Hello Lake Life

I love boats so living the Lake Life with our friends in Maine was an amazing experience! My page today captures the serenity of the lake, fall colours and also a Loon, which is a type of water bird that we saw on one of our boat trips around the lake (grin!).

I started by applying Hickory Smoke Distress Ink onto the page by stamping the ink pad onto an acrylic block and scraping the block over the page so the ink caught on the texture of the paper. I then applied water over the top using a paintbrush to disperse some of the colour across the page. Next I painted Salty Ocean Distress Ink across the page, keeping my brushstrokes horizontal, so it looked like water; to do this I applied the ink to an acrylic block again and picked the ink up with a paintbrush. We saw lots of beautiful fall colours reflected in the lake on our boat trips so I also added Mustard Seed, Fired Brick and Seedless Perserves Distress Ink the same way as I did the Hickory Smoke ink. Then I toned down the colours using Pébéo white gesso which I applied with my finger to vary the coverage; this softened the colours and produced a rippled effect so it looked like the water of the lake. The wording “Hello Lake Life” is a Pocket Card from Tim Holtz idea-ology collection, I added the letters to produce the word “Lake” by stamping black Archival Ink onto some card using an alphabet stamp by Dovecraft, cutting it out and sticking it onto the card. The Loon is cut from a notelet that my friend gave me and was used for the food shopping list. I defined the Loon markings, underlined the word “lake” and exaggerated the stripes on the wording using a black Derwent Graphik marker and a white Uniball gel pen so they stood out more. The fall leaves around the edge of the page are napkin which I ripped and stuck into place using Liquitex Matte Gel Medium; once dry I edged them with a Sanguine Faber-Castell Big Brush marker. I also stuck a couple of the leaves onto some recycled white card and when they were dry I cut them out and edged them with the sanguine marker. I arranged them on the page under the Pocket Card and added some cream jute flowers using Glossy Accents which finished the page.

I thought you may like to go boating with us, here is the view of the lake from the house and you can see the boat on the left-hand side.

It’s a pontoon party boat and is very luxurious …

… with it’s sofa type seating, as you can see my hubby was sitting very comfortably (grin!).

It afforded wonderful lake views with …

… some breathtaking reflections of the fall colours.

We even saw a Loon, which is called a Great Northern Diver here in the UK, who entertained us firstly by diving under the water and then by preening. We found out late one night that their call is quite distinctive and loud too (grin!).

I hope you enjoyed the boat trip and I think that the lake life would suit us very well, don’t you (double grin!).

Challenges

I’m glad I found out about Challenge Blogs as I enjoy taking part, they provide me with inspiration for my pages and are a wonderful way to meet like-minded arty people. So here are the challenges I’m joining today:

I’m pleased to join the lovely Erika from BioArtGal, who is hosting the Vintage or Modern challenge over at Art Journal Journey as this page captures happy memories of our Lake Life holiday.

I’m joining in the fun over at Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge and their Anything Goes challenge with my Lake Life art journal page.

I’m also pleased to join the September Link Party #44 – Anything Goes over at Cropstop Blog with my page as I included some products from companies that they carry in their store.

I’m thankful for experiencing the Lake Life with our friends, so this page is also a reminder that you still have time to join the Thankful challenge at Try it on Tuesday too!

Thanks for joining me today! If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you.

Here is a list of all the materials used to create this art journal page:

• Tim Holtz Distress Ink (Hickory Smoke, Salty Ocean, Mustard Seed, Fired Brick, Seedless Preserves)
• Pébéo White Gesso
• Ranger Archival Ink (Jet Black)
• Derwent Graphik Line Marker (Black 0.05mm, 0.3mm)
• Uniball Signo gel pen (White)
• Dovecraft Essentials Alphabet Stamp Set (WDN ALPHA STMP DCVW0050)
• Tim Holtz idea-ology (Pocket Cards #TH93208)
• Loon notelet – shopping list
• Party Creations Napkins (Autumn’s Elegance)
• The Works (Jute Shapes U-83162)
• Liquitex Matte Gel Medium
• Pritt Stick
• Stix2 (Mini Craft Dots)
• The Range double-sided foam tape
• Ranger Glossy Accents

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Fall Colours

My art journal page today is inspired by our recent holiday/vacation to America where we stayed with friends at their lake house in Maine. We had the most amazing time and as you can imagine I have returned from my holiday with new crafting goodies and lots and lots of inspiration, so here’s my first page – I hope you like it.

