Remember the Ocean Journal

Hi everyone!  It's the last full day of summer so let's go to the beach.

You might remember the ocean journal I was working on this past summer. Today I thought I would take you through the whole book from start to finish. I recently completed it and now it sits on my journal shelf. 

So here it is. You may remember some of the pages, but I know  some of the others I haven't shown you.

One slightly blurry page and some shots that aren't quite magazine quality, but I think you get the finished project.

Its the second project I have recently finished. Hurrah!

That's all for me. Thanks for visiting.

What the Summer is Meant for

The weekend has wound down. A new week of summer and the living is easy.

I have another journal spread for Elizabeth's summer love challenge at Art Journal Journey.

This spread is from my ocean journal. I started by using an ocean themed napkin. When we went to Maine at the end of June these napkins were in the cottage we rented, and I took one home with me. It worked perfect for a base in this page.

I then stamped these 2 ocean themes quotes several times and used white painted to form my big escape word. Once dry, I outlined it with a Stabilo pencil, which I then softened the edges with a wet paintbrush.

Finally I added one of these handmade postage stamps. I bought a package of some postage stamp paper awhile  back. I added paint, some stamped images and some die cuts and ended up making a whole cool sheet of postage stamps with an ocean theme.

Once I tore the stamp off the sheet I added the postage amount and then added some postmarks. I love the idea of making some customized stamps for a particular project.

That's all for me.  Almost time for Game of Thrones.

Happy new week, and thanks for visiting.

Summer Days

Its been a beautiful summer so far. I am lost in summer vacation mode-morning walks, hanging out with friends, swimming in the lake, boating, reading in the afternoon in my hammock. 

I just finished reading .

Its my latest book club book (took me away from reading my cozy mysteries) and was a thought provoking true story about a man who disappeared and lived alone in the Maine woods for over 20 years. He had no human contact and got what he needed by breaking into weekend cabins. Then he got arrested breaking into the kitchen of a kids summer camp, and that ended his years as a hermit in the woods. ( He ended up in jail and all that goes with that.) The book explores why he wanted to live alone in the forest and how he did that in the harsh Maine wilderness. It also deals a little bit with the people who lived in those cabins he broke into. I wish it dealt with them a little more.  I've still got a bunch of questions after reading this, and it should be a great discussion at book club.

And I've started reading this book. This is the second book about Julia Child by Alex Prud'homme, her great nephew. The first book (My Life in France) was excellent so I am excited to read this. The first book was co-authored by both Julia Child and Alex Prud'homme.  So far I am enjoying this, and then maybe I'll get back to some more cozy mystery books.
And I bought 2  new teas to make ice tea. They taste less like tea and more like flavored water. One pouch makes a lot of tea, a whole big pitcher not once but three time. I can drink tea all day for 2 days per bag. :)

I'm enjoying them while I read. And while I make art.
And yesterday I made some strawberry rhubarb jam.

I had some left over strawberry puree from my July 4th cake and decided before it went bad to use it as a base for some jam. I added some strawberries and some rhubarb I had in the freezer.
Just having fun and keeping busy.
Here's another page in my night journal I am making. I did this spread last week and then I found out that the latest Try It on Tuesday challenge is let it shine.

The right hand page is from an old calendar page. I'm not sure if I will leave it as is or do something to it. Here's a closer view of the quote.

And I have another page in my ocean journal too.

I'm going to link this page up to Elizabeth's great challenge, Summer Love, over at Art Journal Journey.
Summer is good. Life is good.

Rainy Saturday

Its a dark Saturday morning here in my world. I am ready for some more sun. Its been too cloudy the last few days. they say tomorrow. I sure hope so.

So today I have another spread in my ocean journal for you.  I showed you a couple of other pages the other day. You can check them out here if you are interested High Tide and Other Things.

If it looks a little confusing on the right page, its because that page is narrower than the page underneath it.

