Okay, I can’t help it. It’s my birthday month, and I have cake on the brain. Not to mention that Mother’s Day just passed…yet another opportunity for cake. But, to be brutally honest, with swimsuit season just around the corner, cake has not felt like a great idea. I feel like I may be becoming more and more self-conscious as I get older. Not really a good thing at all. So, I created this art journal page as a reminder to myself that while over-indulging isn’t the answer, life is just too short to not enjoy some cake!
You can check out the process for the art journal entry on my YouTube channel:
This page actually began with me re-discovering a tool that I’ve had for over a year now. Ranger makes an airbrush tool that allows you to use markers to add an airbrush look on a page. I did a bit of manipulating, but I was able to use my Spectrum Noir Alcohol markers to create a confetti/icing look as the background on the page. This little taste of airbrushing actually had me wishing I had an airbrush tool that gave a continuous stream of air and ink! Let me know in the comments below if you have ever used one of those and how you liked it!
After the background color was laid down, I sketched out the cake and cake stand, adding bold black stripes to the cake. Then I spent a good amount of time doodling in random patterns using two different Dylusions paint pens that I picked up on clearance at Hobby Lobby. It took some work to get the paint flowing on those, but I was really pleased at the fine line that the markers created. Additionally, I doodled a checked border around the page, bringing in even more black to the bright spread.
To top off the cake, I turned to my stash of black and white floral pieces. I learned this trick from Heba Alsibai over at “My Little Journal”. She keeps a stash of floral die-cut pieces that are available to soften any page. It worked like a charm for this spread! I clustered floral pieces on the top of the cake, along the base of the cake stand, and on the right sight of the spread. Love the affect they had!
For the title, I used a mixture of alphabet stamps from Tim Holtz. There was one big issue that I had to deal with when I accidentally used an “n” instead of an “r” in the “Life’s Short” portion of the title. After being frustrated with my lack of attention to detail, I worked on making that “n” look more like an “r” using my black paint pen. While it isn’t perfect, I think the fix did work. Sometimes mistakes happen when you are creating, and the best solution is to just roll with the punches. It certainly wasn’t worth trashing the whole spread when I had already come so far!
What’s your philosophy? Do you go ahead and eat the cake? Everything in moderation? Throw caution to the wind? Let me know what you think!
Keep it creative,
-The Scrappy Wife
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I always eat the cake lol! But as my metabolism is slowing, I am learning to cut the piece in half!