Some Progress

Hey all! Within the last couple of days, I've been quilting, sewing, and making ATCs. Like I was talking about in the last post, I've joined several quilt alongs, challenges, and a pledge related to quilting. The first thing I'd like to talk about is my hexagon quilt. It is a charm quilt, which means that every piece is different - each and every fabric used to make a hexagon or even a partial hexagon is going to be unique if I can possibly do so. Here is what I have sewn together so far:



A close up:



And here is a flower that I stitched together to add:



That's that... if ANYBODY wants to send me sewing scraps to add to this quilt, I would be very grateful - It's so hard to find enough scraps to finish this quilt!

The next project that I'd like to show you is my free motion quilt along top that I made. Here is the quilt before I trimmed it up:



And here it is after it was trimmed:



All I need to do now is to find a fabric to use for the backing and then make the quilt sandwich. I also have to buy the darning foot - it's 10 dollars, so I'm hoping I can find SOMEWAY to afford it, but I guess we'll just have to see.

The last thing I'd like to make you guys aware of is my improv quilt - I joined this challenge where for every mile you log into this government exercise site you earn one piece of fabric to use in your quilt. Here are all of the materials that I have chosen to use thus far with the miles I have logged.



The fabric with the leaves on it is the main fabric that inspired the whole quilt, and the one with the pumpkins on it is the second main fabric. With just those two simple prints, an entire idea for a quilt was born. I actually started working on some blocks yesterday and will continue to work on them throughout today. Tomorrow I will probably post my progress. See you guys later!

I'm Back...

But now I've turned to another page of my creative endeavours. I don't know what it is about the coming of fall, but whatever it is, I am always drawn away from my regular ways of scrapbooking and pulled towards the warmth and coziness of quilting and crocheting, knitting and cooking. I've joined several new groups and quilt - alongs, as you can plainly see in the sidebar of my blog, and a couple of them are starting in September. I also took a pledge - a process pledge. Here is the pledge:

I, Jordan, pledge to talk more about my processes, even when I can’t quite put them into words or be sure I’m being totally clear. I’m going to put my thinking and my gut feelings out there.

And I'm going to do just that. I'm going to blog and I'm going to do it more often - about my works in progresses and the projects that I'm just not quite sure that I like. Even the ones that I hate during the process, I'm going to post; and I'm going to tell all of you what I'm feeling about that particular thing.

I have also joined a free motion quilting quilt-along... I've always been somewhat intimidated by free motion; I love the look, but I'm still scared of it. As I was browsing Flickr a couple of days ago I found this... and as I looked into it, I found that it wasn't as intimidating as it initially seemed. I'm still wondering, somewhat unsure of myself, but I know that everything you do and want to do needs practice, and that practice makes perfect - or at least somewhat better! I'm going to put together a simple top to practice my free motion on. The blog suggests using strips in a couple of different sizes to accomplish this, but I think I'm going to use some of my scraps - different sized squares, rectangles, triangles, and pehaps one or two strips to make a quilt the same size as they are using. I don't think I'm going to use a pattern - I might sketch a bit in my sketchbook this afternoon to see what I can come up with, but I know that it's not going to be something over the top. I'll probably use bigger scraps than I usually use so the top can come together at least fairly quickly - what do you guys think? Also another thing I've been considering is to piece the top too...

Scrapping Like Crazy!!

Today I've just been scrapbooking like crazy! I'm lucky that I'm starting to get it worked back into the swing of things... but today I did FOUR pages!! That is crazy! In a normal week I'd be lucky to get even that! I actually signed up for a bunch of challenges over on scrapbook.com like I said in a previous post. Yesterday I told you guys that I was going to use my blog to keep track of daily challenges that I complete and I DID finish one today! I guess I'll share that one first. Here it is:



The challenge was to use at least eight pairs of two on your page. My pairs are: 2 neutral cardstocks, 2 colored cardstocks, 2 red flowers, 2 pink flowers, 2 buttons, 2 brads, 2 fonts in the title and 2 photos. I didn't journal as much on this page as I did on some of the other pages I did today. I think that it depends on the page itself to determine how much if any journaling a page needs/wants. I really like the way this page turned out... I used a sketch, but sometimes I feel like when I use the same colors, a lot of my pages start looking the same.



This page was a little bit different. I was trying to do a different challenge... to use up those stickers that you have lying around! I know I have a bunch and I decided that it would be a good one to try. The purple circles just came to be - you see, when I'm working on a scrapbook page, I'm really spontaneous... I just let the page flow and go where it wants to. I had a scrap of dark purple cardstock and I thought that it would make a really good accent. But I couldn't just leave it at one circle. I added more, and the more I added, the better it looked!



