My swapping addiction

Hello again,
Ive got a few minutes before I leave for work, so I thought I would keep you posted on what I have been working on recently.
I decided to join http://swap-bot.com/ because I am just loving the journal round robins I am in at the moment, through  the Doll Dreams site and  can't get enough!
I used to make art to purely sell, and I found a small happiness when a piece sold. However the money was never a part of it. When your creating art and sell it for a small price, I realised your really only in it for the gratification. Then I discovered a whole internet world of swapping.
I can't tell you how much more satisfying it is for someone who creates for the love of it, to do so and then get somebody elses art in return. I highly recommend you have a try, but be warned it is highly addictive!

Here are two things I have been working on. The first one is from the Cardboard Project through
http://dolldreams.ning.com/. Each of us send away a cardboard packet we have decorated with drawings and paint to the person below us on the list and mine is well on its way. I recieved a members project yesterday and was eager to do my cardboard page for her packet.

Here is my page:


Made from torn cardboard, acrylic paint, glitter, watercolor crayons, sumi ink and prismacolor pencils

The second thing I have been doing, is through Swapbot. I have signed up for a Alice in Wonderland ATC swap. Its a one for one swap, but I love Alice so much, I though I would make a whole series of ATC's in this theme and place them on flickr available for swaps. I think I would like to swap with someone else's Alice in Wonderland Atc's.
If your interested I will be listing them soon on my flickr site under the username: Artbysonya.
Here are my 1st two, one for Swapbot and the other one is for my series. I am not sure which one will go to my swapbot partner yet. Which one do you think is the nicest?

Handmade Art Journal Cover

Good Afternoon to you!
Ive been working my little heart out lately, trying to get my next round robin art journal ready. The theme for this one is Fairies and doodles - From the Fairy Dreams course by Adriana Almanza.
As I posted on Thursday, I really loved a journal i recieved to do art in. The way it was painted with texture, the artwork on the front and most of all i loved the fancy yarn that tied the paper signatures into place.
SO, as you've probably guessed, I decided to do my journal in a similar style.
First of all I found an old childrens board book with a wide spine and tore the pages out.(You could also use just a normal thick cardboard)  Next I prepped the cover inside and out by using sandpaper to rough it up a bit,
I then applied a layer of thick kitchen paper towel. I adhered it to the cover inside and out with Mod Podge. It was looking lke this

After that was completely dried over night, then came the fun part! I painted it in acrylic paint and added some "Fairy dust" for some extra magic.

My journal needed some of my artwork on the front so I decided to use my Aquamarkers to make this lovely fairy. Again Mod Podge to stick it down.

While this was all drying, I made my watercolour paper signatures to go inside the journal and cut my fancy yarn to length. I use the yarn to tie in the pages instead of sewing them in place. It works really well and you can get them quite tight plus it looks awesome! Add  some dangling beads and Im all done. I so loved making this cover and I know its the start of a whole new crafty direction for me.

Art Journal Round Robin

I'm so excited to be involved with a couple of art journal Round Robins this year. I am currently taking a few whimsical art classes with Adriana Almanza from http://dolldreams.ning.com/ and one of the students has organised the round robins.
The first one is the 'Doll Dreams Basic' journal round robin and its so much fun! I got busy and made a journal from cardboard and acrylic paints and then sewed in my waterpaper signatures.
I just love my front and back cover and the front whimsy girl reminds me of Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games! Although I love the books and movies, I never meant for that to happen she just appeared.LOL

Here is my back cover. How cute is she! Sorry about the dark pics.

So anyway, I sent the journal off and its about to travel right around the world to places like Germany, United Kingdom, America, The Netherlands and Australia. I just cant express what this journal will mean to me when it arrives back home!

In the meantime I recieved my first journal all the way from the U.K to place some of my art in. The journal is by a wonderful artist called Angel, and it is so beautiful , I totally fell in love with it. I wish I had thought of embellishing mine this way!

Here's a picture of it.

Angel specified that she would like all of the contributing artists to add their countries floral emblem to their artwork. As a few people from Australia are involved ,I decided to use my state's emblem of the Sturt Desert Pea. Here is my art work in her journal.

I can't wait for the next journal to arrive. Shouldn't be too long. This is so much fun. I recommend everyone to get involved in something like this if you are into art journalling. If you like these type of dreamy dolls they're many classes to take at the Doll Dreams site.