Viewing Essex through the eyes of Constable

Last weekend we visited friends in Essex and they took us to Constable Country aka Flatford Mill where John Constable painted many of his glorious landscapes. It is now owned by the National Trust and if you ever venture to Essex/Suffolk I would highly recommend a visit.

We were blessed with lovely autumnal sunshine and I can see how Constable found the surrounding countryside so pleasing to paint. Constable's father owned Flatford Mill.
Constable painted many views of the river Stour and I appreciated why he loved it so much.

We enjoyed a lovely walk

 marvelling at the autumn colours

and also enjoyed visiting  the Mill and the spot where Constable painted the famous Hay Wain..I have added a link to see the original painting here

The house on the left was lived in by a tenant Willy Lott.

It has remained just as it was in Constable's time but none of the trees are the original

After our walk we ended up back at the tea rooms.

We even found walnuts which the wind had blown off a lovely walnut tree.

We enjoyed a different view of the river as we sat and chatted. It was such a lovely day.

I was so inspired by our visit that I knew my next Art Journal page would feature a photo from our day. I also wanted to enter some of my favourite challenges.  The dictionary letter over at the Craft Barn for this fortnight is V and lots of challenges are asking for autumn themed projects. I decided to use the word "View" from my vintage dictionary. Do read this definition and you will understand why my creative mind came up with the elements my page contains.

When I read the definition I knew that my Visible image "eye" stamp would work perfectly for this. As well as the "reach of the eye" I wanted to include a landscape photo so I chose my favourite of the day. I loved this view visible through these amazing entwined trees.

I also thought "View" could be through the lens of my beloved camera..you will see how I incorporated that later.

So I set to making a background....I wanted to incorporate the amazing clouds we saw that day..
I made a +ve and -ve stencil from a MB cloud die cut

I then used distress inks to create my clouds in the sky...

I added paints and texture with Crackle Paste to a Tim Holtz die cut tree

I used inky snippet mop ups of card for my leaf die cuts. I added Crackle Paste to some of these too. 

To represent my view through my camera I  stamped and fussy cut out my  Visible Image camera.

Then I put on my creative hat to put all my elements together and came up with this page for my journal. The sentiment which comes with the VI camera was so apt. The newest version of this set even has an extra Smile stamp...I will be using that soon.

You will see that I added a Tim Holtz baroque frame to add to the feeling of looking at a view. I loved this photo as I spotted the trees in the distance through these amazing trees...a  view within a view.

A few close ups......

It really was a fabulous autumn day and unlike Constable, who had to stand and paint his views of the Suffolk countryside, I was able to capture them with my trusty camera and use my photo in my Moment for Jane's Journal. I really was able to "Capture the moment and make it last forever" it was such a perfect sentiment stamp.

I would like to enter my Moment into the following challenges.

The Craft Barn dictionary challenge V my V is for View
Anything but cute an autumn day
Pixies's snippets playground #252
Stamping sensations autumn
Penny Black and More autumn
Dies r us 1/3  fall
Stamps and stencils elements of nature
Fashionable stamping 2/3 trees
Fussy and Fancy 1/3 shades of autumn

Thanks so much for visiting today and for the kind comments which you take the time to leave. It's been the most glorious sunny weekend again although today the sun has decided to take some time off. Enjoy the week ahead.
EDIT; I remembered after publishing that of course Flatford Mill is in Suffolk (just) not Essex. Rather than change the blog title and breaking lots of links I have left it alone :0) (Thanks Di ;0) xx

Back soon,

Bye for now,

Jane x