Mandala Novice

I've been aware of Mandalas for a while but haven't really had a go at doing one myself. But... I saw this year long challenge here (via Darcy) which seemed like a nice way to start. The mandala has been drawn already so you just need to do a bit of colouring in - that, I can do!

Here is my image once I'd done my basic colouring...

But I then wanted to add a bit more to put my own touch on it so I added some doodles and went over some of the outlines so they stood out a bit more...

Really easy and I'm looking forward to the next one!

Artful Readers

This year I'm endeavouring to join in with Darcy's Artful Readers Club - a year long challenge, you can read all the details here.

My twelve books for the year are on the shelf in my sidebar. My book for January is "Wicked Appetite" by Janet Evanovich. I've read quite a few of her novels from the Stephanie Plum series but then I randomly came across this new series.

I'll confess that I started the book a couple of days ago to give me a head start but it was such an easy read that I finished it today - oops! But that gives me a month to do my review and art...the first link up date is the 25th January.

Major catch up!

Oh my poor neglected blog!

A fair bit to catch up on lol...

Firstly, the circle journal I was taking part in came to a close in July.

Here is the page I did for Tracey, whose favourite book is "The Book Thief". I haven't read it but thanks to the joys of the internet I found a quote that I thought I could work with. I wasn't sure how this page would go down as it's a bit different but I liked it!

 

And the accompanying tag.

 

And my last page (apart from the final page in my own journal) was for Catherine. Catherine loves the BFG so I had a go at some drawing...

 

And the tag...

 

So as this was the end of our journals we had decided to meet up for the final exchange of journals. We're dotted about all over the country so we met roughly in the middle in Harrogate, home of AFTH (no coincidence!). Unfortunately Tracey and Janey couldn't make it  but the remaining eight of us had a whale of a time! Lots of laughter and a class with Dyan at AFTH made for an unforgettable weekend. Most of us are starting another journal in the New Year which, after our little break, we're all looking forward to.

 

Here are a couple of cards too using images from the Octopode Factory...

 

 

I'm in the process of moving all my crafty stuff from the spare room into our bedroom (which needed decorating first) so there hasn't been a whole lot of crafting round here recently - hence my absence. Hopefully I can resume normal service soon!

Darcy's journal

So the Circle Journal this month saw me with Darcy's journal - eeek! I was a tad nervous about doing a page for Darcy but am pretty pleased with how it turned out. Her favourite film is Labyrinth and as luck would have it, Lily at The Octopode Factory has done a Jareth image! I used a couple of Labyrinth film posters as inspiration and came up with this...

We only have two months left but we're already planning on what our theme will be for the next one!

I also promised I'd show my calendar journal page for March - three months into the year before I gave up - not bad!

Now...to try and catch up a bit with the Postcard challenge...

Not enough hours in the day!

Here are my postcards for Weeks 11 and 12 of Darcy's postcard challenge. I'm way behind but hey ho, I'll get there in my own time!

Week 11 saw us in The Netherlands. I had to go with Van Gogh - and here one of the reasons I'm so behind - I faffed around trying to decide which painting I wanted to do. I decided to just pick some detail from "Road with Cypress and Star" and, major mistake, decided to use oil paints. My postcard was dry approximately 3 weeks later...(only a slight exaggeration).

And here is Week 12 - Israel. I've gone down the religious route and drawn Solomons Seal...

That's it for tonight. My monthly calendar pages have gone by the wayside but I'll blog February and March's pages soon!