To make my spread I used paint, some art stamps (ArtChix), some die cuts, some back of a sheet of paper, some left over screening from when we redid our screen door, stamps, some blue gemstone stickers, some other metal art pieces and a goldish charm.

And a few more doodle pages from my drawing journal.

I am linking up with Art Journal Journey. This month is the fun challenge of Summer Love hosted by Elizabeth over at Altered Book Lover.

Both the 4th of July (here in the US) and getting my toenails painted are fun things that happen during the summer. 

And Valerie has been showing us  botanical garden photos, which reminded me I never showed you my photos from Kingsbrae Garden which we visited in New Brunwick when we were away last month.

Here's a few views.

I would love to go back and see what it is like in other seasons since this is all the spring/June flowers.

So no big plans for me this weekend. A lot depends on the weather I guess.  How about you?  Anything exciting going on?

Thanks for visiting.

High Tide and Other Things

I'm writing this Wednesday evening as I have a busy day on Thursday. I'm off to see my mom and she has an early  doctor's appointment. And since I have to drive 2 hours to get there, I'll be of with the sunrise (practically). 

So today I want to show you another tag for the challenge going on right now at Try It On Tuesday.

I made it with layers of stamping with some different colored inks. Then I added a scrap of old book paper, the TH people, some paper scraps and a little metal star.

 And awhile back I showed you this journal cover that I was in the process of making.

I have been working on the inner pages and thought I would show you a few pages.

 This book follows the path of the tides, more or less.

I bought a package of brown paper bag paper from Amazon,  and I really like it. It holds up well to paint and matte medium. And it was easier to make book pages with than having to cut up paper bags-as I would need several. Around here the only store I get brown paper bags in is Trader Joe's, and we use those for our recycling. The stack of paper wasn't cheap, but the package came with 200 sheets so I am happy to have it for some other projects. Especially now that I know how well all my media work on it.

An added plus is I can run it through the printer too.

And after incoming tide you get high tide. This one is when the ocean is a little rough from the white foam on the top of the waves.

As its got an ocean theme, and the ocean is a fun place to be in the summer, I am linking up to Elizabeth's summer love challenge over at Art Journal Journey.

So today's art was wall painting. When my daughter was last living away from home I started to paint her room. She had this bright blue paint in there, which was great for a teenager, but not what I wanted. I was in the midst of painting and had 3/4 of her room done when she suddenly moved home. This was 2 years ago.

So now that she has gone again, I decided I was going to finish it up right away. Before the paint isn't any good or summer ends and I am back to work.

And so that was today's artsy endeavor.

Did you have an artsy endeavor today?

Fishies and Stars

Happy Friday everyone.

I'm going for a short post today since I've got an agenda for the day. Since its a rainy Friday I have errands to run and I need to pop into school to put my things away so I can find them when school begins at the end of August. The kids and teachers still have one more week left before their summer vacation beings, but I am not going back in after today and whatever is left my sub can do. Which should be clean up his things and put away the textbooks.

Plus there is a little get together for one of my department teachers who is leaving after this year winds up, so I want to go and say goodbye.

So I am trying to push some more artist boundaries this summer and knock myself out of my art routine a bit. One thing I have in my head is to make some journals. So I've been working on the outer covers for 2 new journals right now. Neither is finished but thought I would give you a peak.

 This top one with the fish is going to be an ocean themed journal and this bottom one with the stars is going to be a night/ space themed book.

Since the theme at Moo Mania is Underwater, I am linking up as that is where you find fish. :) I was thinking maybe I should wait until the cover is finished, but then if I get distracted, which I most likely will, I might miss the link up. So there you go. I don't think I am going to add a lot to the front of this cover because I think those wooden fish (which came off some old mobile I had years ago and just needed a little paint and sprucing up) make the front of this book pretty complete. I do have binding plans though, and will show you the finished cover someday soon.

This is all for me today. Time is getting on.  

Hope everyone has a great weekend.