Work

YES, I'M BACK!!! 
For almost 2 months now I didn't do any creating.
Not that time was really an issue (not more than usual anyway), but for some reason or another my mojo had left the building , just like that, hopefully now it's back to stay for good this time.
The problem with being out of play for so long is inspiration, usually inspiration floods in while I'm creating but no creating equals to no inspiration.
So today I just looked at the challenges I was following and picked one, the alpa/dictionary challenge with the letter W 

W stands for work in the alphabet of happiness.
I used masking tape to create texture on my page

Added some yellow, pink and purple Dylusions paint.

Stamped flowers on some gelliprints and stencilled sunrays in which I wrote the definition:

Work hard every day to be the best person you can be but never feel guilty if you fall short of your goals. Every sunrise offers a second change.

I hope that the posts will follow each other very quickly now.

journey

We are at the letter J in the alpha/dictionary challenge over at The Craft Barn with the twist that we need to add a dragonfly.

J in the alphabet of happiness stands for Journey to new worlds, new possibilities by remaining open minded. Try to learn something new each day, and you'll grow.

I glued down a piece of a map and gave it a light wash with gesso.

Next I made a suitcase and added travel labels.

I typed out my definition and glued it to the back of the suitcase and added a dragonfly.

Decide

Hello there,
I'm finally here to share my D page for the alpha/dictionary challenge held by The Craft Barn.
The next letter has already been announced, yaikes!

D stands for decide in the alphabet of happiness. 
Decide that you'll be successful and happy come what may, and good things will find you. The roadblocks are only minor obstacles along the way.
Although decide was my word I in fact couldn't decide what to do with this page.
Time flew by and the deadline fastly approached so I set to work without a clear plan.
Because the twist is to use pink I grabbed the piece of paper I made for my Jam 4 page using pink and purple acrylic paint and adding texture with plastic wrap.

On my desk there was this stencil I cut the other day with the Silhouette (I was actually cutting die cuts out of scrap paper)  
Ah, piece of scrap = die cuts + stencil, frugal at its best!

I stencilled it with black dylusions paint, wasn't too impressed with the result, the paint creeped underneath the stencil, so it was a blotchy result.
I hid a piece of it with my definition which I typed out and made translucent with some baby oil.
In my art a lot of concepts of my work seem to appear.
Do you know why the paper becomes tranlucent? 
The oil fills the pores of the paper and oil scatters light less then air.
But still wasn't completely happy.
Then suddenly it hit me to glue the die-cuts over the black, that seems to work.
but it still missed something, when I woke this morning I knew it: a rainbow.

Okay, I call this done. 
Don't know what it is with my alphabet but every page seems to be a struggle, 
Maybe it's the size? 
On to the next letter which is S, hopefully will be able to post it sooner then on the last day of the challenge.

Grow

Here is my entry for the alpha dictionary challenge at The Craft Barn, where this time we had to use a word with the letter g.
In the alphabet of happiness G stands for grow:
Leave the childhood monsters behind. They can no longer hurt you or stand in your way.
So I colored some monsters and created a black hole where they seem to tumble into.

Relax

R=relax in the alphabet of happiness.

Refuse to let worry and stress rule your life,

and remember that  things always have a way of working out in the end.

Coloring mandalas is considered to be relaxing,

so I attempted to draw one and colored it in with a combination of inktense pencils and staedtler triplus fineliners.

I stamped the robot with his dog and colored them with my bright set of spectrum noirs.

.

To me it looks like the robot is comforting his dog and saying just relax, don’t worry.

love

Let love fill your heart instead of hate.

When hate is in your heart,

There’s room for nothing else.

But when love is in your heart

There’s room for endless happiness.

Our next letter in the alpha/dictionary challenge over at The Craft Barn is L, which stands for love in the alphabet of happiness 

I wanted to use a resist technique with crayons and Distress stain (a newly rediscovered art supply, thanks to Carolyne Dube, more details of me rediscovering distress stains see here) to color the background. But unfortunately it didn’t turn out as expected, as these heart shapes 

didn’t really appear once I went over it with crushed olive Distress stain.

Oh well, no time to linger about. 

I typed out the definition on my typewriter (several times I must add as there is no backspace on a typewriter arghh),

Fussy cut this cute doggy in 3D and added some washi tape with hearts. Because the page was still a bit bare I started stamping (stars, doodles, butterflies) and doodling some myself.

Now it’s starting to look like it’s finished.

Forgive and forget

Still in the Valentine theme, my F for the Alpha/dictionary challenge at The Craft Barn stands for forgive and forget.

The background is build up by first stamping some hearts in Versamark and then spraying some red DI on top.

Then some more stamping: some red hearts and a black script heart.

Next I cut this cute little bird silhouette and covered it in purple glitter (needless to say that everything is now covered in purple glitter J)

Lastly I typed out my definition:

Grudges only weigh you down and inspire unhappiness and grief.

Soar above it, and remember that everyone makes mistakes.

q=question

Our second letter for the Craft Barn alpha/dictionary challenge is Q.

The Q in the alphabet of happiness stands for question.

I started by writing down all kinds of questions, small and large (from what shall we eat tonight to what is the reason of our existence?) and coloring over it with different hues of blue inktense pencils. 
I cut this stencil

which I used to remove some color with a babywipe.
As focal image I added  this cute gorjuss girl and my typed definition.

break away

The Craft Barn is revisiting the alpha/dictionary challenge held in 2013, which in fact was my first ever challenge I participated in. I only joined in in September, so way behind, but did manage to complete my whole dictionary. 
All the rules for this year's challenge are explained here, I am going a little of the beaten track as I will not use a dictionary (as said did that in 2013) but created an accordeon booklet with one page for each letter 

and I will be creating an alphabet of happiness.
Our first letter is B which stands for break away in the alphabet of happiness.
I created the background following my second Wanderlust lesson.
Added a doodled sun, because going on holiday to the sun is a break and the doodles fit in with the mark making lesson.