Scraptastic; part 4

The next class in Belgium with Ania/Finnabair was so much fun. We got to play, spray, spritz, glue and paint with the amazing Silks and Artist Pigments from LuminArte, and using Prima's wonderful Mechanicals. The result was again - stunning! 

I love the way the framed horse turned out and I love all the things I learned about altering, adding and gluing. Great class!

Take care and see you again soon!

Hugs Cecilia

Scraptastic 2013; part 2 and 3

So my recap of the events in Belgium last month continues, and here is more fun from the trip.

My second class on the first night was a 2 hrs class with sweet Carmen Roets, and the project was to alter a cigar box. 
We used Graphic 45 papers, a lot of black paint, some fussy cutting and some Tim Holtz stamps and the result is really really cool!
This was Carmens first scrap class, but she can rest assured that she was awesome! 

Wasn't this such an awesome way to alter a cigar box? 
I'm on my way to my attic to dig out the bag with old cigar boxes and boy am I going to have fun! 
After this class it was late and my hotel room called for me to get some much needed rest, after all I did get up at 03.30 that day….

Here she is - sweet Carmen! <3

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My first class on Saturday was with Ania Dabrowska aka Finnabair. 

I had all together 3 classes with Ania.

(yes, I know - you're thinking AGAIN?, but I simply lovelovelove her classes, and many of the original classes I had signed up for got cancelled. Not that Ania's classes wasn't an amazing substitute! They truly were! )

The first class was a layout class using tea, and since the first time I heard about her tea stain coloring, I've wanted to take one of these classes. I love the effect from the tea, and this was definitely not my last project using it. I have to try this technique with different kind of teas, and especially the typical Norwegian "nypete" (rose hip tea) that has a wonderful red-pink color.

I'v been wanting to make a layout with an old picture of my great aunt and uncle that built the house that we now live in. I was always very close to them, and it's only right that their photo comes up on our wall.

 

Here's the layout all framed and ready for hanging. I love it so much! 

Take care my friends! See you soon!
Hugs Cecilia

Scraptastic 2013; part 1

I went to Belgium in the end of October to attend the Scraptastic event, and although my personal opinion is that is was a poorly organized event, the classes were superb and I met a lot of wonderful people, so all in all - it'll go down in my scrap history as a very memorable experience, (maybe just not for all the right reasons - yet… ;/ )

I started out with a class with Gerry van Gent, and wow was that an awesome class! 
She's a very sweet and talented girl from the Netherlands and she makes beautiful art. We made a canvas with everything from misting, resisting, die cutting and a lot of fussy cutting. The result is simply stunning, and I can't wait to get it framed and hung up on my wall!

I know I won't hesitate to take another class with Gerry, and I sure do hope it's going to be sooner than later! Check out her work here.

Take care and so long!
Hugs Cecilia

Mormor 95

Another page from my Prima Art Journal, and this time oh so inspired by my last blogpost, the class with Czekoczyna/Kasia. 
When I made this I didn't have any of the watercolors that Kasia used, so I used what I had, but… I do have them now, and I love them!

I took this photo of my dear grandmother on the day the turned 95. She is awesome and seems more like 75 than 95!

The string I used was a gift from my friend Hilde Jeanette, and I just love it so much I hardly use it, I just look at it, but in honor of my grandmother it seemed appropriate. 

Take care and so long!

Hugs Celia

Scrappeskrepper

I travelled to Poland in August with two girls from Norway that I hardly knew. Actually I had never met Linda, and Yasmin and I worked together for a short period at Bikuben, and I had taken a few of her classes, but I didn't really know them, so you can imagine my stomach had some butterflies when I drove up to Gardermoen. 

It turned out that the butterfly ordeal was totally wasted, because we had the best time, both in Poznan with separate hotel rooms and in Czempin where we shared a room. 

I could easily travel with these girls again!

Here is a page in my Art Journal with a photo of my friends and me. 
I believe it was right after this page was done that I realized that AJ is my new favorite thing!

I brought my Instax camera and I got a lot of sweet pictures! Is it possible to fall in love with a camera? I think maybe it is.. 

Take care and so long!

Hugs Celia

Prozart 2013; part 3

My mind keeps drifting back to those amazing days in Czempin, Poland, and I find myself smiling. I love thinking about all my new friends, people that I'm already looking forward to seeing again. I enjoy thinking about the workshops and the new techniques I learned, the beautiful wild animals and birds, the walks in the forest and around the pond, the evening around the open fire and I love the thought of coming back next year and seeing everybody again.

