An Autumn Notebook, inspired by Lucy Edmondson

Hello and welcome to Magpieheaven! Over at PaperArtsy this month there have been a host of incredibly inspiring designers. As always the blog has been a feast of colours, textures and new ideas! One 'experimental' project that really caught my imagination was Lucy Edmondson's image transfer idea here. She used the lovely Chatsworth papers to create fabulous effects on canvas and I was really impressed. I always carry a notebook around in my handbag and I love to make them personal by creating them from the mini flat canvases available, which are great to work on and make good sturdy covers. I sometimes use coptic stitching and signatures, but if I've used up a book and I need a quick replacement, I attach my canvases with decorated tape and stick in a pad of 'Post-its' to save time.

I chose the Chatsworth sheet that complements Lin Brown's leafy stencil and gathered my supplies of adhesive sheets, wet rag and spritzer and the canvases. Lucy's very clear step by step can be found here I had read it, but I needed to go back and follow the steps. To my dismay, the Internet was down and remained so for the next three hours! I needed my notebook, so I carried on using my memory of Lucy's instructions. For this reason, I think my image transfer was rather faint and patchy.

Can you just make out the ghostly Chatsworth leaf at the top? Although this was not the ideal outcome, undeterred and inspired by the lovely Helen Chilton who I once remember referred to a beautiful project she had rescued as initially 'A Dog's Dinner', I decided to go with the 'ghostliness' and use it as the basis for the theme of my project. I love Lin Brown's flower sentiment. Autumn is indeed an embodiment of all the seasons. The skeleton leaves on the path remind us of the frost fronds of winter; there might be the solitary green leaf on the tree to remind us of the long departed spring and the burning gold and orange of the falling leaves recall the sizzling days of high summer. I used this very adaptable Lin Brown stencil on the background of my sentiment and on my Washi tape along the edges too.

Using my ghostly Chatsworth background as frosty inspiration, I sprayed with some Hey Pesto Fresco diluted with water and when this was dry, I created a slightly coloured glaze using Satin Glaze, tinted with just a touch of Inky Pool. I didn't want my faint background to disappear, but to remain a subtle suggestion. I stamped leaves from Darcy's EDY8 in Evergreen, Autumn Fire and Hint of Mint. I wanted to create the stillness there is on some Autumn days when the leaves fall silently so I added some stamping of the mini feather in black Archival. I wanted to evoke frost fronds and skeleton leaves in my embellishments, which I painted first with Honeydew and then accented with Treasure Golds.

These little MDF hearts are painted with Guacamole, Autumn Fire and Honeydew and then edged with Potting Soil Archival and a little Rose Quartz Treasure Gold. The script is from Sara Nauman's ESN11. I used a white Posca pen to highlight the edge of my sentiment and that of the notebook and I thought this was reminiscent of the snow flurries in store!

Here is the inside of my notebook with its supply of Post-its!

This is a close-up of the back of the note-book. I have book-marked Lucy's instructions and I will definitely practise this technique some more with her very detailed step-by-steps in front of me! I'm going to link my experiment up to PaperArtsy this week with a big Thank You to Lucy for her inspiration! Have a lovely creative Autumn everyone!