The frog in his pocket page

Here is the frog in his pocket page. I think he would make a great bedtime toy while you read the story to the child, or a car and travel toy to take with you on the road.

The Famous Jumping Frog of Calavaras county

This little felt froggie doll was designed as well as made by myself. I gave him a little felt vest as well.

The Spiral Dance

Today I made a new fabric journal page with a batik fabric with spirals printed on it. The subject matter seemed perfect to depict a figure doing the Spiral Dance. I stitched inside and outside of each spiral with a running stitch in tie dye embroidery thread then I painted the figure which I designed on my own , with FolkArt metallic Champagne paint. I rather like the way she turned out. ofcourse I  bound the edges of the page with more gold lame bias binding. The flip side is another batik print but I've not decided on the theme of that side of the page yet.

Taking a break from journaling

Just for fun today I took a little break from journaling and made some little felt pins, a heart, a cupcake, a cookie with a bite out of it, and an ice cream cone.

The Salamander

This is the Salamander that is representative of the element of Fire. first i sketched out the salamander, then i painted the background metallic gold with Tulip soft paint. When that was well dried I began painting the salamander red with tulip soft paint and I added orange toward the center of the body to give him a bit of a highlight. When he was well dried I used Tulip liquid bead paint in a pewter color to put a diamond pattern down the salamanders body. I gave him eyes with the black fabric pen and wrote the element of fire with the fabric pen as well.

Bridgid and the new fire

This page has quite a bit to it. First I spray dyed the background in yellow and bright green. When the dye was dry I added some overpainting from water in which I had washed gold metallic from the paint brush. Doing this with just the brush washing water, well stirred, left a very delicate gold wash on top of the green and yellow background. I did two or three layers of the gold wash and let it dry well between layers. I stitched a bit of batik fabric to one end of the stabilizer layer then stitched the painted background fabric over the rest of the page. I sketched on Brigid with a micron pen, then i overpainted all the flesh areas with white Tulip soft paint. When that was dry I added the peach fabric pen coloring and some pink for her cheeks and lips. Then I redid the facial features with a brown fabric pen and outlined her hands and arms as well. I used the brown pen to color in her eyes and the black micron pen for her pupils and a tiny drop of white soft paint for the reflection in her eyes. I used a pearl blue paint for her head dress and gown. I added a little white paint for highlights on her clothing while the blue was still wet. When the blue was dry I added sketched lines of darker blue for the folds in the fabric. I used black fabric pen on the little cauldron and red and orange soft paint on the flames. If you would like to read about the story of the celebration check out  The Starwitch Chronicles here on blogspot.

the flip side of the moon and sun is Bebo the owl

On the back of the sun and moon page I did an owl on a leaf print batik fabric I got at Joanns on friday. I found a bit of a dull yellow/tan fabric to cut the owl out of, and a tiny pinch of lemon yellow for his nose. I apliqued those pieces on then added the eyes which are a twisted metal spacer bead a large tan seed bead and a tiny brown seed bead. I used the fabric pens to draw in his feathers and wings in brown. I also drew in a branch and some toes under him but the branch didnt really show so I used rows  of chain stitch in varrigated thread. Then I sewed 8 fairly large glass leaf pendants which are a pinkish beige color, around his head. They are only attatched at one point each so they swing freely. He is named Bebo for the owl familiar that Athena had.

fabric journal page sun and moon

I found the gold binding I wanted to finish the page with at Joanns so here is the finished page. I added a lady in the moon face in the darker blue section of the page and gave her a couple of star charms for company. she is painted with fabric pens and paints on an apliqued circle of white fabric and given textured silver and white hair. I drew the face in with a micron pen then I painted the flesh tone and lips and cheeks with the fabric pens. Then i covered the entire face with the tulip soft white paint to tone down the colors on the face. After the paint was well dried I retraced the facial outlines with brown fabric pen then i colored the lips in with red and pink again, and painted the eyes metallic turquoise with Lumiere paint. When all the paints were well dry I went around the edges of the face with a row of clear irridescent beads.

