Eyes Up!

This is a very simple page - just playing with a mask and acrylic paint.  I wanted to show a woman with her arms reaching out but couldn't find a suitable picture so had a go at drawing one.  This is the first ever 'person' I've drawn and cut out - I can't really draw so I was quite pleased with the result.  Then journaling written in pencil and torn into strips - this is a quick way of adding journaling which I really like.  The title is handwritten in pen - I'm in the middle of doing Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's class 'Getting Started with Lettering' and am trying to be braver with handwriting - I've got to practice more!

She is lifting her hands up and worshiping God - as we worship God our eyes are on Him and not ourselves and it really helps to get a proper perspective on things!

Have joy!

The last few weeks have been really rough again in health.  This time due to horrible fluey cold which I got twice in quick succession.  However, I've managed to keep my spirits up most of the time!  And the last two days in my prayer time God has led me to scriptures about rejoicing!  So this is what I'm doing - how could I not rejoice when God has blessed me so wonderfully with my family, friends, church, I could go on and on....

I had to express this in my art journal and of course it had to be a bright fun page:

I started with a canary yellow backround and then added a backround which I'd done for a card but didn't like how it came out.  I tore it into pieces and stuck down randomly.

 Then stenciling and stamping.  I didn't have a canary stamp but I love this bird - doesn't it look like its rejoicing?!

And I added sheep because they look happy too, in fact I got a bit carried away with the sheep.....there's a lot of them.

The scriptures on rejoicing:

Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; 

for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

1 Thess 5: 16-18

Through Him we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand,

and we rejoice in our hope of sharing the glory of God.  

More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, 

knowing that suffering produces endurance, 

and endurance produces character, 

and character produces hope, and hope does not disappoint us, 

because God's love has been poured into our hearts 

through the Holy Spirit which has been given to us.

Rom 5: 2-5

Free to be ME

I've been a Christian for about 25 years and its been a really interesting journey!  I can safely say I am not the person now I was 25 years ago and that's not just due to the colour of my hair now  (reddy brown covering silvery grey and brown mix :) .   I much prefer the person I am today.  As Christians we are meant to surrender our lives to the Lord and to live His way.  I've come to realise that there is freedom in living in surrender - freedom to be who God intended ME to be and NOT who I think I should be; freedom to do what God wants me to do which is always good and NOT what I think I should do which isn't always good.

This is the page I did when I was thinking about this:

I stenciled the flowers and bird in bright colours to be coming out of a broken down wall - being free!  I love birds so here's a closer peek:

The more art journaling I do, the more I love it.  Its just such a good way to play with paint and colour and express what's going on in our true hearts.

Eat good things

This is the second page I did for the newspaper challenge set by Julie for Art Journal Every Day.  I used words torn out from a newspaper this time.  I saw the words hunger and Eat! and it made me think how important it is to eat the right things to be healthy.  Then I thought this is the same for everything, not just eating.  For example, if I spend too much time watching the wrong kind of tv programme that's not going to do me any good.  I need to feed myself with good things and I need to feed my spirit with the things of God.  Jesus said, 

"I am the Bread of Life; he who comes to me shall not hunger, 

and he who believes in me shall never thirst."

John 6: 35-36

When I spend time with Jesus in prayer, or at church, or am just conscious of  Him as I go about my day I just feel better!

This is my page:

I really enjoyed doing this.  The backround started out with colour which I'd previously scraped on a page when I had an accident with a Cosmic Shimmer bottle!

 I filled the rest of the page with yellow and orange with Brilliance inkpads:

But I didn't like it so I mixed blue acrylic with a little perfect pearl and scraped it all over the top so just a little of the colour beneath showed through which I really liked:

Then I added doodling:

This was really fun to do and definitely satisfied my creative hunger!  It also led me to do this page where I cut shapes out of newspaper.

Spending time with Jesus is definitely feasting on love!  And that means that I'll have more love to give out to those around me.

Sometimes I need to NOT think

I've been thinking more about..... NOT thinking!  lol!  Sometimes I overthink things when I should either be getting on with things or just not doing or worrying but resting.

We had a challenge from Julie Fei-Fan Balzer for Art Journal Every Day to use newspaper in an art journal page.  I'm really enjoying this challenge, here's my first page using newspaper, I'm sure I'll be doing more!

The backround is red and blue acrylic painted with a dry paint brush and white acrylic through a hexagon stencil. Then I put my home made black texture paste through the mini tile stencil.  I really like the effect:

I added punched scalloped circles and daisies from newspaper.  I used a black bit of the newspaper for the daisies and love how one of them has the word 'jelly' - I love jelly :)

I don't like this page that much.  Still, it reflects too much thinking!

 

This is the scripture I'm going to meditate on to help me with not overthinking things:

Thou dost keep him in perfect peace

whose mind is stayed on thee,

because he trusts thee.

Is 26:3