Calendar Journaling

I haven't quit calendar journaling.  But the creative looking months went missing until September.  So to catch up, here is June

June finishes my first academic calendar journal.  

I went in search of my next one.  One that I hoped I could use any pen I want and do some stamping too without the worry of bleeding through the paper.  Here is my unfinished new cover.  It needs the dates on it yet.

This one has monthly pages as well as weekly pages in between the months.  Which means after I do my journaling with whatever ink media I want, I can tear out the weekly pages and glue the monthly pages back to back and the paper bleeds don't show!  Hiphiphooray!

I started July with every intention of being more creative and artsy, but time kept getting away from me.

There were so many birthdays to be ready for in July.

Then there was August.  I obviously spent the time reading rather than making a creative looking month.  But the 20th was inspiration for September.

So September turned more fun looking.  I chose one short word each day to stamp.  

I found these Ultra Fine tip Pilot Juice Pens for journaling.  I love them!

I rushed to buy them so I thought there were only 12 colors for this fine tip gel pen.  I have since found another supplier and ordered the other 12 available colors in the .38 tip.  I'm over the moon for these pens.  It doesn't take a lot to make me happy.

Have a happy day!

xxx

Annie

Harvest Moon

HARVEST MOON is the theme this week at Sunday Postcard Art.

That falls right into my need to make a few Halloween greetings.

It is a simple make.  The background is scrapbook paper.  I love scrapbook paper as it takes away the hard part of creating a background that I find so hard to do.  The moon is three shades of orange Distress inks, and my Nevermore Raven stamp over the top.  Then a bit more distress ink around the outside edge.

The correspondence side...

Again, scrapbook paper, then I stamped "Post Card".

Happy Mail Day!

xxx

Annie

Ready to Haunt

This week's theme on Sunday Postcard Art is LEAVES.

I took this opportunity to get started on a Halloween greeting.  

The spooky tree is a stencil, the bats and small leaves are paper punched, the rest of the images are die cut.

This postcard will have to travel in a clear sleeve, so I haven't yet decided how I want to do the back address side.

Happy Haunting Soon!

xxx

Annie

Walk Your Pets

This week the theme for Sunday Postcard Art is WHEELS.

I actually started this postcard for last week's theme of PETS.  Needless to say, it didn't get done.  I struggled with the background.  When I finally gave up, I checked what the next theme would be.  Wheels.  My pet walking cart has wheels!  I still had a chance to finish this postcard.  But I was still struggling with the background.  

I worked on the background, but I didn't like it.  Not one little bit.  I finally decided to cut out the images and use my favorite background technique of finding a scrapbook paper that would do the job.  It came with sunshine.  I added Wink of Stella to the fish for his glistening scales look, but the camera doesn't pick it up well.  The tiny silver dots is the very fine Stella glitter.

 

The correspondence side...

Happy Mail Day!

xxx

Annie

Summertime

This fabric sailboat postcard sailed the high seas to The Netherlands and arrived quite safely.

A birthday card (that I basically copied from a Pinterest card).

A scrapbook spread from one of my bicycle rides last summer in Wisconsin.

I always wish summertime would last forever.  Just not the 100+ degree days!

Happy Days!

xxx

Annie

A Birthday and Ms. Skellie

A big three O birthday came around this year and I had a fun time making a birthday card.  Those Tim Holtz 3" number rubber stamps don't keep anything a secret.  Aren't those candles clever?  I wish I could claim their design, but I saw them on a store card.  

I swapped Ms. Skellie mail art with a couple of like-minded rubber stamping artists.  These are the envelopes I sent out.

Those new Planets postage stamps came out just at the right time for my envelopes.

I'm not accomplishing much on my to do list since purchasing a Kindle Fire and joining Bookbub.  I wish I'd done that hundreds of book dollars ago!  

So many enjoyable pastimes, so little time!

Happy Mail Day!

xxx

Annie

Sunday Postcard Art - Picnic

This week I get to host at the Sunday Postcard Art with my choice of theme, which is PICNIC.  I chose this theme because I wanted to stitch this ant.  I was worried how his little legs might end up looking. I was surprised to be so pleased.  And ants go so well with picnics.  This little guy is on his way to a picnic right now.

My postcard backside...

I'm anxious to see the variety of picnic art that my fellow postcard artists will create.

Happy summertime!

xxx

Annie

Scrapbooking Pages

You might not know this, but yes, I scrapbook too.  Yes, too many crafty irons in the fire.

I've never shared my Scrapbooking pages before, but here are a sampling of a few.  My style is greatly different than most I have seen.  I want the pages to be more about the photos than about how many doodads I can glue to the page.  I absolutely love those doodad-loaded pages that I see others making, but I feel like the photo gets so lost.

Dies for cutting out letters with my BigShot has been a real life saver.  Before that I cut them with the Cricut (which was fine except when the paper would tear) and before that I traced letters from stencils and cut them out with an Xacto knife.  Quite painstakingly too, I might add.  

My scrapbooks are the 8.5" X 11" size.  To me the 12" X 12" pages are SO big!  Although sometimes I long for a larger page.  I do have pages that are a double page spread for one event.

This was a year ago and we're about to attend this rally again the first of July.

My very good friend from "home".  Processing the photo like this took away lots of aging and wrinkles. Why can't we do that in real life?

Being away from home, I hadn't done much Scrapbooking.  I loved getting back into it.  I'm looking forward to lots more time with my daughter like this in the future.

These tennies were just barely before the wild colored ones we see today.  I'm sure by now she has a wildly brightly colored pair of tennies.  Some people will scrapbook anything, eh?

I thought when I started in again with Scrapbooking and started right from the current day, that I'd be able to keep up AND work backwards to catch up.  I'm already 10 months behind that "current day".  So I see that it is a loosing battle and I just have to plug along as best I can.  

Keeping that calendar journal is a great big help in remembering the sequence of events and the dates.  I have looked back as a reference countless times already.  

Keeping memories alive for the future.

xxx

Annie

May 2016 Calendar Journal and a Snack

And May 2016 went like this:

The 13th and 14th are very personal feelings days, so I'm keeping them private.

There is only June left in this calendar/planner.  It's about time I went back and finished the cover.

Here is a tasty little snack for you.

CROCK POT RANCH OYSTER CRACKERS

To get the ingredients to my liking, I increased the amount of Ranch Dressing Mix as well as the amount of garlic.  I also added the Worcestershire sauce.  

xxx

Annie

Wisconsin Vacation Altered Postcard

The Sunday Postcard Art challenge this week is to alter a postcard.  

I've had this little postcard for such a long time.  It's a strange size ...not even quite 3.5 X 5.  So I cut a postcard size kraft paper and added my vacationers and a bird to the scene.

I forgot to take a picture of the postcard in it's original state, but I think it's pretty clear that it was just some cows in a pasture.  I haven't played with these two people characters in a long time.  This was a fun filled challenge this week.

And of course we need the card back to tell the rest of the story.

It was tough to decide between this phrase and something about getting a new travel agent.

In reality, Wisconsin is a beautiful state and I love it.

Happy Mail Day!

xxx

Annie