For the background I applied a thin wash of Salty Ocean Distress Ink by stamping the ink pad directly onto an acrylic block, spritzing the ink with water and using a paint brush to apply it onto the page. Next I layered a beautiful Tree Poem stamp from Stampendous over the page using different colours of Distress Ink to depict the fall colours that we saw on our vacation; the Inks I used were Mustard Seed, Spiced Marmalade, Fired Brick, Seedless Preserves and Vintage Photo. The “who”, “what”, “where” cards are created from a 3.25 x 5.25 inch card from a Tim Holtz idea-ology Pocket Cards set that I bought whilst on vacation; I cut it into three individual cards and rounded the corners with scissors so they all looked alike. I added the words to each of the cards using a Zig glue pen and the cards are stuck in place using double-sided tape. For “who” card, I added our friends and our first initials and the date we visited them; these are cut from a card from the same Tim Holtz card set and coloured using a Burgundy Spectrum Aqua Marker. For the other two cards I chose words from a tourist magazine that related to our visit, this included “Lakes” as we actually stayed at our friend’s Lake House, “Crafty Creations” to relate to crafting and craft beers, “Lobster Love” as Maine lobster is amazing, “In Nature” as we did lots of walking and hiking, “Go Coastal” as we visited some local beaches, “Mountains” where we went to see the magnificent fall colours and “After Dark” as we had fun in the evenings going out, meeting people or watching Baseball or American Football in the evening. For the “where”, as we stayed in Maine and their slogan is “The way life should be” I thought it would be fun to include this wording on the card as we so enjoyed living the lake life with our friends so much. These cards are arranged on the page with some dried and pressed leaves from our friends local area and also an American flag and red heart that Erika kindly gifted me when I met up with her on our visit. The small red and yellow maple leaf is very special as my friend picked it out and gave it to me; all the leaves are stuck in place using wood glue giving them a lovely shine and suppleness.

We stayed in Maine at our friends lake house, isn’t it spectacular!

We woke up to this spectacular view every morning …

… and watched the fall colours develop and change while we were there, which was amazing (grin!).

Here are the trees that inspired the background for my page – the fall colours on the lake looked so stunning, especially with those beautiful reflections!

I’m sure I’ll be creating more art journal pages of our trip as we made so many happy memories with our friends and that means I’ll also be sharing more photos from our holiday too (grin!).

Challenges

I’m glad I found out about Challenge Blogs as I enjoy taking part, they provide me with inspiration for my pages and are a wonderful way to meet like-minded arty people. So here are the challenges I’m joining today:

I’m pleased to join the lovely Linda from heARTfullyinspiredby Linda, who is hosting the Creature Comforts challenge over at Art Journal Journey with the warm autumnal colours and the comfort of spending time and creating such happy memories with our dear friends.

Over at Moo Mania and More the theme is Autumn so I’m pleased to join their challenge with my Fall Colours page.

Inspired by my vacation, I’m also joining the Autumn Splendour challenge over at A Vintage Journey with my Art Journalling Style page.

I’m pleased to be able to join the Plant-tastic challenge over at Country View Challenges with the autumnal trees and leaves on my page.

With my inky autumnal stamped page, I’m also joining the Inktober challenge over at The Artistic Stamper.

I’m joining in the fun over at Stamps and Stencils and their Spooky Fun with an Autumnal Twist challenge with my mixed media autumnal page.

As the challenge over at Paperbabe Stamps is Anything Goes challenge, I’m pleased to be able to join this challenge too with my vacation inspired page.

Thanks for joining me today! If you have any questions or comments, I would love to hear from you.

Here is a list of all the materials used to create this art journal page:

• Tim Holtz Distress Ink (Mustard Seed, Spiced Marmalade, Fired Brick, Seedless Preserves, Vintage Photo)
• Spectrum Aqua Artist Marker (Burgundy)
• Stampendous Cling Rubber Stamp (Tree Poem CRR164)
• Tim Holtz idea-ology (Pocket Cards #TH93208)
• Tourist Magazine
• American flag and red heart button from Erika – thank you!
• Zig Memory System Dual Action Glue Pen
• Evo-Stik Wood Adhesive
• Stix2 double-sided tape