Nature Prints Journal Spread

Hello, and happy new week to everyone!

My biggest inspiration of this year has been the year-long Wanderlust 2017 online class. I've started more projects than finished but at this point, this doesn't feel like a failure at all but instead one of the main teachings of the whole class so far.

When I feel good making art, the important thing is to do it as often as I can, and not count the finished projects. This goes at least for the kind of period as I have in my life right now - my to-do-list seems very full also without art deadlines and blog posts. The main thing I'm sorry for is that this has also meant neglecting my blog.

Anyway, today I have a Wanderlust inspired project to share!



A while ago the class theme was Nature Prints. Kasia Avery, the sweet and super talented main teacher of Wanderlust 2017, inspired us with a video of Gelli printing with objects from the nature.



I've used household items for Gelli printing before but hadn't thought of trying something like flowers or leaves. I got really hooked on it right away so I was lucky to have picked plenty of different leaves with the help of our three-year-old! It was a good idea to let them straighten overnight between a newspaper, under a weight of books or something.



I still have some of those leaves from a week ago but I suspect they may get too dry at some point, becoming more fragile, so I may want to gather new ones for my next prints.



The photo above is of the spread before adding the photo and the final touches.



I am also joining the challenges at Eclectic Ellapu: Everything Goes and Art-Piaskownica: Plant/Floral Motifs.



The last few photos are detail shots where you can get a better idea of the see-through beeswax technique!



I made my prints on tissue paper, wanting to try them for the beeswax collage technique I've done a lot lately. Beeswax technique is so special in how it leaves the different layers quite transparent, and I thought this might be the perfect way work with my nature prints!



I just realized I only have photos of the finished project and none of the individual prints. I have gotten the memory of my phone nearly full so I'm afraid I have to spend the rest of the afternoon organizing my photos. I'll post pics of the prints as soon as I have time!



Thank you so much for your visit!

Xmas Selfie: Layout for Scrap Africa Sketch 82

Hello there, and Happy New Year to each and every one reading this post! December is a busy month for many in the craft blogging world, but I seem to have done the complete opposite, having had an unintentional blog break for all of last month.

The darkest time of winter has been a bit tough on my family this time, and I hope the new year brings more energy for new projects. January will bring more daylight, that's for sure, and that already helps! Ideas and plans I already have plenty of. More about that soon!

Meanwhile, it' s sketch challenge time again at Scrap Africa!



Here's the sketch by Denise van Deventer.



I didn't do a lot of Christmas themed crafts this year, but now with this sketch I was inspired to. (I think it goes really well with both wintery and summery themes!)



So I chose a selfie with my little one from previous year's Christmas Eve.



I made my layout while we were at our country cottage for the holidays, so I took the extra challenge of having less supplies to choose from. For instance, I didn't use any store bought scrapbook papers, but combined my gelli prints with some re-used packaging material.



The alphabet stickers, the metallic purple flourish washi tape and the date stickers are all I took from my stash at home. The snowflake and the glittery star stickers were bought for the kids at Lidl (supermarket) and Flying Tiger (dollar store, kind of). The tag with a pocket is also from Flying Tiger, and the snowflake paper is from the stickers' package.



I started the background with a gelli print, made the stars with a texture paste through a stencil, and added some splashes with water and my new Gelatos. I got the Bright Colors set for myself for Christmas, and the colors are indeed deliciously bright! The pale blue I used here is just one of the lighter shades included in the pack.



Some red and turquoise Stickles dots give the finishing touch.





I was also inspired by the challenges at Challenge YOUrself (Happy Holidays) and Mixed Media Place (Mood Board).

At Challenge YOUrself, the continuous theme is that there must always be a photo of YOU in your layout! I take a lot of selfies and enjoy scrapping them, so that suits me well. And for those of you who don't already scrap self portraits so much, this challenge is a reason to!



In the mood board at Mixed Media Place, I was particularly inspired by the combination of sparkle and earth tones, different letter types and of course the stars!



Speaking of how dark we have it here in Finland, I looked up today's time of sunset in Espoo and it has already been at 3.28 pm. Here's a photo I took at 4.12 pm. while writing this. Note that it is considerably less dark now that it has snowed! We didn't have a white Christmas so that week it was already pitch black at 4 pm.



