Our Journals have completed their grand journey- time for the Big Reveal!!

So my journal (which you may remember traveled about dressed grandly in all shades of purple flanked with metallics and pops of turquoise ;)) started with a sign in page for each lady to check in...

And then off it went on it's travels; first to visit Gemma of Gemma's House
Here are her beautiful pages; I love all the gorgeous textures and detail and how did you know that Calla Lilies are one of my favorite flowers? Thank you for the Dragonfly- so special!!

Next, my art book wended it's way to Maggie who put a lovely oriental twist in her pages for me- LOVE the elephant and the flower and the butterfly and the beautiful lady plus all the quotes...I love it all!

Then my book traveled on to  Lisa  (the priti one) who created a gloriously queenly Mary with lots of texture and yummy purple and gold plus a Mehndi  hand for me (I think it's so funny, because I created a Mehndi hand for HER;)) and then a paint chip collage with assorted Mary's peeking through the windows....gorgeous-ness!

The next stop for my book was a bit further away, crossing the sea to the UK to stay with Lisa (the Wright one ;)) who started my pages with a scrumptious peacock feather glued onto a gorgeous wash of all my colors combined and moved on to a wonderful page filled with assorted textures and and collage elements mixed with words and so many wonderful elements i love love love.  She ended her work with one of her famous ladies who advises me to dream big- beautiful!

Onward my book made it's way to Cornwall where  Kat of the Wright Story, who not only created some gorgeous (dragonfly filled!) art for me, but also wrote a short story just for me- so special!!!  I will treasure my Dragonfly Bay (the painted one AND the written words) forever!

For my book's last stop in the UK, it traveled to Manchester to visit with Angie of Art Angel for a bit. And she filled her paged with very Artangel-esque textures and patterning- absolutely beautiful!  And of course, she knows how fond I am of butterflies, and birds and quotes and ladies- very wonderful pages!

Then my book made it's way back to the states and to Tammy's studio where she combined a painting of a lady with a dragonfly (!) tattoo, wonderful words and a tree of friendship- such a fabulous addition to my my book!

And last but never least, my art journal traveled to Kim Collister where she created an incredible series of collages rich with birds, flowers, women and of course dragonflies- such a beautiful end to my little book's travels!

I love that you can see all the pages and bits of wonderful-ness peeking out of my book- what a treasure! 
What an amazing year of art it has been, AND best of all; we're gearing up to start again in amonth or so!  I can't WAIT!
xxoo
Stephanie

Finished with Maggie's pages!

After posting yesterday, I added the sunburst of orange and yellow- I'll admit to cheating just a bit with a smidge of magenta.  I couldn't help it, it was screaming to be included!  So here you go, Maggie's pages of grey, orange and yellow (plus magenta ;-))

 I thought about adding more words to the sunburst, but it's always those decisions that cause my pieces to be overkill- I decided to leave it the way it is, and (hopefully) let it "shine" as it!

I'm in the process of putting together some posts covering the rest of my Paris trip, my garden and all the (many) home projects we've been doing the last few months.....patience!  I AM slowly coming back, I promise!
xx
Stephanie

WIP on the traveling journals

It's nearing the end of the month and that means time to get my current pages wrapped up for the traveling journal project.  This month, I have Maggie's beauty celebrating grays, yellows and oranges.  So, I decided to revisit an old friend of mine; the pencil.....that led to drawing a lady, backed by a flower. 

I always forget how much I LOVE drawing until I pick up my pencils- I have been having SO much fun with this!  To add in the orange part of my task, I'll be doing a cut out to give her a warm background and add a splash of color to her cheek.  And then, this little lady will be on her way for Gemma to add the final pages.  That's right, one month left and all the journals begin their homeward journey.  Can't wait!

That's all for now,
xx
Stephanie

Time for an update on the Magical Journal Journeys!

This month I had the pleasure of working in Lisa of Priti Lisa's journal.  She created the most wonderful handmade book filled with lots of gorgeous turquoise- her inspiration color.  I LOVE turquoise- it's one of my favorites and I couldn't WAIT to get started!  However, August was a month filled with craziness and family crises, and so I got a late start....but here I am with it finally finished and I'm pretty dang happy about it!
I knew I wanted to do hands with henna tattooing in turquoise and I wanted to do a mermaidish sort of girl- but she didn't want to BE done and after wasting a day trying to get her to work with me, I switched tactics.  The patterns on the hands I drew reminded me of scales (which is where the mermaid came from ;)) but they also reminded me of peacock feathers and I had a vintage Vogue illustration on file that I'd been wanting to take inspiration from....after that, it all came together!  I'll apologize in advance for the poor lighting of the photos- I did them before the sun was up by lamp light!

