Weekly Visual Journey

I have started a Visual Journal and as often as possible I am going to make a page and blog it, by the end of the year I hope I will have a book full of ideas, layouts, quotes, colour palettes and further design inspiration.

The first page can be found here and certainly got me started on making a ‘quick’ (well quick for me) visual collage and I certainly had to push myself into working without a plan.

I haven't entered any challenges for a long time and have decided to 'keep an eye' on a few that I know will provide me with inspiration and challenging themes that will get me back into thinking about new ideas and help me explore and practice alternative and perhaps unfamiliar ways of approaching my art. The changes at PaperArtsy certainly look exciting and I will enter this altered book with it's 'fragile' pages there.

So I have another double page spread for you.

This week I wanted to try out  a photo transfer technique and began with two tags and a photo of my daughter as a baby and one of my Mum as a young woman.

I had researched techniques and decided to go with one I had found using mod podge. But my favourite wet glue is Evo-stik wood adhesive so I experimented with that instead.

Many of the tutorials you find say you can only use laser prints but I used my trusty inkjet printer and a thin photographic paper. When the photo was dry I adhered it to the distressed tag (face down) and dried it with my heat gun. I also let it cool and left if for about half an hour to ensure it was dry.

Using some warm water I began to gently rub it into the back of the photo so that the paper rubbed away and slowly the image began to appear.

I continued to do this until I could see the image clearly.

I gave Maddie’s photo a sealing layer of the wood glue …..

….. but not with my Mum’s photo as I wanted to see the differences. I actually prefer the matte finish to the shiny finish from the glue.

I gathered some collage pieces, tissue wrap, tissue tapes, scraps of papers and borders and started to glue them down.

I have to admit I did spend some ‘thinking’ time on this one but not too much, just enough to plan the butterfly in the film strip and to find the letters and numbers I wanted to add.

So there we have it my second go at creating a collage and this time with trying out a new technique as well. I have to say I am rather pleased with it.

Thank you to Nikki, Alison, Sue and Mona for joining my blog hop and sharing your journal pages with me. You can see their contributions below as part of the link-up. I would love it if you joined in as well. I am deciding whether I keep each linky open for 2 weeks or a month, let’s see what happens before I make the decision. So it’s ‘anything goes’ with whatever journal/sketchbook/ type activity is right for you.

This is the code to add to your post so you can share the Link Up with your readers.
get the InLinkz code
Please join our Visual Journal Link Up and thank you for sharing your inspiration with us.

hugs Brenda xxx

An InLinkz Link-up

Something New at CVC

Peace, Hope and Joy for 2015

For my second piece for the ‘something new’ challenge at Country View Crafts I decided to get out my Inspirational Quote Journal as I haven’t added anything to it for quite a while. You know when an idea hits you and you’ve just got to go with the flow? Well that’s what happened here. So if you pop back to see my next post today you will notice the connection in wanting to free myself up from some of the time I spend over-thinking pieces of work and also procrastinating – which I seem to do a lot of……

This is a double page spread with words and symbolism to fit in with the thoughts behind starting a new year filled with peace, hope and joy.

There are lots of layers to these pages using inks, stencils, die-cuts, texture paste, distress paints and stains.

My new candle die had to have an airing as a prayer for peace and to symbolise life, love and celebration ......

..... with the clock standing for the passing of time and that we stand on the brink of another new year, a year in which we hope will bring all those special things.

We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called ‘Opportunity’ and its first chapter is New Year’s Day.  Edith Lovejoy Pierce.

For me in the essence of this new challenge theme the ‘something new’ consists of a new year and using new supplies that I have added to my ever growing collection of art and craft materials, much of it thanks to Susan’s advent surprises plus some crafty goodies for Christmas from my sister Chris. I just love the new dictionary stamp she bought me which I have used on these pages - thanks Chris.

So I am looking forward to many more opportunities in the coming year to learn new techniques, to create more art and to see your new work too which is always an inspiration to me ,,,,

.... and to hopefully buy and play with a few more goodies (and as I have some CVC vouchers to spend too I think I will wait to see what comes from CHA before making any new purchases).

