Journal - South America

My choice this time and it was Bubblegum Pink and Squeezed Orange along with a hot place - South America - well, hot colours ...

So what does that conjure up for you?  For me it made me think of Carmen Miranda and her big hats.  As Wendy likes us to use Dylusion figures wherever possible I began looking at the stamps I had and at the ones I had stamped from my friend, Lorraine's images.  What could I cut up?

Well we ended up with a real mish mash of images, a face with the hands and bugs cut off, a bodice from a swimmer, a skirt from a cat and a nice pair of legs from a legs plate.  The hat needed extending and some fruit adding so I had a look at the images for Carmen and found one that I felt would do, so it became part of the image - almost too big for the page!  

What now for the background - used the two colours stipulated, trying to blend them into one another with my blending tool and then chose Pomegranate for the third colour to add some contrast.  Loved it against the pink and orange.  Not so sure about the way I used it so I had a look for a stencil and I found this one which I loved.  I thought it looked great against the background now.

Why is it I so often want to leave my page as just that - a background?  Anyway, here it is complete with some writing in a style I kind of copied from the internet.

Now to see what Wendy has done - and maybe start on next week's.

WOYWW 447

Hope you all had a nice Christmas and may I take this opportunity to wish you all the Very Best for the New Year.  Anyone doing anything exciting?  Anyone making resolutions ... and more to the point ... do you ever manage to keep them?

Well, my desk has been a hive of industry with me trying to get some journal pages done for my Thursday journal challenge with my friend.  Need to get ahead of myself and have found it hard but so far am doing a bit now and then.  Saves me sitting and watching tv as I have found staring at a screen seems to be giving me pain over my left eye.  Doing my posts in bits at the moment so I don't have the glare of the screen.

Here it is today (last night actually).  Cleared up a bit so that I don't give any of my pages away.  All my Dylusion paints are out because some of them had gone a bit jellified and I have been having a good old mix with a satay stick or two on them.

There on the left is my foam stamping mat.  Used when stamping on the left hand side of the new(ish) journal, my box of Promarkers, some Dylusion background stamps, page protector, my journal turned to a page that I am not using and finally my paints.  

You can see Monkey and KoKo the Koala by the Ozzie flag (thanks Shaz, long time since we met up but still got these lovely memory prompts) and they and I wish you all

A Very Happy Peaceful and Healthy New Year.  Take care. xx

Journal - Christmas

Again one of my choices, red and green for Christmas.  That made it quite a nice easy one to do, or so I thought.  I was convinced I had a stamp somewhere of Christmas Lights but finding it was another thing altogether.  Despite having all my "C" stamps in two boxes (and more. bagged up still in two large cardboard boxes) I could not find the stamp.  Wonder if there is a die somewhere?  Or have I dreamt it?

Not to be daunted I found a wooden stamp with some garlands on and the first line of that well known Christmas poem ... a bit added to it and the page was ready.  Including, not cats, not dogs but ... birds.   Yes, those Crazy Birds got an airing again.

Here they are:

having a party

Now to see what Wendy has done.  Bet she uses Dylusion figures - definitely not birds.

WOYWW 446

At last most of my cards have gone out.  The ones remaining are for hand delivery and none are for peeps who look at my blog.  Whilst thinking about 'looking at blogs' I have come to the conclusion that a certain social media site is ruining blogland.  So many people now put their work on it rather than on a blog that I don't think many people actually visit blogs.  What do you think?  Am I right or talking through my hat?

The desk is now looking reasonably tidy, ready for me to mess it up again when I maybe start to finish off some UFO's.  I just had to do some tidying up after the card making session which seemed to last forever,  I am going to start my "C" cards much much earlier this coming year.  

These are the little blighters that stuck in my hands - I just could not get my head around how I had made them previously and when I finally did get around to some serious thinking I had to start working out sizes etc so that the die-cut image would fit in.  Then they were not perfect squares so the back piece had to be done individually on each one,  I gave up on a few occasions.  Hope the recipients (only four of them - hand delivery) realise that if stood in the window the sky looks as if it has stars in it.  Or, as my son has done, stand it in front of the Christmas tree.

This is a close-up showing the concertina folds (fan folds) for the frame so that you got a three dimensional look for those of you who are not paper crafters.

(ooer, don't know where that orb came from)

and the outside of two of them

Two had Christmas trees on but I passed them on before I realised I had not taken a photo.  Just like I posted all my Elf and Vodka cards without taking photos.  Stressed!

