Art journals again

Let’s have some more art journal pages. This is another children’s book. I painted the covers yellow and stamped flowers at the back and the word ‘journal’ on the front. Relatively minimalist again.

This is an actual drawing! By yours truly! It’s actually not that difficult to draw at all and I enjoyed colouring it too.

The next two pages are (obviously) price tags from charity shops from our last trip to the UK. I love looking for a bargain while helping those in need. Plus the tags and nice and colourful – it would be a shame to throw them all away.

This is a weather report. It says: To be expected till the evening: In the whole country: Snow.

I found the gingerbread Finland image in a magazine, although I have used the same biscuit cutter myself.

And another drawing. Again, this was kid’s play! The hand is mine and even though it looks like I have no knuckles, in the real world I have.

Isn’t this journal full of unusual stuff? Now a comic, ha. It’s called ‘Snowman’s surprise’.
First the snowman says: ‘I chose this present.’
And then ‘Look very carefully! Here it is.’
And then: ‘And here.’
Next he says: ‘Oh, where did the present disappear?’
And finally: ‘Ta-dah!’
Happy Christmas.

Ha, I know, I’m hilarious!

Ok, back to normal stuff.

I quite like this camera page. The background is the actual children’s book page. I liked it and there was just enough space for the text and picture. I covered the original text with gesso and then paint.

This quote is soooo true. Sadly.

The background with balls and stripes on this last one is a napkin.

Art journaling

I’ve been working on several old children’s books which I’ve turned into art journals. I’ve bought them from the local library when they sell old books. Some of them have seen better days but I like children’s books because the pages are usually quite thick.

I love the look of a filled and finished art journal!

I always leave the cover for last. For this one I used golden pearl acrylic paint (el cheapo kind). I have a few colours of it but simply don’t know how to use them. The pearl finish confuses me. So, when I finished painting the cover gold, I didn’t know what to do and in the end just slapped a few gold sticker on it. It’s über-simplified, über-minimalistic.

And here are some pages. Pictures are mostly from magazines.

I’ve been drinking organic red wine called ¿Que Pasa? It’s really nice and I love the label and the cork. It was also very satisfying to flatten the cork with a rubber mallet.

‘Puoli kiloa päivässä’ is the equivalent of the British ‘5 a day’. It means ‘half a kilo a day’.

The picture on this page is from Lidl’s advert. In this country they seem to have a very clever, humorous marketing department. Unless they use the same adverts everywhere.

Tricking and treating and also scaring

I made couple of pages for my art book (which is just a fancy name for yet another journal). The backgrounds are made with water-soluble crayons and the rest is stamping and colouring either with watercolours or coloured pencils.

Knickers in a twist – NOT

I bought a packet of knickers the other day. I was just about to throw the clear plastic packet in the bin when I came to my senses and realised that this packet would make very nice book covers. I cut off one side and the top and the bottom of the box. It had two things printed on it, so I hid them with stickers and added some rub-on stars, too. I added pieces of patterned paper on the other side of the stickers because obviously the printing shows there too. The signatures are all different colours, and to be honest, they are all slightly different thicknesses but it was all I had handy and I wanted the book to be colourful. And that it is. I’m pleased.

 

Recycling cards

Old (store-bought) greetings cards are great for journal making. I’ve been collecting them for some time now and finally made them into for three new journals. I only used really nice cards – the kind I wanted to keep and I thought in a journal they would be safe. I cut the fronts of the cards for journal pages. They are all slightly different sizes, but that’s ok. The covers are the backsides of the cards which I covered with patterned paper on both sides.

If there was any writing on the back of the picture side, I glued on some paper to hide it. So the idea is that the pictures in this journal are just nice and to be looked at but the writing is done only on the other side, the blank sides. This is good because the blank sides are on the left and as a lefty it is much easier for me to write on the left side of the wire binding than it would be on the right side.

This is another book where I chose mainly square cards or almost square cards.

Some of the blank sides were covered completely with patterned paper, whereas some only partly. Some were left blank and I can do with them what I want once I come to write on them. If the white looks too boring, I’ll cover them up later, or maybe I’ll glue on some ticket stubs, leaflets, receipts or whatnot.

And there’s a third one. I used book rings on this one to keep it together. This is a Christmas journal and I used only Christmas cards. The covers are patterned card stock.

This journal has cards of all sizes – some are tiny and some are not so tiny.

Ta-dah! Three new journals, just like that. I love re-using old stuff. Waste not, want not! I’m just about to complete an older greetings card journal I’ve been journaling on for the past few months. I use these types of journals more like a traditional diary, although I don’t record my daily doings as such. But it’s good to write down things you want to remember: good books and films (or bad books and films), places, events, funny things spotted somewhere, unusual things, rants, good wine/beer, anything.

Another medley of scraps

Here are some more cards from my excellent ‘business card book’. Once again, everything on these cards are scraps and found stuff.

 

It’s business

I have moved house many times over the past…well, I’ve moved a lot since I moved away from home. As a result I have lots of out-of-date business cards. I’ve kept them, like you do, knowing that one day I’ll ‘need’ them for something. Only I had no idea what I could do with old business cards. And then it hit me. I’m going to use them for a business card book. Yes, a business card book – that’s what I’ll call it. Basically I’ll just cover a card with some paper and decorate with various things – so this is another recycling opportunity – and then punch a hole and place onto a book ring. I have probably hundreds of these cards, so this is going to be one of these life-long projects.

The thing is, I like projects like this. I can use whatever I have left over from other projects, things I’ve kept or found, and perhaps I can even test any little ideas I get. So far everything I’ve used are from my box of bits.

So, this is the start.

Owls and sewing

I made two more pages for my ‘art book’. Both pages were first coloured with a brayer and Distress Inks. I love the mottled background it gives.

Time

I’m totally in the middle of wasting some time…

The pointing finger

Another journal page here. I don’t really have anything to add, except that the text is so true.