WOYWW 645

 Back again to a Wednesday, these days ares slipping by so quickly it's going to be the end of October before we know it.  Thank goodness we have WOYWW to look forward to each week and get together with friends from all over the place.

So what have I been up to since we last met?  Remember me saying I had done a workshop with Tracy Evans but I was waiting for a stamp to arrive in order to finish it, well I finished it off 

That's all I have to show you.  I have been making Christmas Cards though - now got half a dozen finished and ready.  I won't be disclosing them until nearer the time as I have no idea how many I will be making of another design and who will be getting them/what.

I am at the moment working in my Thursday journal so that, again, is on my desk and nothing else really.  You came to see the desk so here it is

So on the deck (counter) is a blue box which contains some Christmas stuff - berries, cones, ribbons erc - and on top is my Open Spine Journal all complete but I am hoping to put some pictures in it and then show it to you page by page.  The paper with typing on is the list of quotes we have been using for our Thursday journal and net to it is the journal page ready for decorating.  I have coloured it with various autumnal shades of Oxides, Crackling Campfire, Persimmon and Picked Raspberry.  Next to that is my box of Promarkers and on top the pack of flesh tones.  Anything else apart from the black inkpad is rubbish.

You can see I have kept the back wall still as tidy as it was when I first reorganised.  It has proved a good way of storing my inkpads.

That's it for this week.  Hopefully see you next week with more to show you.

Jeudi Journal - Chaos, Panic, Disorder!

Bet that title gave you a start this morning - hopefully not with any of us but rather the quote that Wendy chose for us to work with this week.  "Chaos, panic, ,Disorder ... my work is done" is the complete phrase and I decided to go with a teenaqger theme to illustrate it.

I had a page coloured in Dyan's Pomegranate but for some reason it seemed a lot darker than it was the last time I used it.  Still, I thought it was a good colour for autumn and so I stuck to Autumnal (or October) colours for everything else so that I could enter the page into Art Journal Journey's current theme which is "The Colours of October" as chosen by Tracey.

"Carrie was a bit of a spoiled brat.  A real daddy's girl who could twist him around her little finger and get whatever she wanted.    Her mother, however, was trying her best to bring Carrie up to be a responsible young lady.  But some days she felt she was losing the battle.

Carrie wanted to go out with her friends one evening just after dinner but as she had lounged about all day her mother said she had to tidy her room before she went anywhere.  As usual Carrie had a mad strop and flatly refused to do anything saying that she was going out regardless.  For once dad stepped in and had a quiet word with Carrie asking her to just tidy up her room and he would make things right with her mother and he might even buy her those ear rings she wanted.

Up Carrie went to her room but tidy it she did not.  No, she messed it up even more and as she went down the stairs to meet her friend she said to herself "chaos, panic disorder - my work is done".  She didn't want the ear rings her father had offered her, the truth was she had bought them herself the day before.  And so off she went with her friend Lois to meet up with the others at the yacht club.

I used a new border stamp down one side and across the top because I felt it represented chaos itself, then I added one or two things that I felt Carrie may have moved around, left lying about on purpose, note there are three mugs (those of you with teenagers may be familiar with this).  Finding the background very dark I decided to use diecut letters in various colours for the three words at the beginning of the quote.  Then I finished off with a black pen and realise that I would have been better to do it on a white background - too. late, sorry!  I am beginning to wish I had redone this page.  Doubt I will use Pomegranate again in this way.

WOYWW 644

Another Wednesday, another WOYWW and I am away again, will be back later today.  Only had a couple of days this time as I had a workshop on Saturday and didn't finish it because I am awaiting some stamps coming.   Could have easily used a substitute but as the one to be used was in my order I decided to wait.  So my desk today is as left so that when I get back later today I hope the stamps are waiting for me and I can get on and complete these pages.

As you can see from the photo below it was an online workshop and was with Tracy Evans, as per usual, and I just loved the colours of this journal page she showed us.  

Sorry, still not got around to doing any of the videos I keep saying I will do; one day before Christmas they will get done.  I did think Zsuzsa's video might have spurred me on last week, I did so enjoy it, but then I kept thinking "follow that one" - it was absolutely delightful.  She is so talented.

