December AJ Page-Keep Dancing + book and review

Hello friends!  Hope you had a great Christmas and were able to make some wonderful memories!  I can’t believe that we are ready to close out another year!  The time just goes way too fast and there’s so much more to look forward to!  I think the theme for my upcoming year is in this title post – KEEP DANCING!!!🕺

The last Saturday of the month (AND THE YEAR!) brings us to the monthly Art Journal Page collaboration with my crafty friend, Carol (from Crafty-Stamper)! We get creative trying to use up our never-ending stash piles along with a prompt for each month.  I know she always has great inspiration to share, so please check out her blog too! Here’s my AJ page with the “SMASH OUR STASH” December prompt of “Previous Prompt”:

Since this is the time of the year that we have a “look back”, I thought it would be fun to take one of this year’s previous prompts and come up with a new AJ page.  I chose April’s prompt of “SHINNY/SPARKLY”, and you can catch that page in the photos below or see my previous blog post HERE.

There’s nothing quite shinny or sparkly than New Year’s Eve!  I always think of the ball dropping on Times Square in New York, but it also had me thinking of a disco ball that is very sparkly.  Found this image online and printed it out.  Cut it out with a circle die and then added a bit of colored shading with my markers in grey.  I took a sponge to add glue to the entire ball and then covered it with chunky glitter.   I added some sparkle images and filled them with silver glitter and then die cut the numbers and glued them over top of the ball.

For the background:  It’s just a 6″x9″ black cardstock pre-punched at the top and then splattered with silver watercolor.  I added some music notes and die cut stars.  For the bottom, I used some woodgrain texture paper and cut strips to make a wood floor for the Riley the Moose disco dancer.  A silver metallic paint pen was used for the ball string at the top and the wording around the top of the ball.

I stamped, colored and hand cut the moose and popped him up over a die cut shadow for under his feet.  I typed a quote on the computer and printed it out over silver cardstock.  While it was still wet, I sprinkled clear EP over top and cut rounded corners for the page.  Lastly, I just popped up the glittered ball with foam tape and added some silver rhinestones at the bottom.

• I thought it would be fun to do a review of all of the monthly pages that were created this year.  I put the months in order below.  (If you are on my website, just click on the photos to enlarge them.)

I pre-punch the holes at the short side of the pages each month and then at the end of the year, I use my machine to bind them together to make a book.  I add covers and decorate them.  There is a post with last year’s book HERE.

For this year, I went with the vertical look and added a stretch cord to keep them together better.  I also tried out the napkin with the cover:

The napkin is at the bottom with the foil marble look.  My husband got some napkins for New Year’s, and I thought I’d try it out.  I added some chipboard, stamped and cut out numbers and added some wooden pieces.  I used the rose papers for the covers on the inside as well as the back of the chipboard covers.  It was put together with my Bind-It-All machine and coils.

I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing my Art Journal Journey throughout the year as I sure have enjoyed doing them!  I get to pull from my stash to use, but there is also so much more to use!  So this means that I will for sure be continuing with this journey and I hope you’ll join me too!

Thank you so much for stopping by to have a look back.  Wishing you peace, love and health for the upcoming 2024 year!  See you in the next year friends!!!🎉

Challenges:

1. Art Journal Journey – Above Us Only Sky (New Year’s Eve Ball Drop on Times Square with stars in the sky!!!)
2. Crafting From the Heart – Anything Goes #8
3. Creative Artiste – Anything Mixed Media Goes with option of Christmas
4. Alphabet – ‘T’ is for Texture (texture on the top page with woodgrain floor, the chunky glitter disco ball.  Texture on the book with chipboard, wood pieces and paste.)