Art Journal & Happiness

Work In Progress Wednesday - I'm resurrecting it!

There's nothing quite like knowing you'll be checking in with yourself (and others) at a set time to keep you motivated and get some projects done. :)

So here's the deal. On Wednesday, let's all share what we're working on *and* what we're reading currently. That way we can gather inspiration, stay motivated, and add more books to our reading lists on Goodreads or in our journals. (or both. I'm not judging!) Feel free to snag the button in the post and on my sidebar and link your posts in the comments if you're joining in so we can see each other's stuff!

This week, I've been working in the massive art journal I created from old artwork last week. I've got a spread started that I'm just starting to really dig. I love all the texture of modeling paste and old book pages as well as these deeper colors. As per usual, I don't have an agenda with this, just seeing where it takes me!

I *just* finished Hector and the Search for Happiness. I really enjoyed the whimsical, quirky way in which the story was told - it felt a bit like a children's book written for adults which made me happy. There were a few things in it that had me sighing and saying "Oh, Hector", but overall I was moved by the stories of his travels and the things he discovered about what causes happiness.

It was a very quick read and just over 150 pages and if it weren't a library copy, it would have most certainly had a bunch of highlights, notes in the margins, and maybe even some glitter thrown in to it. Definitely something I'd read again.

The Traveling Art Journal Project - 2016

Acorn painting the cover of my traveling journal.

For the past year, I had toyed with the idea of starting an art swapping circle of some sort. I love making art, but I'm running out of places to store it all, and I love other people's art, but lack the funds to buy it. And don't have a lot of space to store it. ;)

So, I opted to try out a traveling journal circle. I invited my friends who work in any form of 2d art - writing, painting, collage, recipes, doodling, you get the idea - to join up and invite a friend. In the end, I gathered 18 participants including myself, which feels like the perfect number to have this work out in a year's time.

We've had a few snags here and there with communication, but for the most part, so far so good. All the journals are still accounted for after their 3rd mailing and that was my biggest fear. I can communicate with poor communicators, I can spot money to have journals sent on if I need to... I cannot replace it if it's lost in the mail. So, fingers crossed we've ironed things out in the talky talky department and that the postal gods see all of our journals safely to all 18 of their destinations over this next year!

If all goes well, maybe I'll organize a 2nd round in 2017. I'm not a born organizer or space holder, so this is a new, sometimes trying, growing experience for me. I'm a little bit of a control freak, so this is a good exercise in letting go to a certain extent, as well.

I'm currently working on my 4th journal (including my own). My journal has the theme "Exploring the Feminine", another journal had the theme "intentions and wishes for 2016", and the last two were artist's choice.

If you're in the project and don't want to see spoilers, avert your eyes! ;)

The cover of my journal after Acorn finger painted it.


The page I did in my journal before sending it on.


Page from the first visiting journal, which was artist's choice. This was the same week David Bowie died and I couldn't get space or the Starman out of my head.


Detail of one of the pages I did in the 2nd visiting journal, with the theme "2016 Intentions and Wishes." This was an extra page I did in the book, I neglected to take a photo of my main spread. I had written down my wishes and intentions, then painted and oil pasteled over them.


This is the 3rd visiting journal, which showed up yesterday and is another artist's choice. This is the 1st layer of paint and some pencil doodles. It's still fresh, so we'll see where it takes me.

This has been an excellent way for me to keep the intuitive painting juices flowing without the time or energy needed to complete large pieces. I haven't felt much like hanging out in my studio, I started an 18 x 24" canvas the week that Bowie and Alan Rickman passed as a way to work through the grief of losing two of my favorite artists. But it's been in a state of somewhat completion for a bit and aside from that, I've been happier working on smaller stuff these days.

While a part of me is pouting over this, for the most part, I'm just accepting that this is how I need to create right now and embracing it.

Healing and Stealing Minutes

Towards the end of February, I scheduled a yearly wellness visit with my doctor. Before my visit I made a list of all of the things that were concerning me so that when I was there I wouldn't forget to mention any of them.

And for the first time ever, a doctor took every single one of my points seriously. He asked me questions about them, did his due diligence in checking each thing out, took a boatload of my blood and referred me out to a hand full of specialists for the things he felt others would better be able to help me with. We even talked about my visits with the therapist, who it turns out he knows and refers all of his female patients to (because she specializes in women's issues) and he checked my thyroid levels just to be sure there was no underlying physical cause to my issues; aside from being tired, of course. ;)

Needless to say since that visit, I've been very busy visiting a bunch of doctor's offices. It hasn't necessarily been fun, and I've still got about a dozen or so more appointments to go, but I've been getting answers and help and am finally starting to feel better. Just having someone take me seriously when I complained about arthritis pain, as opposed to brushing me off as "too young", would have had me feeling better.

Between physical therapy, the GI doctor, a scope and a procedure to fix my esophagus, the eye doctor (because you know that flared up again!), the ear doctor, the rhuematologist, the therapist, sleeping, eating, cleaning, animal caring, wifing and mothering (especially soothing a child growing 6 teeth at once) there really hasn't been much time left over for things that involve a lot of time or ritual. Even my Beltane was celebrated by speaking thanks to the Universe while I was driving home from an appointment with the windows down and the warm breeze making a million and one knots in my hair.

We do what we can, right?

In the midst of all of this, I quit social media. So if you've been following me elsewhere and noticed I've gone missing, sorry! I'd been mulling it over for a bit and this felt like the time to do it. In the 2 weeks I've been offline, I've noticed a drastic improvement in my moods and I've gotten a lot more little things started or finished. My free time has been spent napping, meditating, reading or working in what I'm calling my stolen minutes art journal.