The third workshop we had was with Czekoczyna aka Kasia Krzyminska , and it was so much fun and such a great, educational, inspiring and fun workshop - just the way I like it! 

We got awesome papers, embellishments and water colors to play with, and I had the best time! I used another of the great pictures that Marcin took on the first day of the event and this is my result:

Kasia is just one of those people that you instantly fall in love with. She is sweet, gentle, humble, incredibly funny, generous and immensely talented. And she is such a great teacher, I so hope she'll be back next year for another class or that I get a chance to watch her magic somewhere else. You can also see her on Live with Prima shows on ustream! Check out her blog here, you won't be disappointed!

Thank you Kasia, for making ProzArt even more memorable! <3

Since this is my last summary from ProzArt, I'm including some pictures to try to show how interesting it was and some of the wonderful people. 

So long Czempin, ProzArt and all my new friends! See you in 2014!

Thank's for stopping by! Take care!
Hugs Celia 

Prozart 2013, part 2

I've been trying to figure out what it's going to take for me to actually use my blog more and post more often, and I've realized that it's actually a quite obvious answer; make it simple! 

So from now on, I'm going to write in just one language, and since pretty much every one that reads my blog understand English, that'll be the language to use. 

I'm also going to stop watermarking my pictures, as this is (to me) such a time consuming thing to do. I'll just put all my trust in people and hope that no one copies the pictures or uses them as anything other than ideas and inspiration.  

I might be writing something about what I've created, and I might not - that'll depend on how I feel about writing that day, but I'll probably write something.. Maybe just something about the weather, or whatever is on my mind.

Another thing I've figured out is that I want to use more sketches and inspiration blogs for my projects, although I haven't quite gotten around to it yet. 

The reason for that is that every time I start looking online for an idea, I end up not making anything at all. I just end up in cyber-I-wish-I made-nice-things-too mode, and all my creativity drains out of my body, so I really really have to learn to JUST look at the sketches/inspiration photo and then START! 

I do feel that this'll come one of these days, and I am a patient girl, so I'm waiting!

Now - here's my first 'simple' blog post. 

This is the second LO I made in Czempin, Poland at the Prozart event. This one in Finnabairs class.

(I'm still amazed by the fact that 4 days and in many ways, such a brief encounter with new people, can make such a huge imprint in my heart and soul. I miss the people, the place and the atmosphere…)

I love the details, the colors and the fact that in every class I've taken with Finn, it's actually 8 all together now, I always love the result! She is such an amazing teacher and person, I recommend anyone that likes mixed media to take one or two of her classes.

Take care, and so long! 

Hugs Celia

ProzArt 2013, part 1

Jeg har vært så heldig å få delta på en kreativ reise, både fysisk og mentalt, og jeg føler meg utrolig takknemlig, ydmyk, glad og beriket.  

Jeg har vært i Polen, nærmere bestemt i Poznan og Czempin, på ett fantastisk arrangement som heter ProzArt. ProzArt ble arrangert av tre herlige jenter; Ewa, Eliza og Ania/Finnabair. Det ble en helg full av kreative overraskelser, uendelig mange flotte Primablomster, lærerike og utfordrende workshops med utrolig dyktige lærere og en hel masse latter og hygge. Jeg reiste sammen med to søte jenter; Yasmin og Linda, og vi startet og endte turen med en natt på ett lekkert hotell i Poznan, slik at vi fikk sett byen og området vi reiste til. Vi er alle tre enige om at Polen er ett supert reisemål med flott arkitektur, utrolig mye historie, svært lave priser, vennlige og hjelpsomme mennesker og god og billig mat. Jeg reiser gjerne tilbake dit! 

Resten av innlegget skrives på engelsk... 

I've been so fortunate to go on an amazing creative journey, both physically and mentally, and I feel so grateful, humble, happy and enriched.

I've been to Poland, more accurately in Poznan and Czempin, at a wonderful creative retreat named ProzArt. ProzArt was arranged by three wonderful and talented girls; Ewa, Eliza and Anna/Finnabair. It was a weekend filled with surprises, a whole lot of Prima flowers, educational and challenging workshops with extremely talented teachers and a whole lot of laughter and cosiness.

