October's Art Journal Friday

Welcome to October's Art Journal Friday!  The weather is getting more crisp by the day and we're fast approaching the fun that is Halloween :) I've been busy putting up a few decorations ready for our pumpkin carving party tomorrow... 

..and been making a few chocolate skulls for our guests too! :)

Of course I'm also hoping to get scrappy this weekend also, and some art journaling would certainly be top of my list for this weekend :) if you haven't played along with Art Journal Friday before, we pick a new theme on the last Friday of every month to inspire you to create a page or two over the coming weekend - there are no rules here, you can use whatever medium makes you happy and we love to see your pages if you like to share them; just leave a link to your page in our comments section and we're happy to come visit and leave you some love :) come one come all, if you art journal all the time or you've never tried it before, have some fun experimenting!

This month's theme is... Something Wicked This Way Comes!  This might conjure up fun Halloween memories for you, or remind you of a scary film you couldn't bear to watch more than once ;) it might be time to explore your naughtier side, or to indulge in some journalling about your deepest fears...
Get journalling this weekend!

Just to remind you , today is the last day to enter our Halloween party giveaway; if you'd like to enter please leave a comment on this post - we'll be announcing the winners on October 31st - Halloween!

Happy scrapping!

Gayle xx

September's Art Journal Friday

Welcome to Art Journal Friday!  It's the end of another month and with the weekend ahead I hope that you'll have some time to play around with your art journals!

Firstly, apologies for missing last month's edition; as you may already know I left the country at the end of last month to go and get married, and returned well into the second half of this month as if I had been on another planet!  Again, apologies, and normal service resumes as of... today! :)

This month's theme is to be 'reflection' - I know certainly in my own life recently it has been a time of great reflection, of thinking backwards and forwards at the same time and taking stock of where I'm at.  I've come to the conclusion that wherever that is, it is a happy place to be :) and so this month's page should be your reflection too!

We're having a few reshuffles with our Scrappy Tree places, so for now if you'd like to share a picture of your creations I'm going to suggest that you post a link in the comments section of this post so that we can come and visit you :) looking forward to it!

Happy journalling :)

Gayle

July's Art Journal Friday

Welcome back to Art Journal Friday! This month, oh boy, where is the time going?? Are we nearly in August?? Seriously?!?

Once again I invite one and all to join us in an art journal exploration, whether it's the first page in your first book or a middle-ish one in your umpteenth :)

This month, our theme is the earth! To be honest, the UK summer seems to have happened back in April but I am determined mentally to be enjoying the onset of the best that nature has to offer in the summer season. Close your eyes, imagine lush greenery and the warm breeze brushing past you (or if you live somewhere with a summer head outside!) and take pen/paint/paper to page! I am relying on you here people, I need to live your summer vicariously through you ;)

If you're feeling generous and you'd like to share, please post your photos at our Ning group here - looking forward to seeing them!

Happy journaling! :)

Gayle

June's Art Journal Friday

Welcome welcome! When did the summer arrive? Here we are at the end of June and it's time for another Art Journal Friday :)

Same rules apply as usual - all welcome! Create a page or pages around the theme for this month, and if you can come and share your creations with us at our Ning site - lots of love to be had!

This month's theme... I thought after going with a quite emotional theme last month, this month we could look at something a little less emotive - technique! An integral part of any journal page is the background, and for me it's often the part I have the most fun doing :) for this month's page I decided to gesso the page as usual and then drip different coloured alcohol inks onto it in blues, greens and golds. I LOVED this effect :) and because of the gesso it didn't bleed through the rest of the pages (as it will do if you don't protect your page, look out!)

I'd love to see what your favourite techniques are for creating backgrounds on your pages - are you a gesso girl? Do you love using acrylics, or do you prefer watercolours, or collage? Or a mixture of them all? Let me know!

If you'd like to share your background with us we have an Art Journal Friday group over at our Ning community where you can upload your page, leave some love and receive some back :) come visit and say hi!

Happy Friday :)

Gayle xx

May's Art Journal Friday

Oh boy, this month I did a page that made me cry! This month's theme is... the sad truth.

