Finish it Friday

I finished!

A couple of weeks ago, I received another art journal in the mail from July. If you remember from several months ago, I was invited to join a round robin art journal project led by the fabulously talented Paula (who had an article published in the current issue of Art Journaling Magazine!!).

The theme of this journal is Vintage Love. This was a difficult theme for me--it's just not my style. But I did my best and finally finished it today. I have to say I was very motivated to finish because not only am I backed up on these journals (I still have to finish Paula's journal), but I REALLY wanted to put a link on Robyn's "Finish it Friday" blog post today. Now I can!

Here is the journal:

A little far away, but I wanted you to see the 2 pages side by side.

Left side

Right side

Detail of the glassine envelope (some small journal spots will go here later). The image is from The Graphics Fairy.

Another detail photo. That purple at the top is decorated packing tape adhered to one side then folded over to the other. I love doing that!

Detail of pearls and lace attached with Tiny Attacher.

Can you see the shimmer? I sprayed the entire page (all of them) with Old Lace Glimmer Mist to make it a little shiny. That image is also from The Graphics Fairy.

The quote I used. You can see the texture from scrumpled tissue paper which I adhered with heavy gloss gel. I then put a thin wash of white acrylic paint over it to blend it into the page. The tissue had been colored with Oriental poppy GM and Burnt Red GM. The colors were a little overpowering for the pages, so I toned it down with the white. I love the texture.

My sign in page-love that image of the girl. She reminds me of me though I'm not that cute! :)

All in all the pages went quickly. There were several of those "ugly" stages where nothing looks right. But Paula says you have to just push past those and continue on. Ultimately, I like the way it turned out. I think it represents my style and matches the theme.

It will soon go off to Margo!! Yay!

I've figured it out!

(After 5 years!)

Remember this is only MY opinion.

If you are offended-IGNORE IT!

It's no secret to anyone who has talked to me for any length of time that I HATE the library in my town. It is awful. I live in a very small town and the library reflects that.

For one thing, they close at random times. If there is a holiday listed on the calendar, then the library has to be closed. No matter what it is. Nothing else will be closed-no schools, banks etc-but sure enough the library is closed. If the holiday falls on a Friday, they will be closed Friday AND Saturday. They are not open on Mondays. Why? Do the librarians really have such a hard job that they need that much time off?

They close at 8 PM. EIGHT O CLOCK PM~!!! What? And earlier on Saturdays. Do people in Tooele stop learning after 8 PM? (Of course with a lot of people in this town I wonder if they ever started in the first place!)

9 out of 10 times they do not have the books that I am looking for. They rarely get anything new. Not even kids books. Their kid section is really bad. They have all kinds of old kids books, nasty falling apart chapter books and very few picture books. And they have so few new children's books. It's very frustrating when one of my kids will read a book at school and want to find it at the library. They never have it.

The worst part about it is that the librarians are so proud of the library and think it's so great. I guess it is compared to what they used to have. But it's nothing to be proud of.

I am happy to pay the $80 per year fee to have a library card at the Salt Lake City Library in Downtown Salt Lake. Now that is a LIBRARY. It's beautiful!! That will have to be another blog post.

Anyway- I went to the library tonight and found every book on my list except for one! I felt victorious! I felt accomplished! I was so happy! And I finally realized after 5 LONG years of living in this hellhole (Sorry if you like Tooele!) how to use our library. Here is the secret:

If I want good books, new books, or anything with substance I can go to the City Library in SLC. If I want a brain candy, entertainment-only novel, I can go our library. HAHA!! I figured it out!! Now I don't have to tear my hair out in frustration when I can't find my book!!

I am so happy

What I checked out tonight

PS-This may sound harsh. But realize I hate this town and I cannot wait to get out. It is sucking the life out of me. In all fairness, I'm sure the library is better than it once was and the fact that they even have a library is miraculous given the education level of most people in this town. And the library does have a few good books: a few classics, a few good non fiction books, and things like that. But when I say 9 out of 10 times it's frustration, I am not exaggerating. Pray for me.