I travelled with two sweet Norwegian girls, Yasmin and Linda, and we started and ended the trip with a night at a great hotel in Poznan, so that we got to see the city and the area we were in. We all agree that Poland is a wonderful destination with great architecture, a lot of history, low prices, friendly and helpful people and delicious and cheap food! 

I really want to go back!

Here are som pictures from our visit to the city of Poznan:

The hotel and the view from my room on the 8th floor.

 Beautiful balconies and a funky statue of a man with a bike with Linda hiding behind.

 The old town square in brass.

He looks angry... 

Polish pastries made on the barbecue and served with sugar and cinnamon... Looked delicious!

 Awesome painted houses on the old town square.

 Then there was food and a whole lot of coffee!

  Yasmin with her camera, Tassen is checking out the fountain and an old lamp caught my eye.

Then on Thursday, the ProzArt event started and Ania came to pick us up in a mini bus. She had already picked up Alina from Romania and Linda from Finland/England. We went to the train station to pick up Minna and Elina from Finland and Anat, Mimi and Einat from Israel. We were the International attendants, the rest of the group were Polish.

The bus trip out to Czempin was beautiful and fun, and we arrived at the wild life research center where we were staying. When we entered the room we saw a whole pile of Prima flowers on the bed, along with polish candy - what a great welcome!

The polish girls were all waiting for us at the supper table, and it was so nice to meet everyone. Such a gang of sweet, sweet ladies. We all recieved an envelope with personal gifts in it, and a lot of different papers and whatnots, so after dinner we started to scrap and make ourselves a name tag using some of the goodies we received.

Friday was dedicated to photo shoots with the great photographer Marcin Ratajczak and we all got 30 minutes one-to-one with him. The photos he took was then used in the workshops the following days. The rest of the day was spent hunting for tags with challenges on them, hidden outside in between bushes, the pond, the animals and the pretty surroundings, and crafting as many of the challenges we could. I found 4 tags, but I only had time to finish two of the challenges, and here is one where the challenge was to make something with the old photo.

Saturday started with a workshop by Karola called "A million layers, a million details", and when I saw the layouts that she brought, I knew this would be interesting. I'm really happy with my work, and I feel that she taught us to not be afraid of and trust that wha tever personal touch you add is nothing but great.

Before lunch we had some spare time to do what we wanted, and I must say that one of my most memorable time in Czempin was the walk with Kasia to the grocery store. She is such a caring, gentle, funny and sweet person, that I sure hope to meet again soon.

After lunch we had a walk through the compound and got to see the wildlife animals they work with there. in addition to these pictured here, there were wild hogs, deer, cranes, owls, stork, peacock and many more.

In the afternoon we started another class, this time with the ever so talented Finnabair, and her class was called "Pretty in Grunge". I've attended three of Finn's workshops earlier and I love them. She really makes me feel comfortable with using colors in a way that I never thought possible. Here's a sneak peak of the layout I made, it will be posted later.

 Saturday evening ended in a bonfire with hot dogs barbecued on a stick, beer, wine, awesome salads, singing in polish, finnish and hebrew, testing out our skills in playing the french horn and entertainment from the compounds caretaker; Mr Henryk. And to top it off - some more creativity in the scrap room before bedtime! 

On sunday, and unfortunately our last day at ProzArt, we had a workshop with lovely Kasia/Czekoczyna, and it was so much fun. I know she had planned for our class to last 4 hours, but unfortunately we had to be done in only three, due to planes and trains leaving, but she still gave us a wonderful workshop. Kasia is energetic, fun and so incredibly talented, and she has a way to inspire and bring out so much of you. I love the work I did in her class, and I can truly say that I've learned that colors are my friend... 

Here's a sneak peak at my layout from that workshop, it will be posted in full later.

I really had such a blast in Poznan and Czempin, and I'm oh so ready for ProzArt 2014 - just give me the dates and I'll be there.

This is probably the longest post i've ever made, but I had to put it all into one post, otherwise it could have taken forever...

So, thank you Yasmin and Linda for the amazing company! Thank you Ewa, Eliza and Ania for making it happen! Thank you Karola, Ania and Kasia for three amazing workshops and last, but not the least; thank you to all of you whom I now proudly call friends! 

You made my days! <3

Takk for at du tittet innom!/Thank you for stopping by!

Klem/Hugs Celia