Week 2 - The Artistic Mother Challenge

Poetry Journal

Better late than never! Here is my poetry journal that I altered. I used one of my favorite childhood pictures and part of a nursery rhyme that I love. I thought the "home" theme for the journal was appropriate with the shape of the journal. I hope to fill the book with many poems and journals entries!


I altered the book by painting it first then adding some art paper that I created in the week 1 challenge. I also added some fabric leftover from an old project and faux stitching rub ons. As usual I used Collage Pauge to adhere everything to my project - I love that stuff! I used a grubby tag for my childhood quote.

Not sure how the Week 3 challenge will go because i have a broken sewing machine! Uggh. Maybe I can alter a bag instead?? I'm sure i will figure it out - looking forward to it!

Week 1 - The Artistic Mother Challenge

Creating my Backgrounds and Action Lists

The various papers I used included regular printer paper, colored card stock, junk mail, lined paper and pages pulled out from crossword books. I primarily used the paint blending technique Shona suggests in The Artistic Mother. I did a few papers using the other techniques but i found the painting blending to be my personal favorite. As i was painting the papers i used paper towels underneath to avoid getting my counter top messy. I saved all the paper towels with the paint splattered backgrounds - I'm really excited about these paper towels and will save them for a future project! After all the papers had dried i used various stamps to stamp randomly on the papers. I didn't stamp every single sheet as i thought in the future i may want some without stamping for whatever reason. I picked my favorite paper for my "Action List" and in Word created the list, printed it on my background paper, scanned it and then printed out 12 copies. Week one is done - YAY!

Backgrounds Before:

Backgrounds After:

Artistic Mother Challenge

Trudy Callan is hosting an "Artistic Art Challenge" inspired by Shona Cole's new book The Artistic Mother. You can read all the info regarding the challenge on Trudy's blog here. I'm going to do my VERY best to be a part of this challenge and add my projects weekly. Can't wait to get started!!

Finally on Flickr

I have been meaning to create a flickr account for the longest time so I recently started one... I do all the web photography for Stampington & Company so I am going to try and regularly add some of my favorite pics from work and of course my family and I.. Check out my flickr photostream - enjoy!

Garden Girl

So excited for my "Garden Girl" project to appear in the next issue of Somerset Memories. Here is a peek at how it looks! It's a really simple project with a shabby garden theme...

Bind-it-All Project 1 - binding your childrens artwork

For the past few years I have been saving my daughters artwork from pre-school. It kind of got to the point where is was "out of control" so it was time to organize it. I have a really hard time parting with anything of my daughters (clothes that no longer fit, her drawings, old birthday cards, toys) just about everything.

I am a huge fan of the Bind-it-All machine by Zutter Innovative. In the Autumn 2009 issue of Somerset Memories I wrote an article about the Bind-it-All that featured the artwork of Shona Cole and Audrey Hernandez. I have been using the Bind-it-All quite a lot and decided this binding system was the best way to create books and archive my daughters artwork. I went through all her paintings, drawings and collages and weeded out some (this part was not easy) and kept the very best ones to bind in what appears to be the first 4 volumes of what could turn into a very large collection/library of Izzy's Art.

The Covers were made of recycled cardboard. Izzy helped paint them which was messy but fun as usual! We used white paint to do her hand prints - this was with out a doubt her favorite part! After the paint had dried we sealed the covers with Collage Pauge. We then simply bound all the books, trying to keep a theme for each one, one is collages, one is paintings, one is "holiday" artwork, and the other number and letter learning worksheets. I used the Antique Brass o-wires to bind the books and added a simple bow to the bind of each book when I was finished.

So much fun and such a great way to preserve your child's artwork for them to look back at and cherish when they are older!

Wonderment

I recently took a totally random picture of Izzy at the front door of my brother-in-laws apartment. Just a simple shot of her standing in front of his screen door.. Well I happened to show the picture to my boss who is a flickr addict. She loves to alter photos and has a very cool style. She altered the picture in Picnik. Click here to see her flickr post and the original!