and lettering.

I also used lettering from the Melody Ross SoulFood, pages again, plus old book pages, and positive and negative cuts for the butterflies,

Finally I used a script Cuttelbug embossing folder to make a back ground of embossed semi distressed script and used some frames made from Paper Cellar Ltd Victorian Classic papers waste after I had cut out some journal pages.. I wanted a strong composition of squares with repetition of elements..

I was  terrrifed of my work becoming twee by using embossing folder and cutting dies, but I am really pleased with the drama of this page...

And also using more stepped pages...

As I said in the previous post ,back in April I was writing about using the Strathmore Journal workshops to make stepped pages and fold out pages, so I have had some pages with the backgrounds waiting to be used since posts in April and June... as another part of my Art Journal Every Day challenge.. 


so this time I have been using the set of stepped pages.

Back in June I made these backgrounds and borders for the stepped pages I made for Strathmore Art Journal papers Workshop 2.


I have re-posted the pictures here which show how I added the borders and used  acrylic washes and sequin waste to make  a series of backgrounds.


But then I was not sure what to do with them, so they languished ...

Then I was thinking about memories and how to exorcise - or learn to live -  with difficult past events.

And also thinking that I want to try to combine poems I have written in the past with my current art journalling.

The result is some dark, confessional pages...

Our first baby was stillborn and a year later we had a beautiful daughter, but then 3 years later we  had another daughter, but she was also stillborn at 38 weeks.

Then 6 years later we had our first son and 22 months later a second son - and it was at that stage that I was able to write about what had happened, so these pages are the poem that came out of a kind of acceptance of what had happened, because what else can you do?

I had my miracle family - we had our three beautiful children - but there were still little ghosts in the shadows of the babies that might have been...

But I had shut it all away so the poem is all about that sealing of experiences - and unsealing them.

Then the final spread is about Openings and Moving On, with some journalling about where I am today... now that the children are all grown up and now that we have grandchildren..

More Using Fold Out Journals -

I always said it was a hyperactive blog - but it is not fast!


Back in April I was writing about using the Strathmore Journal workshops to make stepped pages and fold out pages, so I have had some pages with the backgrounds waiting to be used since posts in April and June... as another part of my Art Journal Every Day challenge...

I had got as far as using some eraser stamps I carved to stamp "seek", "find" and "live" all around the edges of the page, but then I was playing with my new Cuttlebug.

I have got some Tim Holtz dies and big up plates for the Cutttlebug, so I have used his slide film die plus other Cuttlebug and Sizzix dies for lettering, butterflies and dragonflies.

I got some lovely paper by Melody Ross designer collections called "Soul Food" with these great generic fifties/sixties women, so I cut those out and used the same paper as some of the die cut material.

There was a quote on the page with the girl on the left saying "She stopped to smell the daisies" so I used that as the theme of the page. I used two other figures - one on the left looking serious and studious with one in the middle encouraging her to have a full life and also take some time out.

Then I had a rush of flowers and insects going across the whole panorama and to link the women and to give it a joyful feel...

I feel happy just looking at it!!

Making Art Dolls

I signed  myself up for lots of swaps on ATCsforall.com for making art dolls - jointed paper dolls on a theme  - so as a result I have been making lots of dolls.

Great fun, the room is full of funny little people!


Rather than use a template -(thought there are lots of them on the site and on the internet ) - I decided to draw my characters and then turn them into the jointed dolls.

So I did lots of drawings.

I had 4 themes - mermaids, spooky halloween dolls, failed super heroes and women..


I photocopied the sketches I had made and stuck them on a light box with masking tape. I drew over the images, allowing for the overlapping in the sketches - i.e. I added extra pieces to fit behind other pieces, like long necks to heads so the heads could be fastened behind the bodies, extra long shoulders to the tops of arms etc so the finished drawings were all the bits of the dolls ready to be assembled with paper fasteners with all the hidden bits also shown. Hope this makes sense!

Then I transferred the images onto white paper and stuck the whole sheets to card with PVA glue.

I added some finer details - like the hands - and then coloured them in using Inktense pencils. These are very controllable but look like paint when wetted - you can also add more detail over them without the first coat running. I also used some twinkling H20s for the mermaids' tails and metallic pencils for robotic shine...