Wishing you all a great weekend

hugs Brenda xxx

A Visual Journey 2015

A Visual Journey 2015

I have decided that this year I need to free myself from over thinking some of my designs. Don’t get me wrong, standing back, walking away and giving yourself some time can be a good thing but often I am making a small project and I start to procrastinate, try to change elements and over think so that my creativity goes out the window and I completely lose the thread. So I thought that if I made a Visual Journal/Diary/Sketchbook and practiced making quick designs at least once a week or fortnight it would help me to free myself from this constraining practice and would also give me the chance to experiment with techniques and ideas that I pick up when visiting your blogs or that I see on Pinterest.

So today is day ONE and I am looking to post something hopefully every Thursday and wondered if you would like to join me? Along the way I will tell you what my inspiration is or what I am trying to achieve and I will add a linky to the bottom of my post. There are no prizes and certainly no pressure to share every time I post but by linking we can visit other artists or crafters who would like to show us what they are doing and find even more inspiration between ourselves.

I bought this old book sometime last year and have been waiting for the opportunity to use it and now is the time. It's a fabulous hard back with gorgeous watercolour type paper pages. Some were cut and some were just torn when it was made so it attracted me straight away when I saw it on a market book stall.

I have started with a double page collage. First I prepared the pages by drawing round some of the words I wanted to show through then painted them with gesso and a little frayed burlap distress paint. When they were just about dry I places waxed paper between the pages so they wouldn't stick together and put under a heavy box to make sure they were flattened well.

My collage is made up of a variety of scraps found on my desk and as I started to design the layout and pick up each of the elements I was creating links to the book title, so that when I had finished putting it all together I added some words that I thought The Roadmender would see or be aware of when he was out every day. They've added the dialogue I felt this collage needed.

I added a little bit of stamping and consciously chose the tissue tapes to go with the design, but otherwise the pieces were all picked up from scraps that were left on my desk from previous projects. Can you believe that they fitted together so well?

The number 8 is foil tape on card and the piece I played with before making my my new year plaque (see previous post).

I hope you will consider joining in with this visual journey. Anything goes with whatever journal/sketchbook/ type activity is right for you. My Pinterest page explains it as -
'Keeping a visual journal is a journey of experimentation; giving time to be free in expressing yourself and not constrained by others expectations. Practicing design, layouts, composition, colour mixing, techniques, materials, mixed media. Creating your own exercises, titles, mood boards, taking yourself out of the box, finding yourself. Bring new ideas to life, to spark you off in new directions, to allow your own imagination and creativity to develop in complete freedom'.

Thanks for joining me today

hugs Brenda xxx

This is the code to add to your post so you can share the Link Up with your readers.
get the InLinkz code

  Please join our Visual Journal Link Up and thank you for sharing your inspiration with us.

An InLinkz Link-up

Happy New Year plaque

Foil tape plaque for 2015

Happy New Year I hope you will have a happy, healthy and peaceful 2015 and be able to enjoy some regular inspiration time to create and make beautiful art.

I am starting the year with something special I made to hang in the dining room for our new years eve party - a plaque to hang over the mirror with the year on it..

Process steps

Cut 4 ATC size pieces of card (2 ½  x 3 ½  ins) covered with foil tape and run each one through  the texture trades numbers set for 2015. I've used a mixture of Ranger foil and DIY foil.

Cut more pieces of card covered in the foil tape and run through a selection of embossing folders. And adhere the patterned pieces of foiled card patchwork style to an A4+ sized piece of greyboard.

Add strips of the foil tape to join some of the edges and to seal the edges.

Use metal tools to edge each piece and to add any other decorative features you might want to add,

Paint over the whole piece with black soot distress paint and before it’s dry wipe over with kitchen towel to take most of it off leaving black paint in the crevices.

Next take the numbers and again paint and wipe away the excess, let them dry.