A Day in the Life was actually the first layout that I did today. I was just playing around with a sketch that I found on a sketch challenge and it just sort of happened. The primary colors were chosen because I really liked the color the towels gave my picture and I thought that if I used the same colors, it would give the same kind of look to my page. If I was to only give you guys one tip to my scrapbooking style, that would be to never, ever, think about what you are going to do next. That, I think, is the reason my pages come together sooo quickly.



The last page I have to share with you guys today is titled Together Forever. It is a page about my parents wedding and how I KNOW that they are going to be 'together forever.' The journaling doesn't say that particularly, but I just feel it directly from the page. My parents have been married for 13? years and they are still as much in love as they were when they were married. The one tip I have for you from this page is, that, if you have a crop-a-dile, that you can dry - emboss dots!! Using the part that sets the eyelets, simply place it where you like and squeeze the handles! You can see the embossing below the title.

~Jordan~

More Inspiration Pages

In the few days that I've been gone, I've created 4 art journal pages. I know I've sort of been slacking on scrapbook pages, but I've decided that I'm going to focus on that this month, doing art journal pages in between. I signed up for a challenge on scrapbook.com called the Anything Goes Challenge and I hope that will encourage me to scrap more. I'm going to use my blog as a place to record the daily, weekly, and monthly challenges and that should help me blog more too! So let's get started with today's art journal pages. I'm not going to go into as much detail this time, but I'll still share pieces that I really liked about a particular page such as a color combo, a certain technique, a way I put something together, etc.

The first page is another page that has a quote on it, and, guess what, it's another TMNT quote. I know, I'm nuts, but I don't care! These are the things that inspire me, and I'm going to use them! The quote was something that Master Splinter said and it was: "Become One with the Shadows." I don't have the slightest idea why this gave me an idea for a page, but it did, and I like the finished product:



What I would like to share about this page is mostly the colors. I started out by thinking about the colors of the shadows; black, dark, dark, navy blue, etc. The yellow and white came about when I figured out that the page would be way, way, WAY too dark... I wouldn't even have been able to take a picture! And the pink letters were just because there was nothing else I had that would work! The technique that I would like to share with you about this page are the little white circles in the background. I actually started this page with a white base coat, then spread the dark blue on top. Then, using a wet baby wipe, I bunched up the bottom, plopped it down where I wanted a circle, and twisted. This was the effect it gave.



For this page I actually used the same technique as the previous one. Plopped down my baby wipe on wet paint and twisted to make little swirls. They actually remind me of comets for some reason. Might have to try a space page sometime. Hmmm. Anyways, the background was created by drizzling green, lime, and yellow paint directly onto the base sheet in my composition notebook and then scraping it around with an old gift card I just had lying around. The little 'flowers' are asterisks from a Thickers set with Stickles glitter glue in the middle and the capital "E" in 'have' is an upsidedown and flipped around '3.'



This next page is not my favorite page in the world. For real, it is one of my bottom pages. I had just received some fun goodies in the mail; Tim Holtz Distress Inks, Glimmer Mist and a bunch of stamps and some other ink pads. This was just me playing around with different techniques, trying to figure out how to make them work and finding interesting ways of using them. To start off this page, I painted the base white, then stamped an all over pattern with Pumice Stone Distress Ink. Then I Glimmer Misted the top. I layered torn and inked music sheet pieces, stamped some more images, then finished off the page with a title; the smaller letters are rubber stamps by Hero Arts and the bigger ones are unmounted acrylic stamps by Scrappy Cat.



The last page I have to share with you guys today is this one that reminds me a lot of christmas... and I know why!! The reason for this is because of the brown and the green; the colors of the christmas tree! This is a pretty simple page... lots of paint, layers, distressing, and stamping. With the darker brown circles around the stamped heart circles, that was me adhering the circles to the page with Mod Podge. I really like the way they turned out!

I definitely hope you were inspired by my pages, and hopefully I'll be back soon with some more and also some scrapbook pages!! See you soon!

~Jordan~

More Art Journal Pages!

