Stampotique Designer's Challenge

I wait for ages for the opportunity to blog, and then two come along at once! Taking of advantage of the school holidays (and fitting in some classic work avoidance), has meant that I have had some play time in my art room. This tag was one of those serendipitous finds (I think it was a demo piece from a class)which had found its way in to my scraps box, but has actually found its way back out again! The challenge this time, on the Stampotique Designers challenge blog, is to doodle:
Kaz says"Whether it's a few dots to highlight or a simple border, right through to drawing an accent on a stamp, I'd like you to do something freehand on your project."

I chose this Daniel Torrente stamp, Lovely Wings:

I decided that if I doodled a little extra detail in, I could make these beautiful wings into a monster. The caption was something that was said to me a week or two ago, so it seemed relevant on two counts. Here is close up of the little critter:

As you can see, I added eyes to the holes in the wings, teeth to the central hole to make a mouth and two tentacle thingys with some additional eyes. I then doodled some wavy lines of differing thicknesses for him to slither over. Great challenge, Kaz, I loved it!

April already

I have been away from all things arty for too long! It's because I have been wielding a paintbrush of a different kind. The ongoing task of finishing the building project has been dragging on, and Mr H and I decided that we needed a oush to move things forward. The hall, stairs and landing was such a mammoth job, it nearly broke me - in fact I still struggle to get my right arm over my head without wincing, but it is done! We have carpet and painted wood, replacing the rather yellowed varnished pine that was originally there. It's clean, fresh and so nice to have carpet that isn't stained with building filth, or dog hair! Coming out of the bedroom every morning gives me that little frisson of pleasure I would normally associate with a good journal page!

In the meantime, I have been squeezing in a bit of arty-ness, although being so pre-occupied with decorating has meant that I think my March page is possibly the page I like the least over the past three years of journaling! I'm trying to become less dependent on stamps and downloads and reawaken my love of drawing, so this was an initial foray back into the world of wielding a pencil probably since school!

At the beginning of March, I went to Art from the Heart to spend three days arting about with Dina Wakely. We created an amazing book (unsurprisingly mine is yet to be finished!)and as part of the process, we had to create a page to cut up later in the process. I loved the colours and the contrast so much that I decided to recreate the scheme for my April journal page. It's a bit busy, but I still like the boldness of it.