The upside of the northern location is that the amount of additional light is really notable each day that the spring gets closer! And of course with snow, blue moments like the one in the photo can be quite special and beautiful.

I've never been to the northernmost part of my country in the winter, during the phenomenon called the polar nights. It means simply that the sun does not rise at all during the midwinter days. In Utsjoki, the next time of sunrise will be at noon of January the 16th, can you imagine that.

Thank you for for your visit! I'm particularly thankful for all the comments, as always.

Smell the Sea and Feel the Sky: Layout for Scrap Africa

Happy February everyone!

It's sketch time again at Scrap Africa.



I always love a sketch with hexagon shapes! But if you don't, no problem. You don't have to interpret the sketch as literally as I did. Do check out what the other super inspiring DT members created here!



I wanted to use a previously Gelli printed paper for my background, and was also feeling like using a dark background to go with the dark wooden wall in my photo. So I took a dark gre/brown polka dot paper from an old Basic Grey collection, and gessoed most of it to fade the transition to the Gelli paper.



Machine stitching is a great way to attach a thick paper onto another. I placed it with small pieces of double sided tape first.



And used the stitching as an embellishment as well.



This was my first time trying the acrylic inks from Daler-Rowney that I got a while ago. The colours are very strong so I used some water not to make too dark spots. I would have wanted the blots a bit bigger, but couldn't think of a tool to try it with. I'd love to hear your favourite tools or techniques are for splashing inks and mists!



Adding some bling, flowers and old rub-ons from my stash...



I am also joining the challenges at Challenge YOUrself!, where Anything Goes this month, as long as it includes a photo of YOU. If you're quick you can still join it, as it's open until the 4th of February!

And a new challenge for me, Scrapcraft.ru from my neighboring country, Russia − their cool prompt is to combine corrugated cardboard and lace, up until February the 9th!





The photo is a selfie from our last day in California last June, before returning home to Finland. I am so grateful we got to stay whole two weeks with my sweet relatives. This is from the back yard from their almost-beach house just a few blocks from the ocean.

The title is from the Van Morrison song called Into the Mystic, and it describes so well my feelings at that moment, grateful for the unforgettable trip but knowing I'll miss all the people I met,

and the ocean.

"Smell the sea and feel the sky
Let your soul and spirit fly
into the mystic"

Van Morrison: Into the Mystic

Storm: An Art Journal Page

Hello there!

We're getting near the end of January, and though I've had less art time than I would like lately, I'm enjoying the Documented Life Project 2016: the UnPlanner online workshop and community. This is the first time I've signed up for a full year's online course, so let's see how well I can keep up!

I know already that I won't have time to join all the challenges, but the most important thing for me is to create and journal regularly, even if it's in my own pace.



The UnPlanner prompt for the second week of January was: Start with a quote and paint over all but one word.



"The greater the storm, the brighter the rainbow." I got the quote and the idea for this page from the January challenge at Viva Las VegaStamps!

I'm not saying that the quote goes for people in the face of truly great adversity: war, exile and poverty, to name but a few. It can be insensitive to just cheer someone to be optimistic in a situation where concrete help is all they need.

But the way I saw it, describing a certain kind of personality, I quite like the quote. My eldest and I are both sort of quick tempered and can have very strong reactions in our times of distress, but equally in our times of happiness and gratitude. So that's the way I interpreted the storm and the rainbow this time.



The inspiration board (above) was accompanied by this list of words: resolutions, one little words, pacts and more.../and also/... words like femininity, women, exploration, rainbow, neutral and nature, storm, maps, vintage, writing, script, yellows, tans, black and white, stripes, bold, rainbows, storms and more!

I chose to highlight women (girls), exploration, storm, script, stripes (the "One Way" arrows represent these), and for the colours, a combination of neutrals and some black and white.



I built my journal page on a previously Gelli printed paper, and machine stiched it onto a kraft cardstock cut to the size of my binder page. All but the script stamp are from Viva Las VegaStamps!

I stenciled the clouds with black acrylic paint through a DIY stencil I made with my Fiskars Squeeze Punch. Once the paint had dried, I put the stencil back in place stamped the script with white ink.

As for the anchor stamp, I was just experimenting patterns with it, thinking of a naval theme in connection to the storm, when I saw that from a distance the little anchors looked like birds flying away. So I stamped them around the girl as if she was releasing them from her hand.



