One of my favorite retailers sent me their newest catalog and the weight of the paper in it was so great, I decided it would make a perfect recycled art journal. Below is a step-by-step of one of the pages I created…

The Crafter’s Workshop provided me with some product to create this project. This post also contains affiliate links. The opinions I share are solely my own.

As usual, I gathered up some of my favorite stencils (I didn’t use all of them), acrylic paint, white gesso and matte gel medium…all from The Crafter’s Workshop collection of products.

A quick, messy layer of white gesso gave me a more neutral background on which to work.

Next up was some mark making and journaling with Jane Davenport’s Mermaid Markers. These watercolor markers reactivated with each layer I added but I loved the result. However, keep that in mind for your pages if that bothers you.

The 6×6 Fantasy Sphere stencil together with green paint gave my page a restful focal point.

My word for the year, Flourish, is always resonating in my mind. So the 12×12 Jungle Vines stencil helped bring the concept onto the page even though that is not what I was focusing on! Love that about art journaling…

Some doodling because it doesn’t seem like me if I don’t include a bit somewhere!

I used a few Neocolor II crayons to deepen the background color here and there, and also to add a gray shadow to the leaves.

I usually add any wording directly to the page I’m working on but this time I used a trick for those of you that hesitate a bit at doing that! I stenciled the words onto a piece of deli paper. That way, if it came out poorly, I could redo it as many times as I needed! I used the 12×12 versions of Julie’s Words and At The Beach to create my own phrase that fit my sentiment for the art journal page and what I was feeling at the moment. I then used matte gel medium to adhere it to the page.

As a bonus, here are two more pages I created in my recycled catalog art journal. The paper is just great to work on. Next time you need a new art journal, try your recycle bin! You just never know…

Thanks for joining me today…

Consie

The Crafter’s Workshop Design Team Member