#365Challenge.... 25 February 2017

I've received a couple of questions about the page for 25th February so here's a simple step-out of how I created the page...

The page was created by die cutting circles from post it notes (you could use paper instead) and randomly placing them on the surface.

Then I sprinkled 'a bit jaded' Infusions onto the surface and spritzed with a fair amount of water and while it was still damp I removed the circles....

The leaf stamp is from a lovely set from PaperArtsy, by Kim Dellow ref: EKD06.  I stamped these in Archival Ink Potting Soil to tone in with the walnut stain in the Infusions.
The leaves are painted with 'blue green' watercolour paint and copper pencil.

I replaced the circles and stamped on words (using Potting Soil), these are from a mini stamp: JM15.

Hope that answers all the questions  - if not please add them in the comments.

Thanks for stopping by

ALBOTAT: Happy Fathers' Day

Yesterday was Father's day here in the UK,  here is the card I made for my Dad... 

If you look closely you notice something unusual for me.. NO stamping!!  The lovely blue/brown splat (for want of a better word) on the back ground is PaperArtsy's new Infusions - I'm liking those very much!!

 (wood strip is Washi tape, 'happy' is die cut, sentiment banners are computer generated, stag head is from stash)

x

ACP:2 Yellow + F

... yeah, yeah, yeah... this is a late late blog post.. (I thought about moving straight onto April and not completing March's letters but I felt I'd be letting myself (and the project) down if I didn't keep (roughly) to the schedule... (I'm cutting myself some slack here...) but I'm back on it so here we go..

this is yellow's final outing (I've had a word with April and its very accommodating of March's yellow's intrusion into its month (April has a very gentle colour - you'll be introduced to that very soon...)

The second letter for March is F... lots of lovely options for that - and I went for 'feathers' - it was a close call between that & Fabric & Felt - but I didn't have any yellow fabric so that put a stop to that option (and yes, of course I could've painted or dyed it but this letter was late already so lets not complicate things any further...)

aaaaanyhoo I had a plan:  Feathers + yellow paint + papers creating a journal page about feathers.  I find them interesting.  Individually they are such gentle, soft, fragile items but put together can have such strength and give such freedom...

I have 2 sets of feather dies - and I wanted to use the smaller ones.... could I find these dies??
NO. I. COULD. NOT.....
would other dies 'do' in their place?
NO.THEY.WOULD.NOT! ....
It was one of those situations where a substitute is NOT going to be good enough/won't work! (I might've had a frustrated mini 'where are the dies, I've looked everywhere' meltdown at this point while creating what started out a such a simple plan)...

So, after what seemed like hours of unsuccessful searching, I created the page without the feathers - with F now being represented by FRUSTRATING, FIND, and FATIGUE !! it became a page about how I felt at the time of creating, not about the original subject matter.... I like that!

Its a page in my 6in spiral bound journal....  I rollered Slate Fresco Finish around the edges after rollering the paint onto an alphabet foam stamp - love the size of this stamp...

Next I added a wash of yellow watercolour (enjoying working with watercolour paints at the moment)...

then I thought what this page needs is a sprinkling of the new PaperArtsy Infusions - I chose 'Golden Sands'.. then I added a couple of strips of patterned papers....  I like the amount of white space still remaining..

I added the words 'Find!!' (because I reeeeeeaaally wanted/needed to find those dies), 'Frustrating' because NOT finding them was exactly that (lol), and 'Fatigue' because that is what I have and I can't deal with the (not really a)(self-imposed) drama of trying to finish a journal page/project blog post! (Not really life or death is it!)(or rocked science) lol
The die cut gears are there because my gears just don't go round fast enough when I'm fatigued.

I quite liked the page like this... not too bad.... but its missing something... and do you know what that is???

FEATHERS - it is missing FEATHERS.. lol (like a dog with a bone! I just can't let it go!)

So I got out the dies I could find (Sizzix, Tim Holtz - cut and emboss feathers) & die cut two.. coloured them and attached them to the page...

.. and now I really like the page...  and the feather dies that I could find and used turned out to be better than the others because they have texture and detail....

This was a lesson for me - to use what I have and make it work - not waste time & energy trying to find the 'perfect' missing item - the page turned out well in the end - and now has meaning on a completely different level.

Thanks for stopping by

x

PS  remember the mustard trousers from my previous blog post? They've arrived, and they're lovely!! Now I just need to be brave enough to wear them! :o)