The view where I photographed my page is from Kaapelitehdas in Helsinki, an old cable factory turned to a huge center of arts and culture. I'm lucky to take two weekly courses there this spring. This gorgeous view is from the art class where I study experimental techniques in acrylic painting, and the other course is painting with toddlers. I'm sure you'll hear more about these in my later posts!

The view doesn't show very clearly on a cloudy/snowy day like this, but right next to the building there's the sea, now covered with ice. And behind that, the city continues on an island. You can see the bridge on the bottom right corner.



I am also joining the Artistic Stamper Challenge, where it's an Anything Goes theme this month, and Words & Paintery challenge, with this prompt:



Speaking of art classes, if you're able to take some, that is one great way to improve one's life, both today and tomorrow!

Thank you for your visit and I hope to see you again on Monday, with my interpretation of the Scrap Africa February Sketch Challenge #68!

Pocket Art Pages for Scrap Africa Mood Board Challenge No. 67

Hello! With the start of the New Year, the challenge at Scrap Africa is this cheerful mood board combined with the following questions:

What does 2016 hold for you? What are your hopes and desires?



This time, I haven't thought up a word that would represent the whole coming year for me, but what is new is that I'm experimenting a new format for documenting my thoughts, memories and art learning throughout the year. I'm joining the Documented Life Project (DLP) 2016, the UnPlanner online class. You can read more about it here!

The course fee for the whole year is just $12, so even I dared to make the decision to join it, even though I haven't managed to finish a long online course before. I find it generally hard to find the time to watch the videos, whereas I can read books and blogs in bed. Well, now that the phones are smart enough for watching even videos in bed, I might be more successful!



Here's the Scrap Africa Mood Board No. 67, which inspired me with its colours, the doodles, the birds, the vintage crackled paint, the whimsical houses, the gold striped tape and the lighthearted feeling in general. A bit of spring while it's still middle of winter here in the Nordic countries. You're welcome to join until the end of January!



This is the first spread with the monthly calendar view and the monthly divider.





The second spread consists of an art journal page and a photo pocket page.

You can get a feel of the Nordic winter in these photos that were taken in Stockholm, a mid-morning in the first week of January!



The art journal page with the word Freedom in Finnish language was inspired by the Freedom themed Mixed Media Place challenge, and Studio 75 challenge, with the theme of Vintage.



The card with the photos is a Pocket Art Card (PAC) for my DLP 2016 UnPlanner; the prompt was to incorporate the number 16 to represent the new year. Can you see where that is? Yes, there are 16 of the faux cross stitches.

The card was super quick to make. All I did was took a pre-made print/collage background and selected which part of it would make a nice composition. In doing this, it helps if you have a template with a hole the size of the card, so you can see where to cut the best part of the background. I just drew the stitches and voilà, the card was ready! I'm using the 3x4 card size instead of the normal ATC size to suit the pockets of my binder.



My take on vintage may not be so obvious, but for me colours are an important part of the vintage look, and also the crackled paint and distressed paper. I was thinking of what the shades and textures would be like in an aged collage, or old sketches or technical drawings in a museum or an archive.







Thank you for your visit and welcome again!

Illustration Friday: Punch, Collage with DIY Stamps

Hi there! Today I'm showing you the very first stamps I carved myself! The material I used here is called Speedy-Carve. It's a soft eraser-like material that is very easy to carve.

I've had the supplies for quite some time and now was a good time to start, inspired by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's Carve December Challenge.



The lemon slice stamp I made on day 1 can be used alone or together with the one from day 2, the lemon half.

Here I've used them in a mixed media collage piece I'm submitting to Illustration Friday, theme Punch.



Speedy-Carve is a great material, but I didn't have more than the small block that I used more than half of already. I'll have to check out the best place to buy more, and in bigger blocks, too! Another thing I need is smaller carving tools. The set I've bought seems to be good quality, but even the smallest tool is very wide.

Have you ever tried making your own stamps? It's really fun, and it doesn't have to be carved from a material like this - I think even potato prints count, or stamps that you make in any other technique. Do check out Julie Balzer's site and also the hashtag #carvedecember in social media.

I hope to be posting more home made stamps soon!