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Autumn Journal Page

I love to pick up fallen leaves when we go for walks with Finn. The autumn leaves are such beautiful colours. There is just something about them that I can’t resist, although I am never quite sure what I will do with them once I get them home. More often than not, they will end up being tossed away again. This year, however, I was determined to use some on a journal page.

Although the leaves were already dry when I collected them, I pressed them under a pile of heavy books for a week to flatten them before I used them.

I painted the background of my journal page with watercolour paints, in autumn shades of golds, reds and orange. Then I glued a photo of Finn onto the page and surrounded it with the leaves. I glued the leaves down, then covered them with a layer of mod podge to protect and preserve them. I used scrapbooking letters to spell out the word Autumn.

Autumn Journal Page

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My 2014 Art Journal

At the beginning of this year, I started a new art journal. I’m using a sketchbook that I bought last year—I just love the cover!

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Inside, I created a title page. I painted the background and stamped on random shapes using bubble wrap, corrugated cardboard and a cardboard tube. Then I glued down pictures cut from scrapbook cardstock and cards.

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I journaled my goals for the year—nothing too adventurous, just simple things like gardening, writing and crafts. Oh, and most importantly, adopt a dog! Then, throughout the year, I am going to journal about the things that make me happy, the things that make up my everyday life. It might be places that I visit, things I’ve seen, a book I’ve enjoyed, or flowers that are blooming in my garden.

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By the end of the year my journal will be filled with thoughts and imaginings, photographs, drawings, clippings, stickers, and anything else I might want to put in there. It will be like a scrapbook, a way for me to creatively document my year, and at the end of the year I will have a colourful journal of memories.

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In This Garden

As someone who loves both gardening and mixed-media art, I was thrilled to come across the book In This Garden by Angela Cartwright and Sarah Fishburn. The book is a collaboration by 12 mixed-media artists on the theme of gardens. They were each given 4 panels to form a miniature garden, to decorate in any style they chose. The result was a wide variety of wonderfully imaginative gardens, including a New Orleans Junkyard garden, a community garden, Marie Antoinette’s garden, and The Prairie Rose & Sagebrush Garden. There are notes from each contributor on the techniques they used, and also favourite memories and observations about their own gardens. I love this book. I keep picking it up and seeing different things in it each time I look.

In This Garden

Angela Cartwright is one of my favourite mixed-media artists. When I looked up her website, I was interested to learn that before getting into art and photography, she had an acting career. As a child, she played Brigitta in the movie The Sound of Music.

This book has inspired me to make a mini album of my own dream garden to include pictures of my favourite things – foxgloves, birdbaths, scarecrows, herbs, butterflies, dragonflies, birds, sunflowers…

I’ve made the cover so far.

The secret garden

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Today was good

Today was good
Today was fun
Tomorrow is another one

                             Dr. Seuss

For these pages in my art journal I was experimenting with creating backgrounds using watercolour paints and found objects. The wavy lines are made with corrugated cardboard, the circles with bottle caps, and the little square criss cross shapes are made by splodging paint over plastic mesh with a foam dobber. It’s great fun to see what patterns you can make with things you find around the house.

Today was good

This morning when I was visiting my parents, Mum gave me a box of knick knacks to look through, random objects she has kept over the years in case they should ever come in useful, then forgotten about. I came home with a bag of goodies to use in my craft projects – old keys, wooden cotton reels, pieces of jigsaw puzzle, tiny light bulbs and little shells. I’m already planning what they’re going to be used for!