Clare Davis Etheridge

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

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 wax paper using grey, gold and pink acrylic paints.

Here are some art journal pages I have done this past couple of weeks as part of the Season of Gifts over at Get Messy.

I think they could all be done or I could add some more to them, but for now I like how they are. I think they sum up the joy, peace and frustrations of the Christmas period!

If you are interested in joining the Get Messy community, check out their website at www.getmessyartjournal.com. They regularly supply inspiration and art journal guidance in the way of prompts, tutorials and interviews.

Weekly Photos 51/52

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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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 can get a few minutes somewhere, even if I just squash some colour onto a page.

Loving: Home made ‘Baileys’.

Pondering: Making honeycomb toffee, any recipe involving highly heated sugar makes me nervous!

Considering: Pilates tomorrow.

Buying: Art supplies and magazines.

Watching: ‘People of Earth’ which has just finished but it was funny!

Hoping: 2017 is a little more settled that 2016. Personally the year has been fine, but in the big wide world, it has been a little bonkers.

Marvelling: At the art and journal pages I see on Instagram.

Cringing: At a rude notice posted in my neighbourhood.

Needing: Better sleep.

Questioning: What I need to make for Christmas sweets? Cheesecake? Fridge cake? Trifle? Pavlova?

Smelling: Verbena perfume, it is my favorite.

Wearing: My new warm sweater from Marks and Spencer.

Following: My dog through the snow and trying not to fall down!

Noticing: Warmer days, yay!

Knowing: I can’t make all of those sweet treats for Christmas!!

Thinking: How I can be more productive next year.

Admiring: People with a plan.

Sorting: Charity for pick up tomorrow.

Getting: All the presents wrapped.

Bookmarking: Jamie magazines with all the recipes I imagine I am going to make.

Coveting: Top quality acrylic paints.

Disliking: Thin paper in sketchbooks, now I obsessively check the paper weight.

Opening: Christmas cards from family and friends, we don’t get so many now, but it is always lovely to get cards in the mail.

Giggling: At the latest ‘This American Life’ podcast about ‘Kid Logic’.

Feeling: Organized but like I have forgotten something.

Snacking: On mince pies.

Helping: Where I can.

Hearing: My teen chatting on his Xbox to friends near and far.

Happy Wednesday x

Here is a blank list if you fancy taking stock too.

Making :

Cooking :

Drinking :

Reading:

Wanting:

Looking:

Playing:

Deciding:

Wishing:

Enjoying:

Waiting:

Liking:

Wondering:

Loving:

Pondering:

Considering:

Buying:

Watching:

Hoping:

Marvelling:

Cringing:

Needing:

Questioning:

Smelling:

Wearing:

Following:

Noticing:

Knowing:

Thinking:

Admiring:

Sorting:

Getting:

Bookmarking:

Coveting:

Disliking:

Opening:

Giggling:

Feeling:

Snacking:

Helping:

Hearing:

Happy Wednesday x

Weekly Photos 50/52

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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 the way home with both feet on the ground at all times, literally shuffling along! I leapt onto patches of grass for safer traction and eventually made it home.

The ice hasn’t had chance to melt and now we have a layer of snow on it. Hopefully we will head up to above freezing temperatures so that I can venture out and finish my Christmas shopping.

At least the sun is out!

I put the washing out today and it was frozen by the time I had got it on the line! Mother nature’s fabric softener – frost. I am hopeful it should dry in the sunshine.

Happy Monday x

Books I read and Nearly read in 2016

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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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 so much. The story entwines with a fairy tale/dream type narrative which I didn’t always enjoy.

In the summer I had a run on great books which started with ‘Harry Potter and the Cursed Child’ by Jack Thorne which is the script from the stage play of the same name and based on a story co-written by J.K. Rowling. I honestly read the book thinking what the hey, I might as well jump on this bandwagon. I read it in under a week and really liked it, it was a very entertaining addition to the Harry Potter legacy.

I followed this with ‘Amy Snow‘ by Tracy Rees and I loved it, it is a historic novel set in Britain and I am no historical novel reader but the characters and plot twists in this kept it moving along.

Then came the amazing ‘Harmony‘ by Carolyn Parkhurst which I whizzed through. It is chock full of people to love and hate and wonder about.

Another great read was ‘Before the Fall‘ by Noah Hawley, it is a fast paced and character driven story. I would describe it as a thoughtful but exciting read.

The new Emma Donoghue book ‘The Wonder’ was another favorite of mine, a minimal cast of characters but what a story! Brilliant stuff.

So that was eight of the books, the others I finished were

The Girls by Emma Cline

The Trouble with Goats and Sheep by Joanna Cannon. The title and the cover drew me to this book and the fact that it is set in the UK closed the deal.

In a Dark Dark Wood by Ruth Ware

Art Inc by Lisa Congdon (I don’t usually read non-fiction cover to cover, but this one I did)

Books I started and didn’t finish and will not go back to are –

Among the Ten Thousand Things by Julia Pierpont

Drawing Blood by Molly Crabapple

All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders – I might go back to this one.

The Flood Girls by Richard Fifield

Be Frank with Me by Julia Claiborne Johnson

These are the ones I started and may pick up again

Avenue of Mysteries by John Irving

Hitman Anders and the Meaning of it all by Jonas Jonasson I will almost certainly read at some point.

The Girl Who Slept with God by Val Brelinksi I will certainly read, I stopped reading it this year because ‘The Girls’ came into the library and I knew I would only have a couple of weeks to get it back to the library.

