Art Journaling

I have been playing around with art journaling. Currently I am involved in an art journal round robin. Six artists, six journals, six months, ten pages of art work/journaling each. My journal was sent off several weeks ago and I am working on one of the other participants.

I started a separate journal for me to play around with. I have been reading/looking at different blogs and have found some great technique videos on You Tube to get ideas for pages that I can then adapt to my style. The photo is one of my pages. I have rediscovered the joy of drawing in charcoal. I love how it flows across the page and smudges for shading. The background is blended oil pastel, gesso wash, liquid acrylic, and pages from a book.

Meet Mu Shu

Introducing the newest member of our family - Mu Shu. He is the foster kitten that stayed! We have had him since he was four weeks old (I bottle fed him). His brothers went to their new homes on Saturday, but he is staying with us. He is very strange looking - black/white on top and grey on his back with tabby stripes. I hope his color stays!

Our family has been fostering kittens for Philadelphia Animal Control/PSPCA for the past year. Formally know as PAWS, it has been their goal to pull the adoptable animals from the Animal Control, foster and adopt them out. Up until 2005, only 20% of the animals got out. Now it is about 60%. We are helping to raise that number!!!!!

Remember, there are plenty of good pets waiting for you at your local shelter. Check them out before you goto a breeder or pet store. Help make shelters no kill!!!!!!

Charm Swap

June is the charm swap. Make ten charms, 1" in size, and send them in to be swapped out. Here is a sampling of what I made. The other six are versions of the ones pictured. I have two in a bottle cap, the heart is Model Magic, tissue paper, and wire. The square (hard to see) is made out of a plastic Kohls card that I didn't use (darn I could have saved 20%). I covered it with gesso, a piece of map and the saying "Leave a Trail". The little beads where added for a bit of interest.

Heart Pin

Here is a cute heart pin I made for a swap. The only requirements is that it had to be a heart. I made paper mache pulp in the blender (newspaper and lots of water), squeezed out the water, added white glue and shaped it. It took about a day to dry nice and hard. I covered it with gesso then painted and topped it off with gel medium. Then I wrapped 26 gauge wire and beads around it and added a key. I like it!

Altered Tins & Barbie

Here are some photos of altered Altoid tins and Barbie for some swaps I am in. The fish tin was for "By the Sea". I styled it after artist Laurel Burch. There is a fish charm hanging and lots of beads, shells and beach glass along the bottom of the mermaid. The fairy garden has real twigs forming the door. Inside are textured background papers, silk flowers, charms, yarn and tiny stones. Barbie is for an upcoming swap. She was gessoed, candy wrappers (from Easter) were applied all over with gel medium, her hands, feet and face were painted, her hair streaked with sharpie and a two Mary Jane wrappers make up her skirt.

Look for New Photos

I plan on adding some new photos in the next few days of some completed projects. Be sure to check back to see some altered Altoid tins and Barbie. Yes, even Barbie can not escape being altered!

Tile Necklaces

Here is the results of another altered art swap - tile necklaces. The hostess of this swap warned that they are addictive and you can see, they are! The base is a bamboo tile that has been pre-drilled. The metallic one is a piece of art paper applied with my favorite gel medium. Jewelry wire and beads are wrapped around it. The butterfly one has a tissue paper/gel medium background, butterfly image and butterfly charm. Beads trim it out. "Dream" has a tissue/gel medium background with a scrap paper word applied. It is decked out in some very sparkly beads.

So far I have made ten of these. I have a few I am wearing, my swap partner received one and my mom got one for her birthday. I have not decided what to do with the overstock yet.

Paper Mache People

My art class was making paper mache puppets for the school musical, so I decided to play around a bit and created these dolls. The base is newspaper. When the dolls were hard, I covered them in tissue paper with gel medium. Each has a heart stamp, flower hair or fun yarn hair. Their back sides have bar codes on them (not pictured).

Altered Jars

I was in an altered jar swap and kept going with it. The flower jar is a mandarin orange jar. I covered the jar in gesso, applied floral tissue paper with gel medium, added some paint details and sealed it. The lid is a piece of an antique dress collar and buttons from my collection. The jar is trimmed with ribbon, yarn and fabric beads that I made.

The sea turtle jar (sea turtles are one of my favorite animals) is done the same way as the above. I had been saving the tissue paper since 2007. It was from the Grand Cayman Turtle Farm. I purchased something in the gift shop and it was wrapped in this cool paper. I knew one day I would do something with it. The lid is trimmed with beads on 26 gauge jewelry wire.

Another Altered Spoon

Here is another altered spoon I made. The moon and stars are sculpted from Model Magic. Craft wire is wrapped around the spoon. The quote says "The night walked down the sky with the moon in her hand." It is cut into small pieces and inserted into the wire along the length of the spoon.