Jan works in Pam's 'Inspired by Teesha' Journal

This is such a lovely colourful journal and all the pages are awesome and really go with the theme.
I chose to do one monotone page and one colourful. I have admired Teesha for many years as well and find her really inspiring.
I started by doing my borders and then filling the inside space. I have several Teesha stamps and also some collage sheets so i used these to complete my pages.
I hope you love them Pam as I certainly loved doing them.

This is the monotone one.

And the colourful one.

Jan does Things with Wings for Colleen

This is a small cloth covered journal that is so beautiful and colourful! I love the bird stencil I have so decided to use that and the page evolved. First I used gesso and Neo Color 11's and baby wipes to create a nice background.

Then I added some elements to create a bit of a frame and then did collage and stenciling. Also added some washi tape for emphasis.

I made a tag in the same vein for Colleen as she made a lovely one for each of the people who worked in her journal and asked us to make one for her.

I hope you like the page Colleen. I love things with wings too.

Joans page in Jan's Journal "Favourites"

Jan's journal with the theme of " Favourite" is another lovely small journal.  It already has some gorgeous layouts created in it.  I was going away for a three day crafting weekend and this was one of the things I took with me to do.   I had planned to do heaps of things but actually did not finish one thing.

I started off thinking that I would fulfill the theme  by using my favourite inks and other media and would find a phrase to suit.  However my crafting muse was no where to be found that weekend and after gessoing over the background twice, because I did not like what I had done.  I finally settled on a pale pink background created using distress oxides.  I did no more to it that weekend.

Picking it up some time later in week at home, I was still not sure where I was going with it, so I added to background with some stencils and background stamps.   I then stenciled, drew and painted some flowers and grass along the bottom.  I then decided that some of the flowers needed to be raised so I used clear texture paste to paint on top of some of the flowers.  I still had no idea where I was going, so I thought I would approach it from another direction and find a quote that had something to do with favourites.  I started flipping through some books that were on my table, one of which was an older copy of Winnie the Pooh, which I have used in collage etc, so not much of it left and about two pages in I came across the phrase on the left page,  and a few pages down, the quote on the right page.

Now most of you know that I cannot draw to save myself, but the drawings in this little book were so simple, I thought that I could perhaps copy them.  Now to find a place for Pooh to sit amongst the grass.  I squeezed him in somewhat on top of a couple of flowers and drew Piglet further up the page.
Although no masterpieces, I was pleased with the drawings for me.  I then wrote the quotes by hand in pencil and went over them in gel pen.

After all that it was a very simple page in the end.  I hope Jan will see past the bad drawing and will know that I tried my best.

Jan's spread in Joanne's Fairy Tales

Well, when the themes were first announced I had heaps of ideas but then the time came and I had a blank. But i started with some stencils and lighter colours and it progressed from there.

But it got a bit darker after that and I ended up wanting to use a couple of  favorite Stampotique stamps.

A slightly darker theme but i hope you like her and her little companion.

They kind of flow together when side by side. I used several home made stamps too.

Jan makes a Homage to Art

Jan makes a Homage to Art in Lisa Jones Journal

I decided I wanted to do a page that paid homage to Gustav Klimt. I have a lovely book about him and his art and it has wonderful full colour plates. So plenty of inspiration. I am amazed when i look closely to his art that he was so adept at mark making. He could really teach us modern artists a thing or two. Here is a close up of one of his pictures. Awesome.

I was also inspired by Sue Davis, a wonderful American artist. I love how she gets her backgrounds, so I used this for the base of my page.

Then I created my tree and went to work. I did a bit of stenciling and doodling to tie things together.

Hope you like it Lisa.

Jan is Empowered

My first page in the new round is in Lesley's lovely Empowerment Journal. It is quite a large journal and this is a bit of a challenge. The spread is A3 landscape.
At first I did some layers and stenciling. Trying not to muddy the colours as I often end up doing in my enthusiasm.

Then I added the elements I wanted to feature and set to work. I originally wanted to use the slogan 'Empowered Women Empower Women' but that was already on the back of the journal so I dug through my stencils and found a relevant Dina Wakley one. I still ended up losing some of the vibrant colour but I am fairly pleased with how the page came out.

Hope you like it Lesley. It will be on its way to Pam next week.

AAJS Round 4......Favourites.

I felt very honoured to be the first visitor in Jan Mullane's lovely journal.  Jan has done an excellent job making her journal, which is a comfortable size to both work in and to post onwards.  Her art work is very special.

For my spread I decided to try out a background I had seen demonstrated by a FB friend.  I used dylusions paints, stencils and stamps.  My intentions were to take step - by - step photos....but I forgot!

My focal point is dandelions, made by using a snipped toilet roll insert and a delicate touch.  They turned out OK.  I did the centres with bubble wrap and then some perfect pearls.

My quote says:  When you look at a field of dandelions, you can see, 100 weeds OR 100 wishes.
I hope it pleases you Jan, always remembering that we all make very different art and that is part of the joy of being part of such as this.

