February 2024 - Your Word of the Year + Your Element + Dragon or Red

 

 Here's a fun one for you since Chinese New Year will start on Feb 10th and this year will be the Year of the Dragon!

Chinese astrology is based on the year of your birth, and you will be a specific animal depending on which year you were born, but you will also be a specific ELEMENT (eg you could be a metal tiger or a water rabbit or a fire rooster ). If you want to use your element here is an easy way to work it out:  

If the last number in your birth year is 0 or 1, your element is Metal.

If the last number in your birth year is 2 or 3, your element is Water.

If the last number in your birth year is 4 or 5, your element is Wood.

If the last number in your birth year is 6 or 7, your element is Fire.

If the last number in your birth year is 8 or 9, your element is Earth.

So for example if you were born in 1981 your element would be Metal and so on.

Feel free to use your element (or not) and/or the prompt Dragon (for Year of the Dragon) or Red (considered to be the luckiest colour). 

It is our hope that we can continue to use our word of the year in all of our pages this year just to keep that fresh in our minds, together with the monthly prompts or instead of them. The choice is yours!  

We can't wait to see what you create this month and what you choose to focus on!

#MTWartjournalchallenge

Design Team Inspiration

Let's see what our lovely Design Team have created this month. If you love their projects, please visit their social links, like or follow them on your favourite social media.

ELLE - EOTC

This month's challenge was a fun one.  I already knew that my element was water and that I wanted to use it and my word of the year.  As this month will also welcome in the Year of the Dragon I wanted to include a dragon and then I found these red flowers which gave me a red element too so I managed all four options in one page and that made me pretty happy!  My WOTY is READY and so I added in the statement "Je suis prêt" which is French for "I am ready".

Visit Elle:  BLOG - FACEBOOK -  INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

HEATHER MCMAHON

Ohh there are so many challenge options this month! I went with my element (water) and red. I absolutely adore these watery images by Tracy Verdugo over at ArtStacks so I based my page around them.

Visit Heather:  BLOG - FACEBOOK - PINTEREST - INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

HEIDI MATTESSICH

Visit Heidi:  BLOG - INSTAGRAM -  YOUTUBE 

⬷⤐

KOUNELI

Visit Kouneli:   FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

LENA BLANKENSTEIN HOLMSTROM

Visit Lena:   BLOG - FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM - PINTEREST - YOUTUBE

⬷⤐

MATILDE FAB

This time I was inspired by the colour (red is so energetic!) and the dragon. I used my word of the year (Imagination) as well. I tried to create some unique background using for it stamps, beautiful sparkling spray, and texture paste with a stencil. These little drops are made of acrylic paint.

Visit Matilde:  BLOG - FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM - YOUTUBE

⬷⤐

SUNILA MAHAJAN

Visit Sunila:  FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

Prizes & Special Guest Designers

This year we are very happy to welcome ArtStacks Designs as our prize sponsor. 

 ArtStacks will be donating one of their fabulous DigiStacks to the overall winner of each of our challenges this year.   

In addition, one or more participants, handpicked by our team, may be invited to be our Special Guest Designers, to be featured on our blog and promoted in our magazine and social media.

Feedburner Subscribe by Email

Google has made the decision to retire this feature, and so the Feedburner subscribe by email option is going away.  If you are already subscribing to our blog updates by email, don't worry as we have moved everything to a new service, so you won't miss any updates!  If you are not currently receiving our blog updates by email and you would like to, please click on the link below, to make that happen.    

To follow us on other social media, please visit the links at the top right of the page.

Engage with us!

Tell us what you think in the comments below!  Please leave your comments at the end of this post.  

Are you entering the challenge?  
Do you feel inspired by our fabulous DT this month?
Did you enjoy our new magazine?

Challenge closes on the last day of the month at 11:59 pm EST.  

Enter in our Facebook Group, using this month's Challenge Album!  

Enter on Instagram by tagging us and using the hashtag: #MTWartjournalchallenge

Happy New Year 2024 - Your Word of the Year + Open The Door To Your Year of Creativity!

