A Whimsical Art Journal Cover

I am participating in a traveling art journal group for the very first time and am really looking forward to sharing art with a talented group of ladies.  Several of them I've swapped ATCs with and some are new friends.  I decided that I'd make my own journal rather than buy one because I'm a glutton for punishment.  ;)

France Papillon (my art journaling idol) is celebrating her 100th Journal on Monday and has asked her followers to share their process.  This particular project of mine is very different from her style, but I learned so much from watching her JoM videos and since the theme for my journal is On the Isle of Whimsy I went a different direction.  Here is a look at how I created my art journal cover.

I cut some chipboard to size, 6" x 8" and then ripped pages out of random books and tore them into strips.

Next I glued the strips onto the chipboard.  I tried to keep it very random alternating the orientation of the strips.  After everything dried I cut the excess off with an exacto knife.

I smoodged on some gesso and while it was still wet I put the wet sides of both covers against each other to give it some texture.

Oops.  Forgot to take a picture of the embossing paste step.  I just randomly added some through a stencil and when it was dry I added acrylic paint in a few colors and then dabbed it with a baby wipe to blend the colors a little more.

I added some more bits using acrylic paint and ink with stamps and stencils.

I thought some glass bead gel medium would add some nice sparkly bits.

The white circles on the side were too white so I filled them with embossed and colored circles. After I glued them down they still needed a little something so I rubbed some distress ink over the tops to make the embossed parts stand out more.

Whimsical trees on an island are finishing her off for now.

I still need to come up with a title but I think I'll let it sit for a day or two until I figure out what I want.  Until then, check out France's blog and videos.  She's amazing.