Since I can't sleep tonight, I thought I would try my hand at making some art supplies. I have been making art journals for awhile now, from cereal boxes, mac and cheese boxes, trash meant for the recycle bin. I've been having a lot of fun with it, as it's free stuff we were going to get rid of anyway. If I mess something up and hate it, I don't feel bad pitching it. Recently I discovered the joys of bible journalling. It's the same sort of thing, only using bible study (and often a journalling bible) to create meaningful, deeply personal, art which speaks of God and your walk with Him.
I do not have a journalling bible. I'm using a large sketch book I picked up from Micheals for about 5 bucks awhile back. The pages are not what I really want for my bible journalling. I would prefer a journalling bible like this one: the ESV journalling Bible. Which I can't seem to make into a link with this tablet...Here's the amazon page: http://www.amazon.com/Single-Column-Journaling-Bible-Black/dp/1433531917/ref=pd_cp_14_4?ie=UTF8&refRID=0XEAVMBZC33VDYE3EE0E
Back to the frugal art supplies...So I've been checking out some of the amazing work done by these ladies who are bible journalling. Truely wonderful and breathtaking kinds of stuff. I won't be doing that. I study the bible. I'm a bible teacher. I look for the 5 W's and an H then go to the original text, in the original language. I study the time period, the location, the political activities going on at that time, what world history was happening then-all to put the word into the correct context. Because context RULES. So many horrible things have happened because people didn't handle the word of God appropriately.
Once I have all that in order, I look for application. Begin with prayer, handle the Word correctly, apply the truths to your life (and make changes in your life where necessary), end your study time with prayer. The bible journalling is to take me out of my standard way of bible study and give me a bit more relaxed/informal way of connecting with the Lord. Just read the bible, let the words wash over me and meditate on what the Lord is saying to me through His word. Then use journalling, sketching, painting, stickers, letters, quotes, songs or whatever moves me, to show how the passage touched me. What God was saying to me in that verse, how I can use those new insights in my daily walk with Him.
But the supplies used are often expensive and I don't have money to spend on art supplies right now. So I saw what these ladies were using and decided to make my own. Here's how I spent my night: I made six spray bottles of alcohol shimmer inks, with an additional eight for re-filling and extra colors. All for pennys. Here's how:
Since I had never used alcohol inks or shimmer mists before, I looked them up on Pinterest. The directions given caused me no end of angst. I could not get my paint to mix at all with the straight rubbing alcohol. It was a diasaster. Next I tried food coloring with the straight rubbing alcohol. Again a bust. I tried oil paints rather than acrylics- horrible.
Finally I tried something that worked. A very small amount of acrylic paint, an eighth of a teaspoon probably or less, with half water and half rubbing alcohol. Success! After an excessive amount of shaking, the mixture blended sufficently enough to test spray.
A lovely mist coated my test paper. But it was blah, in my opinion. I wanted some glitz. Some sparkle. Some snap!
All the recipes I found for this shimmery type of stuff called for something called Pearl Ex Powdered Pigments. Yeah, like I have that just hanging around...And it's in the middle of the night and my hand is throbbing like crazy...No, I was not going to run out and look for that stuff, even if one of the 24hour stores would have it.
A few months ago I bought two multi-compartment eye shadows from the Dollar Tree. The reason for this was the little metal pots the eye shadow comes in makes wonderful miniature cookie sheets and bake ware. So I had two of these 12 pot eye shadow sets.
They shimmer. They sparkle. They were going into the alcohol inks!
Since I figured whatever these Pearl Ex things were, they would probably be more intense than my eye shadow pots. So I doubled up on the amount for each spray. I used two per color.
This actually made enough for my little jars of glimmer mist, which I then transfered into the spray bottles. There was enough leftover shimmer in the little pots that I refilled them. So rather than have eight shimmer mists, I have six Alcohol Inks with shimmer and eight Glimmer Mists. All in colors appropriate for any type of journalling page I've seen done to this point.
I found a 2 oz bottle of Rangers Dylusions Collection Ink Spray, bubblegum pink, for 5.85 plus shipping and handling on Amazon. This was without any shimmer. Here's a breakdown of my costs:
6 spray bottles from 5 Below. $5.00
1 32 oz. bottle of rubbing alcohol from the dollar store: $1.00
2 12 color eye shadow sets from the dollar store: $2.00
8 one eighth teaspoons of 8 different colors of craft paint from Goodwill: $1.00 (this is a rediculous over exageration of the cost, but I have no idea how to figure out 1/8th of a teaspoon from a 2oz bottle of craft paint 8 times so I just gave you the cost of one of the 2 oz. bottles)
the little jars were free, as I washed them out from a former project and had them in my work room
Total cost for 32oz of alcohol inks and glimmer mists: $9.00
Which equals, if my math is correct, 28 cents an ounce. But WAIT!
I did not use nearly all of the rubbing alcohol or the eye shadows or the paint. Only about half. Which would bring our total to $4.50. That brings our total to: 14cents per oz.