 

 Happy New Year to all our friends, fans and followers!  This year is all about creativity, and in particular, YOUR creativity, so why not join us in our monthly explorations and challenges and make this your most creative year yet!

Do you choose a "word of the year" each year? If so, for this month's challenge, be inspired by your word and/or the prompt to "open the door" on 2024 and get creating.

Let's start by choosing our Word of the Year. This is something that some of our team do every year and find it very helpful to keep focused on what's important and what we want to achieve that year. If this is something you already do, then you have probably already chosen your word. If not, then there are several ways to decide on your word.

Sometimes the right word just pops into your head and you know that it's "the one" you need.
Sometimes it appears when you start to set intentions for the year ahead.
Sometimes you might choose one word to focus on and a couple of supporting words.

Try reflecting on the past year, and think about your values, intentions and goals for 2024 or you could try making a vision board.

There are also other ways to chose your word, one of them is by using Susannah Conway's free workbooks to "unravel your year" and "find your word". Here is a link if you want to try this method.

Please note though, there should be no pressure involved.  Just because it's called "word of the year" doesn't mean that you have to have it in place by January 1st.  Try creating a shortlist of words that speak to you for one reason or another, and then try them on for size, and see which one fits.  

It is our hope that we can use our word of the year in all of our pages this year, together with the monthly prompts or instead of them. The choice is yours!  

We can't wait to see what you create this month and what word you chose!

#MTWartjournalchallenge

Design Team Inspiration

Let's see what our lovely Design Team have created this month. If you love their projects, please visit their social links, like or follow them on your favourite social media.

ELLE - EOTC

After being convinced that I had settled on my word of the year for 2024 for the last few weeks, I then changed it three more times before finally realising that it had to be READY! There are lots of things I want to achieve next year and some of them could have been my WOTY but not unless I am READY, so that had to be my word!

Visit Elle:  BLOG - FACEBOOK -  INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

HEATHER MCMAHON

Isn't the new challenge fantastic! I decided to use both options - a "word of the year" PLUS "open the door" as it's relevant to my word.

It didn't take me long to pick a word. If I'm going to achieve the things I want to achieve this year, I'm going to need lots of determination.

The image, quote and main papers are all from ArtStacks.

I hope you can join us!

Visit Heather:  BLOG - FACEBOOK - PINTEREST - INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

HEIDI MATTESSICH

Visit Heidi:  BLOG - INSTAGRAM -  YOUTUBE 

⬷⤐

KOUNELI

Visit Kouneli:   FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

LENA BLANKENSTEIN HOLMSTROM

Visit Lena:   BLOG - FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM - PINTEREST - YOUTUBE

⬷⤐

MATILDE FAB

Hello in New Year! For the first challenge I had to think about my word of the year. And I've chosen IMAGINATION. This page is about imagination and my message is "open the door and let the imagination fly".

Visit Matilde:  BLOG - FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM - YOUTUBE

⬷⤐

SUNILA MAHAJAN

Visit Sunila:  FACEBOOK - INSTAGRAM

⬷⤐

Prizes & Special Guest Designers

This year we are very happy to welcome ArtStacks Designs as our prize sponsor. 

 ArtStacks will be donating one of their fabulous DigiStacks to the overall winner of each of our challenges this year.   

In addition, one or more participants, handpicked by our team, may be invited to be our Special Guest Designers, to be featured on our blog and promoted in our magazine and social media.

Feedburner Subscribe by Email

Google has made the decision to retire this feature, and so the Feedburner subscribe by email option is going away.  If you are already subscribing to our blog updates by email, don't worry as we have moved everything to a new service, so you won't miss any updates!  If you are not currently receiving our blog updates by email and you would like to, please click on the link below, to make that happen.    

To follow us on other social media, please visit the links at the top right of the page.

Engage with us!

Tell us what you think in the comments below!  Please leave your comments at the end of this post.  

Are you entering the challenge?  
Do you feel inspired by our fabulous DT this month?
Did you enjoy our new magazine?

Challenge closes on the last day of the month at 11:59 pm EST.  

Enter in our Facebook Group, using this month's Challenge Album!  

Enter on Instagram by tagging us and using the hashtag: #MTWartjournalchallenge