Category Archives: Journal 2

Good Old Days?

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Good Old Days?Hello friends!

It’s a wet, windy and dismal day here on the Isle of Wight and I’ve been struggling with a low mood, actually been on the verge of tears a couple of times, and I have no idea why.  I’m not normally a depressive person but I let things at work get to me today.  Two days of having computers not working hasn’t helped because it has put me behind with stuff. I have let other stupid little things get to me too.

Coming home, doing some art and stroking Billy Kat has helped a lot.  Cats are such good therapy 🙂  There is a big meeting at work on Friday with a lot of senior managers, and I really need to get a positive head on for that.  Today if anyone had asked me how things are I’d have struggled to say anything positive and that’s not good.  Sometimes I just get days like this and hopefully I can turn it around tomorrow – I must remember I can make a choice to be happy, breath and smile 🙂

This spread is from my 6×6 journal.  I started with a smooth gesso’d background, painted it with a brown acrylic then collaged some ripped vintage pages (that Alicia from Altered Bits sent me) and some scraps of old maps of my town.  I don’t actually use the real maps, but scan them, print them on photographic paper and age them with tea so they look like the real thing.  Then I used some blue acrylic paint and some white ink dabbed through punchinella and wrote the quote (in my poor handwriting) in white ink and highlighted (or do I mean lowlighted it) with black.

I have become aware recently how much people look at the past through rose tinted glasses.  Especially at work, things were always better back then, in the Good Old Days, although when that time was differs from person to person.   I also know that rather than aching for the past and what was, we should all try and live more in the present.  As Oprah says, “this moment is the only one you know you have for sure”.  So we’d better enjoy it.

Thanks for listening, just putting this all down has helped me to lift my mood, I think tomorrow is going to be fine.

Enjoy the rest of your week.

Big love

AJ 🙂

 

Spring Sunshine

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Spring sunshineHello Friends!

I hope everyone is good and fine today.

It’s a bit ironic that I am posting this spread tonight because it is pouring with rain outside!  We did have about two weeks of glorious almost summer weather, and even today between the showers the sunshine was bright.  I do love the lighter days and the sunshine.  The light does bring joy to my heart 🙂

On this spread, in my 6 x 6 journal, I gesso’d the pages, then painted with acrylic paint.  I collaged a ripped up Daffodil bag I picked up at the local garden centre.  You were supposed to fill the bag with bulbs and buy them but I only wanted the brown paper bag.  There is also a little bit of artist tape I made following my friend Carolyn’s instructions.  Pop over to Carolyn’s blog A Colorful Journey to find out more about making your own tape – be warned though it’s addictive 🙂  The flowers are die cut baby wipes I had used to wipe back paint on other pages.  The font for the text is called “Jellyka Delicious Cake” it’s a free font I found on the internet.  I’ve been practicing my writing skills but I’m still never really happy with my own handwriting.  I think the black shading is a from a set of cheap oil pastels I bought.  They are not good so this week I ordered some Portfolio Oil Pastels and I am hoping I will have more success with those.

My life is hectic again at the moment.  I have a meeting this Saturday I need to prepare for  – including writing a report and transferring a load of photographs into a presentation for our guest speaker, but this evening my computer decided to go sloooooooowwww and it took several hours to sort out.  Mind you while it was running System Mechanic and fixing the problems I was able to do some art so I shouldn’t complain should I?

I am loving the workshops over at 21 Secrets and just wish I had more hours in the day to play.  Some of my friends tell me that if they didn’t have a job they would be bored, I can’t believe it, I would never be bored at home would you? However I would be broke if I didn’t work, so needs must 😐

That’s all for now  “It’s time for Bed”, said Zebedee

See you soon

Big love

AJ 🙂

Cycles and Circles

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Circles within CirclesHello friends,

Happy Wednesday!

21 Secrets started on Sunday and I am so excited, there is so much choice I really don’t know where to start.  At the moment I am just browsing before I make a decision.  The playground is open for 9 months which seems like a long time, but it will soon fly by.  In three months last year I only managed to do about 4 of the workshops, so realistically I will probably only complete half of what is on offer this year so I need to choose wisely.