Here are my "henna" hands- I had SO much fun doing these!

 And the inside spread; I used the back of the hands to write Lisa a note...

I thought the quote was perfect for the peacock lady, so I went for it!

So there you have my turquoise entry for miss Lisa.  Next I'll be playing in salmons and greys for Maggie and then only one more book before they make their final journeys home- I can't WAIT to see my book!

Ta ta for now,

Stephanie

P.S. I also managed to get a canvas sketched so you may actually see me here again pretty soon- fingers crossed

xx

Playing around with whites.....

Hello again, here I am with my monthly check in for the traveling journals.  This month, I had Angie of Artangel pages to play in and her color of choice was white.  She generously allowed us to add one other color if we so chose....I used purple and yellow to create neutral shades to paint an angel for the "Art angel" I  thought it was appropriate!  And then painted the words; "Find your wings and fly" and tore around the angel to allow the words to peek through.

I was really scared of this challenge, but in the end, I LOVED working in white!  I'll be sending this gorgeous collection on it's way to Gemma so she can have her turn playing in white.
I hope to be back soon- I have so much bloggy catching up to do!  The kids go back to school soon, and then I hope to be back in the blog world- I miss all my peoples!

My pages for Kat's Traveling Journal

So once again, I've been absent from blogland- but not because I had nothing to share, more that I  have been crazy busy!  I just finished my spread for Kat of The Write Stuff's journal.  You may remember that the only requirements of this art exchange are that we use colors specified by each artist- Kat chose magenta, teal and silver.  When I was in Paris taking pictures at Monet's garden, I knew I had to use these images for Kat!  I was reading her blog a while back and she'd commented on how whatever colors we happen to be working in for the month- those colors seem to pop out at you everywhere you go.  This is SO TRUE!!!
Anyway, I used two images for references- the first is of my Mother's hand cradling the only peony we'd found in bloom- we love peonies, so believe me when I say we looked high and low for this one! 

And then of course I had to use monsieur Monet's famous bridge draped with wisteria

 (I took the creative license of making it magenta for Kat ;))

 I made prints of the hand and peony painting so I could use it for collage- here it is closed up with elements of each fold peeking through.....

here it is with the back fold opened....

  I felt it only right to use a quote from Monet...

So, that's that!  I'll be sending this on it's way for Gemma to work her magic in as I begin playing in Angie's journal next!

xx

Stephanie

Still Going Round and Round...Lisa Wright's Journal Entry

Here I am, belatedly posting Lisa Wright's journal entry- I'm also late getting it to the post...there's just been SO much going on around here!  In hindsight, I wish I'd done her pages before I left for Paris, but I was hoping for inspiration while there and assumed I could get them done quickly.  And I would have been able to except for the fact that our home has been a construction site for the last 4 weeks!  (more on that later ;))  But I got them done in the end and even tho I hate being late, Gemma was very nice about it.  And it won't happen again, Gemma- I PROMISE!!!
So Lisa's color of choice was rust, and I was so excited to play because it was out of my comfort zone...waaaay out!  I knew I wanted to do a rusty keyhole with a hole cut out so you could see to the next page and when I started searching for a cool quote to go on the inside, I found Nat King Cole's lyrics to "Paper Moon" and thought it was perfect!

Here is the rusty keyhole- after I'd drawn it, I decided it needed a guardian angel- so that's how "Claudia" came into the picture- she reminds me of Lestat's adopted daughter in The Vampire Lestat....

 And here is the inside; once I decided on the words, I KNEW I had to use a sickle moon with a rusty sunset and I had to include a "Lisa inspired" lady reclining on the moon.  There's also a little friend hidden in the picture...do you see her?

And here it is all cut up and glued back together:

That's all for now- I'm off to mail this to Gemma- and then start on the next jounal pages for Kat- because I.WILL.NOT.BE.LATE.AGAIN!
xx