More catching up and a momentous decision

The decision first - I will not be renewing my contract at my current job at the end of July.  I am going to take some time to find out what I really want to do with my life, and I finally think I have some tools that will help me to take positive steps rather than drifting rather aimlessly, dabbling in various pursuits.  I have just signed up for Julie Gibbon's Art Journal Adventure to learn more about making mixed media storybooks - I am not a great fan of collage as an art medium for myself, probably because I'm not very good at it, lol, but I love the look of it in other people's art journalling.  And since I'm already doing some fairly deep work in Julie's Great Round of Mandala I'm hoping that learning a new technique with storybooks will help me determine what to do next. And if it doesn't, I can always find another contract, lol.  But in the meantime, I will make a concerted effort to really delve into what my true heart fire & soul passion is, rather than just going with the IT contract work that I am good that but which is, quite literally, soul-destroying. 

And on to more light-hearted stuff.  More playing and experimenting with the ICADs, still not really following any of the prompts but allowing things around me and other people's postings to inspire me :-)

#25 and #26 were done using foam stamps with acrylics on watercolour backgrounds that I made right back at the start of ICAD, when I was experimenting with the rainbow prompt.  Facebook is having hissy fits today so is posting images in all sorts of random ways, despite how they appear on my PC.  #25 is actually upside down, as the green glitter gel pen should be stems for the flowers.  

ICAD #25

ICAD #26

 #26 was an attempt to marble colours, but I was too impatient and didn't wait long enough for each layer to dry before adding the next one, hence the slightly muddy effect.  Glitter stars from a pack of card-making decorations from the 99p shop :-)

ICAD #28a

ICAD #28b

ICAD #27

 Another blog random - all of these pictures were taken at the same time in the same orientation but my blog (and Facebook!) won't put #27, or #28b in landscape mode, however I have them on my computer 8-/  And despite moving the first ones around without any problems, I can't change the order of these on the page.  Maybe it will correct itself over time, or once I publish the page!  # 27 was finger-painting with ready-mixed children's paint, then a rub-on transfer from a set (99p from The Works), whilst the rest were inspired by another posters ICAD where she put splots of paint onto one card, then squashed another card on top and peeled them apart to get interesting textures.  28a and b were the pair that I did this way, though I lost a lot of the lovely texture as they dried - maybe I need thicker paint or a less absorbent card.  I could try using gesso underneath or maybe a shiny paper. 29 was done by lightly pre-folding the card in half to mark the centre, then dabbing paint onto one half, before closing the fold.  I was aiming for a butterfly effect but Facebook wouldn't turn this image around and once I had viewed it in portrait mode a few times, I suddenly saw this as trees at sunset, reflected in water :-)

ICAD #29