My nature art journal project

I am going to host a nature journal project. It will travel in a Round Robin Style. Every participant will create her own nature journal. It will not be a journal with a nature theme. It will be a nature journal. Meaning you will use it as a journal to record your encounters with nature.
Some SUGGESTIONS for what you can do with this journal:
-Include pressed flowers and leaves you find. You may also record time and location where you found them and identify them using a flora. Maybe describe it with botanical terms.
Since this is an ART journal, you may do this on a watercolored background, or whatever else.
-Journal about your favourite spot. For example, if you have a favourite tree to sit under, try to share this experience with us. Take a photo of your tree, write how you feel about this tree, what it means to you. Share memories connected to this tree. Include leaves from the tree, do leaf printing, do a sketch of the tree, or a watercolour painting, this can be abstract if you are not a good figurative painter, just express the colors of the tree. Include photos taken in the morning and at night.
-Take a walk in nature, document your trip, write about flowers and animals you see, the mood you have, share your photos taken on that trip, include a pressed flower you find beautiful, make an abstract painting with acrylic or watercolour in the colors you saw on your trip, or figurative if you have the skills.
-You can make leaf and flowers pressing by just stamping them on the page with paint. Or you can use them as a negative.
-You can also use magazine images, pages from books, or other images/rubberstamps etc to show what you have seen. But it should be image of something you have seen in nature, not just any nature picture. It should be personal pages.
-Recreate a flower you saw, making a paper flower of scraps…then you can paint the stem, and include real leaves from the flower. That is really mixed media, which I encourage in this journal.
-These are just suggestions to get your ideas started, they are not guidelines.

REMEMBER: This is not necessary a project for advanced artists/crafters. I am definitively not. I have never done anything like this before. But you should be willing to try something new, and willing to experiment, and venture into the unknown. My two passions in life are art and nature, and I am really eager to merge these two passions. Are you too, maybe?

SO, over to the boring rules. It is really important to me that this doesn’t get lost. So I am not taking sign-ups for this project, I am taking applications.
The rules:

1. To be included , you need to either:
-Know me , or rather that I know you and your swapping and communication skills. You don’t need to have swapped with me before, but if I know who you are and I know I can count on you, that is enough.
-If you don’t know me, I want someone I trust to vouch for you.
Anybody can apply to this project, then I will decide if you need a reference or not.
If you are known to communicate badly, you don’t even need to apply.

2. The most important rule of this is: COMMUNICATION. You have to stay in touch regularly. Post when you send and receive. And also discuss the project in general(I will create an own yahoogroup for this project). If you are not willing to discuss this on a general basis, it tells me you are not really passionate about this project. Since this is a long-term project(please think thru the commitment before you apply), unexpected events may occur and you don’t have the chance to work on the journals like you should. That is perfectly okey. Just communicate, and pass the journals on without working in them. That’s much better than nesting on them for months. I need you to commit to let us know if a crisis appear. I know maybe a journal rr may not be first on your mind if you lose someone close to you, for example, but in that case, I want you to commit to spend 5 minutes online to let us know and then pass the journals on. In some extreme cases where you are not able to let us know….if you are ill on the hospital for example…we will be hanging in the dark with questions…therefore… to be in this project, I am going to need your phone number. Don’t worry, I wont bother you, unless you stops communicating via email.

3. COMMITMENT: Think thouroughly about the commitment of this project.. Do you have time, energy and passion for a long lasting project? Also think about money…the journals can be expensive to mail, and I don’t want you to come later and say you don’t have money to pass the journals on. Once you are officially signed up for this project, you are NOT allowed to pull out.(Unless you have a good, valid reason of course) If I accept your application, you are not automaticly officially signed up. I am going to ask you for a confirmation later.

4. PRACTICAL INFO: You can make your own journal, or a store bought one. Start some pages in your own journal. The journals should rotate monthly. Then you have a month/almost a month to make 4-8 pages in everyones journal.
We will have set mailing dates(approx of course). That is to avoid one person receiving maybe 2 journals to work in before she even made her own. That causes stress. So after I have posted the officially and final flight list, the mailing date will be one month from that, and you are not allowed to mail it before that. No one should have more than one journal to work at, at a time.

If I scared you off by all this strictness…that’s okay. Then you are not fit anyway. I want only reliable participants who are all 100% into this going as smooth as possible. And also, if you don’t enjoy being in nature, if you are not at home in nature, if you don’t feel one with the nature, this is not for you either.

SO, come on and email me for questions, requests and applications! My email is : ulvinnen1@yahoo.no



Marthe Syversen

Art journaling class

Here is one of my art journal pages based on one of the creative exercises in the online art journaling class I am taking. It's about how inspired I get by autumn colors!

A productive and creative day

Here are some of the things I have made today. The first entry is from a "Tales of another broken home" deco. The theme has nothing to do with me...I am just stating this, as those who watch my blog and are not familiar with decos, might understand this as selfbiographic as it includes my name. Well, I assure you it's not. The name is there to sign my entry in a nice way. I am none of those things described. Well, enough about that! I love how it turned out...its just simple collage really,no advanced stuff, but with those beautiful papers from www.shabbycottagestudio.com you really can make some cool stuff!

