Friday In The Studio – My Sketchbook Is Almost Full

“Dear Father Christmas, please can you bring me a new sketchbook as I’ve almost filled mine up since I started it in January. Thank you”

I’ve only a couple of pages left in it and at the rate I’m going I’ll need to add a few tip-ins before Christmas. If anyone can recommend a good one preferably hard cover A4 please tell me as I’d be interested to know.

leaf-sketch

I know it’s a bit corny and I’ve said it so many times but I find the forest in Autumn so full of inspiration. When I get back from a walk my pockets are usually filled with treasures I’ve picked up along the way. I have to point out the mushroom below didn’t end up in my pocket, I took a photo instead. Just sayin’

mushroom-sketch

I really need to work on my Christmas card design for this year and I’ll be working in those last few pages.

Have a good weekend

Jaine x

Friday In The Studio – Getting Ready For December

Who documents December in a special journal? This random pile is a few of my journals from past years including an altered book, fabric, faux dori and a mini file folder for Instagram photos, I’ve tried them all.

dec-daily-stack

This year I’ve decided to go once again with an altered book but this time I’ve taken the pages out and used only the cover.

dd16

I thought I’d go with an elastic style binding to hold the pages in which will enable me to reuse the cover next year.

dd16inside

I used watercolour paper for the inside pages as I can paint, glue and do almost anything I feel like to them without them falling apart and just as a bit of an experiment I decided to tea dye the paper for a bit of a vintage feel.

Oh boy I had no idea that it would make me so happy once the pages were dry. To be honest, I really should have done it before I sewed the pages together as it was a bit of an afterthought but I was so happy with the colour, the staining and even how the pages curled and buckled once they’d dried. I was positively squealing with delight.

tea-dyed-pages

I’ve three books or signatures of five papers each sewn together on the sewing machine and these fit through the elastics in the cover.

tea-dyed-pages-inside

The cover has been decorated with firstly some Collage tissue paper from Canvas Corp along with some lace, tags, stickers and a few sequins.

dd16

I am more than happy with it and can’t wait to dive in.

I’d love to know if you’re going to document December in any way? Let me know.

Have a good weekend.

Jaine x

Friday In The Studio, Sketching Again

It’s been absolutely ages and ages since I did any sketching, that’s not including the little sketches and doodles in my travel journal. No, I mean actual sit down with a pencil and seriously draw type sketching.  I even  had to hunt around for my sketch book it’s been that long.

sketching

Anyway I’m so glad I did and I even decided to document my weekend with a sketch in my journal.

sketching2 sketching3

The colours of Autumn are so inspiring and I can’t get enough of them.

I hope you all have a great weekend. I might try and get out in the garden for a bit more cutting down before the winter.

Have a good one and see you next week.

Jaine x

 

Friday In The Studio And A Look Into My Travel Journal

As promised I thought I’d share a few pictures from my travel journal in my hand made faux dori cover. It was a joy to sit in the evening on the terrace with a glass of vino filling in the day.

dori open-side

journal

The planner side of it didn’t escape my doodling and in fact keeping that up daily helped me if I needed to go back a day or remember where I was for any reason. I love the little calendar with its doodles. I should make stickers out of them.

august-planner-2 sept-planner

I selected a few pages to show you not that I bore you with the whole thing.

I used water colours mostly and I took a few stickers and some washi with me too.

travel-journal-2

When it came to the photos, I knew the size and format I wanted to print them out at so I sketched a box on the page where I would eventually put the photo once I’d printed it out at home and made a small note of which picture it would be.

travel-journal-3 travel-journal-4 travel-journal-5 travel-journal-6 travel-journal-7 travel-journel

I’m very excited to plan my Christmas journal now. It won’t be too far away.

Have a good weekend

Jaine x