No glorious sunsets for you to see, we had hoped for one last night as it was our anniversary which is why we chose to be away for it but I was intrigued by some of the plants growing in the rocks that line the sands to the promenade.  Not a clue what these are but they look like succulents.

You can see from this photo how there are huge rocks stretching quite a way along the front to the actual beach.  It is surprising what springs up from within them - quite a few sycamores and a lovely cotoneaster at one place.

As you can see from the picture above the beach is covered in pebbles which have built up into a bank at this point.  We did enjoy seeing the birds although they were too far out for me to photograph with my phone but I will leave you with this picture where  the dots are actually oyster catchers (I think).

Jeudi Journal - Time

 To begin with I had a greenish page, a bit on the limey side, but as I changed my mind on what the story was to be I had to change it with some blues.  Out came Peacock Feathers and Mermaid Lagoon Distress Inks and between them I got a kind of ocean colour.

Now the rule for this page is that we use Dylusion products, we can use others but today I broke the rules and put bodies on them which are certainly not Dylusion ones.  To make up for it I stamped a border using one of Dyan's stamps - of course the heads are from her collection.

"Lottie and Eleanor are two girls about town.  Always hanging around with the 'In Crowd' they can be seen at all the best parties, in the best tea shops and the most favoured of department stores.  So far they have not joined in with 'The Hunt' that some of their acquaintances take part in but that is purely because neither girl sees it as anything other than a "cruel sport".  Cocktails are the thing they enjoy most of all, coupled with their desire to dance and visit the Theatre.  In fact they had been practising the Shimmy and the Black Bottom only that morning before setting off to the beach.

Lottie really wanted to impress Archie, a local landowner's son, and so she had bought herself a lovely yellow and black swimming costume especially for Tuesday as that was the definite day Archie went down to the water.  She had also bought herself a black satin fascinator which she wore at a jaunty angle on her neatly coiffured hair.

The two of them hung around outside the beach hut they had hired waiting for Archie and his friends to arrive, time was going on and both girls had things they wanted to do.  Eleanor was getting particularly agitated about the time and what other things were happening that day.  Lottie, on the other hand, wanted to see Archie, or, more to the point, for Archie to see her in her new bathers.  'So much to do, so little desire to do it' was all she could say as she tried to persuade Eleanor to stay just a little while longer."

I wonder if Archie did come down, and if he did, did he notice Lottie in her black and yellow outfit.  Perhaps that is something we will never know.

As I said at the beginning I tried to replicate an ocean colour, I drew a beach hut very much in the background and made a border with one of Dyan's stamps choosing the circles to represent the wheels on the bathing huts that they used to take down to the water's edge in those days.  The words, once again, were typed as there was little room for any fancy lettering.

So because we are set in the 20's I am entering this into Art Journal Journey where Wendy has her Vintage theme running for the month.

WOYWW 643

It's another WOYWW day!  Gather your craft stuff whilst you may - show us your desk - then off to play.  Not much of a poet am I?  But it is Wednesday and that means it is WOYWW.

Yes, we've been away again but no more glorious sunsets, sorry.  I did make two birthday cards but sent them off without scanning but I did remember for Mary Anne especially, to show some of my Midori Books.  Well that's what the Jane Davenport ones were sold as - here they are:

These are the covers of some of them.  Top left and laid out at the bottom are two covers done with Abs in workshops, the centre one is my own covered in tissue and decorated, the third with the ladies is the bought Jane Davenport one as is the white one laid at the bottom right.

This is an attempt to show you the inside.  If you look top right that is the Jane Davenport one (my first) and there are lots of individual booklets inside.  One is for a holiday in Amsterdam, one for a Christmas market in Germany, one for unmounted stamps by a certain supplier (long gone idea) and so on.  The books are not stapled together but held together with a piece of elastic - like shirring elastic, each in its own cover so it is easy to slip two more pages in if/when you want to.  Is that clear, or clear as mud? If "muddy" I will have to do a video of them.

Not had the chance to do the videos for You Tube of the journals, but I have done the covers for my Open Spine Journal or whatever it is called.  I won't put them on here today but I hope to get up to date with some videos later.

