Be Open - Journal Page

Hi everyone, 

I’m sharing my entry for Week 27 of France Papillon’s ALAD/ASAW challenge. 

The theme for this week was,  "What message would you give  the world?" I decided that mine would be a general message to just ‘Be open’.    I though that if we were open to others we might learn to respect their thoughts, ideas and choices, even if they weren’t our own. To be open to love too, in whatever form it manifests.  To be open to ourselves and to our own emotions and feelings. I thought that, just maybe, if the world could be more open there might be a little more acceptance and tolerance...... Maybe simplistic but I can hope.

Anyway, that was my thinking behind this journal page:

To get the ball rolling I chose some white 140lb cardstock which I cut to 13 x 20 cm. Next using a combo of Stamping UP Watercolour Ink (Saraha Sand) and  Ranger Distress Oxide and Distress Inks (hickory smoke, bundled sage) I smooched and blended the inks to get the background I wanted. Then splattered with water to give a ghosting effect when I dabbed it off with a dry paper towel.

Flipping the page over to the reverse, I drew a 2” circle roughly in the middle of the page and then sliced inside the circle with a craft knife to create segments.  I also added a couple of strips of complimenting coloured paper from my stash, along the top and to on of the bottom corners.

Going back to the front of the page, I added Ranger text tissue paper and washi tape with a little Ranger Multi Medium (matt) for good  measure. 

I made a small vertical cut to the top RH corner and rolled back the edges. I also rolled back the bottom LH corner..... (now you know the reason I glued colour paper to the back, as this now shows through to the front of the page).  To get rid of any white edges, I inked all edges with a Faber Castell Artist Big Brush Pen (cold grey).

My next step was to use my current ‘go to’ stencil by TCW (mini tile texture)  and Ferro Texture Paste (graphite) randomly over the page. I really enjoy the combo of these two together, especially the grittiness of the Ferro.

Now I wanted to create a rust effect on my page and after experimenting with one of two mediums I resorted to using Ranger Distress Stain (rusty hinge), letting it flow through and around the texture paste with the aid of some spritzed water and drying between each application to get some depth of colour. 

I cut another piece of the colour paper but this time to the size of my page and with the right side of the paper facing to the back of my spread, I glued it in place. This way the front of the coloured paper would peek through the cuts in my spread.......

Now for the heart: this was drawn free-hand out of a test piece of the background card. The edge of the heart was again coloured using the FC Artist Big Brush Pen (cold grey). I also applied a thin coat of Windsor & Newton Artist’s Acrylic Gesso (clear) and set it aside to dry, which in the current heat took less than 3 minutes.  

To colourise the heart I used the same Ranger DS that I used for the drippage (rusty hinge) and then coated it with a coat of Ranger Crackle Paint (clear rock candy).  As the heart was small (about an inch in size) my layer of crackle paint was kept thin so that the crackling and crazing would be fine when it dried. To finish it off I wrapped my heart in 3mm silver jewellery wire.

Here is the heart wrapped in wire sat on
one of the rusted elements I talk about below.

I decided to rust a few metal elements, a key, a floral medallion and a numeral and to do this I used Finnabair’s rusting kit. This was the first time I’ve used this kit and it certainly does what it says on the bottle.... it’s amazing and looks so realistic. I glued the rusted medallion into the centre of my circle and layered the heart on top with dimensional foam pad and a touch of Glossy Accents.

My final touches were to add some gold coloured seed beads and irregular hand stitching in black cotton.

A close up of some of the
irregular stitching and seed beads.

 The rusted key was glued to the top LHS corner ........

and the numeral tucked behind the rolled back bottom LHS corner.........

A computer generated sentiment was edged with hickory smoke and black soot and layered on top of some dyed gauze.  The page edges  were similarly inked to help frame it and a few more splatters added in rusty hing, black soot and white gesso. 

My journal page was complete once backed with black card and a couple of tiny tags, one for the date and the other to denote it was made as a ALAD/ASAW challenge piece.

I am really enjoying France’s challenge.... it’s really make me stretch my mojo. But by only doing a layer a day, it’s gives me time to ponder my next step/layer, so it’s not stressy at all.

I hope you’ve enjoyed my post.... thanks for stopping by.

Happy crafting.

Carol. xx