A Couple of Autumn Journal Pages and a Tag

 HI everyone. Happy Thursday. 

     I'm back today with 2 journal pages  for Alison's Autumn Colors and Inspiration challenge at Art Journal Journey. These pages are from the autumn journal I made last month.

    This first page started with me gluing down some well used scrap deli paper. You can see it on the left side of the page. Then I layered some scraps of colored paper around it, and finally I took some neutral watercolor paint and colored in the white areas.  Then I added some black scrap swirls from a die cut, as well as adding  some black half pearls to that. I stuck down these white leaf stickers, added the number piece and finally  added the sticker quotes which are just a little bit crooked. 😏

     This next page started with some scraps of paper and then I layered over that some printed tissue paper by Paper Artsy/Alison Bomber. I used watercolor to color in the rose hips.  I added some black metallic paper trim along the bottom, as well as the little bird; I stamped the quote from a very old Wordsworth stamp. Finally I took a medallion that I made awhile back from paper clay. I inked and painted it to get it to look like it does.

      The newest challenge at Tag Tuesday is Spooky Vibes, hosted by Pinky. I started a couple of tags the other day, and here's one I've finished.

       I started by using a stitched  spiderweb die on my tag. Then I inked it, die cut the wreath, the phrase and the crows. I used some foam confetti bits on the wreath, added a little die cut spider and then finished with some washi tape along the bottom. I hope it's spooky enough for your challenge Pinky. 😀

    Let me finish with a few random views of autumn I've snapped in the last couple of weeks.

These first few are from the last of the year trip to my local botanical garden.  The next couple are some views from my area.

I don't know what caused this leaf to have stripes, except maybe from a car tire ( or tires) that ran over it.

And finally, last night my husband went  on a comet hunt drive. We found a place wide open to the west, and even though the comet looked like nothing more than a vague little puff of cloud to my naked eye, my phone picked it up.

That's all for me today. Thanks for stopping by. 

    

Time for a New Challenge

Hi everyone. Happy Tuesday. That means it's time for another challenge at Try It on Tuesday.

    But first let me thank Kath for being our guest designer, and also say a big thanks to all of you who joined our Autumn Magic challenge. There were so many beautiful pieces for this challenge it's going to be hard to get consensus on a top 5 I think. 😏

Today our new challenge starts. This time our theme is Halloween, which is another favorite of mine.

     This time I pulled out a lot fun and cute monsters and ghouls from from stamp collection and made page with some fun trick or treaters or perhaps instead of trick or treating it's Halloween party time. I love how the actual ghosts on my page have scared faces. 😏

     I started by painting the background midnight blue and once that dried I stamped some text. I stamped, colored and fussy cut all these creatures. They are  from a several different companies (Gerda Steiner, Stamping Bella, Tim Holtz, Picket Fence, Rubber Baby Bumpers, Inkadinkado and Posh Limited). The quote is also stamped.

   Our Halloween challenge runs for the next 2 weeks, so I hope you're feeling spooky or playful. Be sure to check out the other designers ideas because with this challenge, there are so many ways to go.

    I am also linking up to Alison's Autumn Colors  and Inspiration at Art Journal Journey since Halloween is an autumn holiday. Please remember that at AJJ we only accept forms of art journaling, no cards, tags, ATC's etc. But at Try It on Tuesday we accept all forms of art.

 

T Stands for Part 2 of my Trip-Maine, New Brunswick and into Quebec

     Hi everyone. Happy new week to you. I'm back with part 2 of my giant road trip. And I'm also here for T day over at Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's blog. You just need to share a drink to join T day. I have a couple of drinks in my post, but  first let me once again share the map of my trip just in case you aren't familiar with the area.

Today we start off our driving  through the potato fields of northeastern Maine just about to pass into New Brunswick, Canada. The scenery was really pretty.

Maddie loves to be co-pilot, even if she can no longer see where we're going.  She puts her bottom on the floor of the backseat and her front on the console. 

Welcome to Canada. 

We picked up a highway and then exited onto this scenic and rolling road. I think these fields are also for potatoes.

  

From potato fields we entered some densely forested area.

     We didn't see any moose on our trip. It would have been nice to see one, but it's also OK since they live in my area where I have seen several on various occasions.  I certainly wouldn't want to collide with one while driving though.

And of course there's always road construction no matter where you go.

     We stopped for lunch in New Brunswick just before heading into Quebec. The burger plate was a special of the day, so we each had that. I had a Diet Coke and my husband has Coke Zero. Here's my first ticket for T this week.

Then we crossed this bridge over the narrow end of an ocean inlet, and we were in Quebec.

    Our route that day took us  along part of the south shore of the peninsula. We also stopped at a National Park all about fish fossils, but sorry, I'm saving that for a separate post.

 Instead here's a few views of the scenery.

     That  land off in the background (across the water) is New Brunswick, which made some time confusion for us. Quebec is the Eastern Time zone, which is what we have at home. New Brunswick is in Atlantic Time, which is one hour ahead of that. The time on the car clock and our phones kept bouncing back and forth for a bit, depending on where the signals were stronger.  Of course the actual time was in the Eastern Zone because we were in Quebec.