As you may or may not know, I have been working over the last couple of weeks on a ward for older adults with dementia, and hearing some heart-breaking stories about the people that the patients were before their illnesses. It got me thinking about my own experiences about people in my life that had had their health taken from them and their existences after this happened, and it made me think about how people's stories get passed down after they are no longer able to tell you about who they were. Obviously family are a priority source of information in telling you about who someone is, and I journalled all over this page about my own feelings about how your identity comes out in this way. But it was really striking to me about how for example my bookshelf tells you so much about who I am, and about what's on my iPod would tell you so much about me, even if I wasn't able to explain to you why.

Your page doesn't have to make you sad ;) but for your journaling this month, really think about something that tugs at your heartstrings and try to journal about it. It doesn't have to be about people, or animals, but just something that really made you think and cherish your knowledge that little bit more just because you know that knowledge is very precious.

If you can share your page, or if you have any thoughts to share, I'd love to see them at our Ning community if you'd like to call in :) the link to the Art Journal Friday page can be found here.

Wishing you a wonderful weekend ahead and looking forward to seeing your pages and hearing your stories! :)

Gayle xx

April's Art Journal Friday

Welcome to this month's Art Journal Friday! With May nearly here and the weather being SOOO much better (aren't you just loving it!) I am feeling colours this month - the light is better and lasts longer, and the world looks completely different just for having a little sunshine fall upon it :)

So keeping it simple, for this month's art journal prompt, create a page using any combination of oranges, purples and/or gold, in honour of the wonderful sunshine that is making a reappearance! All are welcome, and if you'd like to share your page and some love, you can come chat with us at our Ning Community and upload your work there.

Look forward to seeing you!

Happy Art Journaling :)

Gayle xx

p.s. simply can't post today without wishing congratulations to Prince William and Kate Middleton on their wedding day - best wishes for many happy years ahead, from The Scrappy Tree girls!

March's Art Journal Friday

Welcome to another Art Journal Friday! If you haven't played along before, please feel free to come and join us - all welcome! On the last Friday of every month I post a journal prompt to encourage you to get your pens, paints, paper, glue, plus anything and everything you can lay hands on(!) and to have a play. We have an Art Journal Friday group set up at our Ning Community if you'd like to share your pages with us - you're sure to receive a lot of love :) click here to visit our Ning site.

I haven't had a lot of time lately to do the things that I enjoy, like reading for example (well, reading for pleasure rather than study!) and I am very much looking forward to getting some quality fiction time in in the near future! It got me thinking about how much the different books I've read have created pictures in my head - I can still conjure up very clearly the mental images from books that I read many years ago, the people that I read about and the places that they went.

This month's journal prompt is to pick a book, a character or a place that really struck you and journal about it. You could pick a favourite book and journal maybe about the things you enjoy about it and the feelings it gives you, or perhaps a book you only read once but which created particularly vivid thoughts or images for you that you still remember. Maybe you have a favourite character who embodies something for you and you feel engaged with in some way (I am still mourning the death of Dumbledore by the way, maybe I need to work through that! lol). Perhaps a location in a book was created so well by the author that you feel as if you have been there yourself.

This challenge is just for fun; whether or not you create a page, or decide to share a page, is entirely up to you :) photos can be uploaded to the Art Journal Friday group; please leave some love if you stop by and see a page that you like :)

Happy weekend and happy journaling! :)

Gayle xx

February's Art Journal Friday

Welcome to Art Journal Friday, come one, come all and bring some paper and crafting stuff! I've been thinking since the last time I posted this that I have been a bit lazy of late in making sure that it's completely clear that art journaling is open to EVERYBODY, and can be as serious or as fun as you want to make it :) if you need to get something off your chest, use art journaling; if you need to have some fun and play about with your supplies, make a mess and try out some new stuff... put it in your art journal! It's all good, all valid, and if you love or hate it, no one needs to know but you :)

The aim of our monthly prompt here is to maybe give you an idea to start you off on a page; you're free to take whatever you want from the prompt, and if some or all of it doesn't work for you, then that's ok too :) for me, I'm just happy to spread the art journal love!

This month I wanted to journal about something a little more personal to me; I am in the process of moving jobs, and had been working for my old employers for about 10 years! It's really made me evaluate my relationships with the people that I've worked with, and made me think about the advice, the knowledge, the inspiration they've passed on. I'm more thankful for their support towards me than they will ever know, and this month needed to work through how emotional I was feeling about that! There have been tears on this one people, I warn you! :-D

This month's prompt is inspire - journal about someone (maybe more than one person) who inspires you, and you want to say thank you to them. It might be that you're journaling thoughts that you don't feel comfortable to share with that person, or thoughts that actually you've already shared but you feel strongly about it and it will make for a great journaling experience for you :) if you want to cover it up under some paint/paper once you've written it then you can, it's your art journal (and personally I do that all the time!). Sometimes the process of getting it out of your brain and onto paper is the important thing, not that you record those thoughts for posterity!

