Category Archives: Art Journal Calendar

Monthly Art Journal Diary Page – March

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Some of you may remember the pages we did for a monthly calendar, using a cross between art journaling and scrapbooking. Here was last year’s March layout. This year, I am doing something a little different. I have been participating in Joanne Sharpe’s wonderful online class, Draw Your Awesome Year. We are each working on a journal, and each month we are creating an artful layout to use in documenting little bits about each day.

This is great for me, because I don’t typically journal every day; at least not a full page. That’s why just a snippet of info is a great way to keep a bit of info so that I can look back and remember the year.

March daily calendar art journal.

This particular spread’s design was created with Inktense pencils and a water brush. Isn’t it great how you can create something by only coloring in the negative space? I love these pencils because they are so vivid and not too messy!  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to being messy!

I pulled out my greens and just went to work. Not a great idea! I should have looked at my color swatches and realized that “Leaf Green” has a brown tone in it! Yes, I dove in right around the title of my page, and it was hard to get that color toned down. I tried to pull it into other areas of the page, but the top of the right page has a little too much more my taste. The background and design are done, and for me, it’s time to move on!

Do you often find that you spend a great deal of time trying to “fix” something you didn’t plan on happening in your art or crafting? Share your stories so I don’t feel like I am all alone!

June Art Journal Calendar

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Artful Adventures June Art Journal Calendar

June Art Journal Calendar

Here is another month in our series on art journal calendars.  This idea for June is made in a 9″x12″ art journal. This particular journal has tear-out pages, so it can be taken out and added to the rest of pages that have been done this year. Previous pages this year have been made on 12″x12″ card stock, and the months have either been on a single or double page layout.

Here’s the process for this month’s pages:

  • Background misted with color at the top and bottom of the page. The top is someway blue and the bottom somewhat green.
  • The June title was just hand written and embellished with a little dot and line work.
Handwritten June Title

Handwritten June Title

  • I made a stencil of a watering can using my Cricut, and used a yellow PanPastel to create the watering cans, covering the entire shape.
  • When finished with the PanPastels, I went outside and sprayed a workable fixative over all of it, so I could continue to work over the Pan Pastels.
  • After realizing it would have been better to have the handles open to see the background, I went in and colored the handles and the open tops with black marker.
  • Now, it was way too dark, and so a bit of paint was mixed to coordinate with the background, and painted into the handle openings.
  • Two different green markers were used to create wispy grass along the bottom.
  • Three colors of stamps were use to create the flowers. Some being stamped two or three times to get different levels of colors.
Wispy Grass and Stamped Flowers

Wispy Grass and Stamped Flowers

  • Next, a bit of paint was mixed into the water color, and the open tops of the watering cans were filled in, and the water drops painted.
  • Finally, Glossy Accents was used over the water drops and the top openings of the water cans.
Glossy Accents added to water in cans and water drops.

Glossy Accents added to water in cans and water drops.

  • Last, but not least, numbers for the days of the month were written onto the watering can spouts.

It is kind of hard to see, but the misting on the bottom also has some sparkle in it! I love sparkle and shine!  What are things you like in your projects?

May Scrapbook Style Art Journal Calendar

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Artful-Adventues-May-Art-Journal-Calendar

May Art Journal Calendar

An art journal calendar is a fun way to just make a few note about your daily life, and this style is great if you are just dipping your toes into the world of daily journaling.  A great feature of creating your own pages is the fact that you can start anytime.  If you didn’t start in January, no problem!  You don’t have a pre-made book with dates that are just empty. (If you did use a pre-dated item, you could always just fill in the previous pages with other stuff — notes, ideas, sketches — it’s all good!)

It’s been kind of hard to get into a spring mindset, with all the snow that kept showing up in April.  I felt like where I went, there it snowed!  This page kind of represents a spring morning, the dawn of a new season! Even with the threat of snow as I was making this page, and my daughter coming in to tell me that she was standing outside and watched a light rain turn into snowflakes, I was still determined to make a spring page for May.

Here’s the way the page came together:

  • Large letters were used to create a mask for the word May.
  • I used pastels to create the background.
  • Then I blended and played with the color to make my version of early morning.
  • I decided I didn’t want to cover the background I had so much fun creating, so I used a piece of lightweight cardboard from the back of a tablet of paper and made a flower template with my Big Shot and a flower die.
  • Tracing around the flower die, I left a few running off the edge of the paper, and made some close enough together to make them look like there are some behind others.
  • Day numbers were added at the edges of the flower shapes.
  • Some doodles were added here and there.
  • A border was doodled around the entire border.