New fabric journal page

After looking at some fabric journals on line I decided to try being a little neater with my pages and put a little more work into the surface of the page. I started with my normal dryer sheet background and added a small segment of a light blue fine print fabric. Then I cut out a small circle for the sun face. I did a very fine buttonhole stitch all the way around the circle with varrigated thread, then i stitched it down to the middle of the blue fabric. Using a micron pen I drew on the face, then I used Tulip fabric pens to color the face in, peach around the edges of the suns face, pink for the lips and cheeks, blue dots for eyes with smaller black dots in the center. When I had the face colored I went back with brown pen and outlined the eyebrows and nose area again to make it more distinct. I drew on the suns rays with the micron pen then I filled them in with metallic gold Tulip soft paint. When they were dry I took the same varrigated thread and made lots of tiny french knots around the rays of the sun. Then I gave the sun some solar flares with chain stitch. I stitched some beads in a light irridescent gold over the buttonhole stitch edge of the suns face. Last I stitched a square of darker blue/green fabric over the lower section of the page, it has gold leaves printed all over it. Im not sure if I will add more to the lower section of the page yet.

the Ostara page for my pagan fabric journal

For Ostara I gave my page a young lady with pale skin and blonde hair. After I had colored her face with the tulip fabric pens it just seemed like the colors were too strong so I got a little bottle of tulip brush on soft white paint and went over the flesh colors. It toned things down a lot and gave the surface of the fabric a sort of velvety feel. It gave me whites for her eyes and the highlights in her eyes as well. After I overpainted the face I did go back and redo many of the brown ink lines to give the face more definition. I gave her a branch of Dogwood blooming beside her as it was my favorite flowering tree as a child. Ostara is a time of renewal.

Crystals for my fabric journal

Today I added a page celebrating the element earth to my fabric journal. First i used spray on dye on the plain muslin background. I drizzled a little water over the spray in some areas to add effect and let it dry, then I used the white tulip paint and an angled brush to directly paint on several crystal points. When the first layer of white paint was dry, i added a little more hit and miss to give the appearance that there were veils and clear areas in the crystals where the background would show through. When the second white layer was dry I added a layer of Lumiere paint in Halo violet/gold for some purple crystals. When the purple paint was dry, i added dark purple pen outlines and striations to the sides of the crystals and light blue to the white crystals. Then in purple pen i wrote The element of earth . I like the way it turned out, now i just need to sew it to the Ostara page I painted yesterday.

Honoring the element of Air

The element of air can be depicted in many ways, waving ribbons or flags, windsocks, windchimes, butterflies, birds and flying fairies. The color of air is Yellow and it is also connected to intellect, so go out and get some fresh air and inspiration.

fabric journal page for Beltane

For Beltane I added a bride with a wreath of flowers and leaves in her hair and a tree branch with ribbons like the Loreena McKennitt song says, "tie ribbons round the sheltering arms in the springtime of the year."

The flip side of page one of my wiccan fabric journal

For some reason the scanner didnt pick up the flourescent orange which was colored on the outer edge of the suns rays. This page celebrates the Summer Solstice.

New fabric journal

This is the first page of my new fabric journal. I decided I wanted to try out fabric pens, dyes and paints so I started with a set of tulip fabric pens from Hobby Lobby. This journal will depict things germain to my wiccan belief system so I started with the Mermaid as a Water elemental. It was drawn directly on the fabric with no pattern or tracing.

