The Artist in All of Us!

Yes there is one in all of us, and boy does Donna Downey know how to find it!!  If you know of her, everything you see and hear on her blog, is magnified when you meet her in person.  She is a bundle of energy, and inspiration, she is bold and encouraging.  She is a hugger and an impulse buyer!!  During the workshop on Saturday, one of the attendees showed her some fabric altered with a machine called an embellisher, out came her phone, and budda bing, she found one and bought one right there and then!!  I did three workshops on the weekend, and spent an amazingly inspirational day on Saturday with my SIL, Julia, by my side.  LOVED it, we both did.

Friday nights class:  A layout created on Prima canvas, it already has text on it!! Did some stamping, some iron ons, bling, colour washes with acrylic paint, I made it my own with some distress inks around the outside edge.

Saturday's classes:  The morning class, Life's Artistry, was a canvas album, and was very messy.  I still have blue fingers!  No one got even remotely close to being done.  Lots of colour washing on our canvas, paper and flowers, and fabric was attached to cardboard, also for inclusion in the album, some stamping also.
 

 

Donna showing us how to apply acrylic paint to canvas, and then use India Ink for journalling: 

Saturday afternoon: The Inspirational Journal.  This is where she really got us challenged.  Donna strolled around the room, giving us instructions....ie: pick a page, and use only 1 colour of paint, new page, you can only use ink, now use circles, two colours, one stamp, very fast paced.  She showed us some techniques, drippage, image embedding, image transfer, white washing, glue resists....then she made us get up, take our journals and go to someone elses' table.....and use THEIR stuff...EEEK!!  and WOW!!  It really made you see your own supplies in a different way.  She totally wants everyone to stop hoarding, USE your products, experiment, get messy, be daring!!  Some pics of what I did: 

Some I like, some I am totally going to keep working on, we really only scratched the surface.  Can't wait to continue it.  The journal is supposed to be somewhere to test ideas, a foundation for later work, an inspiration!! 

Fabulous time, can't wait to do it again!!!  Thank you Donna!!