July Calendar

In June I was sooooo behind!  Going to the beach for a week in late May, then unexpectedly having to care for the two grandchildren for about 2 weeks took its toll on my getting much done, as well as traveling for college orientation for our third daughter, so my June calendar pages were created late, and filled in rather scantily.  In fact, about all I could say/remember for some days was a generic "catching up".  Here is June, completed:

But, for July I am just about on time!  I have been participating in the monthly calendar challenge (create a calendar page for each month as it comes and note something about each day) with Kate Crane at The Kathryn Wheel.  There you can find links to everybody else's creations for the month.

Since I was determined to get July ready by the 1st or 2d (and since I, as usual, didn't begin until the last minute), I began with a piece I had done for Traci Bautista's free workshop on doodles something on the Stathmore Paper website.

I made some copies on my printer (which unfortunately was low on ink so the colors did not copy very true, but were ok.  I just glued them onto the notebook I am using for my calendar.

I stamped butterflies with a stamp and gesso for the days, and outlined the butterflies with a black "writing" paint bottle -- which outlined fatter than I wanted, but oh well.  You can see by the right hand page I finally got the hang of making a thinner line.  hmm.  Maybe that's why people say to "practice" first -- maybe one day I'll give that "practicing" on a scratch piece a try with something.  There are some glittery swirls I made with gold stickles, but they don't show up in the photo.  The pages have kind of a glittery magical look in person.  It's been so hot here (100-103 degrees every day for the past week, and for all this week!), I think I wanted a little bit cooler palette than one usually thinks of for July -- cooler than my June.  Must be wishful thinking.  It's so hot the bees and butterflies aren't flying and so dry our trees are dropping leaves as if it is fall.