Another page for the fabric journal

This page was all scrapped in like some of the other pages with random scraps of fabric. I put three decorative pieces on top of the page . A coiled felt flower center with orange beads. a Blue spot with a frog has an edging of yellow shades of needle lace. The orange and yellow flower is crochetted. This block displays different techniques and a couple of unusual fabrics like the pink with bright metallic dots and the pink with a wild funfur look. These bits were leftover from making Barbie clothes for my grand daughter.

finishing small projects make you feel good

While I was looking in one of my boxes of sewing projects for scraps for my fabric journal I came across this little felt change purse I had cut out. I stitched it up with small buttonhole stitches in varrigated thread. There was a strip of light orange felt next to it about ten inches long and a quarter of an inch wide which had been cut from a piece of felt with pinking shears, I used that to coil up and make the flower center. Then I cut six flower petals and sewed them on the purse flap in a circle and stitched the coiled flower center over the joined flower petals. I cut out a simple leaf and sewed it on down the center vein line. I finished up with a velcro dot closure under the flap. project finished. And I still found a few things to add to the unfinished fabric journal page.

back side of the second page of my fabric journal

I discovered I had also set aside a couple of paper pieced square in square blocks so I used that as the back side of the crazy patched page along with a section of pale yellow tiny printed bubbles. I even journaled on it with a sharpie saying Stitch your dreams in little seams. I ran binding around the block like a picture frame, It is a muslin leaf print. It was fun making this little page and gratifying that I used up things that had been sitting in a box hiding for the last couple of years. I didnt purchase anything new for this journal yet.

new pages for the fabric journal

This is the front side of the page. I discovered this almost finished dryer sheet full of crazy patches so I finished it up and added a butterfly button and the coil work flower and felt leaf, I thought it looked particularly like spring.

page 10 of tag journal

A simple design for St patricks day on a textured paper from bazil the light green card stock is textured with little daisies and the darker paper is textured with dots . I punched out the four leaved clover from the darker paper with a Martha Stewart  punch.

page 8 and 9 of the tag journal

the leaf pattern cardstock was from a k and company stack and the dressform was stamped in brown ink on tan paper , cut out and glued on. The inchie is on pink paper and has drawn and cut out flowers in greens and pinks with accents in ink. Its supposed to look a bit like a fuscia flower.
The next tag is from the Studio 45 Botanica stack the backround is a book page from a set of almost playing card size printed pieces. then another page was printed in diamonds with writing and flowers in the diamond shapes, and a punch out page had the little round punch out with the bug on it. All assembled with simple glue and a hole punched at the top makes for an attractive tag.

pages 6 and 7 of the tag journal

The first tag was a letter with a border, stamped on tan paper with olive ink and cut out in a tag shape, It has a silver key over printed on it, and a tiny black and ivory printed tag with a harvest gold brad and a black and ivory printed heart glued on. The tag at the bottom used up scraps of a blue and white chevron print tag, with beige printed page about butterfly over the bottom of it, a hand made paper scrap in golden brown then a cut out butterfly from the cover of a botanical paper stack with gold printed on it.  The large tag on the other page is from the blue chevron cardstock. it has the mini french letter printed on it in wine , a key on a background of a different bit of printing in black with the key colored with a silver pen, the red design was a punch out from an oriental decorative print page and the key was on the cover of the botanical stack along with the shiny blue flower print so I cut those out and glued them on.

page 4 and 5 of the tag journal

the first tag is on a red paisley background and has a stamped postcard cut out on it from tan paper, it was stamped in brown but I used a red pen to add a little color to the postmark and stamp area. The small two hole tag on this page was also a traced shape from a page of punch out tags. It has a mini french letter stamped on it, with some tan rubbed on it and a gold border and brown borders around the holes. the letter was stamped in olive green. The final tag is a large dress form stamp by Inkadinkadoo with a background of pattern pieces. I stamped it in brown and colored in the fabric, the stand of the dressform and the tape measure then mounted it on a beige printed cardstock and cut that a little larger than the stamped image itself.