If you do want to share your finished page with us, there is an Art Journal Friday group at our Ning community where I promise you will receive lots of love for your work! We are a supportive bunch and we love to see what you create :)

Have a wonderful weekend!

Gayle

Welcome to January's Art Journal... Saturday?

Yep, this month's prompt is coming to you a day late as we wanted to focus yesterday on our charity auction! See this post for more information - there are some great handmade gifts available in our eBay shop, so support Save The Children's Haiti Relief and get yourself a beautiful handmade item at the same time :)

Now on with the art journaling! This month I'm really thinking a lot about what we're working on at the moment at The Scrappy Tree, which is Valentine's and our projects over the coming weeks to raise money for Save The Children, and I got to thinking, the one word that was really jumping out at me was 'gift'. With Valentine's on the way, many of us are already thinking about gifts for our loved ones; of course with our projects this month we are hoping to combine that with giving a gift to those in need.

For this month's page, journal about a gift in your life, maybe something important that you have given to someone, or a treasured possession that someone has given to you. You might even want to journal about a cause that's important to you. You could use 'gift' as your title word, or perhaps journal about what the act of giving means to you.

Feel free to share your page with us at the Art Journal Friday group at The Scrappy Tree Community, or even just visit to share some love :) happy weekend!

Gayle xx

December Art Journal Friday

Here we are with the last Art Journal Friday of the year on the very last day of the year! If you haven't played along before, maybe think about making yourself a New Year's Resolution to try something new this weekend :)

To join in, all you need to do is to create an art journal page using any medium you like (paint, paper, fabric, collage etc etc etc) using this month's theme over the weekend, and if you'd like to share with us you can upload a picture here at The Scrappy Tree community AJF group - if you don't feel you want to share your page, by all means call in and leave some love anyway :)

For this month's prompt, I decided it was time to say goodbye properly to the old year and welcome in the new! I know that for many people 2010 has certainly had its challenges ;) my suggestion for this art journal page is that you write ALL OVER the page with all the things that you want to leave behind where they belong in 2010 - write whatever you like using whatever language you like and don't worry that anyone will see it because....

...then you're going to paint/collage/draw/write ALL OVER IT with all the good things that are coming your way in the new year! It could be good things you know are going to happen and are really looking forward to, or equally good things that you want to happen - you never know unless you ask, right? ;)

Hope you have fun with this one, I know I'm going to!!

Gayle xx

November's Art Journal Friday

Happy Friday bloggers and crafters, and welcome to the November edition of Art Journal Friday! If you haven't played before, I post a prompt here on the last Friday of the month which runs all weekend, and we invite to use this as inspiration for some art journaling over the weekend using any medium you like. You're invited to share your piece with us over at our Ning community, where you're sure to receive lots of love for your artwork, and if you don't feel able to share by all means come on over and leave some love for someone else! Art journaling is for everyone and we would love you to come join us!

This month sees us in the middle of Thanksgiving weekend in America, and in the UK... it's the end of November! After November comes December, that particular time of year when for many of us life steps up a gear for a good couple of weeks :) Some of us enjoy the excitement and the change of pace, and some of us dread it and wait for January! ;)

Well for this month's prompt I would like to invite you to journal how you feel about the upcoming festive season; are there certain things appearing that are making you feel excited about the time to come? Or does it more fit you to create something calming to counteract the rising tide of busybusybusy which is fast approaching? Come join us this weekend and share your December anticipation! Click here to take you to our Ning community if you'd like to visit us there and share some thoughts :)

Happy journaling! Gayle xx

Art Journal Friday

After a little time away, I am excited to be bringing Art Journal Friday back to The Scrappy Tree! To do something different from the Halloween weekend, in just a week's time it will be November 5th in the UK, a reason to let off lots of fireworks! Guy Fawkes Day is a traditional day in the UK where we burn a 'guy' on a bonfire (the guy is some old clothes stuffed with newpaper) and let off fireworks to commemorate the foiling of a plot to blow up the Houses of Parliament and the King of England in 1605. If you'd like to read more about the history behind the celebration, I have included a link here.