My page.

The quote

Close up of dandelion.

AAJS 4 Favourites by Jan Mullane

I have made my journal from an old envelope and folded it in half so the pages in the signatures are A5 size but a spread is A4 in landscape. Shouldn't be too expensive to post!

I base coated and then used some Tim Holtz printed tissue to cover most of the outer cover and inner covers. I then added  some collages elements and some stamping.

There is a pocket in the back made from the envelope opening for some journaling card that can be completed by each person who works in the journal.










You have already seen the back page is from the Dot to Dot June challenge. This is the inside back cover.

The Inside Front Cover has the contract and posting order and I was really pleased with the printed tissue as it had mentions about Contracts and dates etc.

Then I started the journal off with the first page. I chose all sorts of favourites. I have stamps from Teesha and stickers I purchased from Roben Marie and techniques from Jane Davenport's site done by Courtney Diaz....

It was a lot of fun to do. I hope you enjoy working in the journal too.

"Faces and Figures" Guest Post by Joan

Jan's journal was in group 2 of the circle journal swap, which meant that I was not scheduled to do a page in this journal.  However when Jan had her journal returned to her at the end of its journey there were still a few blank pages in it, so she sent out a call on AASG to see if anyone else would like to do a page.  A few of us in group 3 put our hands up and I was one of them.The theme of Jan's journal was "Faces and Figures"

I received this journal towards end of December and I had planned to work in it over the Christmas and New Year period.   However in December, I unexpectedly lost my longest friend in Australia and to make it even worse, she was 10 years younger than me and had not even been ill. Anyway it knocked me back a little and made me look at little more closely at my own future. 2016 was a bad year all round for celebrities of my generation and older and many passed away. In Jan 2017 the Sun Herald newspaper printed an article in memory of most of those celebrities from around the globe and it was accompanied  by a collage of faces and figures of these stars.  When I saw this picture I immediately knew I wanted to use it for my page in the journal.

First of all I gesso and painted the background in similar colours of the collage.  The collage was set around a large swimming pool with the theme been a cocktail party, so there were lots of blue and green colouring.  I then scanned, reduced and printed the picture a couple of times on tissue paper.
I pasted  the tissue one copy on top of the other onto the painted background. That is where it was at until I went to a journal group meetup with Lynne, Lisa, Liz, etc. I took the journal with me to work on and when one of the ladies pulled out a basic face stencil to use, I thought I would like to try and use it also.  My mistake I think in retrospect was using a paste that was too thick, but hindsight is great.  Anyway I stenciled the face outline on the right hand side on top of the tissued faces. Now I cannot draw so this was a big step outside my square, even though I was using a stencil.  With a great deal of help from Lynne I managed to get a basic face but the textured paste was already set and was quiet lumpy in places and could not be removed.  Initially it was a very androgynous face and I was not sure where to go with it, however after painting and removing and adding more paint and taking it off and trying to fix eyes, nose, side of face and lips about 50 times over the next couple of weeks, it eventually turned into female, if  a somewhat scarred and battered one. During this period of trial and tribulation, in my mind she became representative of my friend Vikki, who was a natural redhead, a great horsewomen, a brilliant software developer, a professional photographer and a friend to many especially me.  So she stayed, and after adding some text and some doodled borders, I decided it was finished.  I hope Jan can live with this at least for a little while and then she can give her a fond farewell, before covering it all with gesso.

 

Face it!

Hi Everyone

Today I am sharing a double page spread I have done as a "fill in" person to help complete Jan's "Faces & Figures" journal which is nearly done and will be able to make it's way home! I noticed it has been "travelling" for a whole year!!!

I've used my Gelli Plate to cover the base pages with paint - using stencils and acrylic paint - always love the effects you can get with the plate - fun to play around with! Added some washi tape and scraps of muslin cloth, scrabble type letters plus the collage elements and a few sparkly gems!

Collage "paper dolls" are from a fantastic & quirky Etsy Store Art Tea Life - I LOVE this store - collage sheets are perfect for journaling and this sheet was perfect for Jan's Faces & Figures theme! Lots of fussy cutting involved obviously but well worth the effort!

FACE IT WE ARE ALL UNIQUE!!!

This gorgeous journal is filled with such amazing pages by the members of AASG that I am sure Jan will be blown away when she receives it back and gets to "peruse" it!! I really enjoyed working in it!

Lisa J - Working in Jan's Faces and Figures Journal

Jan's journal is in Round 2 and her baby arrived home last month, with a few empty pages.  So I jumped at the chance to fill one of those blank spots, and Jan was happy to oblige!

I love drawing/painting faces and trying to improve on my techniques, so knew this is what  I wanted to do.  I found an interesting face in Pinterest to use as a guide.  

For my background I laid down part of a French diary I have, a beautiful peacock feather serviette, some gelli printed papers, and an old book page.  The remainder was given a pink wash with watercolour.