So that is it - just need to wish you all a Merry Christmas before moving over to Julia's and on to see what my friends have done.

Oops - told you I was stressed.  Here is my desk:

Now to my Dyary and Journal for 2018

Journal - Dogs

This week it was my turn and I chose Dogs for our topic.  Well, actually we had a lot of titles and colours in our list but Wendy asked me to type the list up so I moved them about a bit so that we were a bit more 'alternate in choices' in our pages.  Never noticed that the week following 'cats' was 'dogs' - still, it doesn't really matter does it.

The two colours I had chosen were Peacock Feathers and Twisted Citron, two of the Oxides that I like together - no doubt Wendy does too as we both tend to go for Teal as a colour and these are not dissimilar to it.  Especially when mixed like this.  For my third colour I used Walnut Stain because I rarely use the two browns I have in the Oxides and chose to do my background stamping with my three colours. I used a bit of black because black is not a colour and I wanted to do some dirty bits to go with the Walnut Stain edging.  

My (Dylusion) dogs were coloured, as usual, with my Copics but I did find that some of the colours had a tendency to bleed.  Strange.

Here is what I did - 

Now to pop over to see what Wendy has done with two of her favourite colours.

WOYWW 445

Well, after all the waiting it is nearly here and I am nowhere ready for the joyous occasion.  I am talking about Christmas.  Still making Christmas cards as you can see.

these are my last ones

Of course I never make things easy for myself.  Have had this weird and wonderful idea in my head of making the image you can see (three cards at the back) kind of bowed out.  Of course the border is so narrow that it has not made life easy.  This is as far as I have got (below)

Tried doing it so that the recipient just had to push tags through the back but then there was the problem of it becoming a card.  Tried leaving unpeeled tape on one side and thought of issuing instructions but decided to the non-card maker it might prove a bit fiddly.  Besides which, who wants a DIY card?

Ah well, back to the drawing board.  Maybe next week I can show you what I ended up with, and show you some of my other cards I have sent.

In the meantime, we have been snowed under with 'weather'.  We managed to get me to anti-coag clinic on Monday but could not get back up our long drive.  I got out and walked and Chas dug the car out.  It has stayed in the garage since and the snow has stayed on the drive with a bit of help from another snowfall.  This is from the kitchen window, it doesn't seem to be thawing.

and our Christmas tree in the back garden

That tree was about 5' when we moved it to here.  It had survived two moves and has thrived here.  I just don't know when it will stop growing - maybe it will bow over in time as it gets too high but I hope it stays forever.

That's it for this week folks, off now to see what Julia has been up to.  See you all over there.

Journal - Cats

This week Wendy chose to use the colours Brown and Orange and the theme was to be 'cats'.  I used my Dylusion paints.  Well, I had to as Wendy had bought me a pot of the delicious chocolate brown paint so it went with the orange and I introduced the turquoise. 

I used my brayer to add the two (Wendy) colours and used the turquoise as an accent with a Dina Wakeley stencil.  Didn't like how it turned out in the turquoise so introduced some circles (Tando stencil), and some stamping but still did not like it.  Then out came the baby wipes and I added colour here and there, swapping them about until I liked the background.  I really did like the background and was in two minds whether to just leave it and add words and start this journal page again.  It actually is more colourful than it looks on here, well, the colours are deeper, more intense.  Trouble was it was a bit dark by then for the figures!  Rethink!

So I completely changed my thinking - added a silver half moon (complete with eye and mouth), put the cats close together as if they were having a cuddle and wrote the words in yet another 'try out font'.

That's it!  Off to see what Wendy has done when I get back from my trip to Germany and the Christmas Markets.

All the Fours - What's On Your Workdesk 444

Here we are, another week has flown by and 'oh em gee' it is nearly Christmas and I have so much to do and I am not around to do it.  Why do I get these brilliant ideas to go away for a few days?  I am in Dresden.  Travelling light so there is no computer therefore the desk is as left at home on Sunday.

You can see my "C" cards to date.  Some 'elf' ones (still not shown them to you have I?), some Vodka ones and a scenic one which Chas cannot understand because "it's all brown" - "Sepia my dear, Sepia - for the olden days, like Dickens time".

Under the grey book are my others still not done, not even one of them.  Might end up with three of them finished and no more.

Right, that is it.  Too much to do before I set off, still, this is the way Julia likes it, short!

Toodle pip!  See you over at Julia's.

(Thanks Julia for sorting me out last week xxx)