Wednesday 14 May 2014

Positivity Journal - Revisited and Recycled

Hello everyone!!  So pleased you're here for a visit and hope you are having an enjoyable day!
At the beginning of the year, Astrid Maclean from Astrid's Artistic Efforts posted about a Positivity Journal she had started to create.  The purpose of this Journal was to record one positive thing that happened each and every day.  Just little things like someone opening a door for you or giving you a smile.  I thought this was a wonderful idea!  To have a little journal with just positive things in it so that when we get a bit down and think that life is just a bitch, we can look at this little book and see the positive things that do happen to us each day.  If you'd like to visit Astrid's original post on this project you can find it HERE.  My Journal became a little different from Astrid's in that I actually record events in mine.  Things like going to the movies, or a family picnic or even going to lunch or dinner with a group of friends.  Simply recording ordinary activities that we thoroughly enjoyed and want to remember.  So, I created my book and posted about it and started creating the pages for it and it did start out looking good.  Unfortunately it turned into a bit of a disaster!!   The book was too small!  After inserting a half a dozen tags it was bulging at the seams and, each time I created another page  using a wet medium everything just leaked through all the pages.   I was tearing my hair out and actually gave up working on it.  Anyhow, the other day I was cleaning up my Craft Space (Shock!! Horror!!) and came across an old Manilla Folder and I had an Epiphany!!!  Instead of throwing it away  I could use it to make a new Positivity Journal.  So that's what I did and here it is!!
The pages measure 6 x 3.5 inches and, although there are only 5, each one is a pocket that will hold 4 tags.  So I can actually keep 20 reasonably sized tags in this booklet which should give me plenty of room to record on.
 I found some scrap designer paper to use for my pages and will simply decorate each one before sticking them into the booklet which means, no more leakage!!!  Woo!!  Hoo!!
 For the first page I used Chipped Sapphire and Walnut Stain Distress Ink on the background and also gave it a quick burst with Lindy's Stamp Gang Starburst Spray in Cape Cod Coral.  I then used KC's Crackle and Flutter stamps with Memento Tuxedo Black Stamp Pad.  The butterfly and the grass stamps are from a free set that came with a Get Stamping Magazine.  Both were coloured with water colour pencils and the tufts at the end of the grass stalks were created with Flower Soft Citrus Crush.

 The little bit of texture was added using TCW's Mini Tile Texture Stencil and some home made texture paste.  The little frame is Imaginarium's Brackets on Oval Frame which I simply coloured with acrylic paint and then lightly swiped with Versa Color Gold.
 On this page I've used Broken China and Walnut Stain Distress Inks.  The paper is actually a yellow base and so the blue of the Broken China turned greenish.  I love it!!  The background stamps are from Prima and the Washi Tapes are my favourites from Tim Holtz.
 The clocks are a free printable.  Unfortunately I cannot give you the Web Site because it's been closed down.  I stamped them with KC's Script stamp and mounted them on some paper board to give them a bit of dimension.
 Cut the heart from another piece of designer paper,  mounted it on paper board as well and coloured it with Fired Brick Distress Ink.  Used the Mini Tile stencil again and hand drew the small hearts with a white gel pen and coloured those with watercolour pencils.
So, my new Positivity Journal has been started.  As you can see I still have more pages to decorate and also still have to make the cover and the tags as well, so there is quite a bit to do on it.  This will be a project I will work on in between my card making for a bit of relaxation.  I loooooveeee getting messy with inks and stuff and this will be just for me so I can do whatever I want and not worry about pleasing someone else.  Fun!! Fun!! Fun!!

Thank you so much for visiting and I hope this post wasn't too long and that I haven't bored anyone.  Hope you all enjoy the rest of your day.
Take care and God Bless.
oxox Marg

10 comments:

  1. This is positively gorgeous! and so glad it was not big enough for all the wonderful things in your day to record.. It is a really good idea to dwell on the positive.. Love the pages you have decorated, gorgeous back grounds.. I hope it brings you a lot of cheer to look back on!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dear Margaret, it's so beautiful!!! I love every detail!!! Hugs :) I became your reader :) You have such sweet blog!
    ~Olga Kovalchuk

    ReplyDelete
  3. Totally gorgeous! POSITIVELY stunning indeed you clever, clever gal!! So awesome. You are very talented ♥

    ReplyDelete
  4. Marg your positivity journal is positively amazing. I love it! Karen.x

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hold the front page Margaret!!! This is fabulous! I'm so glad you persevered with this idea - sometimes we all need to stand back from projects to get some perspective and a different angle (doing that right now myself!) and when the lightbulb goes on if makes the whole experience even better. I'd love to see more of this as you progress. Jenny x

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh Marg, so happy you had this epiphany!! This new little journal looks amazing, each and every page completely stunning!! Like Jenny above, I can't wait to see how this will continue! Thanks also for this reminder.... My little journal suffered exactly the same mishap and has been lying around sadly neglected, but now you have given me the inspiration to start on a new one too!! Thank you for that!!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Such a great idea. The pages are just beautiful. A great idea for a gratitude journal. Thanks for sharing.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Love this idea Margaret and it is absolutely beautiful to boot. Thanks for sharing. x

    ReplyDelete

Thank you so much for visiting my blog and taking the time to leave a comment. I read and appreciate every single one.