I've totally been on this kick lately! I just love doing these art journal pages... they are so fun and easy to do. Very meditative as well - they make you feel GOOD! I have 2 pages out of my art journal to show you... and I did these between yesterday afternoon and this morning; it goes to show you just how quick they really are! I'm going to basically give you a step by step of each page so that you can recreate it in your own way if you so choose. The first page was just me experimenting a little bit. Here it is:



I started out thinking that this was going to be a really bold page since the colors black and red are usually very striking when put together. So those were my base colors. I painted my background black, dried it with my heat gun and then painted strokes of red over top. I thought that since my background was already dry that it would be okay, but, as it turns out, I didn't let it dry ENOUGH so the colors blended slightly in some places into a maroon like color. Since that wasn't quite the way I wanted it, I painted over top of the RED again and it become more bold it some places. I then added strokes of violet over top of the red and black. Then the page just felt really dark to me and so I decided to add lime green to the top - a lot of lime green! Since lime is my second favorite color, I think I kind of overdid it a bit, but it looks okay now. For the strips along the bottom, I used a strip of corrugated cardboard to stamp lines. The circles I stamped with a piece of corrugated cardboard cut into a circle (freehand) and the dots were put on in yellow with the handle of a paintbrush.



This next page was actually for a challenge that I started on scrapbook.com called the August Inspiration Challenge. The challenge was to watch the very first episode of TMNT (teenage mutant ninja turtles) and to make a piece of art that used something that inspired you about that episode. I chose a quote from Raphael that says "whatever they were - they're junk now!" I decide to use a gray for the background because it reminded me of metal... which is what I think of when I think of junk! Like the last page, I stroked on several different colors of paint - a lighter shade of gray and a lime green. Even then, I wasn't quite feeling it, so I added the corrugated cardboard stamp across the WHOLE page! I liked it a lot, but I still felt like it was missing something. I added the black strips along the top and bottom and a little on the sides. I then felt that I needed one more color to brighten things up, so I decided on red circles (in honor of Raphael's mask color, I used red). I actually used the bottom of my embossing powder to stamp them... I painted the bottom and stamped away! Lastly, I added the quote, highlighting the word JUNK since it was my whole inspiration for the piece. I used crayola colored pencils to write. They worked perfectly!

I hope you enjoyed looking at some more of my art journal pages, and I hope to share with you all some more scrapbook pages here really soon!

~Jordan~

Art Journal Start!!

I've been wanting to start an art journal for a while now... a long while! Finally the composition notebooks I was wanting to use went on sale for school and I got one... I know I'm cheap and I admit it! I painted the cover black with a strip of lime green along the binding and I glued a piece of ribbon along the transition between paint colors. Here is the first page in the book:



I REALLY like it!! I had so much fun and it was really relaxing; so easy to create. I didn't worry once about if I was going to ruin it... like I sometimes do when creating scrapbook pages. I used a bunch of layers of paint in all different colors and I stamped on it with "stamps" that I found around the house.

Thanks for looking!

More ATCs!

I just finished up all of the ATCs that I needed to complete for the swaps I'm in now. I received my newspaper ATC from the swap I was in and I absolutely love it! I've got about 5 ATCs to share with all of you guys today. 4 of them are rubber ducky ATCs and the other one is another elephant one. Let's get started!

I guess I'll show the elephant ATC first... I really like it! It just seems that even though the small size was hard at first, I got over that really quickly. Almost every ATC I've made since I've started again I've fallen in love with!



To create this ATC, I started with a white ATC blank. I then continued on to use a brown ink pad to rub over the top, giving it a soft distressed look and feel. I selected several 1" cardstock squares in 3 neutral colors, arranging them in a grid on top of the base. I stamped an image in the lower left hand corner and added a strip of paper tape measure that I distressed. Once the elephant is on top, the ATC is complete.



Coming up with ideas for a rubber duck ATC was a lot harder than expected! When I signed up for the swap, I didn't think that it would be difficult at all to create a good looking card to swap. Boy was I wrong! I had the toughest time figuring out where the best places would be to put the ducks - goodness, even finding images of rubber ducks was hard! But I finally found enough to create all of the ATCs I needed.



As you can see, this ATC has basically the same layout as the last one. They are the same for the most part, yet so different in so many aspects. The colors are very different, as are the images. I crumpled up the background and inked the wrinkles, added a scalloped strip and white circles. I also matted the ducks in a coordinating color and put stickle dots on the circles.



I have to say, I think this might be my favorite rubber duck ATC to date! I love how his head is so much bigger than his body... It's so out of proportion, yet so cute at the same time! The supposed stitching around the edges are actually marker lines and the blue tint to the "sky" is - get this - eye shadow! I saw a package of my eye shadow in the bathroom today and thought "wow... that looks an awful lot like chalk!" Sad isn't it? It was really light, but it worked for what I was wanting.



I did this one basically the same as the previous one as well. I thought that the images themselves were just so cute, and the first ATC that I made turned out so well that I couldn't help myself from making another!

Hope you guys enjoyed looking at my work and I'll talk to you guys soon!