Not bad for my nights work. Not bad at all. And the sprays are gorgeous! They dry almost instantly and the shimmer is luscious!! I'll need to get more spray bottles and make more in every color! I love this!
I do not have a journalling bible. I'm using a large sketch book I picked up from Micheals for about 5 bucks awhile back. The pages are not what I really want for my bible journalling. I would prefer a journalling bible like this one: the ESV journalling Bible. Which I can't seem to make into a link with this tablet...Here's the amazon page: http://www.amazon.com/Single-Column-Journaling-Bible-Black/dp/1433531917/ref=pd_cp_14_4?ie=UTF8&refRID=0XEAVMBZC33VDYE3EE0E
Back to the frugal art supplies...So I've been checking out some of the amazing work done by these ladies who are bible journalling. Truely wonderful and breathtaking kinds of stuff. I won't be doing that. I study the bible. I'm a bible teacher. I look for the 5 W's and an H then go to the original text, in the original language. I study the time period, the location, the political activities going on at that time, what world history was happening then-all to put the word into the correct context. Because context RULES. So many horrible things have happened because people didn't handle the word of God appropriately.
Once I have all that in order, I look for application. Begin with prayer, handle the Word correctly, apply the truths to your life (and make changes in your life where necessary), end your study time with prayer. The bible journalling is to take me out of my standard way of bible study and give me a bit more relaxed/informal way of connecting with the Lord. Just read the bible, let the words wash over me and meditate on what the Lord is saying to me through His word. Then use journalling, sketching, painting, stickers, letters, quotes, songs or whatever moves me, to show how the passage touched me. What God was saying to me in that verse, how I can use those new insights in my daily walk with Him.
But the supplies used are often expensive and I don't have money to spend on art supplies right now. So I saw what these ladies were using and decided to make my own. Here's how I spent my night: I made six spray bottles of alcohol shimmer inks, with an additional eight for re-filling and extra colors. All for pennys. Here's how:
Since I had never used alcohol inks or shimmer mists before, I looked them up on Pinterest. The directions given caused me no end of angst. I could not get my paint to mix at all with the straight rubbing alcohol. It was a diasaster. Next I tried food coloring with the straight rubbing alcohol. Again a bust. I tried oil paints rather than acrylics- horrible.
Finally I tried something that worked. A very small amount of acrylic paint, an eighth of a teaspoon probably or less, with half water and half rubbing alcohol. Success! After an excessive amount of shaking, the mixture blended sufficently enough to test spray.
A lovely mist coated my test paper. But it was blah, in my opinion. I wanted some glitz. Some sparkle. Some snap!
All the recipes I found for this shimmery type of stuff called for something called Pearl Ex Powdered Pigments. Yeah, like I have that just hanging around...And it's in the middle of the night and my hand is throbbing like crazy...No, I was not going to run out and look for that stuff, even if one of the 24hour stores would have it.
A few months ago I bought two multi-compartment eye shadows from the Dollar Tree. The reason for this was the little metal pots the eye shadow comes in makes wonderful miniature cookie sheets and bake ware. So I had two of these 12 pot eye shadow sets.
They shimmer. They sparkle. They were going into the alcohol inks!
Since I figured whatever these Pearl Ex things were, they would probably be more intense than my eye shadow pots. So I doubled up on the amount for each spray. I used two per color.
This actually made enough for my little jars of glimmer mist, which I then transfered into the spray bottles. There was enough leftover shimmer in the little pots that I refilled them. So rather than have eight shimmer mists, I have six Alcohol Inks with shimmer and eight Glimmer Mists. All in colors appropriate for any type of journalling page I've seen done to this point.
I found a 2 oz bottle of Rangers Dylusions Collection Ink Spray, bubblegum pink, for 5.85 plus shipping and handling on Amazon. This was without any shimmer. Here's a breakdown of my costs:
6 spray bottles from 5 Below. $5.00
1 32 oz. bottle of rubbing alcohol from the dollar store: $1.00
2 12 color eye shadow sets from the dollar store: $2.00
8 one eighth teaspoons of 8 different colors of craft paint from Goodwill: $1.00 (this is a rediculous over exageration of the cost, but I have no idea how to figure out 1/8th of a teaspoon from a 2oz bottle of craft paint 8 times so I just gave you the cost of one of the 2 oz. bottles)
the little jars were free, as I washed them out from a former project and had them in my work room
Total cost for 32oz of alcohol inks and glimmer mists: $9.00
Which equals, if my math is correct, 28 cents an ounce. But WAIT!
I did not use nearly all of the rubbing alcohol or the eye shadows or the paint. Only about half. Which would bring our total to $4.50. That brings our total to: 14cents per oz.
Not bad for my nights work. Not bad at all. And the sprays are gorgeous! They dry almost instantly and the shimmer is luscious!! I'll need to get more spray bottles and make more in every color! I love this!