Life Outside the Fishbowl

A Cool Art Journaling Idea

I love to magazines in art journaling. I use the pages to do images transfers and cut out words and photos for collage. Here's another great use I found - magazine photos as stencils. Specifically photos of people to use as silhouettes.  I can't remember where I saw this first, but Julie Fei-fan Balzer  has a great video on this. 

And here's one of my pages where I used a magazine silhouette mask. I covered the page in packing tape before cutting out the image so I can reuse it over and over again. I had a great time using a variety of inks, paints and stencils with my silhouette. I picked up the fun stamp at the Spy Museum in DC.

 

Cool Office Finds - and a Coupon

I had to go to Staples yesterday to pick up some folders for taxes and poster board for Girl Scouts. While I was looking for the folders I came across a whole display of Martha Stewart office supplies by Avery.

I picked up a 5.5 x 8.5 binder and divided sheet protectos to match - these should be great for a minibook. The divided protectors would easily fit 3x5 photos. And the labels are cool - chalkboard, erasable, kraft, metallic, shaped.... There's also folders, notebooks & organizers.

And while looking for a photo to link for you, I found that Staples has a coupon on their website good through March 3rd for $5 off a purchase of the MS office stuff. 

More Winter Twig

Sharing another layout I did for ScrapbooksPlus this month with Little Yellow Bicycle's Winter Twig line. Thankfully "Snowmagedeon" is a distant memory.....

 

Art Journaling Pages

It's been awhile since I shared art journal pages. I did take some photos back in December, but then kept adding to the pages. And I'll probably keep adding to most of the pages below, but that's all part of the fun.  I've been doing a lot of playing with products, including paint, stencils and stamps. You'll see a few homemade stamps on the pages.

Here I started with testing a stamp I was carving. I decided to add the other two primary colors on top, and branched out into stencils. I had saved the horoscope from my birthday last year and collaged that onto the page, along with a stamp. This is one of those pages I keep going back to and adding things, a bit at a time so it's never really done. Just looking at it now makes me think I want to add some magazine transfers or more stamping.

Below is one of those pages where I really wanted to release some feelings. I started by journaling all over a blank page, then went back on top and started adding color with inks and paints. Lots of stamping, a bit of collaged words from magazines and a few rub ons.

For this last one, I wanted a hexagon stamp. Actually, it started with wanting a die to cut a decent size hexagon..... but anyhow I made myself a foam stamp. Then used it to stamp red paint on the page.

After that I layered a bit of stenciling on top. I really didn't journal on this page, I just like the simplicity of my shapes.... for now....

And one final page for today. This started out by using Tim Holtz's tissue paper as a starting point for a collage. I used a Crafter's Workshop stencil to make the clouds, made with Neocrayons, water color pencils and ink. I'll go back and add some more at some point, including journaling and a more color on the page.

A Few Cards

I had some time this week and was able to participate in My Mind's Eye's card challenge. I started with some of the leftover scraps from my designer's challenge layout  - and ended up with two cards.

I used papers and embellishments from the Miss Caroline collection - "Dilly Dally," except for the die cut tag which is from the "Dolled Up" group. *Love* the patterns and tickets.

For the second card I grabbed a few extras My Little Bicycle alphas, although they don't seem to photograph true to their color.

Supplies: My Mind's Eye paper from Miss Caroline: "Adventures" Fair, "Best" Vines, "Hello" Flannel, "Curious" Petals; Die cuts: "Adventures" Journal Card, "Best" Title, and "Cute" Title; "Best" Pins & Buttons, red twine, Martha Stewart border punch, Vintage Photo distress ink, My Little Bicycle chipboard alphas, Studio Calico wood alphas.

Redoing Layouts

When I flip through my scrapbooks, I'll often cringe at some of my earlier pages. I still love most of the page I've made, but honestly, there's a few that I can't stand. I have a really hard time leaving them alone. Like the photo of Rachel as a baby with word stickers stuck all over the page {shudder}.

So, when I was flipping around looking for photos use in CHA projects I found a few newborn baby layouts that really, really bugged me.

