May Scrapbook Style Art Journal Calendar

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!

 

Using an Embossing Folder for Texture

Here is a quick tutorial on using an embossing folder with the Big Shot.  This is the type of folder I used on the cupcake with hearts frosting, which was the Stripes folder mentioned in the video; as well the Petals-a-Plenty folder used on the heart couple.  When you have these little folders on hand, you can make quick work of adding some dimension to a card, scrapbook page, and even fun elements on an art journaling page, or mixed media piece.

Heart Punch Couple

Heart Punch Couple Kristie Sloan

Dress was embossed before cutting heart.

You can make this cute couple with either a heart punch or die cut!

The black heart for the man’s jacket has been cut partially down the center and then folded out from the center to make lapels.  A white heart makes his shirt, and a ribbon with a knot at one edge makes a tie.  A dot of Crystal Effects makes his button.  (As I am writing this and looking at this photo, I see that I didn’t get his tie on right!  It will actually look neater if you get it on with the snipped off part turned on the bottom!)

To give the dress some texture, the paper was embossed before the heart was cut.  A little ink sponged over the embossing gives it more dimension.  It was also cut deeper in the center to give it more of a plunging neck line.  Rhinestones were set around the edge for more sparkle.  Her body was made from a light pink paper heart, with a little ink to give some depth to her body.

The hearts for this couple were cut from a set of Framelits, as I wanted them larger to go on a scrapbook page.

Heart Punch Couple 2 Kristie Sloan