Long winded Wednesday (On Thursday)

So many things  have happened since my last post. I have started a second job as a server in a 24 hour restaurant. Worked this past weekend at both jobs getting three hour blocks of sleep between shifts. Not my favorite way to achieve sleep deprivation.
Made some serious decisions concerning the education of the small one. She has been pulled from the charter school officially as of this morning. Was delighted at being able to proceed with this new direction thanks to someone wonderful I have known online for a while. Homeschooling has been something we had been considering for a long while and the situation we are in now allows for it. Since I am working outside the home and hubby is doing the stay at home dad thing it has become a real possibility. He has always been more of a teacher than I and can work with her much better. Sometimes creative people clash and it seems to be made worse when it is parent and child.
I have done many things in and for my various journals and would love to share some of them with you here.

 This is in my larger journal. These are going to be filled but the boxes were simple and looked right on the background. The color is not great in this picture but starts as a green and runs through to bright orange at the other end of the page.

This one is in my travel binder. The paper is actually yellow and this picture is mostly true color wise. I have been exploring the symbols I use most frequently and the color combinations that speak to me most. Adding writing to a piece is something that I feel a need to work on as well. I have been trying to expand what I put on a page and writing seemed to be the next step in that goal.

I have been following a prompt challenge from one of my favorite bloggers (link on the side-bar, you should check her out and buy her stuff if you are into journaling at all) and the most recent challenge I have completed was about books. I have read and been influenced by too many books so I decided to stick to the most influential Authors. I made an 8 page simple signature and pasted it into the small journal I made for this challenge. On the pages I listed my 13 favorite authors of all time and as many of their works that I have read as I could. I think it came out well.

This is a selection of the stamps that I have made recently. The black pieces are indeed chunks of flip-flop that were dissected for this purpose. One pair were on clearance for 2$ at the grocery store and the other pair were 1$ at a dollar store. The number of stamps I will be making with the rest of the material is dizzying to me. The corks are not saved from my own drinking habits (not much for wines) but gotten for free at a local "high end" eatery. They were going to throw them away... Can't have that now.

Finally, these are my homemade ink pads. A round make-up sponge set in a small plastic tub. I added food coloring, rit dye and alcohol. I love the way the colors blend and vary with each stamp. The top one is an orange / red / purple and the bottom is yellow / green / blue.

I hope you enjoy this peek into my craft room. I wish you all peace, love and joy.