I've just finished Week 41 of France's ALAD/ASAW weekly challenge, where the theme was 'A quote to live by'. I laughed when I saw Kathleen's chosen quote, (Kathleen was the challenge host for this week), because it was the one that flew into my head. Although it's not the only quote I live by, it's certainly one of them and the one that I think is the most true in life.
Here is my finished journal page.....
......and a quick step by step run through:
I coloured my journal page and also some scraps of white card using SU watercolour crayons (subtles collection). The end result was lovely. All the different shades of blue were gorgeous and almost too beautiful to cut up.
Using three different sized circle punches, I cut a variety of circles from the now coloured scraps. I ran double sided tape along the back of each circle to hold it in place whilst I stitched them into strips of various lengths on my sewing machine.
A word of warning here! Using double sided tape with your sewing machine isn't a great idea, as the glue from the tape builds up and causes both the needle and thread to stick. I've learnt this from previous experience and now use hand sanitiser to wipe down the needle frequently to prevent any build up. It makes it very slow going but it will at least keep your machine in one piece!
I also ran a line of stitching around my journal page, or at least as much as the constraints of the journal would allow.
To add some detail to the lower part of my page, I added some embossing using an IndigoBlu stamp (bubbles) and white SU embossing powder.
The circle strips were then arranged and layered along the top of my page and glued into place...... glued, because the backing to the double sided tape wouldn't pull off after I'd put a line of stitching down the back of each strip, as I thought it would. Using more double sided tape on top of the existing tape wasn't an option either, as it wouldn't stick to the backing paper of the tape that was already there. Glossy Accents was my only option given I wanted the strips to be held permanently in place.
At this point I felt the page looked too top heavy and decided to 'knock back' the strips into the background by dry-brushing a little white gesso over them. It definitely looked better once I'd done this.
I'm having a bit of a love affair at the moment with Stampendous chunky white embossing enamel, so I mixed this with Stampendous Frantage Chalky White Deep Impressions embossing powder (shabby opaque blue) and sprinkled this randomly and rather liberally over my circle strips and down the margins of the page. This served to 'knock back' the strips even more and to add some shimmery texture to them. I was more heavy handed at the top of the page and gradually less so as I sprinkled the EP down the page.
To balance my page I stamped a Vivas las Vagastamp (scribbled circle) in French Ultramarine Archival ink across the centre of the page, at the bottom. This was a bit of a challenge but with the aid of TH's stamping platform it work well enough.... phew, it all could have gone horribly wrong at that point!
My quote was computer generated in blue ink and edged with a SU watercolour marker pen (not quite navy).
I'm pleased at how the page turned out despite the challenges. Stamping on an uneven surface let alone across the centre of an art journal and over embossing (which acts as a resist) is never a good idea. Also adding so much texture across a page can make it difficult to close a journal but careful placement of my strips countered this.
One niggle is that the 'white' embossing powder I used for the lower half of the page was not as white as the Stampendous EP and looks almost cream against it. Luckily it's very light so isn't that noticeable I hope.
Overall I'm cool with my page and hope you like it too. Thanks so much for dropping by and taking time to read my post. A new ALAD/ASAW has started today (week 42) so please pop by again to see how my challenge piece for week 42 evolves.
Have a wonderful day and happy crafting.
Carol. xx
No comments:
Post a Comment