Im Back!

 Is there anyone out there ?? Such a looong time since i blogged! Freshly retired this year so hoping to be on here more often

Have recently rearranged my little studio took me almost 10 days! but Im ready to art away!

loving these little houses hoping to get my DH to cut me some more, love the chunky wood

Hang on to empty boxes! there is always a use for them!

Im getting my sewing mojo back too!

Ive been checking out lots of lovely blogs just recently so many lovely projects, also enjoying Pintrest, so much to look at! & I'm loving tutorials, such generosity to share ideas & projects.
Think  I might need some on refurbishing this blog, but there are so many choices I can't make up my mind! Im ready to get arty again !
Be back soon
Don't forget to leave me a comment, Id love to hear from you x

Time Flies!

My first post of 2013!  Time flies and Life races on! January was a great month for me, I had the pleasure of my twin Granddaughters, son and Daughter in Law come from New York for a visit! It was a very busy time, keeping up with 2 two year olds! and it snowed !  Absolutely no time for any art play, but I managed to take some supplies on a trip to Florida at the end of january and managed to make 3 art journal pages! plus I also bought more supplies! February passed in a blur, I didnt manage any art time then either! March arrived and also my new Dina Wakley Book!  yeah I managed one art journal page! inspired by this fabulous book!

A week ago today I drove to Harrogate with Bernice Hopper we were off to Art from the Heart to spend 3 wonderful days with the fabulous Dina Wakley! We had the Gelli Printing Class and then 2 days of Art journalling in layers.  Monday morning we woke to Snow! and I also had a sore throat and stinking cold! The class was fabulous and I was throughly hooked on Gelli plate printing, we made lots of prints on various papers and then made some of them into a book, we also made some stamps from fun foam and used them in our book, which is not quite finished!lol
here are some samples, I loved the vellum/parchment paper prints also the deli paper

On Tuesday the snow had almost gone, but my cold got worse and now I was coughing a lot! my sincere thanks to the lovely ladies on my table,  Bernice, Ann & Sue who were very tolerant  of me  leaving the table every so often to go outside & cough! Art journal in layers was a very busy intensive class, so many wonderful techniques to try out and learning to layer with paints, inks, stencils etc, the day went so quickly.  Last day was just as busy! so much paint and ink and stencil fun interspersed with my coughing! ( it was a bad asthma bout & I am now taking steroid tablets to improve it, but it wasnt fun at the time)  I didn't manage to finish my book this time either, but its almost ready to be glued together & hopefully over Easter i will spend some more time on it.

This is one of my favourite pages, I just love the textures and dimension

Its amazing how many layers you can add to a page ! dont think I managed the 40 layers Dina was hoping for! As always Dina make the class so much fun! with so much information and encouragement we cant fail!  Thank you Dina!

I should have counted the layers on my hands! they took a long time to clean up! lol
Thanks also to Dyan @ Art from the heart, I loved your yorkshire pie!! it went a long way to making me feel much better! and to Ben for keeping the shop so well stocked with so many tempting goodies!
Thanks for stoping by for this rather long post! hoped you enjoyed your visit, dont forget to leave me a comment.

X Maggie

Oops!

No more excuses! I'm a bad blogger, probably because I'm not getting much art time and have little to show sometimes life takes over and you've got to do what you've got to do! Hopefully I've done it! And I will start to get more art time in 2013- in two days time!

First off it will be the tidy up of tidy ups in my studio, seriously anyone walking into it would think it had been ransacked! I only did a few canvasses from October to end of November, so I cannot understand how it got so bad! I also probably shouldn't buy any more stash! But with a new craft shop in the village it's kind of hard to pass by without stopping in and stocking up! If you should ever get lost and end up in darkest Leicestershire you need to visit BarjanB crafts in Newbold Verdon, it's full of great goodies you just have to have!  Would you believe we had a visit from Andy Skinner!! At the end of November needless to say I was first in line and we had a fabulous demo& workshop with him, & he is coming back in April I think! Happy days. thanks to Barry and his wonderful team!

I've signed up for an online workshop Lifebook 2013 starts 1 Jan so I really need to get tidying so I can actually start getting arty! I really want to do other online classes but I'm resisting until after January, I'm having some special visitors arriving soon - My beautiful Twin Grandaughters - so I want to spend precious time with them before I get involved in anything else!

I did manage to do some canvasses I'm enjoying the process very much and have more I want to do
Here is a peek of my most recent ones

I also need a lesson on photography! and layout, the last three photos are not true colours as they were taken in bad light! I could also do with a crash course on how to improve my blog , I never seem to get around to reading up how to do it hopefully I'll manage to do that very soon.

Thanks for stopping by this humble blog,

Wishing a Happy, healthy, prosperous & arty New Year to everyone

X Maggie

yikes!

I can't believe how time flies! I haven' t blogged since June! I could give you a long list of excuses, but I'll spare you!.  Life get hectic sometimes, but I'm finally getting some arty time again.  I have been busy, honest, Ive made quilts, been to the Festival of Quilts, love it, I'm in the middle of some bunting just now, and also made some canvas projects.  I think i may have my fingers in too many pies! that's the problem, so much i really want to do but don't always get the time . Hey ho, that's life.

