Welcome to our January guest ...

Nicole Doiron with her take on our inspiration artwork this month.  This is such a lovely page - so soft and gentle but with a real seaside feel.

The overall Summer theme of "Bondi Scene" was my main inspiration so I picked a picture of my boyfriend walking by the seashore in our hometown as the main focus of my layout.  The first design element you notice when looking at this artwork is the artist's unique style of using thick paint strokes.  I tried to reproduce this technique on my background by adding lots of white gesso with a spatula mixed with mist and acrylic paint to create an effect of foamy blue seawater at the top and sandy beach at the bottom.  I then added many sea-inspired embellishments and dabbed everything with a bit of white paint, as is my style.

I'm Nicole from Canada's beautiful East coast! I share my home with my fiance Yves and our fur baby Sugar the cat. I love reading, music (yes! I do sing in the shower sometimes!), social game nights with friends, road trips and spending as much time in my scrap room as I can! I have a shabby chic romantic style and I love to dabble with mixed media techniques. I started scrapbooking in 2004, starting blogging about it in 2011 and it has been a marvelous adventure ever since!  Having always been interested in art (it was my major during my first year at University), I am thrilled to be a Guest Designer this month at ARTastic, concept of which I love!  Thank you Jane for this opportunity! 

To see more of my creations, you can visit my blog, Scrap-Utopia, at http://scrap-utopia.blogspot.com

Some more of Nicole's gorgeous work ...

Thank you for joining us this month Nicole.  It has been wonderful having you join in with us.

Remember ....

You still have time until the end of the month to upload your own take on this challenge.  All details are on the blog sidebar. We'd love to see what you can do with our inspiration this month.