Tuesday 31 January 2012

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!



Monday 30 January 2012

Ready for February

I have been keeping up with my Art Every Day journal and will show you all the January pages later in the week.

In my journal I am also doing the monthly Calendar challenge set up by Kate Crane.  This usually involves painting a background and cutting up squares, or in February's case probably hearts, and sticking them on as mini journaling blocks.

However I was inspired by this photo that I found on Pinterest and which can also be found on Flickr.

So here is my version ready for February:

Wednesday 25 January 2012

A home for tags

I have been on lots of courses run by Anneliese.  To the extent that the running joke was that she was thinking of installing a hammock as I seemed to be there so often I may as well sleep there!

Anyway, this has meant that I have part-finished altered books, completely finished altered books, an altered scrapbook book and lots of tags.  You can find out about Anneliese's workshops at Creative Journey Workshops.

One of her upcoming workshops is her Altered Technique Book which is a mix of making tags and journaling about the technique in an altered book.   And so, inspired by the photo on Anneliese's website, I set about altering a book.

But rather than recycling/upcycling an old printed book I used a sketchbook that I've had lying about for ages.   I removed some of the pages ready to start.

When I start projects, especially when I'm at workshops, the fear factor jumps in or the perfectionism streak!  I get really stuck with the colours, the theme, the everything about what the finished project will look like and find many ways to procrastinate!   So I decided that I would just not think about it, and stick things down and paint and stamp without thought for the end result.

Last year I had taken part in an international swap of collage ephemera all of which I was keeping in the envelopes they came in, inside a box.  So not likely to ever make it to a page!! 
 I spread out all the ephemera on the table and sorted into piles of similar papers or bits.

Then I randomly stuck the ephemera down on the blank pages.   I chose 3 colours of Dylusions acrylic paint - Vanilla, Turquoise and Orange.   I painted every page all over with the Vanilla and added highlights of the orange and turquoise and used some sequin waste to stencil with.
 
Then I chose 2 sets of Dylusions stamps and limited myself to those and stamped randomly over the pages.



I took each set of tags which had the instructions on how to make them written on the back and copied the information onto the page and then stuck the tag in.  I used a Tippex Mouse to make the white lines to write on.




The tag content so far covers Distress Inks, Alcohol Inks, Using Metal and 10 of the 12 tags of Christmas.  And there's still room for 16 more tags.   Good thing I'm off to another workshop very soon!



Friday 13 January 2012

One Little Word ~ January

I am using the prompts from Ali Edwards in the BPC class One Little Word 2012.  I did the class last year but felt at the end of the year that I had completed the tasks for the class but that my word: RESTORE had not made as much impact on my life as I would have liked.

I am determined this year to move forward, to do less procrastinating and to achieve my goals.  And to that end, as you know, I have written them down.

Although I have to be honest and admit that I do love this poster.  A brilliant excuse for procrastination.

I am using the same binder as I used in 2011 so needed a page (on the left) to cover the blank page behind the last entry for 2011.   I used Wordle  to make a graphic of the relevant words and then listed my goals for 2012.


The small page on the left should have a photo of me on it but I haven't found one I like yet!



Ali provides the prompts and the graphics to print out.  Instead of putting the 9 cards into individual pockets I have stuck mine onto Kraft card and put it into one large pocket.

Thursday 12 January 2012

Scrapbook Life Journal 2012 update

I've been working on and off over the past 2 weeks on my Life Journal.  Each week Stephanie provides resources and prompts.

The back cover of my binder

The front cover

 The January divider

Stephanie provided this doodle for us to colour.

The theme for January is Honesty

 My One Little Word for 2012 is FOCUS and to help me focus I listed my goals for the year


On UKScrappers there's a thread where people encourage each other to walk each week.  My goal this year is to take one long walk each week and here are the layouts I've done in my Life Journal to remind me of the walks.
 



Tuesday 10 January 2012

I met a greater-spotted bird-spotting biker

In keeping with my goal to do one long walk each week I went to Middleton Lakes ~ an RSPB Reserve.  To be honest anything further than walking round Sainsburys is a long walk.  
However this was 6km or so (or 3.75 miles in old money!)

I'm not sure whether the distance is calculated on when you get to the start of the walk or includes the distance from the car park!
Anyway after I'd walked the Wetland Trail and met one couple taking photos and a man carrying a mountain bike, I met the aforementioned biker.  Who was very nice, and very chatty.  He wore camouflage trousers and jacket and a bright red top!   He had a fabulous Nikon camera with the most amazing lens. However he said he had wanted to buy a larger one which cost £12,000 and instead had bought a Nikon Bridge Camera for £300 which had the same capacity - 800 mill (whatever that is).

His opening gambit had been 'It's very quiet here today.'  So thinking about the 3 people I had seen, I said yes it was but this was the first time I had visited so had no idea how busy it might be.  To which he replied 'Well most of the birds seem to be hiding and I haven't seen the longhorn cattle.'  (Keep scrolling down for the rest of the conversation!)






Love the idea of this notice - wildlife only please - rather than the usual No entry - do NOT style of sign.

Not sure what these are since I was on the same path as the greater-spotted bird-spotting biker.   Look like Longhorns to me!

The path round the meadow eventually came out alongside the canal.  What a dfference a few years make.  Below this photo is the same canal in January 2009.


Just see how muddy the path was.  I asked the gsbs biker if the whole path was muddy and he said some of it was.  I said I should have worn my walking boots rather than my walking shoes, but at least I wasn't in my ordinary shoes.  
To which he responded: 'I saw a woman who was getting on a bit, she was about 60, and I just had to tell her that the sandals she was wearing weren't suitable for the walk.'  I refrained from telling him that I'm 62.  Anyway this bit of path was the beginning and end and much of the middle was less muddy!

Near the car park was a farm where there was this stand-off.

And here's the gsbs biker's bike in the car park.

Today is also 10 on the 10th day over at Shimelle's blog.  I thought I would show you 10 of my photos from today's walk.  Of course, you will have noticed there are 11 photos ~ but the one from 2009 doesn't count.   If you want to see more 10 on the 10th click here.