Today will be Different by Maria Semple. I loved ‘Where’d you go Bernadette’ so I want to give this book another go.

I am currently reading ‘I’ll Take you There‘ by Wally Lamb which is going well so I am optimistic that I will finish!

All of these books I borrowed from the library except ‘My Grandmother says to tell you she’s sorry’ which I bought to take on holiday and ‘Hitman Anders’ which is on my shelf. Yay for libraries!

Happy Reading and Happy Friday!

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

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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.

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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!

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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.

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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 the ‘trees’ in blue ink with a sumi brush then stuck on the used stamps and added some gold (spotting a gold theme!!).

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This page was prompted by the Get Messy team to listen to a christmas song and see where it takes you. I heard ‘Last Christmas’ on the radio and while I was out walking the dog I had an idea to make an animal page as if they were all swaying along to the song! There are some unusual faces going on, but this page just makes me smile!

I really enjoyed my art journaling pages this week! If you want to learn more about the Get Messy community, go here to find out everything.

Happy Thursday x

How did 2016 go? A personal year review.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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 what I got up to in 2016-

I joined Get Messy at the end of 2015 and really had no idea what I was doing getting into this art journaling lark. I made a few terrible pages at the beginning of 2016 then as the year progressed and I kept up with the art journaling habit (because I knew if I could just get the hang of it I was sure I would like it!). Now we are at the end of the year and I am still art journaling and loving it. Often not sure what I am doing, but doing it anyway!

As part of Get Messy I made a Facebook Live broadcast which was terrifying and a wonderful experience all at once. I have never made any sort of video where I was making art and talking the viewer through it as I created. I loved the feedback and inspiration it gave me.

I managed to be creative every day, by drawing, painting or art journaling or all three. I didn’t post what I made every day, but I made sure an art supply hit paper daily.

One of the main ways I achieved the create every day thing was using monthly challenges. So through the year, I did some sort of challenge every month. January was Lisa Congdon’s Creative Bug draw a day, February was the ‘Sketchbook Magic’ drawing challenge from Ria Sharon on Skillshare, March was a Skillshare challenge off shoot from Elisa Choi Ang’s class ‘Sketch your Life’, April was a watercolor challenge hosted by Fox and Hazel, from April to July I did The 100 Day project, July was Creative Bug and Pam Garrison’s draw a day, August was Creative Bug and Dawn DeVries Sokol’s Art Journal challenge, September was Creative Bug’s draw a day-Jennifer Orkin Lewis prompts, October saw Inktober, in November I had no challenge to follow so I did my own thing, December is a little of my own ideas and another art journal challenge (Christmas/holiday specific) from Creative Bug and Dawn DeVries Sokol. Phew!

I had one of my coloring pages published in The Coloring Studio issue 2 which was very exciting! I have never been ‘published’ before.

Though the year I have kept up my yoga and pilates practice along with one or two cardio sessions a week. Got to keep everything moving!

As I read books, I kept a record of what I read and what I started and didn’t finish. In all, I started 22 books and finished 12 (still reading the 12th). I will write a separate post about what I read and what I didn’t!

Now my hair is grey, I have worn it blue, purple and pink this year. Colour lasts up to a couple of months on my grey and it washes out gradually so no nasty ‘grow-out’.

‘Pokemon Go’ was a thing for about 7 and a half minutes in the summer then the novelty wore off!

We holidayed in Cape Cod.

We got a new dog.

Everyone had a birthday with cake!

I met lots of new fabulous people via the interwebs and learned more than I could tell you.

Did you have a good year? I hope so, I know the world went a bit bonkers but hopefully in your haven it was a lovely year.

Do you write goals or resolutions for the New Year? I have been using Susannah Conway‘s ‘Unravel your Year’ workbook for the past few years which is fun to fill out and look back on.

I just watched a video over at Skillshare by Ohn Mar Win all about goal setting and I wrote pages and pages after I watched it about all the things I want to do in the coming year and when I grow up. Sometimes it is just good to write it all out don’t you think?

Happy Wednesday x

Weekly Photos 49/52

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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.

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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 pages before I stitched each signature which was great fun!

But I was still a little worried that once I used hand stitching to sew the signatures together along the spine it would not hold.

I know, I need to look on the bright side!!

Well, you should have seen the beaming smile I wore when I finished my sewing and the book looks great and holds together, just like the ones in Arne and Carlos’s book. Now I just need to persuade myself to journal in my new book which I just like to to look at right now. I need to grab some paints and make a few marks I think!

In the Get Messy Art Journaling community, we are in the Season of Gifts and I bought the paper for my journal using money which my Aunt and Uncle gave me for my birthday. A gift to start the season. I have been art journaling on a regular basis for a year now and it is purely because of the Get Messy community, so thanks to everyone who is a part of Get Messy, what a gift.

Happy Friday x

Bag of entertainment for kids big and small

Published by Clare at CatsEatDogs

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 mini sticker books are brilliant and super fun, they are small and don’t have many stickers but they are cheap as chips and worth buying a few. I remember my youngest spending ages with my cousin’s husband making sticker monsters while we waited for a very slow meal to be served when we visited England a few years ago.

There is a single jack in the bag, the rest are somewhere with the ball no doubt! Portable games like this are great for the park (not so much in a restaurant).

For boys, a handful of cars is never to be sniffed at, they are entertainment for a long time, especially if you can draw a road somewhere and drive them around!

Sadly the entertainment bag is no longer deployed, but I still keep it, just in case!