My desk is rather busy with a jumble of stuff for a workshop I am doing online. Thought I had better get everything together whilst I have the chance.  So here it is below and then its toodle pip until next WOYWW - IN OCTOBER!

Jeudi Journal - Sarcastic?

"Things were a bit tight after the end of the war and Mrs Brown had been as frugal as she possibly could be with most things.  Her husband had been invited to a "bit of a do" by his boss at work, "just drinks and nibbles and a chance to network" hubby had said.  He wanted his wife to look nice and so she had been planning a new outfit for weeks.

She had managed to unpick the sleeves from a golfing sweater her husband used to wear.  It was in good condition apart from holes in the elbows where he had leant on his desk and together with the sleeves from one of her own sweaters (she had got bleach on the front of it whilst cleaning a while ago, ever so upset she had been) she felt it made a super top for her.  She knew she wouldn't be the best dressed woman there but with what Reggie earned and what she managed to scrape together she felt her outfit would be admired and maybe even a talking point amongst the other women.

It was the skirt she was most proud of.  It had taken a long time in the planning but with begging her friends for old ties that their husbands and sons no longer wanted she had made herself a skirt.  She was absolutely delighted and couldn't wait for Reggie to come home.  She had it all planned.  They would have a light meal that evening, so little preparation was needed, and then he would get in his best demob suit and she would surprise him with her lovely new outfit set off with a cute beret her aunt had knitted for her and which she had attached a bow to.

Reggie came home, they sat down, had a bite to eat, in anticipation of the "nibbles" that evening, and sure enough, Reggie went upstairs, had a quick shower and came back down all ready and sporting a cravat as it was a special evening.  Mrs Brown looked at herself in the mirror upstairs, gave her beret a little twist to one side to show off the bow and walked slowly down the stairs and into the living room.

"Well?" she said, as she stood there waiting for Reggie to tell her how lovely she looked.

Poor Reggie, he was not sure about that skirt at all.  He realised she had done it all to make an effort to look nice for him in front of his friends from the office but he was not that good at making his face look as if he was really saying nice things and so he asked himself "Hmm.. should I answer normally or should I be sarcastic?"  In the end he said "I do like that beret you are wearing dear, but surely you won't be keeping it on all the time will you?"

To begin with I had a green page done previously and so I stencilled my favourite 'wallpaper looking stencil' over it very lightly in Tea Dye, added a 40's tv and some flying ducks (at this point `I must say we never had flying anything on the walls of our house when I was a child) to try to give it an authentic 40 - 50's look about the page.

I chose to type the words out again instead of doing my own writing as I had so little room on the page to do anything other than that.

Now that I have managed to reproduce something like a vintage vibe to this Dylusion page I am entering it into Art Journal Journey where Wendy has chosen vintage as the theme this month.

WOYWW 642

Another Wednesday, another WOYWW and another desk to bare.  We've had another nice week weatherwise so it's been some nice sunshiny days for us in the north, hope everyone else has had much the same.

I did find my inner pages for my spineless journal just after I had posted, it was in the pile of papers on the right hand side of my journal.  Recognisable by the sari ribbon - which I did not see - needed my new glasses from Specsavers!  Well, it is still in the same state, ie not done the front and back covers but that's because we have been away again and I didn't want to mess up with Gesso and paint etc etc.  I did, however, almost finish a tiny teabag junk journal.  I'll show you the front cover. I just ran out of tiny things to put in it so there are three pages still to finish. I'll put it on my You Tube later when it is finished.

Talking Journals, Mary Anne mentioned a Traveller's Notebook in her comments to me last week.  I wonder if she means the Midori Books.  If so I have lots of those, they were quite the craze a few years ago and I made my first with Abs from AA&C but I had bought a Jane Davenport one previous to that.  The posh bought one came with all kinds of attachments - I really did not need all of those - could have made similar myself.

Anyway, here is my desk:

And here are some journals for you to look at, I'll dig my Midori's out next week.  Maybe even have a Journal Fest.

Finally some sunset photos from Monday evening, strolling along the prom

The colours are not as vivid as the one I took, a few weeks ago, but it had not been as dry a day.  However I still enjoyed it and it was worth waiting for as we walked along,  I loved how the top edges of the clouds were tinged with gold.

That's it for now so see you next week hopefully.