April & Altered Book Backgrounds

Wow, April already? o.O Whoever is fast forwarding thru my year needs to stop it right now!

Anyway, here is March all filled up:

 

And April all ready to go:

I did my April calendar awhile ago & I didn't like it at first. Then, this week I added the green butterfly & it brightened up the page & now I quite like it :) 

Like I said last month- I can't add any more pages into my little overstuffed notebook so I am trying to work with the ones already in there. I used some of the scraps left over from making the notebook for the squares.

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I have also been working on prepping some backgrounds in my altered book journal.  I try to do a few pages whenever I get new paint- that way there will be a nice variety throughout the book :)

lime green acrylic sprayed (with a mini mister) over dried black acrylic

 layered acrylics

bubble wrap + acrylics

acrylics tinted w/ watercolours

For this spread, I mixed dark pink watercolours in with the pastel pink acrylic paint to brighten it up a bit :)

I have a vague idea of keeping this journal for sometime when I will be very busy (say.. the first year I have a FULL TIME teaching job maybe? lol)  That way I will have a book with lots of pretty, ready to go backgrounds (that I still did myself!)

Hope everyone's April is off to a good start!

A Page & a Paper Doll

 

I was looking thru old magazines & found this image of a little girl pouting. She was just adorable. This grungy blue page had been left untouched in my journal because I liked it too much to use for anything (one of the hazards of using pretty paper!).  So I'm glad I finally used it!  I wrote the words using my left hand (I'm right handed) so that the handwriting would look like a little kids. I know it's not very fancy, but it is one of my favourite pages :)

I've had a sudden "art craving" lately- does anyone  else get those? lol I've been wanting to make dolls... paper dolls & art dolls & ragdolls & little stuffed monster plushies! It's not  something I've really done much. When I was about 10 I used to make little 3-D paper houses & two sided paper dolls. I don't remember how to do the houes... but the dolls were pretty simple.

 

Ta-da! The first paper doll I've made in a long while!
Her dress is made from scraps of patterned & drawing paper & a ribbon for the sash. Her body is recycled  pages I tore out of my altered book journal.

back

lol I remember that my classmates thought it was very odd that my paper dolls had two sides... 

I think she is quite pretty & have named her Allie :)

Charlie & Audrey- doodle style!

I was having a little Charlie Chaplin marathon awhile back, and got the idea to do a portrait of him in my zombie-doodle-style.

 

 I am usually not very good at drawing men.. lol But I think I did Charlie justice :)

 And I did another little Breakfast at Tiffany's inspired doodle. (cuz it's my favourite movie!)

I did a Marilyn Monroe as Lorelei Lee from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.. but I was not happy with it. 

I am thinking I might do some ACEOs for my shop like this.. maybe make them like little movie posters. :) What do you think? 

March

I had a little problem with my calendar for this month.

See, what I have been doing is making my calendars on separate sheets of paper & then adding them into my notebook. Usually by folding them in half & taping them into the binding.

But over time I have added A LOT of pages this way, and the poor little book is getting overstuffed. I am only a little bit more than half way thru it, & the pages towards the back are starting to roll under. So I need to knock that off.

None of the 2 page spreads I had already bound in the book would have worked very well for the calendar. what I ended up doing was a little single page calendar, about half the size of my others.

I started out with a watercolour rainbow again. Altho, this one is a TRUE rainbow- with primary colours & everything lol.  I inked the edges with a black ink pad, but I wanted a sharper contrast between the colours & the black.. So I went over the edges again w/ some glossy black acrylic, & added some paint splatters as well.

I did the word "March" using my improvised stencils :)

 

The squares about about half as big as my usually ones, and I still had to re-arrange them several times to get them all to fit >.>

I highlighted the dates for each week w/ a different colour. The rows didn't really line up, so the colours help me keep them straight (I hate when I end up writing on the wrong square!)

Despite the fact that it is a mini calendar, I ended up quite liking it except for one teensy little thing...

THE WEEKS START ON SUNDAY!!

I use my online calendar as a guide when I make these, and somehow I didn't notice that it was set so the weeks start on Sunday.  I ALWAYS set it to start on Mondays.. I hate having my weekends wrap around. >.<   bah!

What I Made This Month

I wanted to share some of the random little things I've made in the last month or so :)

1. Rainbow Monsters Journalling Cards

2. Dragon ATC for my father                             3. Project Life embelishments

4. Shimmery Library Pockets                              5. ink doodle

6. MORE Alice in Wonderland cards

7. Rainbow Watercolour Days of the Week tags   8. Hello Kitty bracelet for my mum

9. Junk Mail Pockets    10. Cell Drawing (inspired by Chel at Ginger Blue)  11. Caligraphy Samples for my future sister in law :)

12. New Etsy Shop Banner!

13. February Calendar filled out!

Quick Project: Improvised Stencils

I've been trying to find some cheap stencils, but so far- no luck.

I have several packs of scrapbook paper which came with these sheets of diecut letters, so I thought I might try using them.

I coated them with gesso so they would be more durable, which was tricky to say the least. I tore the first sheet I tried to do this to.

On my second attempt, I put the sheet on some slick plastic, swiped on a light coat of gesso & then quickly peeled it up before it had time to start drying.

Once they were all dry, I did some experimenting & found that they worked well with ink pads & sprays :)

All in all, it was kind of a pain! lol But I don't like having to wait until I can buy something to do the things I want to do. Sometimes you've got to get a little creative. ;)

Working in the "Courage" Journal

 

I've started working in my little courage journal.

The title page, with the definition..

This is the first little page  I've finished.
 The quote is from the movie "Angus" that I've always liked...
And it seemed like a good excuse to draw myself as a superhero! hehe

New Journal

I finished one of the journals I've been working on! :D yay! I am so happy with it!

 

The light blue on the spine is just masking tape that I painted w/ acrylic paint. I added some silver glitter glue along the edge to keep it from peeling up.. and also just for the sparkles. :)

I have a piece of glitter cardstock in a page protector as the "title page".  I figure once I decide what I'm going to call the journal- I can add some letter stickers to the page protector. 

The inside is mostly cardstock in fun colours- lot pink & blues, teal & green.. 

Pocket pages..

I had these envelopes that were a pretty good match for the cardstock I was using, so I included them as little pockets too.

Fold out pages.

some little plastic pockets for ATCs..

I have a nifty little plastic book cover to protect my drawing on the front :)

It's nice & fat- just how I like my notebooks :)

http://www.etsy.com/shop/beadstostring

For the binding I used  Irish waxed linen thread, which I ordered from BeadsToString on etsy.  I loved it- it's easy to work with, and it holds a knot nicely. I also love the colours (I got turquoise & fuschia).

February Calendar

*grumble grumble* too much real world drama lately >.<  

Anyways, it is February now right? So time for a new calendar :)

I did a loose calendar grid & the month with a white Prismacolor pencil (which works almost as well as a crayon for a resist effect & you can get a finer line!) before I made a watercolour rainbow.

After it dried, I added the squares for the days and some hearts in white watercolour & the white Prismacolour pencil again. And some colourful heart stickers I found.  I do wish I had remembered to ink the edges of the squares, but I still like this one a lot. :)

I usually try to stay a few months ahead.. but it is already February & I haven't even started the one for March yet- don't even have an idea in mind. o.O Oh dear. lol