Step-By-Step: June Calendar Page

I finished June's calendar page a few days after June started...I always seem to do that.  Anyway, I am so into the green in my yard and all around me this time of year I thought the page should be as green as possible.  This background is splattered watercolor and watered down acrylic paint through a stencil of abstract squares.  

The day squares are made from lime green watercolor paint applied to cardstock.  There's a bit of brush marks on the squares that the camera didn't really pick up.

The finished page has June written in water based Sharpie paint marker.  I also stamped a few images around the edges in black StazOn ink.  I was really happy with how the individual day squares turned out, I just loosely brushed watercolor around each square and then added the day number in black gel pen.

I hope you have a ton of wonderful things to remember in June!  Happy green days!

Tutorial: Frosted Glass Candle Holders

 With our new table out on the deck finally delivered, I thought it was time for new candle holders outside.  I started with simple glass votive and round candle holders from Micheal's as the base.  Using an X-Acto knife on a healing pad with a ruler, I cut varying lengths and widths of masking tape.

I covered each of the candle holders with lots of strips of tape.  Using Krylon white frosted glass paint, I painted each of the glass holders with two coats of paint letting the first coat dry before I did the second coat.  Use a sweeping motion from side to side to apply the paint. 

I let them dry for about an hour before removing the tape.  Pretty fun!

I really like them when they're lit up at night.  See the wonderful patterns the cast behind them?

I hope you enjoyed this step-by-step process.  Happy summer!

Tutorial: Checkered Art Journal Background

Here is one of my favorite techniques for creating a multi-layered background that can be as colorful or as subdued as you want it to be.  Plan to get a bit messy with this fun process.

 

 Start by taking text printed pages from vintage books and give them some color.  Using inexpensive acrylic paints, squirt a line at the top of the book page and drag the color down with a plastic gift card or old credit card.  Watery, inexpensive acrylic paints work best for this...save your expensive acrylics for a later step.

Make a  bunch of pages like this with lots of bright colors.  Brighter, dark colors work best for this.

Rip the pages up and make a patchwork page of the ripped pieces.  You can paint the background pages first if you want, but here I left them white. Glue the colored text pieces down with a glue stick or gel medium.

Put a thin, watered down layer of white paint or gesso over the colored patchwork.  The less you use, obviously the more color that will show through.  I vary the amount of white, but on this spread I used a lot of white and really blotted out the colors for a more subtle effect.

Use a cosmetic sponge to create a checkerboard of squares using white or off white paint.  Here I tend to use a higher quality brand of acrylic paint that isn't so watery because it's more opaque.

Fill the entire page with a checkerboard.

Outline some of the squares with metallic acrylic paint in a random pattern using a paintbrush.  I outline about 1/3 of the squares.  My favorite brand of metallic paint is Utrect Iridescent Gold. This adds just a touch of interest to the entire layout.

Now you have a background ready for all different applications and lots of layers if you so desire.  Below are two ways I've used this background.

On this page my background papers were dark red, green and purple.  I put ripped pieces of a paint blotter page on the left and right side filling in the page with writing.

For this page I used all blue and turquoise text pages for the under layer.  I also used a glaze of blue paint on the outside edge and then filled the inside with text and babblings.

What do you think?  If you try this technique I'd love to see what you do!

Step-By-Step: A Striped Page in Beth's Journal

About once a month, Beth and I exchange Moleskin journals.  We were paired together from one of my online art journal groups last Fall and it's an absolute blast getting her journal to work in and see what she's put into mine each month.  Here is a spread of pages I did in her journal...

I started by stenciling through scrapbook paper with acrylic paint in dark purple.  I then put a wash of lighter purple paint to color the spaces in between.

 This piece of cardstock I decorated a while ago with splatters of watercolor paint.  I then drew random swirls around the paper with a black Pitt pen.  Using a ruler and Exacto knife I then cut the paper.

I cut the paper into strips that weren't uniform in width for interest.  Using a glue stick I attached them to the page leaving about a 1/4-1/2" in between the strips.

Because the book is so fat, I found it easiest to simply cut off the excess with a detail scissors.

The last step was to fill in some writing.  I used a Glaze black gel pen on the purple parts.

I hope she likes this spread!