The weather is still sunny here in the UK but not as warm as it was last week.  It’s going to be a huge shock when it eventually rains as I can’t remember the last time that happened.  I hope it’s not until after the weekend as we have a four day break this weekend for the Easter holidays.

The spread above is from my 6 x 6 journal and was created after I watched a YouTube video on circle fractals, unfortunately I can’t remember the name of the video now and I can’t find it again.   But when I was doodling one day I thought I would give it a go and I really enjoyed it.  After I had drawn all the circles I coloured them with my inktense pencils and when they were dry added the white dots and finally the words.

Hope all is good with you

Big love

AJ

Out of the blue, I found you

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Out of the Blue...Hello friends, happy Wednesday 🙂

I created this bluish spread with gesso, Derwents Inktense blocks, a Tim Holtz reflection script stamp, some scraps of scrap book paper and edged the pages and the papers with irredescent purple ink.  The phrase ‘Out of the blue, I found you”, kept coming into my mind so I stamped it with some tiny alphabet stamps I got from Hobbycraft.

I was thinking how lucky I was to meet my soul mate when I was still at school and how over time (over 40 ears) the relationship has changed in nature but is still constant and true.  Then I found this amazing quote by Sir Hugh Walpole.  You probably can’t read it from the image but it says:

“The most wonderful of things in life is the discovery of another human being with whom one’s relationship has a growing depth, beauty and joy as the years increase.  This progressiveness of love between two humans is a marvellous thing; it cannot be found by looking or by passionately wishing for it.  Its a sort of divine accident”

See you soon

Big love

AJ 🙂

Past, Future and Present

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Past, Future and PresentHello Friends

This is a quick post because it’s early morning (although I’ve already been up an hour and a half) and I have to get ready for work.

Right now I am full fo anxiety.  Something has happened at work, I am totally unsure exactly what happened, but it means that either I have messed up, or one of my colleagues has been very dishonest.  I really think it is more likely to be the former than the latter, but either way I am in an uncomfortable situation.

The spread above from my small journal is about the past and the future, I used a lot of collage on this one, old book pages, old maps, and some old adverts.

I quite like the quote, but for now I need to go and face the present.  Wish me luck!

Big love

AJ

Let your heart lead the way…

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Let your heart lead the wayHello friends

It has been a glorious weekend in my part of the world, warm and sunny and, for me, extremely busy.  I hope you have had a good weekend too.

On Saturday morning I did some shopping then spent the afternoon working with my local history group in the Heritage & Learning Centre.  When I got home I decided to clear out  the space underneath our decking.   My house is really old, it was built in about 1860, and underneath the house is a huge space like a cellar but with an earth floor.  Underneath the decking area is what was originally a small yard with two cubicles – one I think was where the outside toilet was and the other I suspect was where there were originally steps going down from the kitchen to the yard.

We have lived in the house for almost 16 years now and the yard and both cubicles had gradually filled up with bits of wood because they ‘might come in useful one day’.  Recently I began to realise that even if the wood could be reused, it was going to be impossible to get to any of it except those bits balanced precariously on the top of the stack.  So yesterday I decided to clear it all out.  I swept the area clean and then put back the very few bits that actually will be useful.

Today I got up early and, after typing up an article for the Local History group and before T was awake, I loaded up the car and took most of the wood to the local tip.  When I got home T was up and I got washed and changed into clean clothes and we went to pick up his friend N.  N has severe learning difficulties and is somewhere on the autistic spectrum, but he is lovely and T usually spends time with him one day during the week.  Last week was N’s birthday so for a special treat today we took him out for a walk and then for lunch.  We all had a great time.  By late afternoon we were back home  and I went to visit my parents who are both doing well.

I managed to work a little on a couple of art projects during the day too, so that was a bonus 🙂

This spread above, which I make a while ago, is in my 6″x6″ journal.  I’m not sure if you can read it, but on one page it says “Let your heart lead the way” and on the other it says “Your heart will find treasures your eyes can’t see“.   There are lots of layers of gesso, acrylic paint, scrapbook paper and Adirondak colorwash spray.  I wish I could remember where the scrapbook paper with the butterflies on came from, because it’s lovely.  It could be from the stash I bought when I was in LA last year, unfortunately I can’t remember for sure.  Anyway I was pleased with how this spread turned out.

