Immersed In All Things Celtic!

  Over the last few weekends I have been able to experience the best of the Celtic culture without leaving town! For 25 years now Bethlehem has been host to the annual Celtic Classic. We stumbled upon it in its very first year when we decided to take a walk downtown. From that year on I marked my calendar each year and don't think I missed one! It begins on a Fri. eve. and runs thru Sun. eve. the last weekend in September. The festival has grown and continues to bring the best bagpipe bands, music groups, food, Highland game competitors, border collie herding competitions, jewlery and Celtic inspired clothing from all over the world!! One could never see all the FREE entertainment provided as there are  at least five different areas with something happening simultaneously. The weekend after that we went with friends to the new Sands Event Center  (practically in my backyard) to see Celtic Thunder perform!!
  All I can say is it was the most happy and joyful (almost out of body) experience although hubby and I had seen them perform several times before. We even got to meet and chat with most of them-a very unexpected surprise-and besides being the NICEST guys-they have the most incredibly beautiful green, blue and blue/green eyes!! All of them  are from Ireland with the exception of one- George who's from Scotland. Even hubby was impressed by them :)

  I could go on and on but enough of that and on to the pages these events inspired me to create.

  I began by adhering some crumpled tissue paper  in places with gel medium. Once dry I covered the pages with some watered down acrylic paints in a yellow green, turquoise and kelly green. The borders along the side were created by stamping onto tissue paper with Jet Black Staz-On ink, trimming, then adhering it to the pages with PPA (Perfect Paper Adhesive). Looking at it while taking the photo I realized how much this looks like a relief map of Ireland on the left page!

 This is the "stamp" I used:

 

  Anyone remember these??? They're called bolios and were (are?) manufactured by Judikins. They are four -sided and look kinda like a rolling pin. Here's another side of my Celtic bolio:

 

 

 

  I own five of these-one's flower themed, one is seashore themed, another is southwestern/tribal and another  baroque borders. (Three of them were passed on to me when a dear friend died). I love using them for borders on envies and cards-they're the perfect length to cover a card's edge without having to restamp!

 

  And here is my completed journal spread:

 

 

  I am not a scrapbooker by any means and find it challenging to create a "layout' type of page. So I took inspiration from Jill K. Berry's book Personal Geographies along with a fellow blogger/artist I "met" since I began  linking up to Art Journal Everyday.  Chel Micheline (click on her name to see her blog) creates the most beautiful pages using photos, ephemera and sometimes lots of journaling. I admire her compositions and attention to the details. Check it out and you'll see what I mean.Thank you Chel!

 

  One more note on the whole Celtic thing: any time I am immersed in the music and people of that culture it brings me to a happy and joy filled place that is just unexplainable. Although  (from what I know)  I am mostly French with a tad of Swedish and perhaps German thrown in, I feel in my heart of hearts that somewhere in my roots lies Celtic blood. It's something I've felt since I was a child asking for a bagpipe (really-who asks for that-esp. when none of my relatives ever played that type of music in their homes and besides, what kid wouldn't ask for toys?). I've always had a thing for plaid too. My friends have always told me I was so different from my family in so many ways that they'd swear I was adopted. I wasn't. Needless to say, Ireland and Scotland are #1 on my bucket list. And don't get me wrong; anyone that knows me knows full well how much I LOVE my French heritage and everything French. Let's just say I think I belong in Europe :)

 

  Have any of you ever felt such a deep connection to something not knowing where it stems from? I'd love to hear about it. If you're still with me, thanks for indulging me! I'm linking this journal spread up to Art Journal Everyday and to Paint Party Friday. Let the partying begin!

 

 

                 "A single moment of understanding can flood a whole life with meaning."