Week 5 : DLP 2015

Information about the Documented Life Project is HERE.

I always read the weekly challenges for this project, then look at what the featured artists for the week have done, and then I think about the project for at least a day before I start. Inspiration comes in different forms, and this time it came from a few different places.
I liked Sandi Keene's idea of cutting shapes from her paper, and LOVED the piece that Miranda Banks created. Those tree trunks sparked thoughts about a couple of quilts I've seen lately - this one that I shared in a post about our quilt symposium

"Roots" by Karen Johnson

and this that I saw in my weekend class by Karen Stone

I'd also been working on my mixed media dream catcher (see my previous post) which had leaf/feather shapes. Began by looking at my underpapers

This was plain newsprint which lies under and alongside my projects as I work. I use it to clean ink off stencils and stamps, to catch overspray, and sometimes I clean off my brayer/brush. I smiled at them for a bit and then I had to choose....I was attracted to this one - can you see a house with a heart in it?!

But I was really committed to a tree, so decided to glue this next paper into my book. The red and green on the right spoke to me of Pohutukawa - our lovely NZ summer tree

I had found a quote I wanted to add to the page, and once I ruled off my journaling space, I saw the perfect place to write the quote

The purple markings inspired a feather

Next up was to "see" the tree with roots

I also spotted a heart opportunity :-)  
I had thought I would draw stylised and stenciled leaves on the tree, but I didn't like how my first one looked

so I tore some extra bits of paper to cover that and also added more under papers around the background edges

Quite liking it, and wishing I can say it's done but I don't feel in my heart like it's there yet. I haven't ended up following my cut-out inspiration (except for the butterfly) or the leaf shapes but can't really see I can integrate those. If in doubt, walk away and look again the next day (these progress photos are a bit yellow cos I was working at night)

Click on any photo to see it larger

In the morning I decided it was too blendy and I needed to add more colour to get definition. I did that primarily by using watercolour pencils 

It doesn't seem like much when I look at it now, but I can see a difference when I compare the before and after photos

Before : I had just added a blended  line of green
around the outside of the tree head

I've spent enough time on this now...it's time to call it done and move on. 

Hope you enjoyed seeing the process and how you can start with some inspiration, but end up in a different place ;-)

You can see all my posts about this project HERE and I've created a Flickr album for all my Documented Life 2015 spreads HERE.