Page two and three of the tag journal

These four tags were done on various papers from k and company. The stamps were stamped on brown paper with tan ink and cut out. All four stamps were from Michaels 1.50 stamps for spring. The last one, the sea horse was done on a background coppied from the opening left in card stock when punching out another pre made tag. I did one layer on gold paper and one on brown paper then just a plain rectangle of patterned paper and glued the sea horse cut out on it. You could use brads to secure it on a card or package if you wanted.

my Tag journal

This art journal is of the gift tags ive done. the first page tags are both done on waves of water cardstock , the top one has a fish postage stamp on it, and the one at the bottom has a martha stewart punch out seahorse on it.

a small section of a botanica page

To this portion of a page I added an iron gate stamp, a words and Key stamp and a little floral corner stamp to my watercolored background. Then I added a sketched bee at the top. when i coated the page with gel medium the stamp ink smeared a little but i dont think it actually takes away from the page. It actually made it look more antique to me.

more Botanica

Along with a section of the cover of the Botanica stack I used several dimensional die cuts by K and Company. They give a lot of life to the page.

Collage made with Botanica papers by Studio 45

I love the detail of Studio 45s work. This reminds me of victorian journals filled with aged papers and perfect drawings.

Back to the original art journal for today

Today I did a small watercolor of a birds nest on a branch just to feel like i was actually making art. It isnt anything fantastic but it gives me a sense of the life outside of this dry city

The front page of my first fabric art journal

The front side of the first page is randomly pieced christmas fabrics stitched on a dryer sheet by hand, then the section in the middle is  coiled threads stitched with an overcast stitch like a basket or an old fashioned braided rug would be. then it was stitched to the back side of the first piece i made which was dark wine colored pieces. Not sure how many pages I will put in this book . I might make a cover for it of felt.

quiet day

Dick Clark died today, hard to imagine the world without him rockin and rollin and seeing in the new year in times square. Bandstand is truly over.

sea turtle and sea weed growing from a shell

the last half page i have finished up to this time is on a orange seaweed background and has a green sea turtle and green seaweed that looks like its growing out of a shell.

a blue sort of paisley page has a tan writing area

I added a gull to the top of the page and a little sandpiper to the bottom. Simple and restful I think.

Sea Turtles on a page that is mostly beige to start with.

this page had the swirls at the bottom and some antiquing and the one fish, I added a die cut sea turtle, and three stamps from the stamp page in the pad of paper. The sea turtle reminds me of my daughter Amber.

red corals and shells

This page is full to the brim with red corals , red seaweed, a crab and a red orange scallop shell. I doubt I will be journaling on this page either.

The backround on this page is a red sort of paisley like pattern.

over top of that I put cream writing paper and two shell die cuts from the package I purchased today. Since its a half page you can see parts of the other pages that are full size peeking out.

the orange seaweed background

has cream writing paper over it with seaweed like cut outs at the top, and today i found the acetate die cut to go with that paper in the group i got at joanns.

This page will likely not have journaling on it.

This is a map page with shiny aqua designs on it and I added the two ship cut outs and the die cut of a compass from the set of die cuts I got at joanns today from Kand Company by Tim Coffey. It makes such a nice page by itself i dont think ill try journaling over it .

This is a full page size

this page background is an orange sort of seaweed and Ive added a large shell and a clear acetate die cut with seaweed and a red starfish at the bottom and a gull at the top from the K and company die cuts i got at joanns. The other starfish is from a Studio 45 pad of paper I got at Hobby Lobby which has butterflies and sea life in a very unusual mix . Their paper is more expensive but its very well done too.

I loved this large Mermaid stamp

One whole page from the pad of K and company paper by Tim Coffey is made of postage stamp like images. The background paper is ocean waves and i cut wave shapes into the writing section of the paper then I added small die cuts from the ones i purchased at Joanns today. Im very fond of the sea horses too.

This page has a background of leaves from a beach weed

So I continued with cut out flowers at the top of the writing surface and added Michaels Recollection bottled flowers and a silk leaf. The Postage stamp at the bottom is sea weed.

