Thursday 30 January 2014

Sssh - Pray Silence for The Craft Barn's Q&L Challenge


Hello and welcome fellow crafters!

Time for another entry into The Craft Barn's Quotes and Lyrics challenge. (Click on the link to get all the details). This time the prompt words are silence and dazzle.

You may be aware that I'm putting together an AJ style quote book with blank spaces on my pages so that I can collect more quotes as I go along. For this challenge I have chosen the word SILENCE and a beautiful and thought provoking quote by Ruth Fishel,

"I will take time to be alone today. 
I will take time to be quiet. 
In this silence I will listen... 
and I will hear my answers"



It is VERY unusual for me to use my own handwriting on ANY layout, but for some reason today I don't seem to hate it quite as much as usual, so it is making a VERY rare appearance!



This layout has been a bit of a love/hate project. I hated the background when I first painted it. It is two colours of blue acrylic over a VERY loud and busy floral tissue paper. The paints seemed to be really grungy and produce a miserable January-esque sky colour - topical, but NOT what I wanted!

A quick spritz with some London Blue Dylusions lifted things immediately and I could see that the layout had potential. Additional background layers came from an Indigo Blu circle dot background stamp, randomly stamped in black Archival and some texture paste layered through a dotty mask. I had hoped that the texture paste dots would remain white for some contrast, but as it dried it soaked up the colour from the underneath layers - oh well... A few splats of White Linen Dylusions completed the first "go" at the background.


The die cut clouds were inked with Faded Jeans DI and adhered to the page using  Scotch quick drying glue. I didn't use matte medium as the Dylusions are water reactive and would have "run". When the clouds were dry I went round the edges of them with a Faber Castell Big Brush marker and smudged the line to blend. This really anchored the clouds on the page. The title is made from Papermania Mini Alpha stickers (keeping up with my stash busting resolution!).

Next I die cut the birds - I was originally going to keep them white, but ended up colouring them black, and stuck them to the page - this time with a smear of matte medium on the back but not on the front.  They are birds but I think this layout has a bit of a look of a Battle of Britain skyscape about it - the tiniest birds could easily be confused with Spitfires!

Finally I went in with my Paper Artsy ink splatter stamp and randomly stamped with black Archival, making sure to get some splashes on the clouds to ground them on the layout. I used a Craft Stamper freebie grungy border stamp to partially frame the page.


Close up showing: grungy border stamp, ink splats, 
FC Big Brush blending and Faded Jeans DI inking

All in all I'm pretty pleased with this layout, especially as I really wasn't keen on it at first! Please do let me know you came - I'd love to see what you are up to.



23 comments:

  1. Well done persevering with this - the background looks great against the white clouds. Your handwriting is good too - it makes it more personal!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great idea to use the clouds to write the quotes on.....I love the background as well, I think it certainly worked out well

    ReplyDelete
  3. It works beautifully. I like the clouds with your writing on

    ReplyDelete
  4. Great background and a lovely quote.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Beautiful, calm, just makes me want to sink into a cloud and say nothing! K.

    ReplyDelete
  6. The background turned out well in the end! Lovely layers of stamping and stencilling and clouds!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Inky drops on clouds, that is amazing and has to be done! Beautiful background and stencilling.

    Beautiful quote, can imagine myself looking up at the clouds and hearing the silence :-) xxx

    ReplyDelete
  8. These are wonderful pages! Love the mottled colors in the background, love the color choices, love the clouds, love the splatters, love the handwriting. All exceptional design choices. I have started an art journal but so far my choices are pretty timid. This is daring and beautiful. Inspiring! Cathy

    ReplyDelete
  9. Visiting from the Craft Barn - Oooh, LOVEly work Maisie. Bravo on using such a beautiful poem and, btw, your handwriting is perfect AJ script in my opinion :o))

    ReplyDelete
  10. That's a fantastic page. Love the clouds and your hand-writing.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Gorgeous, I love the background and the quote
    Rosie x

    ReplyDelete
  12. Adore your sky there Maisie, and yep got those birds too, they are great. BJ

    ReplyDelete
  13. Thanks for telling me about the Wall of Fame as I forgot to look yesterday. Now I can't seem to get the blog to load, I guess they might have taken it down for maintenance. I await its return. Thanks BJ

    ReplyDelete
  14. fantastic sky. Love the layering of colors, stamps and textures.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Stopping by from The Craft Barn--Not only is this a beautiful layout and quote, but your handwriting is very stylish, too!

    ReplyDelete
  16. I love your handwriting! Gorgeous clouds and a great layout!

    ReplyDelete
  17. Love your pages. x

    ReplyDelete
  18. I always love reading how artists minds work and I was really impressed with the way you kept going with what turned into a fabulous spread. Even your handwriting is fantastic.

    ReplyDelete
  19. such a beautiful page and there is nothing wrong with your handwriting...

    ReplyDelete
  20. It's so beautiful. I love the skies and how you wrote in them.

    ReplyDelete
  21. There is a lot of power in just being still, listening, and reflecting! Your pages are wonderful and what they say is inspiring and enlightening!

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for sharing your happy thoughts. Maisie Moonshine x

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...