The starting point for this spread in my altered book was the notion of sovereignty. It’s a term that’s banded about our circle and it’s one that I’ve started to pay a lot of attention to (particularly as I’m writing Digging for Dharma). This notion of owning your own power. Of stepping fully into who you are and what you do.

I made a start with some tissue papers pasted onto my pages with matt acrylic medium. Tissue paper is fast becoming one of my favourite materials. Despite it’s delicacy, it is fabulously easy to manage.

I sprayed on some Adirondack colour wash in buttercup and Dylusions ink spray in lemon zest, fixing them onto the page with more matte medium (otherwise, they’ll react to any further layers).

Some of us had been discussing the notion of the Queen archetype last week on Facebook and I felt a close association with her. The image of a queen fit perfectly with the theme of sovereignty, and so I sketched a quick whimsical style portrait onto the page and used a mix of acrylic paint and watercolour crayons to colour her in.

I love the effect when I paint over a background, where some of it shows through the new image. Mmmm, yes I do!

The whimsical style was really to offer me an opportunity to complete a portrait more quickly. On reflection, I know that it’s also a reflection of me acknowledging the themes without getting too stuck on them.

I journaled in her hair using a Pitt Artist pen by Faber-Castell . The words I used were a list of the personal values I’ve been working on as part of the Circe’s Circle coaching work.

You can see in this close up that my style has not progressed to a fine and neat finish! The hair, the crown and the jewels were all coloured in using metallic acrylic craft paint < definitely in my top 5 supplies list!  The outline was reworked with the outline pencil in the Inktense watercolour pencils selection.

On the adjoining page, I journaled some more on a Tim Holtz oversized tag, attached it with some twine and washi tape, then added a key to echo the background and symbolise this unlocking of a new knowledge of self.

I did try out a glue stick resist technique on the tag (shared by Kreative Notions) but it failed miserably – due to using a cheap glue stick, I suspect. I’d love to be able to decorate tags well, but it seems beyond my grasp for now. I ended up just using some distress ink and outlined it with a Letraset Promarker.

I do like the brightness of this page. It was super simple and quick to complete. I think I’m leaning towards less complicated work just now, especially with regards the backgrounds. the bright colours are calling to me and I can’t often resist the sheen of metallics.

Hope you enjoyed this peek into a page 🙂 What themes have you been exploring this week?