And Yet More 30 Days In Your Journal

I am still doing this wonderful on-line course by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer. It is really good for showing new techniques that I have never tried before and also it has freed me up to do much more of the journalling - instead of just the art!

This was an interesting spread to do, as it uses a collage of old book pages, plus gesso and watercolour as the background and has a focal point of a face and hair.

I like the idea of the face becoming an integrated part of the page, with journalling flowing around it.
My first woman had wonky eyes so I had to repaint her. My husband says all my women are dreamy pre- Raphaelite types with full mouths, large eyes and languid expressions ( he thinks they are very soppy!). Therefore this face is a much stronger and more powerful one... I did not like her much at first, but she is growing on me! I think she would be someone to turn to for good advice!


The next page was great fun; this part of the course involves playing with alphabet letters, and trying to use your own style to make a personalized font.
I shall be interested to see how this page develops (watch this space!)

I made a grid for the alphabet and used the left over right hand side of the page to add to the left hand page to make a slightly wider spread for journalling; I used Julie's lovelyThanksgiving image as although we don't celebrate it here in the UK, my son is in Michigan with his US wife and they were celebrating with a chicken stir-fry:)

(Some of the journalling is a rant I'm afraid as my husband's hospital referral - which was supposed to have been done a month ago was never made:()

However - for the headings I used some Dover and Sizzix alphabets, some peel offs and the numbers were Tim Holtz chipboard letters, Sizzix again and some Cuttlebug numbers - plus my nice new spotty washi tape as thanks to Julie I have found this new arty resource!

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!!