The darling buds of May

The weather over the bank holiday was much better here than forecast and I got lots done in the garden. We decided to get up early on Sunday, as Bear was staying, and I sat on the back door step with a cup of tea in the early morning sunshine. As I sat there I heard the humming of a big woolly bumble bee and watched him carefully going in and out of every single foxglove flower.

Such a great sight. Summer really is just around the corner.

Once Bear went home I decided it was finally studio time and I knew exactly what I wanted to make...some new pages in Jane's Journal. There were some fun challenges I wanted to enter and I wanted to reproduce all the gorgeous pink/purple tones of the foxgloves I had seen and even the buzzing bee. The scrap around the World challenge has a mood board to use and Crafty Individual's wanted some "music to our ears"I also needed a suitable quote to use. I started jotting down some design ideas, also using the challenges requirements and as it was a May holiday I immediately thought of the Darling buds of May....both Shakespeare's sonnet and the old TV programme. Yes my brain does work in the strangest ways. I had thought of using " The buzzing of the bees" as my music but I looked up the Darling buds of May on You Tube and came across the theme music...I had forgotten how sweet it is.... have a listen here It also made me realise how many years ago that series was on. It was actually 1992-93 and Catherine Zeta Jones looks about 15 in it! In it's time it was such a gentle pleasant show and it reminds me of long hot lazy summers.

With that tune in my head I also decided to look up Shakespeare's famous sonnet.

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand’rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to Time thou grow’st.
     So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

 And of course the May that he is writing about is the May blossom of the Hawthorn but I wanted to also use the pun of the month of May. In Shakespeare' s time May was actually one of the summer months.
I opened my journal fueled with all my inspiration and selected some acrylics similar to those of the flowers. I wanted some texture and thought it would be fun to continue the theme of May so I tore some printed months of May out of my planner diary.I also added some old dictionary pages too in deference to Shakespeare's unique and wonderful use of the English language.
I also took my TH blossom stencil and added some texture paste through it.

  I then had fun dripping down watered down paints until I was happy with the background.

I also sponged some Archival ink through another floral stencil. I also added some splashes of ink

 Next was some stamping using my Claire's designs flower and Crafty Individuals bee and flower stamp; they are 2 of the great freebies that CI enclosed with my last stamp order from them.

 I also added some colour to the stamping using my Inktense pencils and some water.

To add the words "The darling buds of May" I decided to try my hand at writing it myself as I certainly don't have a stamp with those words on and I wanted something more natural than printing if off on the computer. I tried my hand at doodling for the first time last week and thought it was time to up my game!  Once I had written the words I added some other doodling with a black and a white pen. Thank goodness it worked out OK, it's always a moment of trepidation when you take up a pen and start drawing the letters freehand.

So here are my finished pages.

and some close ups

 You can see my lettering and doodles here...these bees are as busy as the ones on my foxgloves.

 Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz......................

 I like the way the calendar pages are still visible through the layers.

I would like to enter my journal pages into the following great challenges;


Scrap around the world May mood board for their epic 2nd birthday event

 I was inspired to use the gorgeous pink and purple tones and colours, the flower buds in different shades (just like my flowers in my garden) and also the lettering .....I wanted lettering on my pages too...and the happy quote about life being celebrated.
I also loved the texture of the shoes  and the ice cream and cone so I added lots of texture to my pages.
My Journal is a Dylusions journal;each page is 5"x8" as required by the rules.






Little Claire's outdoors
Anything but cute  vintage garden This is a newbie on the block, do check it out!
The Craft barn holiday (May bank holiday)
Craft stamper take it make it; a stamp
A sprinkle of imagination anything goes The products I have used are Inktense pencils and Black Archival ink.
Crafty Individuals It's music to my ears. My CI stamps are the freebie bee and daisy.My music referenece is the theme tune to the darling buds of May which I then used as my quote.
That craft place shabby chic
The Artistic Stamper Journaling your heart out
Stamping sensations Flower power
Simon says stamp Wednesday stencil it
That's Crafty numbers up my numbers are all the May 2015 dates I used as my texture.
Mixed media monthly May flowers
A vintage journey spring colours
Country view scenic
Noor! UK May flowers
Art with heart mixed media mahem
Sweet Stampin birds and/or bees
Inspiration Journal  pasted
Crafty Calander Things with wings
We Love 2 create anything goes/mixed media

I would also like to link up to my friend Brenda of Bumblebees and dragon flies. This is not a challenge but a way of sharing our visual journals and she would love to see you here #21

Thanks for visiting me and I hope you all had a great holiday weekend too? I have today off as I don't work Tuesdays and my jewellery class in on half term......so what better way to spend it...yes I am seeing Daisy and my DD.....:0)

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x