Art Journals on my table..

Has it really been a month?

A lot has happened actually this last month, besides working on getting my parents house ready for sale, and then selling it, as well as finding a bungalow for them  I started the "21 Secrets" workshop and have been having a great time. It's been such a relief after all the stress my family has been under lately.

This is a journal I started yesterday and finished today, well that's a lie, the cover is finished, I have the signatures to add, but I want to paint the pages of the signatures first .

In "21 Secrets" I made flowers  in Ro Bruhn's class , and although I wasn't intending to use it on a journal cover it just seemed right. The background has lots of ink and paint , stencils and doodling which I first learned about in Roben Marie Smiths journal class. I also included some stitching, and my own techniques.

So this is a combination of Ro Bruhn, Roben Marie and Me styles hahaha

Below is the back of the journal cover.

Nice bright colours too which started when I took Terri Kahrs class at

"21 Secrets".

 For those who know Terri, you know she loves colour, bright, rich colour.

We made a journal in her class too and two of the pages I worked on already are in her style, with a touch of my own style of course.

Here is a look...

and here is another look...

I used mostly Terri's own altered images, and if you notice the second layout has a sweet little envelope for my secrets, that is if I ever write in these journals. I seem to prefer the painting, layering and collage part more :)

You may not of even heard of "21 Secrets", and I am no way affiliated with the workshops,

but I highly recommend them if you want to learn new techniques, or be inspired. For beginners 

and seasoned artists alike, there are 21 classes by 21 different artists and you have until the end of the year I believe to finish all of them, and it's a very reasonable price.

Here is the link to

"21 Secrets"

so you can see for yourself.

 I have also made my own foam stamps in Ro Bruhn's class, will share that soon .

In other news... my sister is now waiting to start chemo , her cancer is stage2 which means it has spread into the lymph nodes from the breast, but the tumour in the breast was removed successfully . She needs aggressive chemo now, probably in a weeks time she will start. After that, more surgery to remove the nodes and after that radiation, so she is going to have one heck of a tough year this year. I still can't believe it.
Your thoughts and prayers are much appreciated.

So I had a lot to cover today, that's what I get for not posting in a month.
Hope you are all well, love to you all.

Whimsical Journal Cover

Finished another journal cover this week made on mixed media paper.
When I start I have no idea how the colours will end up or the design but this one just spoke to me, add a little bird. So I did and I am very pleased with it.

It will be folded in half after I stitch some papers inside.

In other news, my sister has her surgery date for Feb' 26th and she will be so happy

to get that tumour out. They will be doing a lumpectomy and taking some lymph nodes from

under her arm. I think they do this and send it all of to the lab to see what stage the cancer is at.

She will have four weeks to recoup before any other treatments as it takes this long for the test results. Its probably a good thing, gives her time to get some strength back.

Prayers appreciated as always.

Thank you, and have a great weekend.

Lynn x

Niagara Falls after the storm

After the biggest snowfall in five years , the day after it, we drove to the Falls to take photographs. I don't remember it being so beautiful, maybe because this time the snow was so fresh. The water was a green colour crashing down and creating so much mist you couldn't see the bottom.

It was nice because there were a lot less people than usual. Thank goodness they have the "Welcome building" there because my fingers were starting to freeze after 10 mins so we went in to warm up.
This is the view of the Rainbow Bridge which you drive over to the United States. I wish I had thought about going over to take photos from their side, darn it. We didn't have our passports and you need one now to go back and forth.
Maybe we will have another snow fall like this before the end of Winter.

The lamp posts looked beautiful all covered in Icicles, and so did the Welcome Centre below, look how pretty it is. It looks like lace edges.

This is as close as I could get, the stairs and patio were closed due to the ice.

Everyone was very surprised to see a lady in her shorts , I don't know what she was thinking. She was with someone so I am sure if she wasn't in her right mind, he would have made her get dressed. Then I thought maybe they are on their way to Florida, which a lot of Canadians do this time of year, but still, shorts???? I took a photo of the back of her but I won't be posting it on the web LOL.

Maybe just one more shot, this one I really love with all the mist. This is the spot where you get wet walking along the edge. You can barely see just a glimpse of the rest of the falls through it.

I have resized these for the web and added more to my Facebook album, so some of you will have seen these already. Don't feel like you have to comment again ok?

I broke down and joined in on Facebook a few weeks ago and I love it, problem is you forget you have a blog sometimes and that other people do too because it all gets posted there. I love Facebook for connecting with my blogging friends on a daily basis.

Ok, just one more because these guys looked so good, and they add a pop of colour in all the whiteness .They were over Five Feet , I know that because they are taller than me :) Left over from Christmas I suppose. This coming Christmas I swear I must go and see the lights, can you believe I have never done so? Shame on me living so close.

Have a great day, be back soon....

Mixed Media Journal

Happy February my friends, I hope you are all well.

Just dropping in with something I actually finished. I say that because I seem to have

several unfinished projects on the go and am having a hard time deciding where to go

with them. Do you ever get like that?

This in an art journal, I insert mixed media paper, water colour paper and some of my inky papers in the journal for artsy friends to create on. Or not, doesn't matter :)

This one I am keeping for myself because I gave all my others as gifts.

I love the bright colours on this journal too, lots of layering and finished up with some

machine stitching. 

You can still take Roben Marie's workshop on her process to creating these journals. I took

it last summer and really enjoyed it, I just put my own style to the finished product  which is good, because we don't all want to look like we make the same journals or papers :)

A few more papers that may be going in another journal.
The thing is you can use these papers for backgrounds on atc's or collage, and they are a lot of fun to create using spray inks.

I have had a hard time focusing on art to be honest, maybe that's why the unfinished projects. We found out a couple of weeks ago that my sister has breast cancer and there has been a lot of different feelings and emotions flying around here. I am not sure when her surgery will be, but they are thinking a lumpectomy to start with. It's such a shock when you get news like this, then after a while you start to accept it and do what needs to be done. My sister is being really good about it, so I know she will do well :)

I am happy that January is over now, it just seemed like a very long month.

How's things with you?

A Little Whimsy

Hi again creative friends....

I thought a little whimsical art may brighten up this cloudy day.

Even if it's not cloudy where you are, it may still bring a smile to your face.

I know it did for me when I was creating these two small canvases.

I needed a hand made gift for my friend and I hadn't done any art for months so after a few attempts at other things I decided to make a very whimsical and fun canvas.

Lot's of layers, paint, stamps, doodles and rub ons , and the use of 

my "one word" for 2012 which was "GROW".

Not so much to grow a garden which I certainly did , but to grow

mentally, spiritually and creatively. I learned a lot of new things last

year including the graphics program Adobe Illustrator, and I learned

a lot about myself. 

I really enjoyed the process in creating these two pieces and that is what really is the most important part of art for me, being in the moment , and feeling that joy feeling while you play. How about you, do you enjoy the process?

All photos were taken with my iPhone5 , which as you can see has an amazing camera. I didn't add any fancy textures or effects on them.

If you are looking for a smart phone I highly recommend the iPhone and not just for the camera which I looooove....
Did I say how much I love my iphone camera?

If you are new to these kind of phones, you might not know that you don't have to buy the actual phone, you can get one through a plan you set up like I did. I upgraded my old school mobile phone to this beauty.

All photographs on this blog unless otherwise stated are copyright to me, but you are allowed to pin them with a link back to this blog. Thank you :)