I painted my girl in, and used water soluble pencil for her features.  I love the way Toni Burt does this, and in my next life I want to be able to paint like her! :)

Her hair was done with modelling paste, and didn't quite turn out how I had hoped.  Oh well, art is all about experimenting after all!  To go with the pink background I decided to give her purple hair.

I added a few pink stencils and stamped images to complete the background.

The journalling came from a song that I love - Iris, by the Goo Goo Dolls.

Hope you like it Jan!

Jan works in Jenny's Ocean Life

This is a nicely made journal with lots of interesting bits added and interesting binding.
I really liked the monochrome cover and so wanted to stick to a fairly monochrome theme. Of course it got a little out of hand.
Then disaster struck! I had primed the pages but obviously not well enough and so when i went to town with ink and water etc etc I found it had leaked through to the other side of the page...heart in mouth... then as I had left a page in between it wasn't on anyone else's work. Phew. Thank goodness.
I am always a little afraid when working in others journals of this exact thing happening and usually wrap all the pages firmly in plastic and masking tape while I am working in a journal.
Soooo.. Jenny never fear all is good, I just had to glue another page over the ink splodges.

I adhered some gauze on to the page and did stamping and doodling. I found a lovely poem and glued that down.
Hope you like it.

Jan does Rachel's Garden of my Imagination

This is a lovely little journal crammed full of lovely pages. I decided to do a fairly calm, un-busy page... but then of course my usual nature kicked in and it did get a bit more on it than I intended.
Here it is. I have also included for Rachel a book mark that i got in Suzhou in China. From a wonderful little street in the old town with lots of books and journals and art, I could have spent all day there. Hope you like it.

Jan's Faces and Figures Journal by Roz

I really liked these images that came from a book published in the 60's. I did the yellow part 1st and then had to make the other side work. I'm not much into doodling but it seemed the thing to do here. Also had fun doing the dots and the word...once again I usually shy away from hand lettering.
All in all I'm happy with the result...hope you are too Jan.
I have another spread almost worked out so will try to get that done on the weekend.

Jan's Page in Vintage Circus for Sharon.

This is such a lovely journal with some gorgeous work already done. I was glad of the wee lull in the Round 2 journals moving their way around Australia because I had to have an operation on the elbow that i broke just over a year ago when round one was going around and was in hospital for a few days and incapacitated. However with Physio and rest it is getting better.

I was given a lovely roll of washi tape for a birthday pressie a while ago and was really happy when Sharon announced the theme as I thought yay! I can use the tape.

Then I thought it would be great to include some of the photos from a show my daughter created all the costumes for in 2010 that was a vintage circus theme. The link to some of the photos is <www.behance.net/gallery/209862/lunamorph-show>

She did an incredible job (her ability to design and sew has me in awe) and all the performers were amazing. I had the strong man, Sharon, but no bearded lady. (That's another photo shoot!)

I base coated the page with Gesso then included my circus washi tape and collaged some vintage papers and then bit more gesso to tone things down.

I then got some frames and cut out the pictures and arranged them. My theme was Postcards To Home. Based on the story line of "They called me a Freak and so I ran away and joined the circus"

Hope you like it. Sorry it is a bit more like a scrapbook page but that's how it worked out. =)

Just discovered the link may not work very well. When you get to Behance.net just search Lunamorph... hope that works

Jan's Faces Journal

For the past to days, I have had the pleasure to work in Jans' beautiful 'Faces' journal. I really had no ideas as to what I wanted to do, so the first thing was for me to get rid of the white page and get some background colour down. I glued down some torn text papers and then started sponging on bright coloured acrylic paints. I used a few stencils and the result you can see below...

Once I was happy with the background, Ideas started flowing...even though I can't draw a face for the life of me...lol...I decided to cut a mask out of thick watercolor paper and I think this is when the idea of wearing a mask, covering our true emotions came from.

I used a grey blue as a base for the face and I painted and decorated the thick piece of watercolor paper for a mask. I decided to leave the underlying face relatively plain, except for one eye with a tear drop falling from it.

 So when the mask is lifted, you see one of  many emotions a persons can hide when you are staring them in the face.

I really enjoyed working in Jans' journal and am hoping you like the page. Thank you.

Lee works in Jans Faces and Figures

Figures and Faces

is moving on.....................

cant get it the right way up?

detail

Thanks for looking!

My version of faces by Sharon Williams

It's always a journey every time I begin a new page in someone's journal. Faces was a little daunting in that it is heavily collaged to date and I'm not sure how good I am at collage but I was willing to give it a go. 

It turned out fairly well. I started with a sketch of a fairly simple face. She was quite confronting, staring out from the page. Almost like she was daring me to continue.  Then I thought about the collage bit and in my effort to find something suitable, I remembered that I had some wood block prints of a self pose tacit I had created years ago. It's not much as a portrait but interesting as a layered element. 

Then I wanted a story element to go with it so I added my favourite super power quote and it ended up better than I expected. To complete the page, I cut up a baby wipe that I had been cleaning my brushes on and had kept because it was pretty. Little cut out hearts gave it a bit of colour and it felt done. 

It's always a bonus when that happens!