Welcome a New Year, A New Decade!

 Happy New Year everyone!! Hope you're still with me after my holiday blogging break;) It's taken me a bit of time to get back into the creative flow after hardly doing any art. Spending time enjoying the holidays with friends and family was my priority. I hope you all enjoyed as well, and speaking of, I will begin by sharing the wonderful handmade cards I received from (mostly) blogging friends (my challenge art projects will follow in this long post):

 My first Christmas art came from none other than  Bleubeard, Elizabeth, and Squiggles of Altered Book Lover.  A lovely tip in page with an equally sweet note on the back as well as a typed message. Thank you, thank you dear Elizabeth!! Sorry my photo doesn't do this the justice it deserves.

 From Eileen at The Artful Crafter who is a regular at T Stands For Tuesday. Don't you just love this tree? Thank you Eileen!!

 So many fun stamps on the envelope, and the art print is by Lenna's great uncle who was a prominent artist. Lenna certainly got his genes:) You can find her here at creativelenna. Thank you Lenna!!

and how amazing is this mail? My dear friend patty knows me so well. Oh, those beautiful napkins! And her card at the top just glistens with sweet touches of gold. Although Patty has not been blogging she and her beautiful art can be found on both Instagram and Facebook. Thank you Patty!!

     and these are handmade cards from various other friends near and far.Thank you!! And thanks for the snail mail cards and ecards too.You all are the best-mwah!

Now, on to some art challenges:)

 Do any of you choose a word of the year to focus on? I've been doing it for 5 years now. This word chose ME after I had been asking for guidance to show me my word, and when I was still a bit hesitant it appeared in a big way!

 A fairly simple page in my mixed media journal. The mandala - like stencil has flecks of sparkle in the paint as I added embossing powder to the mix but it doesn't show here.

 I also made a vision/dream board page which faces the above one:

 Just cut and paste from magazine clippings that spoke to me.

 And to seal the deal on my word, as I was going through a pile of books I had read some time ago, this one appeared in the mix:

                  Of course I am now rereading it!:)

 I will join in at Art Journal Journey for the new theme this month of "Something New" chosen by Jo. New art, new word for 2020.

 This next project is meant for the Simon Monday Challenge (something new) and Tag Tuesday (celebrations), and this will also be my ticket for T Stands for Tuesday:)...

 New to me is the Distress Resist Spray I used on the white media tag (Ranger) before blending Festive Berries, Worn Lipstick, and Tea Dye inks over it. Other products: Distress Vintage Photo, Black Soot inks; coffee cups and sentiment from the Coffee Time stamp set by darkroom door; clip art images, buttons, ribbon from my stash; washi tape (Recollections). Also sharing this tag with the Darkroom Door January IG Challenge.

 One more journal page:

 Also new here is the Dina Wakley Collage Papers-love these!! This was a warm up page -one I needed to do fairly quickly to help me get started back into art journaling. Fluid acrylic paints were used for the background, watercolor was used to tint the lips and eye, and Marabu black acrylic ink was used to spatter.

 I will also join in again at Paint Party Friday!

 Let's all please keep in our hearts and prayers the people and animals who are suffering terrible losses in the devastating fires in Australia.

     "Another Sunrise, Another New Beginning."     Jonathan Lockwood Huie