Happy New Year!

Happy New Year to everyone! May you have an art-filled 2016!

It's finished! I completed the last spread in my Documented Life Project journal on Wednesday, just in time!  I am quite pleased that I created a spread for every week, even if a little late sometimes, and that I tried to follow most of the art challenges and journal prompts.

Week 53 - Dec. 26
Art Challenge: Storytelling
Journal Prompt: Storytelling as an underlying fabric

For this week I wanted to sum up what the experience of DLP meant to me. I used the idea of the woven fabric of relationships and that art is the common thread that unites us. 

At Thanksgiving my daughter gave me a box of upholstery samples left over from when they bought a chair. She didn't want to just trash them and thought I could maybe use them. Of course, I never turn down any supplies!  I cut small pieces of the different swatches and glued them in a heart shape over a loosely watercolored background. I challenged myself to leave white space as that is usually impossible for me!

I used journaling labels for the days of the week. The circle sticker inside the heart is the DLP 2016 logo sticker that came with the new 2016 kit.

I outlined the heart and journaled around it. Finally, I glued some randomly placed string on top of the heart to represent the common thread.

This last page is bittersweet - I'm relieved to have finished all the weeks' pages but also will miss the weekly challenges.

Here is my finished journal, just bursting at the seams! It doesn't close and has expanded exponentially.  I have yet to decorate the covers as I didn't want to mess them up while working on the pages. I also intend to print out the weekly challenges and attach them to the back pages.

This has been a very gratifying and challenging exercise for the year. It will be a keepsake for me to remember all that happened in 2015, along with 53 spreads of art! Thank you so much to the original Art to the 5th gals - Robin Marie Smith, Rae Missigman, Lorraine Bell and Sandi Keene.

For 2016 I will be participating in the Art to the 5th Documented Life 2016: the "unPlanner." I can't wait to see what the gals have in store for us this year.