Blend alcohol inks over, then drip some blending solution over then recessed areas and wipe off. I was aiming to get reddy numbers and a brown background. Drip the browns in the recessed areas and again drip a couple of drops of blending solution on. Pick them up and move them around so that the colours move across the foil. When dry I got a very small paint brush, the black soot DP, the brown alcohol inks and blending solution. I painted some black around the numbers to help them stand out more and then just played with the other supplies until I was happy with the blending and colourisation.

The numbers were mounted onto brown card and adhered to the board and a spread a little teak wood alcohol ink around the edges to frame it (just like I would with vintage photo or walnut stain distress ink on my papercraft projects). Add some snaps with the Cropodile and some wire to hang it by.

It was dark by the time I got to take this photo so it looks completely different to the one above it, but here it is hanging on the mirror, you can just see the reflection of some Christmas lights.

Thank you for all your support and wonderful comments last year, I so appreciate them particularly when my teaching schedule got so busy and I couldn't get round to see you all as well. But new year and fresh start, I am definitely going to try and do better.

We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.

Walt Disney

Enjoy your creative moments.

hugs Brenda xxx

Tim's tag for December

I am so pleased I managed to find a bit of time today to get my last Tim tag of the year done, all the details and process steps for Tim's own tag are over on his blog. Although I have got the prancing deer that he used, I decided to go with a lantern which reminded me more of the new year and the candle signifying peace. In fact you will see candles from me again very soon.

I didn't have all the supplies Tim used but I did use all his techniques from the background to the lantern and greenery. The word vision comes from Tim's stacked artful words strip die

I love the way the lantern turned out with the distress paint background and the glitter over the top and of course I added one of my rusted bells, it just seemed to fit, I love the candle stuck behind the frosted tag

The little clip at the top of the tags is one I bought when I went back to my home town of St. Ives recently (near Cambridge). One of my old school friends was working in a vintage shop in town so I popped in to see her and found them, they have a hook on them so the tag can be hung up.

Well it's New Years Eve tomorrow, have a great day and evening I will be back Thursday with two posts to start the new yeatr. I can't go without giving my huge thanks to Tim for an amazing year of creative inspiration and these wonderful monthly doses of sheer brilliance. As I am so late (again!!!) getting this completed and linked to Tim's blog, I won't have so much time to wait till the next one. I shall now pop over to his blog and link my tag for the last time this year.

Take care everyone.

Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.

Hal Borland

hugs {brenda} xxx

Ring–ring, ring-ring…… new challenge at AVJ

Ring out the old – Ring in the new

It is my turn to choose the challenge at AVJ for the next fortnight and I thought it should be themed around the New Year but trying to keep it as ‘open’ as possible.

I found a short poem –

“Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.”
Alfred Tennyson

This inspired me to think about using the bells die, I don’t have the big one just the mini movers and sharpers ones but even with Christmas looming I didn't get much of a feel for it. I also thought about using the Tim clock but some of my amazing teamies were posting their fantastic contributions with clocks on and I decided I needed to go in another different direction. It was after chatting to my sis about it that she took me off to ‘telephones’ – ringing friends and family to wish them a Happy New Year. So this is my contribution for ‘Ring out the old, ring in the new’.

The Tim telephone was cut in greyboard, daubed with black soot distress paint and a small amount of vintage photo, broken china and peeled paint distress embossing powders sprinkled in and heated. When cool I blended walnut stain distress ink over it.

The cover was made with a linen type fabric sponged with tarnished brass distress paint.

Over this I adhered some old telephone book pages and then I applied Wendy Vecchi's black embossing paste through the clockwork stencil and let dry then some black gesso through Tim's texture layering stencils.

When that was dry I stamped some images, words and numbers in black, brown and white acrylic paints and used black and white posca pens for outlining some of the numbers.

These became the covers. I added just a few collage pieces…..

… and another collage on the inside cover…

.. some tabs …

.. and left the back cover with just the textured background.

Tim’s label letters came in really useful for the index and the front cover. My inspiration this week was his telephone die and the layering stencils. By using other textures (book paper, hessian and sewing) and mixed media techniques I am really quite pleased with the outcome.

I hope you'll be inspired to translate the theme in your own way for this challenge.

Have fun.

Hugs Brenda xxx