Inktober 2018: Over the Hump...

For the very first time,  I have been taking part in #Inktober2018 and thought that I'd share my journey up to the half way point of the month.  I am not a confident drawer, especially with ink, and have made a light under drawing in pencil each day before committing myself to inking.  Sometimes I have kept things simple and cartoon like and sometimes I have attempted a more artistic effort with shading.  There are lots of alternative prompt lists available,  but for my first year, I have kept to the official prompt list.  I have used a fine, black Posca pen for inking each day.

The Earth Laughs in Flowers: An Art Journal Page

This art journal page was created in response to the May Challenge over on Mission Inspiration.  As usual there were 8 steps to follow, 3 suggested colours and 5 prompt words to choose from.

Locks and Keys: A Tag

The current challenge over on Tag Tuesday is Locks and Keys.  I found a quote that I liked, "Smile, it is the key that fits the lock of everybody's heart." by Anthony J. D'Angelo and based my tag round that.

From Gelli Print to Mother's Day Card

I made this Mother's Day card from the last print that I pulled during my recent half hour gelli plate experiment (see HERE for details).  Happy Mother's Day to my darling mother; I appreciate and love you!

Cuba: An art journal page

The prompt for this week's challenge on Junk Journal Junkies and Mindful Art was Cuba, with the colours restricted to orange pink and green.  Having pondered on the subject for a few days and having looked at lots of images, I decided to make it a rather literal interpretation using a map outline, the flag and the name to create my page.

Ink Spray Tag Trees

This is the first of two milestone blog posts; today's post means that the total for 2017 equals the total number of posts in 2016 and 2015 added together.  As tomorrow is the second anniversary of my first blog post, I have certainly shared and created more this year!  Having worked on art journal pages for four days in a row, I went back to working on a smaller surface; a #8 manilla tag.  This was for the August challenge on Tag It Tuesday: use your spray inks.

JJJAMA Challenge 29: Orange, Turquoise, Yellow, Laughter

I decided to keep things simple for this week's challenge with Junk Journals Junkies and Mindful Art.  The colour prompt is orange, turquoise and yellow and the theme 'Laughter'.

Scrap Tag

I needed a quick piece of art to blog today and the challenge set by Tag Tuesday for the next fortnight (Use Your Scraps) was right up my street.  I never throw mop up sheets and interesting pieces of paper towel away.

My First Ever ATCs: A & Z

I can't believe I left it this long to create my first ever ATCs (Artist Trading Cards).  These 2.5" x 3.5" mini works of art were created for a swap hosted by Junk Journals Junkies and Mindful Art using the letters A and Z.  I immediately had an idea for the topic and a way to theme them across the three that I made.  I have used both the Wee Africa stamp sets as well as the silhouettes from the African set and the Zebras stamp and mask from the Giraffes, Lions & Zebras set by Claritystamp.  I have always enjoyed building up scenes and this was really fun to do on a small scale.  I am also entering these in the Emerald City Crafts Challenge #2: Anything Goes.

Crafting on the Move

Having spent the last five days in Berlin with a group of Y8 pupils, I had very little time to craft.  The only time available to me was on the plane travelling both ways so I packed my set of 20 Staedtler Triplus fine liner pens and a small Daler Rowney cartridge paper hard back note book so that I could doodle.  Even so, I only managed one page during the entire trip. 
I started with dark blue and drew paisley inspired shapes all over the page.  I then used the purple to add an inner shape and filled between the two with arch shapes.
 









I decided to fill in the whole background between the 'paisley' shapes with swirls in the original dark blue pen.
Finally the inner sections of each paisley shape were filled with spirals in the next lightest shade of blue pen. 
I'm not sure if I consider it entirely finished yet; I could colour in some of the zentangled areas, but it helped me to relax on the flights, so all is well!