Author: Clare at CatsEatDogs

Get Messy Art Journal Season of gifts week 3-4.

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This week I met a fellow Get Messy member and it was great!  I am in a couple of groups on Facebook and via the interwebs but I have never met any of them in real life. Now I have! We met at the local library who have a room we could use to art journal and paint and make a mess generally!  They even have drop cloths for the tables to catch our painty inky messes. The time flew by as we made ink galaxies and gelli plate printed backgrounds. I had plans to make journals and all kinds of things, but we ran out of time.  So I will be making some journals this week I think so that I can work in some mini sketchbooks in the new year. I took some dried seeds and botanicals which I had previously gathered on a dog walk through the woods, some printed better than others as is always the way with the gelli plate.  I printed on vintage book paper, kraft paper and dry …

Weekly Photos 51/52

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Here are some snaps from the past Christmassy week. 1. The piccalilli (Jamie Oliver Magazine) recipe worked a treat and it is delicious! 2. We got a little bit of snow and some freezing cold. 3-5. Laumeier Sculpture Park. here in St Louis. 6. After three goes at honeycomb toffee, I finally hit success! 7. Grass and water at Forest Park. 8. Monkey bread for Christmas morning breakfast. I used a ‘from scratch’ recipe and it was very successful! I hope you all had a very happy Christmas! Happy Monday x

Taking Stock December 2016

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The final stock take of the year, as always, inspired by the wonderful Pip at Meet Me at Mikes.  Making : Journals with gorgeous paper. Cooking : Pizza. Drinking : Egg nog frothy coffee. Reading: I am about to start ‘The Yellow Eyes of Crocodiles‘ by Katherine Pancol Wanting: To stop running about getting Christmas stuff ready.  Nearly done! Looking: Through the ‘Flow Book for Paper Lovers‘. Playing: Christmas songs, I like the ‘This is Christmas’ album by Emmy the Great and Tim Wheeler the best. Deciding: Whether to order dinner or make it! Wishing: I didn’t have to go food shopping for Christmas, I don’t have to get much, but I wish it would just arrive in my fridge! Enjoying: Planning Christmas and what we will make and eat. Waiting: For school to finish tomorrow.  It seems so late that the kids finish school on the 22nd December. Liking: Christmas/holiday art journaling, with Get Messy Art Journal and Creative Bug. Wondering: Whether I can squeeze in some ‘art’ time today, I am sure I …

Weekly Photos 50/52

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  1. There is something wonderful about a little tiny parcel arriving in the mail from far away lands.  This tree and sweets are from my beautiful friend in Finland, I am sure she made the tree and it is fabulous! 2 & 3. I helped out at the library this week as hoards of kids came to make decorations for their trees. They swirled paint around inside plastic baubles and made some very successful ornaments! These cloths we used to protect the tables turned out pretty too! 4. Some finished ornaments. 5. I pulled out the watercolors for a page in my handmade journal. 6. Funghi in the countryside. 7. Country sights. 8. The giant tree is decorated with ornaments old and new! We have had a sprinkle of snow this week and lots more ice which I don’t approve of at all. The ice started on the night I was at the library and when we came out to go home, the car park was a sheet of ice.  I walked most of …

Books I read and Nearly read in 2016

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In 2016 I started to read 22 books and finished 12 (nearly 13).  If a book has not grabbed me by about page 50, I will put it down and move on the next.  I always have a list of books I want to read which of course is way longer than the books I have read so far, so I am never without a book to read (or at least start!). I started three books before I read my first book of 2016 which was ‘The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend‘ by Katarina Bivald.  It was an easy read and not particularly amazing but I enjoyed it. ‘A Man Called Ove‘ by Fredrik Bakman is my top book of the year, it is full of wonderful characters and is funny and heart searching all at once.  All revolving around an elderly grumpy man called Ove!  Characterful books are my absolute favorite. Having said that, I also read ‘My Grandmother Told Me to tell you She’s Sorry‘ by Fredrik Bakman and I didn’t love it …

Get Messy Art Journal. Season of Gifts, Week 2.

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We are in the second week of the Season of Gifts over at Get Messy Art Journal.  These are some of my pages from the week. The first two are in two separate journals and the second two are in the journal I made and showed you last week.  I like having the different papers to work over. For this page I scraped some background paint onto my sketchbook, I used gelli prints on dry wax paper to glue over each page.  The dancing swan went in and of course some gold splatters! These trees were finger painted, well the first was and then I squashed the opposite page over the first and made a twin print of the tree.  A gelli print was glued over the spread and I doodled decorations over one tree and things I am grateful for over the other. This spread is in my made journal and I used the same background as the swan page most likely to use up the paint I had on the scraper!  I painted …

How did 2016 go? A personal year review.

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I have precisely three memory cells in my brain, so I keep a daily Moleskine planner for each year. Not for artistic endeavors (although I plan to try this in 2017), not for meaningful goal setting, but for pure and simple remembering what the heck went on that day.  I have a collection of filled diaries and I like to look back and see what we were up to on this day in years past or check what presents were bought or received for a birthday or Christmas. Because no, my three memory cells can’t hold it all in.  I don’t record each day minute by minute, some days I miss altogether, but I do manage a few words or a sentence or two most days. So when I thought I little 2016 review post would be a good idea, the first thing I did was grab the Peanuts Moleskine from 2016.  I have immediately learnt that I need to be a little more specific in my diary entries – goal for 2017. Here is …

Weekly Photos 49/52

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1. We had a birthday this week, my youngest son was 12!  Nearly a teen, yikes.  I made him a red velvet cake with plenty of frosting and grated chocolate. 2. I snagged these dried up flowers one morning this week with a view to draw or paint them. 3. This journal was my first go at a journal with more pages than just one signature.  It is three signatures all sewn together. 4. My husband bought us a new Christmas tree this week, it is a giant! Happy Monday x

Hand Made Journal. Season of Gifts. Get Messy Art Journal.

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Do you make things but deep down think ‘this is not going to work’ ‘I won’t make it the way they do’ ‘this is going to fall apart’? I sometimes do and I did when I embarked on this book.  I was feeling the pressure from the lovely paper I had chosen which I didn’t even want to chop up! I picked up the book called ‘Make your own Ideabook’  by Arne and Carlos from the library and they make bookmaking look so easy.  This is a book with many signatures (books within the book) all sewn together which is something I wanted to have a go at. I have made simple books before which I have hand sewn, but Arne and Carlos use a sewing machine to fasten the pages in each signature.  I was convinced that I would end up perforating the pages and they would pull apart like toilet paper once I had sewn them. Never fear, all went well with the sewing, in fact I also did some random stitching on some …

Bag of entertainment for kids big and small

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When my boys were younger, I always carried a bag with us whenever we went out for a meal or an appointment or on a train journey.  Ours is a fabric drawstring bag from the Yorkshire Sculpture Park, small enough to fit in another bag but big enough to hold plenty of things to do.  An innocent looking bag which contained all I needed to keep the kids occupied and happy while we waited for food or the doctor or travelled on the train or a plane. Of course there were often phones and iPads involved too, especially on plane journeys, but I always brought the fabric bag as ‘non screen’  back up. So what is in this magic bag of entertainment? No magical unicorns I am sad to say. One of the best and simplest things I always had in there were the drawing books, plain paper, lined paper and the mini doodle book.  Enough for one each or we would draw on the same page or take turns adding to a picture. The …