Next thing I know, I'm ripping them outta the page protector and grabbing some paper. I had recently picked up some of the Simple Stories' Baby Steps papers. I added some old Pink Paislee paper that I'd been saving...

and another page, with a Hambly transparency over the back side of a holiday paper. I used Claudine Helmuth paint and a Crafter's Workshop transparency for the clouds. Other supplies - Maya Road envelope, October Afternoon ephemera, My Little Bicycle alphas.

I recently did this layout for ScraPerfect's blog, using their Perfect Crafting Pouch to print my journaling on vellum.  Well, in general I liked it, but there were parts that bugged me. The ribbon, for one. And it was just feeling a bit dark. So I made a few adjustments.

And here's the revised layout ...

Designer's Choice Layout

We're doing something new at ScrapbooksPlus this year. Instead of our monthly pagemaps, we're replacing it with designer's choice layouts.  DT members will take turns creating a one page layout with new products from the store, complete with a sketch, supply list and directions.

This month, I'm up. And I grabbed items from My Mind's Eye's new Sweet Caroline collection. Most of product is from the Dilly Dally collection.  Love these papers! And I liked the rub ons so much I grabbed a second package. I left room for a 4x6 photo, plenty of journling, and a short title on top of the wooden sun.

A Day with Dyan Reaveley

The Monday after getting back from California I was packing a bag and treking up to the Queen's Ink in Maryland for a class with Dyan Reaveley. It was ball. Dyan is as funny as she is knowledgeable. And spending the day with Karen, Lisa and Angela was icing on the top - even with all the shushing going on.

I posted several pics on Facebook at the time, but thought I'd share some here, too. We made journal pages from newspaper and got to play with Adirondack paints, Dyan's new spray inks, Perfect Pearls mists and Dyan's cool stencils. Fun, fun, fun!

I'd never been to the Queen's Ink before. It's mostly a stamping store, with mixed-media worked in. It's in an old brick mill - fabulous walls & windows. And they've got lots of eye-candy all over the store  - it's given me the inspiration to get those unused configuration boxes out.

 

Murphy's Law

So last night Thomas asked me about Murphy's Law. I can't remember how it came up, but after I told him what it was he asked, "Is that for real?"

Well, yes, I told him. Look at what just happened. Today we had to pick up 93 cases of Girl Scout cookies. And Thursday my car's engine came on again, after two months necessitating towing again to the dealership. The day before we needed the SUV to pick up cookies.

The towing guy recognized me.

Anyhow, apparently the car will be ready on Monday. At least this time they found something and not another "well, we couldn't get an error code and can't duplicate the problem." They're replacing a cylider head on the engine. That's just not good for a car less than three years old.

So, yes, Murphy's Law is alive and well. And we were able to cram close to 50 cases in the rental car. Thanks to another mom with a minivan we got all the cookies.

Today is the Cub Scout Blue & Gold. Food is ordered, entertainment confirmed yesterday, parents are ready to decorate. We've got four huge piles of paper products in our living room. Hopefully, Murphy will stay home....

 

Winter Twig

The February DT kit at ScrapbooksPlus is the Winter Twig collection by Little Yellow Bicycle. Thought I'd take a moment and share two of the layouts I did.

I added some pink - well, it's about Rachel so there has to be pink. The is the extent of the snow we've gotten this year - not that I'm complaining at all! I added a bit of dictionary paper and tucked in a few pink odds and ends from October Afternoon, Basic Grey and My Mind's Eye.

And this next layout is a total scraplift of Lisa Truesdell's layout in the Hero Arts booth from CHA. It was my absolute favorite layout of the show. I had a bunch of large-sized scraps left from my other LYB projects and that layout really stuck in my mind.  It was fun to just make something quickly following someone else's design and a good way to relax after a busy trip.

I didn't really measure for the rays of paper, just kinda eyeballed where I wanted to cut. I was planning to put the 70 in the middle of the circles, but decided to use a lace embellishment from Basic Grey  to help hide my uneven paper ends a bit better. The stamp is a target stamp from a recent Studio Calico kit.