This is also a half page, I thought adding half as well as full pages would add interest.

This page has a peralized sheen over it and i added some little die cuts around the writing space as well.

I didnt get this page in the scanner in the right place

 However it is the first page in the book , I covered the center of the pages with beige paper to write on. The seahorse at the top is a rubberstamp image and was done in tan on brown paper and cut out. I guled it and a sheahorse stamp and a sea urchin cut out at the bottom. The pages are edged with aged brass crackle by Tim Holtz.

Inside cover

This inside cover was printed with large designs but I added the blue and yellow shell and the clear acetate seahorse. Though he looks dark brown on here he is actually metallic copper in real life. Scanners are never 100% perfect with anything and im even less perfect about getting things in the scanner in the right place. It is much easier to work with the strathmore journal with the big spiral binding as it lays flat far easier.

this journal was created for writing Sea Spells in

It came out a bit dark due to the thickness of the compass pendant I put on the front of the book. This is an ordinary composition book that is decorated with K and Company papers designed by Tim Coffey. I got it at Joann fabrics and today I found a couple of packages of die cuts that went with it so I added them to the pages and realized they were good fodder for the Art Journal Blogging.  I loved the aqua color of the sea on this map, the ship is printed on it at the bottom but the two postage stamp looking ships at the top of the page are added from a page of postage stamps that were in the Pad of paper.

fabric journal pages

Textile journaling  is something ive seen a couple examples of, but when I read an article about using only scraps instead of buying anything new a light bulb went on in my head. Ive been making these silly little scrap blocks over the last couple of years when the urge to use up scraps hit me. I use a dryer sheet for the base of the block and sew on at random scraps of mixed fabrics in either color families or totally mixed. Ive used the sewing machine and by hand sometimes i turn under edges and sometimes not. sometimes I match threads and sometimes not. Sometimes i use lace and ribbon scraps as well if i have any of those. You could use buttons and such to decorate parts of the block and If you do want to journal on it, you could start your block with a piece of plain muslin as a basis since its easy to write on or embroider on, then add your scrap work around it. Since the book wont get washed or worn or most likely sat on, the edges dont need to be hemmed. Ive seen some fabric books that are very neat and beautiful and have lots of lace and pretty things on them and Ive seen some that are all raw edges and wild looking. Both sorts have their charm . This would be a good way to start a young girl on fabric crafting, since perfection isnt needed and it would be a form she could keep . Enjoy your wild stitches and crazy moments.

Young girl dreaming of her future

This lovely young girl is day dreaming of all sorts of possible futures and likely all of it seems to hinge on rather she gets invited to the prom by the right boy. We never know what causes the various expressions to drift over our daughters faces. I know we usually see them stuck to a telephone. Im sure they are hatching up wonderful plans with their friends that would terrify us as parents. Im glad my girl is all grown up now.

Pensive young girl

Today I did a pair of watercolors in my art journal. This is a lovely young girl who is sad for no reason. I know emotions like that hit teenage girls with no warning and no seeming reason. It makes it hard to be a parent because you always want to cure their problems. Often there is no cure but chocolate and an hour of headbanging music.

copper wire coiled into links

copper colored wire is coiled into links over a mandrel that helps keep the links the same size each time. then they are joined with straight pieces upon which a flat black bead is strung. This kind of work is time consuming but enjoyable.

Austrian gold fired beads with medallions

These are the same type of bead as before only they are mixed colors I found the medallion elements in the same section of the bead shop , they have 4 colors of faceted stones in them as well and I connected the parts of the necklace with seed beads and a fairly fancy closure.

Austrian gold fired beads

This necklace is made with beautiful beads from austria which are fine lead crystal in a wonderful turquoise color they have been coated with gold first, then faceted afterward so the ends of the beads have gold on them but the center facets let you see the lead crystal of the bead, they are interspersed with gold colored fillagree beads. I really enjoy this set.