That’s all for now, see you soon

Big love

AJ

Bright Colours

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Bright Colours

Hello friends!

It’s been a bright and sunny day here today and I had intended to go for a long walk this afternoon, but T asked me to help him in the garden so I did that instead.   I didn’t get my walk but at least I got some exercise and was out in the sunshine all day.  I am tired now, but in a good way.

This spread is from my 6×6 journal.  It’s not my greatest achievement and in fact I messed it up so badly I had to gesso over about half of it to redo it.  The grey areas are actually very sparkly glitter paper.  I never can capture the sparkle with a camera or scanner so you’ll just have to take my word for it.  The symbol with the swirls is the symbol for an open mind (according to something I found on the internet).

One of my favourite quotes is from Sir Thomas Dewar (1864 – 1930) he was a Scottish whiskey distiller and salesman.

“Minds are like parachutes… they only function when they’re open.”

That’s all for now, I have to go and iron my work clothes ready for another week of work and I have a cat demanding some urgent tummy tickling too.

See you soon

Big love

AJ 🙂

Cut not the wings of your dreams…

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Cut not the wings of your dreams ....Hello friends

I hope everyone is well and happy.

This spread is from my 6″ x 6″ journal.  I covered the pages with printed tissue paper then coloured them with yellow and green sparkly paint, the same batch that had set to a thick jelly and I thought would be unuseable.  Then I added the borders with red acrylic paint.  I know, I know another strange colour (Eng. spelling :-)) combination from me, but I like it.  The background text is from a Tim Holtz reflections stamp. The two patches under the images are some translucent paper I coloured and edged with  distress inks.  The image of the man’s head is from the Graphics Fairy‘s blog.  The girl with the wings may also be from the Graphic Fairy.

The wonderful quote is from Flavia.

That’s all for now.

Big love

AJ


Advice from Albert Einstein

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Advice from AlbertHello friends!

Thanks for dropping by.

If you could meet anyone in the world (dead or alive) who would it be?  I really think I’d have liked to have met Albert Einstein.  A man of super intelligence but with that little glint of mischieviousness in his eye and crazy hair.  I think he must have been one cool dude.  He said so many deep and profound things and I love using his quotes in my journals.

This spread from my 6″x6″ journal  is on a textured gesso ground.  I bought some tiny tubs of glitter paint (old stuff) in a charity shop and when I got home and opened them the paint, instead of being liquid or creamy, had set like thick jelly.  At first I thought I’m not going to be able to use it, I stuck my finger in and a great glob of sticky paint stuck to it.   I wiped my finger on my book to remove the paint and magic happened.  This lovely luminescent orange glow transferred to the page.  It doesn’t really show up in the scanned image but that orange sheen is just fabulous.  For some reason, not even known to me, I added pink and purple to the page.  Colours that really shouldn’t go together or with orange but I love the way it turned out.  I added pink flowery torn paper edged with purple ink and stamped over with some flower stamps.   There is something about those particular flower stamps that reminds me of the early 70s when I was young, all my friends were hippies and we thought we could change the world…

I added the quote from AE to finish the spread off. I hope you like it.

Big love

AJ

Writing in the Round

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Hello Friends

I hope everyone is well.  I am feeling much better and only had one day off work.  My husband is now poorly but not with the same thing.  He’s had a few days off work and has suffered much more than I did.  Hopefully we will both be back on track again soon.

The spread above is from my 6×6 (handbag size) journal.  I still don’t feel comfortable writing in my journals so I thought I would practice my lettering. I painted gesso in a spiral on the pages so that some parts were left without gesso and then I used Inktense block over the top to create the background.

I drew the ‘true love’ flowers in the middle and then started to write – from the inside out on the first page and the outside in on the second page.  I coloured the petals of the flowers with glitter pen so they sparkle, and drew the wobbly border all around – et voila!

Not much else to say really and I need to get on with my scanning of old photographs.   So far I’ve scanned and cleaned up 11 photos, only about another 100 to go!

Hope you all are having fun

Big love

AJ