Do you have to do what I say?

"No!"

That was Dina Wakley's mantra over last weekend.  Dina is a great teacher and had produced this fabulous idea for a book.  The class was called 'Poetry in Motion' and took place over 3 days at Art from the Heart.

On Friday and Saturday we painted backgrounds, stencilled, used Dyan's new stencils, learned about Pan Pastels and did lots of other painty, messy, playfilled activities.  Such fun.  We were encouraged to fondle other people's work although I think we were probably quite restrained and only looked and were inspired.

On Sunday we assembled the book.  Did I get it right?  No.  Did it matter?  No!  I had listened and then put the page the wrong way round.  Not wrong! Different!  However I did add an extra sheet (which means 5 more pages to decorate).

On each day we were encouraged to dance. Not always a pretty sight!  But encouraged to move because we were making a book that moves.  I didn't completely finish at the workshop.  Had I done everything Dina had said to do?   Say it with me: "No!"

Dina had provided us with sheets of poetry which didn't really appeal to me.  (Sorry Dina).  However since I didn't have to do what Dina said, I printed out some words from songs we used to sing at church (well apart from Lord of the Dance), that were dance related.

Is the book finished?  Well it is for now because I have lots of other stuff to finish.

Will I add more stencilling and stamping to it?  Maybe. 

Did I enjoy the workshop?  Definitely.

Will I go back for more?  I really hope so.

I can't believe it's March already

Here are my February entries in my Art Every Day Journal.

I'll be honest though and say that some days didn't get done on the day but I have finished the month.

This is the finished February Calendar.

And here is the March calendar ready.  If you want to find out more about the art journal calendars go to Kate Crane's blog.

A totally creative weekend

I spent the weekend in Derbyshire.  Not the whole weekend because I came home to sleep, but the greater part of Saturday and Sunday was spent in the Snelston Reading Rooms with other eager crafters and the amazing Anneliese.  We were on a technique workshop using Ranger products.  Anneliese is a Certified Ranger Educator. You can find out about her workshops here.

There were 2 concerns about the workshop.  One, would the wretched weather last week prevent us from getting there.  And although the temperature was -7.5 degrees C when I set out on Saturday morning the roads were clear and the only ice was to be found where I parked in Snelston.

Secondly I have done very many workshops with Anneliese and I was concerned that I might just be repeating the same things.  I previously blogged about making an altered book to house all the tags I've made at her classes.

But joy of joys there were very few overlaps.  Anneliese had divided up the days into 9 product sessions and I haven't done any technique classes with her on Distress Stains, Perfect Pearls, Perfect Pearls Mists, Colorwash  or the piece-de-resistance the cotton bag to keep all the tags in.

We started on Saturday with embossing techniques which I found harder than I thought.  After all I've done embossing before but most of these didn't really work and my inner perfectionist was already panicking.  Anneliese was pointing out that these were technique tags and so didn't need to be beautiful but actually I would have liked the technique to have been right!  The one in the middle is a particular disaster - I used the wrong stamp I think.

Then we moved on to Dabbers ~ acrylic paint.

 

The we used Perfect Pearls.  I've never been very good with Perfect Pearls and it showed, but I feel that I improved.

The next group of tags was back in my comfort zone with Distress Inks.

 

Sunday was a messy day starting with Alcohol Inks.

Then we moved on to Distress Stains.  I haven't liked this product much as I couldn't see much use for it other than covering a large area in one colour.  However Anneliese introduced us to lots of techniques and I might be converted.  Just as well really because I found that I already own 8 colours plus Picket Fence!!!

We moved on to Perfect Pearls Mists

And then to Colorwash ~ another product I'm not very fond of.  But guess what?  I do have 4 colours of this.

And lastly ~ drum roll please.  We transferred a print onto canvas using Gel Medium and also stamped on the cotton bag.

And I'm pleased to say that my inner perfectionist enjoyed the weekend and Sunday in particular, thankfully coming home with a totally finished project that I like!!

Do check out Anneliese's workshops ~ they are really well-taught and enjoyable.

Letter Love

I have started a new online class with Joanne Sharpe called Letter Love 101.

It called for the use of a composition notebook and I had just the one.  When I was last in Florida, Laleina (my daughter-in-law's niece) asked her Mum to buy me this:

And when I had coloured it in:

So it is just the right notebook for practising lettering in.

First of all I gathered together all the black pens that I have:

 

I've still had to order some more because I don't have any Copic pens.

Here are some of the exercises using the pens:

January pages

I am amazed to find myself up-to-date with my January entries in my Scrapbook Life Journal.   The first few entries can be seen in this post.

And here are the rest of my pages.

These are the walks that I have done:

We were asked to cut out words from magazines.  No other information.  Just cut out words that jumped out to us as we went through the magazine.  A few days later we were given the instructions for what to do with the words.   We had to make sentences across a double page of our scrapbook.  Remember that we cut up scrapbook cardstock at the beginning and out them randomly into the binder.  

And this was what I came up with.

I did this extra page as a result of some of the things I have been thinking about.  Plus I was inspired by a photo I saw on Pinterest.

I'm looking forward to Stephanie's next assignments for February.

The last day of January

And here is my Art Every Day journal for the month:

And my completed January calendar:

I'm all ready for February.  Bring it on!