Journals, Gelatos and Paper Punches

I now have quite a collection of paper punches - circles in all sizes and a few squares too. I love using cut up and punched paper and have searched every nook and cranny in my studio to find all of my old paper. Using old paper for cut-ups in a junk journal is a fabulous way to repurpose paper you were never very fond of.

 

This pink paper with big lips has been in my stash a very long time, it works great for a dress for my paper doll and as a border on the adjacent page. The paper doll has been glued to an envelope in my junk journal that I stamped and colored with Gelatos. The sheet music page is actually a fold out with additional cut papers on the inside.

 

This is black cardstock and an old calender page in one of my junk journals. I love the simple beauty of the stark white and yellow on the black page. All I used was a few circle punches and a glue stick.

 The flower side of this journal page is a greeting card I gessoed, then used black paint to sponge on a stencil pattern and colored with Gelatos. The house journal page is a piece of poster board which had previously been used, I gessoed it - added a few stamps in Staz-On brown and colored with Gelatos. When I adhere paper to a surface which has been colored with Gelatos I use a liquid glue such as Elmer's Glue-All.

I have also been experimenting with cutting tools, next post I will give a few tips for how to use some of these tools to come up with fun and funky shapes.

Gelatos on a Paper Bag Journal Page

Rita Barakat is a fabulous Mixed Media artist.....she uses Gelatos by Faber Castell in a lot of her work... I love,love Gelatos. When you subscribe to Rita's newsletter she often includes an art video in which she demonstrates products and comes up with some cool things to do with them.

 This week she was using Gelatos....she made some beautiful cards.  I got out one of my Recycle/Smash Art Journals and turned to a fold out paper bag page to try Rita's technique using gesso, stamps and Gelatos.

 

Scribble Gelatos all over the page, add water and blend with a paint brush.

Rita painted one of her colorful girl characters to put on a card, I decided to paint a funny pocket watch to collage onto my journal page.

I love using cut paper shapes in my journals, this is the finished page...image from a magazine, black paper cut-outs, pocket watch painted on watercolor paper and gel pens.