Then I laid each join together, pierced them with a - mmm don't know what it is called it is basically a pointed spike in a metal handle - and then used paper fasteners to animate them... I shall be quite sorry to see them go!

Using Chine-collé Dry Point Prints in collaged journal pages

I decided to use the mermaid prints I made at my printing workshop to illustrate a spread on the subject of "Mermaid Tales."
The inspiration is T.S. Eliot's Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock with the mermaid imagery:-

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

  I do not think they will sing to me.

  I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.

  We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown            
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.


I used watercolour spray paint for the background and collaged on some embossed rectangles cut from a decorated page and embossed with Cuttlebug textures.

I used two complete chine-collé mermaid prints and then cut out the mermaids from other prints I had made.

I tried to bring the whole page together with an overlay of cut out and collaged waves.

Acetate Dry Point Prints and Lino Prints

 These are the prints I made using the Cuttlebug as a printer.

They have been altered for an ATCsforall.com Chunky Book swap, so these are 4" x 6" pages.

I cut out doors and windows so that they would open and added collaged medieval images inside the houses, before backing them with strong cardboard.

Then I decorated the houses with Derwent Inktense pencils, and added more collage elements to the outside of the buildings. Again these are medieval images cut out from some imagery of old Books of Hours.

Now I have a terrace of nice little houses, all ready to fly off to the USA once I have "chunkied" them up with beads, ribbons etc....!

Using a Cuttlebug as a printing press for Dry Point Printing using acetate sheets and Lino Cutting

After playing with a borrowed machine, I have just bought myself a Cuttlebug which is an embossing and cutting machine, with potential for cutting tags, alphabets and embossing backgrounds... and I am already using it for that.

However, when I first tried it out, it  also occurred to me that it might be possible to use (or maybe that is abuse) the machine as a printing press...

I have been doing a chunky house swap for atcsforall.com, so I had made 6" x 4" drawings of house fronts for that, so I thought that they would make  ideal linear shapes for printing from.


I have to say it took a bit of trial and error!

I used a water soluble black printing ink (Calder colours Ocaldo block printing water colour) rolled it out on a plastic tray with my printing roller and then rolled the black ink over the acetate  plate.  Because it is clear I always scratch the surface with a finger nail before I get started to make sure that the  incised side is facing up.

I had not got any scrim, so after pushing the ink into the plate with a rectangle of cardboard, I scrubbed the ink off using newspaper. It is VERY messy so I used disposable latex gloves. It took several goes to clean the plate and a lot of pressure.

Then I took the gloves off and washed my hands so that I would not be gunging up my new machine!

I had already dampened some coloured card by spraying it with water and then interleaving it between sheets of kitchen roll.

I placed the plate face down on to a sheet of the damp paper.

  Then I carefully sandwiched the plate in lots of newsprint so that
a. there was no stray ink to get on the Cuttlebug
b.there was a certain amount of give when the print went through the roller.

I put it through the machine using the normal configuration recommended for embossing - first plate a,  then plate b, then the sandwich of print, then the other plate b on top and wound it through the machine..


First I made the paper too wet and the print  was watery.

Then I tried again and the prints were too faint (it is sounding like the three bears!).

But I still thought it ought to be possible so  I went back to the acetate plates.

I went over each plate again and cut the lines again with a slightly broader etching needle.

 I also made the printing ink a little more liquid with a squirt of water from a sprayer to make sure that the ink went really well down into the etched lines.

(It's probably not a good idea to change two things at once but I was a dying to see what I got).

And here are my first successful plates.

It also works for lino cutting, though again I had to mess about with different layers of paper filling to get the lino and paper to go through the machine without stressing the machine too much, or without it just rolling through and not printing.

I used a Tim Holtz Distress ink pad which I rubbed over the surface of the lino which was lying in a sandwich of paper - this also printed very well, though  it is easier to take lino prints than the dry point as you can take a print off lino by rubbing the receiving paper on the back with a baren.

However,  I am very pleased with my first experiments -  especially the dry point as it is impossible to take prints from the acetate plates without using some sort of press.

Mmm now for some chine-collee perhaps?