The planet deco is also simple made with scrapbookpapers and rubons.Nothing fancy here, but it still turned out nice, so I am showing it here. I love the theme though...I have always been fascinated of space...whats out there!

I really had fun with the vintage train decos... It's a swap in LovelyDecos. Here I used old train schedules, a Orient Express collage pack I bought over at www.europeanpapers.com many years ago....Finally found a use for it. I don't recomand you to shop there though, even though they have lots of nice stuff....It took months before the store owner cared to send my order, and many emails...sigh. Also used Color Wash and walnut ink here...my new favorite products!

And last, an ok entry in a vintage women deco.

Soon you will be seeing some art journal entries for me. I am going to start one, finally!

Two things have pushed me now... The challenge blog www.kreativdagbok.blogspot.com , and my enrollment in an online ar journal class at www.mycreativeclassroom.com . I recomand you to check both out! At that site, I am also enrolled in an altered book class , but I probably wont upload anything from there, as we are creating a technique reference book only... But thats a great idea that will come in very handy! I have just started, so I am eager to continue.

I will try and work on art journaling tomorrow...stay tuned!!

Blah!

It's been a blah day today, I had planned to do so much , in a relaxed way of course, but the day vanished into nothing. I woke up really late, and I hate that as the day vanishes and I just feel blah tired. Then I ended up reading a book some hours, a really lame book btw, but I couldn't stop.
I meant to finish a personal swap to my friend Tiia today + two groupswaps to her...But I only got decorated one deco tonight... this vintage deco. I used three hours on it.... because I had these stupid breaks all the time. But I think it turned out nice in the end. The book paper were really old and a piece fell off when I tried to glue it on...an accident , which turned out cool:) So I am definitively doing that again. Also something went wrong when I was rubbing on the word... the A got messed up.... But I still liked the page in the end. I don't think I will do more about it....its not a million dollar artwork anyway. I need to have a relaxed view on this...What happends, happends.
I really don't understand what happened to this day:( It's not that I wasn't inspired, cause I am. I think it's all due to me sleeping late! The root to all evil, LOL:)

Anyway yesterday was really nice, the day with my boyfriend. We were out shopping, and we had a great meal.

Now I am so much looking forward to 25-27 april. I am going to Oslo then, to the great stamp and scrapbook show. I will stay with my mum and my brother (and his family) that weekend. I will go to the show on Saturday with a deco-friend of mine. It will be really great to see all those supplies in one room, and to my friend. After the shopping spree, we will try and deco some together:) Really looking forward to that!

On the Sunday I will spend the day with my brother and his family.. I hope to do some crafting with my niece and nephew.

Some decos late at night:)

I worked late today, and didnt get started with any decoing until 23. I hadn't planned to make any, actually, but I just had to! I had this creative urge and had to try and create something.. But now, now I am tired and am probably not going to make anymore tonight...even if I want to!

These are flower and fish entries. Flower scan is not good, paper looks white, but is actually a pink patterned paper.

Tomorrow I am going to have a romantic evening with my boyfriend. We are going to play a boardgame....not sure what actually, as we will go out and buy one! Just to do something together. We will also buy some nice food to cook together. I am REALLY looking forward to this, spending a day with the one I love. It's too seldom it happends, as we often work different times, and when we are at home together , we are tired and he relax with WOW and I with decos. SO I am sure tomorrow will be nice:)

These are something I just made today, entries in a Tales of another broken home deco, and a depression deco. In addition is a Journey thru a garden 4 x 4.
Just ask if you wonder how I made them.

My cemetery angels decos

Here are my cemetery scans, via swap in LovelyDecos.

They were awesome fun to make, partly because I am very inspired by the theme, but also because I had bought so much new stuff from collagestuff.com which I used here;old bookpages, rubberstamps, and collage images.

What I have done here for the backgrounds are;clearembossed onto the book pages, and sprayed with Color Wash. The stamped images will then act as a resist, as you can see. I also added some walnut ink on one, and acrylic paint on the other, as well as some cool rubons:)

Here is a vintage art deco square I have made for a swap in QualityDecos.

I have used a vintage book page as background, which I sprayed with walnut ink, and rubbed distress ink, and stamped swirls.

Then I distressed the photo, and added some rubons and brads to finish it off.

I really took my time on this piece, and I like how it turned out.

The swirls stamps and bolt brads are from Panduro, the store I work in.I guess you all understand I shop there A LOT:)

Finally started a blog too:)

Okey, seems like I have really been missing out on the new big craze......BLOGGING!
After a little push in the back from Maria Øgren, I decided to go for it, especially now that my scanner is working again! I thought it wasn't any point blogging without photos.
In the blog I will mainly show and comment my work in decos, ATC's and other mailart, and, probably, in addition to some whinings about life and all.
I am quite addicted to the internet, so you will probably hear from me a lot.

Well, I am hoping for comments though, as its no fun blogging just for myself....