''Remember remember the 5th of November,
Gunpowder, treason and plot,
I know no reason
Why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.'

I would like you to take something from this that speaks to you personally and journal it this weekend! Whether you are an ardent fan of firework displays, or whether you would prefer to take something a little darker from the plots and the treason... your choice! Scrappers, card-makers, artists, combinations of these and more! - make something and share it with us :) you can use any medium that you feel comfortable with, and combine them if that is what helps you to get your ideas onto paper/wood/metal/fabric :)

This one is just for fun, so have some fun with it :) if you'd like to share (and we'd love to see!) please feel free to upload your pic to our Ning site, and if you see something you like there then please leave some love! Have a great Halloween weekend Scrappy Tree-ers!

Gayle xx

Art Journal Friday

Wahoo! It's Art Journal Friday at The Scrappy Tree! After a quiet month on the blog, we're all ready to get creative!

If you haven't played along before, this is a weekend long art journal challenge - create a page or pages along this month's theme and if you want to share then you can post at the group on our Ning site, which you can find here. Always lots of love left for all who decide to play :)

This month's theme is 'animated' - what lights you up and makes you feel excited? You could find some animated images you love and collage them, or try drawing some of your own! I fell in love with an image I found in a magazine and knew I just had to use it :) have fun!

Gayle

Art Journal Friday

Running a little late with Art Journal Friday this month, but it's May Bank Holiday weekend here in the UK so you've got an extra day! :) This challenge will be running from Saturday to Monday, so upload your pictures to the Ning site by the end of the day on Monday if you'd like to share. This one is just for fun!

This month's theme is change - right now where I live, the weather is finally taking a turn for the better after the harsh winter and you can feel that the air is warmer and see that the plants are starting to come out of hiding.

What does the change in seasons mean to you? Can you see the differences in the great outdoors where you live? Or are there things that you can do and places you can go at this time of year that are meaningful to you? Are you noticing how different everything looks in the sunshine? Or are you eagerly looking forward to the change in the seasons because it hasn't arrived yet?

Make a page this weekend, and if you want to share it with us come and upload your pics to the Art Journal Friday group at our Ning site by the end of the day on Monday.

Happy Journaling!

Art Journal Friday

It's here again, the last Friday of the month! Welcome to March's Art Journal Friday :)

For this month's prompt I wanted to talk about something close to my heart over the past few weeks - TIME... or lack thereof! Recently I am finding that the constraints of a 24 hour day are simply not sufficient, and as a result life goes by at a hundred miles an hour!

I want you to journal what time means to you - have you got too much, not enough, are you looking back in time or do you want to look forwards? What do you do with your spare time? Is there a period of time in history which fascinates you? If you could go back in time would you do things differently?

This one is just for fun, but if you'd like to share your pages (or take a peek and leave some love!) then feel free to upload them to the Art Journal Friday group on our Ning site. This challenge will be running all weekend, we look forward to seeing your take on the theme!

Gayle

National Craft Month - ATCs!

So as part of National Craft Month we wanted to share with you some simple little projects for Spring that might get you thinking about trying something new. If you like the look of this project, check back on the last day of March, Wednesday 31st, for news of an ATC swap and competition!

Now, I am a huge fan of ATCs (Artist Trading Cards) - it was my first step away from the more formal scrapbooking/card-making that I started with, because there were no real rules apart from the size of the space I was working on (2.5 inches by 3.5 inches). It's a small space to work on when you've been working on 12 by 12 pages, but a fun challenge nonetheless and I think less intimidating to work on when you don't have the 'rules' to follow (such as including a picture, a title, journaling etc).

Our theme for this month is springtime and blooms, so I worked on a flower themed ATC using a flower stamp - I used a couple of different techniques so I'll explain as I go along!

Starting with a plain ATC card measuring 2.5 inches by 3.5 inches...

...and a flower stamp (this one is made by Papermania)...
I stamped two flowers onto the card with embossing Distress Ink....
...and sprinkled on some Tim Holtz Distress embossing powder (this one is Walnut Stain).
This is what you get when you tap the card...
...and then heat with a heat gun and leave to cool. You can then rub the image with your finger to remove some of the powder to get that distressed look.
I stamped the same image onto the card in Fired Brick and Mustard Seed Distress Ink, and added some gold Stickles to the main two flowers to emphasise them...
I edged the card with some Fired Brick Distress Ink....

