• Blog

    January Journal embellishments

    Since the cold weather finally found Minnesota, I’ve been doing a bit of lap crafting. It’s too cold in my basement craft space to spend any length of time. I had yesterday off for Martin Luther King Jr day so I spent a bit of afternoon time by the fireplace re-watching a series. Re-watching something lets me craft while still getting a bit of entertainment value simultaneously.

    I’ve definitely been more inspired by junk journaling lately. I watched a YouTube video the other day that talked about using those 6×6 paper pads for an easy and practical embellishment. A full page pocket.

    They were super simple yet slightly boring on their own. I decided to add clusters to them to jazz things up a bit.

    As you can see they are kind of like chips…can’t have just one.

    Here I grabbed an ATC to show the pocket part. When the pocket get glued to the journal page it will be adhered only on three sides creating another pocket behind.

    After embellishing the pockets with clusters I decided that my stash of clusters needed a bit more interest. I grabbed a container of paper flowers and set to work.

    I had so much fun working with this limited palette of flowers.

    As you can see I went a bit crazy, but I used up the whole container of flowers from my stash. I’ve been think a lot about all the stuff I have for crafting and how meaningless it is to have around if I’m not using it. I made a pledge to myself to use things. Even if I don’t have a specific plan at the moment. Moving forward with creating. Not everything has to a a plan. I’m being BRAVE and using the stuff. Creating without an end goal in mind per say.

    While I crafted, my buddy Marvin kept me company. He’s sweet like that.

    This is a poor picture taken as the sun was setting but look at the blossoms! This plant has never bloomed for me. I’m so pleased that it finally did!

    Over the long weekend I had plans to have Bloody Mary’s with the neighbors but they came down with a cold. I wasn’t too sad since it was so frigid outside. I didn’t relish the idea of walking across the street. Instead we all had our own and shared a photo in our group chat. 🙂 I suppose we could have done a zoom call but that really would have been overkill.

    It was back to reality for me today. The end of semester is Friday so suddenly all the kiddos want to get some work done! Imagine that! Keeps me busy and makes the day go by really fast.

    Linking up with Elizabeth and friends for T Tuesday where we share a beverage and whatever else comes to mind.

  • Art - Creativity

    Junk journal pages from long ago

    Technically these aren’t super long ago… but a couple months old. Honestly, with the way this winter is dragging on and on it still feels a bit like January-February. It’s all just a cold white blur.

    My wonky junky journal is getting super thick. I’m on the last signature and am trying to be a bit more aware of the thickness of embellishments I am using. 

    I hadn’t realized that I never posted any of these pages. Thankfully I was looking through the folders on my laptop and discovered my error.

    I love the colors in this one. I was certainly wishing for warmer days when I created this one.

    This page has hidden journaling about my baby girl turning 20! What in the world…that just isn’t possible.

    Again with this page I am wishing for springtime. How foolish I was to think it was coming anytime soon.

    I used a scrap of fabric to make a little fabric flip to hide a bit of journaling.

    When I finished this page I realized that my date stamp ended with 2022. I had to improvise. Since then I ordered this new date stamp. My problem is solved until 2032.

  • Art - Blog - Creativity

    Junky art journal

    As so often happens, I was inspired to create smack in the process of cleaning up my art space. I had bits of this and that laying around…parts of projects that went astray…papers headed for the recycling bin…you know the usual junk that seems to take up my precious space.

    The inspiration to make a small hand bound art journal was from Susanne Rose art. I follow her in Instagram and always love seeing her work in these small journals

    All of the pieces I had laying around really worked well in a small size.

     

    Including these upholstery fabric strips… again cut for another project that never came together. They worked perfectly stitched down on a stack of book page and plain newsprint paper.

     

    I stitched my signatures in using waxed linen and a pamphlet stitch.

    I was sure to leave lots of space this time around. I tend to make very chunky pages… especially when I don’t have the space.

    I goofed a little here. The needle didn’t pierce the gold fabric on the first stab through. I may use some lace to cover or just leave it as is.

    It’s not meant to be perfect. It’s wonky. It’s junky. It’s fraying. It’s just perfect for experimenting.