    Besides the beautiful natural scenery, I also noticed all these bright silver church steeples as we drove along. I discovered that many of the steeples are tin-plated, which gives them this really pretty  look. I also noticed how most every community had their own designed steeple too. Quebec may be part of Canada, but it is also very French. We have many French Canadian communities here in New Hampshire, and although you don't hear the French language as often as it used to be spoken, there are still a few homes where it is the first language. But we don’t have any of these silver steeples that I’ve seen.

     And here's drink reference #2 for T day.

  That evening we stopped at a grocery store to get some food. We also bought some supplies to make our supper. We were staying in an updated farmhouse that night, and some tomato soup and a grilled cheese  hit the spot ❤️. I really wanted some super cold water, so I stole one of the bottles we freeze and use in our cooler to drink that evening (since it had started to melt anyhow. and the house had no ice in the freezer.)

    I shared this photo before, but this story is still one of my trip favorites.  The farmhouse had 4 bedrooms, and we originally thought we’d just take the one that was on the first floor.  However the only bathroom was on the second floor, so we decided to sleep upstairs.  However when we went to bed we couldn't find Pete. He’s the nervous one of the 2 dogs, so we couldn’t imagine where he was.  My husband was down stairs looking for him, and I searched upstairs.  

    Ha ha. I think he was missing his dog bed, as he had found himself a bed and made himself comfy long before we even went to bed. What a guy. This was his bed for the night. He didn't even get up when I came in to see him. 😏

That’s it for me as this post is getting long. If you missed post #1 and want to see it, you can find it here: Part 1. Have a great T day and week ahead.

Autumn Leaves

 Hi everyone. Happy weekend.  To those of you in Canada, I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving weekend. And if you're in the US, I hope you get a long weekend for Indigenous People (Columbus) Day on Monday to enjoy. 

     Today I have  photos of autumn color to share with you. These first few are from our recent Quebec trip and are taken in Gaspe National Park. The interesting thing about the Gaspe Peninsula is that you have the ocean or St. Lawrence River and then just a few miles inland you have 4,000 foot mountains in the Northern end of the Appalachian Mountain Range. In a few spots there are mountains right at the waterline.

These first few not only have some pretty autumn colors, but also have some cool low clouds.

A few of these photos are from the road, and I included the road because I think it helps add some scale.

These next photos also have some pretty color and are also of some 4,000 foot mountains in the Appalachian chain.  These were taken  several days later at the very end of our trip, as we drove down through Franconia Notch in my home state of New Hampshire on our way home.

     I think the color was just a tad bit more in Franconia Notch, and that was probably for 2 reasons. One, it was a few days later than our being in Gaspe National Park, and two, these mountains are not as close to any large water body (the ocean or St. Lawrence River) as Gaspe National Park is. That water definitely has some  temperature tempering, although  much of the leaf color change comes from the amount of daylight not temperature. Or it could just be that there are fewer evergreens in this area also.

     Today would have been my mother's 95th birthday. Funny, my brother and I were talking, and he always feels sadder on the day each of my parents passed, and I always feel their loss on their birthdays. I'm just going to have to find something fun to do today like make and then have a slice of chocolate cake which was my mother's favorite. 😀

     I'm linking up to Gillena's Sunday Smiles.  Enjoy your weekend.

Friday Art

    Hi everyone. Happy Friday. The other day I was digging up a lot of my tall phlox plants out of one of my gardens and moving them to a different spot. These plants just got too big where they were. Well in the process I got a nasty kink in my back, so what I hoped to have finished by now, didn't get finished. However, after a few days of not stressing my back, it is feeling great again, so hopefully I can get out and finish moving those phlox plants today. Keep your fingers crossed  that the nasty kink in my back doesn't return. 😏

     My journal pages today are  a spread from my Harvest journal. I've shown you several pages from that project, but there's still some I haven't shared.  Today's spread has an autumn theme so I'll be linking it up to Alison's Fall Colors and Inspiration at Art Journal Journey.

     I had this photo in my stash, and I think it's a riot.  It was black and white and I added just a bit of color. I also mounted it on some black paper and then on a scrap of handmade paper someone gifted me. I don't remember who it was, but thank you if you know it was you. 

     On the right side I die cut the scale. I don't use this die and embossing folder often, and I almost purged it. I'm glad I held onto it because it works well here. I also die cut the big pumpkin. The sparkling trophy was also in my stash.

     The background was made with a numbers stencil, some ink pads, some tissue paper and also some paint. I finally finished the page with the orange ric-rac since I thought the left side needed a bit of orange to match all the orange on the right. 

    I am also linking my page up to Creative Artiste Mixed Media for their challenge number #109, and because it's Friday, I'll also be joining Gillena for her Friday Lunch Break. I'm saving the last installment of my art walk for next week when Nicole is back hosting Friday Face Off, so if you were looking for it, you'll have to wait just a little bit longer.

    And did anyone (in the Northern Hemisphere) see the northern lights last night? My friend texted at about 7:30  and mentioned they were already putting on a show. Wow! It was exciting. I love how my photos even picked up the stars that were out also. 

     And if there weren’t so many trees I bet the view would have been even more spectacular.  

Have a great start to your weekend everyone.