...and accented some of the background flowers with orange and yellow Sharpies...

I went over the petals of the two main flowers with Glossy Accents...
...left it to dry and then spritzed with Glimmer Mist...
After it was dry, I outlined the two main flowers with a white pen to make them stand out from the others...
...and inked the areas around them with a sponge, using the Fired Brick and Mustard Seed Distress ink, and this is what I ended up with!

The main thing I love about ATCs is that it's a small space to have fun trying some things out - why not give it a go!

Join us again tomorrow for March's Art Journal Friday challenge! This will be running all weekend and we'd love to see your take on this month's theme which will be announced tomorrow.

Thanks for looking!

Gayle

Happy St David's Day!

Wanting to wish you all happy St David's Day from The Scrappy Tree! March 1st is the day of the patron saint of Wales, Dewi Sant (St David).

For the benefit of Scrappy Tree-ers living outside the UK, many Welsh people feel that this should be a national holiday, but until the prime minister gives it the thumbs up, today is mainly celebrated by wearing the Welsh symbols of daffodils and leeks (often not real ones!) and in the schools, the children dress up in traditional Welsh costume and take part in Welsh language music festivals. Cawl (Welsh stew) and Welsh cakes are eaten all year round, but are well known as Welsh dishes. Check out Wikipedia for some more information!

I also want to say a big thank you to everyone who took part in our first Art Journal Friday challenge over the weekend - we had a great response and I'm grateful to everyone for sharing their work! If you want to see the amazing pages that were created this weekend, visit the Art Journal Friday group at our Ning site.

Our next Art Journal Friday will be on the 26th March, hope to see you there!

Gayle

Welcome to Art Journal Friday!

It’s the last Friday of the month - Welcome to Art Journal Friday at The Scrappy Tree!

I have just recently been brave enough to try this particular medium and I would love it if you would join me! The Scrappy Tree girls have been kind enough to me to see how enthused I am about this new form of expression and just as others have done for me, I want to share with you.

First of all I want to say quite clearly that ART JOURNALING IS FOR EVERYONE. Seriously, if I can do it, so can you. I had spent plenty of time admiring the amazing pages that the art journal experts turned out, thinking oh my GOSH I could never do that. And you know what? Maybe I never will. But it doesn’t matter! If you can put pen to paper, brush to paper, glue to paper – you can art journal. And all I’m asking of you today is one little page :) Papercraft, painting, sketching, collaging - the list is endless and it's all good!

The way that I got brave enough to try was through finding a prompt. Someone gave me a focus point to start from. It’s true to say that art journaling can be the most personal thing that you wouldn’t want to show anybody, or it can be the opportunity to try out a new technique along with a quote or a picture or a title that speaks to you in some way – speaks to you but no one else would know why you chose it.

I would love for this challenge to give you the chance to try art journaling if you never have before, because I have just started this journey myself and would love to share it! But equally, if you have been art journaling for some time and you want to take part, remember it’s an inspiration to others as well as every page being another step in your own journaling journey – everybody welcome!

Ok, so here’s the challenge!

Using the prompts below as inspiration, create a journal page over the weekend. If you’d like to share it with us (we would LOVE to see your pages, but if it’s too personal then we understand that too) then please either post it to the Art Journal Friday group on our Ning forum, or e-mail the image to me at thescrappytree@hotmail.com and I can post it for you. If you are taking part but don’t want to post your page, please come and leave some love! Please send your images in by Sunday of this week.

Now I ADORE Alice in the Wonderland, in particular the 1951 Disney film version – the Cheshire Cat has to be one of my favourite characters of all time! So as we start thinking about March in just a few days – the March Hare and the Mad Hatter sprang into my mind at once! – I would love to see pages with an Alice connection. A purple page in tribute to the Cheshire Cat? White bunnies for the White Rabbit? Playing cards or roses painted red for the Queen of Hearts? Do you want to celebrate your ‘unbirthday’? Have you learned a lot of things from the flowers? ;) Or in the words of the caterpillar – ‘who…are...you?’

I hope that everybody can find something that speaks to them and inspires them this weekend! Happy art journaling :) from The Scrappy Tree!

Gayle