That was it!  I think as the month goes on, I will be able to add more doodling and other embellishments as it becomes clear which days have more written in them. We’ll see how that goes.

I hope you will make a page and come over and share a picture of it over on our Facebook Artful Adventures Group page!

Here are some of my other examples of art journal calendars.

Have you made any art journal calendars, either in more of an art journal style or this scrapbook style?  Please share your ideas with us!

 

Heart Punch Shamrocks on March Art Journal Calendar

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Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-Heart-Punch-ShamrocksI always love it when I can show you something and get a project done at the same time!  Today, I’ve got yet another way to use a heart punch or die cut.  We are almost to March this year, and St. Patrick’s Day brings Irish inspired design to many things during the month of March.

These were made from vellum so that they did not completely cover up the background layers.

For this March art journal calendar scrapbook page:

VintageSt.PatricksDay
  • Used a green piece of 12×12″ card stock for the foundation piece.
  • Die cut “March” from a printed paper, and inked the edges of the letters
  • Arranged the vintage greetings and adhered them.
Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-March-Project-Layout
  • Toned down the greetings with a bit of white craft ink.
Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-March-Project-Inking
  • Punched hearts from heavy vellum card stock
  • Inked the edges of the hearts
  • Arrange the hearts into shamrocks
  • Adhered just the points with a bit of glitter glue
  • Topped off the center of each shamrock with a bit of Crystal Effects, to make sure they adhered securely.
Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-Heart-Punch-Shamrocks
  • Drew stems on the shamrocks with a marker.
  • Numbered the petals of the shamrocks to be used as a tiny journal spot for each day.

Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan_March-Art-Journal-Calendar-Scrapbook-Page

Don’t forget to join us over at the Artful Adventures Facebook Group and share your completed items!  There will be “lucky” prizes drawn in March for those who have uploaded something they have created. You never know when those drawings will be held!

Heart Punch Art Journal Calendar

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February-Heart-Punch-Art-Calendar_KristieSloan.comKeeping an open mind to what you can use a punch for, made quick work in creating my February Art Journal calendar in a bit of both scrapbook and art journal style.  Making things more artful isn’t hard!

Here is how this went together:

  • I found a piece of red with white dot paper for the background.
  • Used coordinating paper and cut letter out.
  • Found the letters not only coordinated, they just blended in and faded away.
  • Outlined the die cut letters with marker to make them stand out!  Much better!  Adhered the February title.
  • Hand cut 3 hearts in different shapes from paper that looked like book text.  I didn’t want to use book text, because I wanted to make sure the paper was archival safe for this project.

February-Heart-Punch-Art-Calendar_Kristie-Sloan_step1

  • Added definition to the text hearts by using pastels on the edges with both a gray and red color. (Use what you have on hand for this step, inking will be just fine – just rub it on.) Note that this was purposefully not done neatly.

February-Heart-Punch-Art-Calendar_Kristie-Sloan_2

  • More definition was added by just loosely outlining around and partially on the hearts, with a thin black marker
  • Punched smaller hearts out of a white vellum card stock, and arranged them on page.
  • Attached the vellum hearts in the corners with a glue dot.  Normally you want to be careful what you use to adhere vellum, because it can show through.  I used that to my advantage, and used it as the tiny spot to write my numbers for the days of the month.  Also, I decided that I would attach the hearts only in a single spot, in case I want to write under the heart.  That way, I have several options for journalling and can actually double my writing space if I need to!

February-Heart-Punch-Art-Calendar_Kristie-Sloan_3

  • I outlined a couple of special days during the month, which are a holiday and a family birthday!

Artful Adventures February-Heart-Punch-Art-Calendar_FullPage-Kristie-Sloan

  • I went in a put a dot of Crystal Effects on the upper left edge of each punched heart to give it a little more stability.  Those dots weren’t dry when I took the photos, so they really don’t show up.  It will be a nice little shiny accent for each day!
  • Done!  Although I realized I forgot to put the year.  However, don’t you think if it is sandwiched in with a bunch of other months from the same year it will be okay?  I may add the year, I may not.  Oh, maybe I’ll just use a date stamp!

If you make a calendar page, please come share it with us over at our Artful Adventures Facebook Group!

Here are some supplies you can pick up over at my Stampin’Up! store.

Heart Punch – #119883

First Edition Specialty Paper – #121878  (Also used on this project)

White Vellum Cardstock – #101856

Glue Dots  – #103683

Stamp Sponges – #101610

Ink Pads

Basic Gray – #126979

Real Red – #126949

White uni-ball Signo Gell Pen – #105021

Crystal Effects – #101055

Typeset Alphabet Bigz Die Set – #127553

Big Shot Die-Cutting Machine – #113439