I can spend hours on the computer blog hopping and online shopping! for yet more arty supplies, so I'm now restricting myself to 45 mins just before bedtime! too many beautiful blogs and new ideas and inspiration to take in and before you know it the evening is gone and I'm too tired to get arty.

Here are a few of the things I've been up to.....

some canvases

What next? I want to start using my pan pastels I bought them some time ago and haven' t really used them much, any ideas?  also need to get going again in my journal, I seem to have abandoned it, more canvases, Christmas themed this time, yes I know I mentioned it,  but its only 105 sleeps so its time to get cracking!

Ive gone over my 45 mins now, so i'm off to get some shut eye!

Thanks for visiting, don't forget to leave me a comment!

Happy painting, inking, stamping, journalling etc!

X Maggie

ooops!

Ooops! I seem to have fallen off my blog! I can't believe the last post was on 10 March!! Which also means that I've fallen with a mighty bang off the 365 Calendar Challenge on Kate Crane's blog..... sorry miss! My arty life seems to have disappeared at the moment, real life has taken hold of me, but there is a shred of light starting to beam again, I actually got back to my little studio  last week and managed to do some ART!  whoop,  1st a journal page, then a teeny tiny canvas, and another canvas which I haven't managed to finish yet as i can't seem to find the right image to go on it! but I like the colours!

I had some more motivation last Saturday, I spent a fabulous day at Art from the Heart! with the fabulous Dyan! Yeah, I did the canvas workshop - been trying to get on that one for months! I enjoyed every minute of it and produced not to bad a canvas! (if i should say so myself!) I choose a colour palette completely out of my comfort zone! Im usually purples/pinks/lime green etc but I did have a cranberry/burgundy  colour in there! I was a little gung-ho with the centre strip! but i'll know next time not to go so high! I'll definitely be making more of them! watch this space!

I've been having a clear out in my studio, sooo many magazines, got three bags full but don't know whether to recycle them or take them to the charity shop.  I admit I have too much stash! but there are so many tempting items online! Im trying to be restrained and start using up more stash before buying more! I may have to restrict my internet browsing! if that possible!

Thanks for stopping by, don't forget to leave me a comment!

Hope everyone has an arty weekend.

X Maggie

Dina's Workshop!

Last Thursday 1 March, I travelled to Harrogate to attend a Dina Wakely workshop at Art from the Heart!
3 Days of arty fun!, Friday, Saturday & Sunday.  We danced! we sang! we laughed and most of all we played with gesso, texture paste, paint, stencils, pan pastels, inks and stamps! First off Dina showed us the 'Poetry in Motion' book we would be creating, then in Dina style, shared the techniques to create it with us!  Dina is a wonderfully relaxed teacher, encouraging, and supportive, there are no mistakes! and we don't have to do it her way! We all started with the same pieces of white paper, but everyone finished with different designs,  it was amazing to look at the finished projects,  they were all fantastic!!

Here are the first few pages in progress,

and the book made up, although Ive not totally finished it as I need to add some images and more poetry,
I'm very pleased with the result and especially drawing the face! that was nerve-racking! thank goodness for the magic stabilo pencil, it works wonders!

The whole process  was very enjoyable and I especially liked stamping on tissue paper and adding the stamped pieces to the book with gel medium, the tissue paper seemed to disappear and the stamped image looks so good.

A visit to Art from the Heart would not be the same without seeing the Lovely Dyan! and of course its a chance to add to my ever growing stash!!

just look at those flying pigs! so cute! I love them!(Paper is Graphic 45 Old Curiosity Shoppe)

It was a throughly enjoyable weekend , with lovely company, hopefully I will be able to go on another one soon!

I hope you enjoyed your visit to my blog, thanks for stopping by

xMaggie

Catching Up!

Im almost caught up! (with the Calendar Challenge, @ Kate Crane's site) despite the fact that I forgot to blog my February page in February! oops,  Here it is now....

I used Distress Stain in Victorian Velvet, splashed some water on then stencilled with a heart stencil in the same stain, it came out quite light so I did it again! then stamped some dots, I'm pleased with the colour and the page.

Ive managed to do my March page but its unfinished, as I can't make up my mind what stamps to use on it, the paper blocks are not quite the colour I wanted but didn't have anything else that suited so its rather 'Bright" and certainly not my usual colours! but I'm warming to it. Just pleased to have it ready at the beginning of the month instead of the end !

I dry brushed Dylusions acrylic paints then stencilled the blue squares, used a chicken wire stamp and added some white through punchinella !  I will show the finished page next month.

I had hoped to blog a bit more often, but never seem to manage it! There are always so many other blogs to follow, projects to finish etc etc, but I will try harder! I have also being doing some online classes, so I have been busy,  Im off now to link up this post and catch up on all the other Calendar pages which can be found @ thekatkyrnwheel.blogspot.com  I really must work out how to link these addresses, would it make my life simpler? probably not, I usually take the long way round.

Thanks for stopping by and don't forget to leave me a comment!

X Maggie