Totally NOT a card today! I'm talking Art Journalling 101 today!

Because I was off work most of the summer with my broken wrist, I thankfully have lots of vacation that MUST be used before year end or I'll lose it. And with 25yrs under my belt, that adds up to a diaper load of vacation! I do plan on taking a fews days off mid November for a trip to Virginia, plus a couple days for the American Thanksgiving (although I AM proudly Canadian, I am indulding the hubs again with a Lions Thanksgiving Day game...he owes me!!!!) But even with all that, and a couple weeks in December, I am able to take every Monday off from now to the end of the year! And I have been pretty much working 4 day weeks since my return to the day job so let me just say....January ain't gonna be pretty when I go back to a 5 day week! Oooooh! Ouch!

On my Monday off this week, after getting all my DT work done, and a doctor and a chiropractor visit under my belt, I had the afternoon to JUST PLAY! Oh my, how I love to PLAY! So I pulled out my art journal book (all Emily's fault) and my papersoft products (again, Emily's fault) and my viva decor inka gold (ya, Emily) and some of my fav Stamping Bella stamps including Dandelion Wisps, "I am" script, and Fluffy Flower Head.  These are all larger stamps, and although they lend themselves to Journalling, they could still be incorporated into cards.

Anyhow, here is my page. I started with the papersoft and applied three different colours of green. Then applied the papersoft with the sponge dauber to the script and fluffy flower stamp and stamped that over what I had just applied. Not totally happy because they came out too dark so I used the sponge dauber to soften off the fluffy flower. I did this SEVERAL TIMES, probably too many times, but remember, this is just an experiment!

When I decided enough was enough I started collaging pieces of text from a book I bought solely for this purpose. Coccoina is one of my FAV glues for stuff like this. Then I applied more papersoft over the text to age it a bit. One thing about the papersoft is that it dries very slowely. Good when you want to change your mind and 'rub out' what you've done, but bad if you are happy and want to build over what you've done. So if you want to build, you can always use a heat gun. Which I did, and then stamped the dandelion with versafine. I was getting really happy now!

Now I started adding Buzz and Bloom chipboard embellishments that were covered with Inka Gold. I added some, took some away and moved them around until I was happy. I did have some trouble gluing them down and found that Ranger Glossy accents worked best.

For you die-hard card makers, you may not love this. But boy oh boy did I have fun just playing around. I even perched it on the table opposite my sofa so I could gaze at it a bit! Ya I'm kinda weird that way!

Friday I'll be back with a card again!