I met some friends for coffee this past Sunday and one of them had her art journals with her. And they were beautiful and filled with so much energy and devotion. Thumbing through them made me miss my own practice terribly, but I found myself lamenting how long it took me to put together the pages in my book. SO LONG. SO elaborate. I don't have time for that!

Oh, but I wanted the time for it. And so, I'm changing up my practice, tossing the "rules" aside and fitting it in when I have a few minutes. It doesn't need to be elaborate (unless I want it to be), I can jump around from page to page willy nilly. It doesn't have to be deep or beautiful, it simply needs to be a soft place for thoughts, paper, paint and glue to land and be a rock for my need to make things to cling to. And if ah ha moments, beautiful art or secret messages appear there, so be it.

P.S. I'm feeling disconnected and dissatisfied with the name and feel of my beloved space here. It's one of the myriad of reasons I haven't been blogging, because I feel like what I want to write about won't "fit". So I'm pondering a new name, one that better encompasses all that I am, since this is, in fact, a personal blog.

So after a solid 6 years, soon The Whimsical Cottage will be renovated.

Summer Reading & Recent Art

I've been piddling around the house, doing more reading that arting recently, as I re-read Harry Potter for the umpteenth time. This has become a Summer Reading ritual of sorts for me and it's always amazing how much I either forget year to year or discover in the depths of the books. On this read-through, I'm finding myself short on patience with the Boy Who Lived, finding him to be more irritatingly self-centered than on previous read throughs. I'm nearly done with The Half Blood Prince, so I doubt my opinion will change this go-around, but next Summer will most likely be different.

Much like my art, my current moods tend to flavor my reading experiences. So right now, external forces have irritated me enough to cast poor Harry in an unfavorable light. Ah well, there's always the solid love I have for Snape to fall back on. That will never change, fear not, Fictional Boyfriend!

All that aside, I have made little pockets of time to sketch, paint and work in my art journal - which has once again, been sorely neglected.

First off, is a wee body sketch in the Moleskine.

Several years ago, I doodled my first person in my sketchbook like this one. At that time, I was sitting on a bus heading towards the Metropolitan Museum of Art for my Art History class in college. A friend was sitting with me and we were chatting while I doodled. It started with a form, that I fucked up while shading, that I had sketched out with an inky Pilot pen. I decided, rather than scrap the piece, I'd work with the fuck up to shade her in. And thus, this style of sketching started for me.

Some people have remarked that it looks like musculature, and that may be true, but it's highly inaccurate, because I don't try to follow the patterns of musculature. So much as those of light and dark. This newest one ended up getting arms in the end, but I sort of wish I had left them off. I liked her better without them. Ah well, that's what sketching in the Moleskine is about to me though; experimenting, letting go and not really caring if it looks like shit in the end.

My much neglected altered journal got some attention the other day. Now, before you feel horrible for the poor thing, let me explain the cause of my neglect. This book has been my journal for over 5 years, it is 500+ pages long and the 1960's pleather spine of the poor thing is threatening to burst open like a cicada shell should I stick any more ephemera on to its pages! After speaking with some friends the other night (thank you for your input, guys!) and looking up some tutorials on how to remove and re-attach the covers with a larger and less flimsy spine, I'm confident that I will be able to finish the book instead of leaving it with 160 blank pages.

And so, I pulled it out, opened it up and drew an immediate blank as to what to work on. Never to be forced to put something away by lack of inspiration, I pulled out an envelope I keep s collection of small word cutouts in and chose a word at random to serve as my jumping off point. The word I drew? "Drowning".

At first I had dark images going through my head, but I pulled paper scraps and images from my collection based on what appealed to me and let the page shape itself. The images were laid down and I was content with just that, but as I cleaned up my collection of paper a page from Homer's The Odyssey caught my eye and as I scanned it, the phrase "Wine-Dark Sea" and word "husband" leapt out at me. And so, the phrase on the page came to be:

"I escaped to the wine-dark sea, there my husband awaits."

A wee bit eerie how it came back around to drowning in the end, romanticized or not, huh?

And last but not least, a finished piece that I started back in March. She's watercolor and Micron pen on watercolor paper and heavily influence by the work I've been doing with acrylic over the past year. The same style doesn't translate as well to watercolor, but I like her just the same.

Her name is HeartSight, for those curious. :)

A Wee Nod

Joe put this odd little tarot deck in my stocking this year for me to use in my mixed media work (the minors look like playing cards and I typically don't like a severe lack of symbolism for reading). After posting earlier I decided to journal about my word of the year and figured, what the heck, let's pick a card to go with it. This is who showed up.

Nods from the Universe, little signs that I'm on the right path.

Pagan Art Journal: Green Men and Wild Women

It's been a while since I've really sat down to work in any of my art journals. Mostly it's been because I've been feeling burned out; my days have held very little spiritual time lately, consisting primarily of working, eating and sleeping. But like I said in my farewell to 2011 I have a good feeling about 2012 and plan to get into the nitty gritty and really let the essence of me shine through; I'm not letting anything suck the life out of me or send me to the shits anymore.

And so, a return to art and to journaling is in order. While I was planning on working on something in my giant art journal, the wee book I've dedicated to becoming my pagan art journal called out to be used instead. I suppose my spirit wanted time for both art and spirituality, how could I deny it?

This spread was originally the beginning of a background which would house my thoughts on Yule. However, when I looked at the greens and yellows, I saw someone there. And as I looked further, I realized there were two someones. I worked over the areas without conscious thought, in thin layers of white paint and revealed there lords of the green and growing things:

This page was absolutely magical for me to work on, as the faces emerged I felt energized. In my practice, the Lord and Lady of the Greenwood are the two deities with whom I work most frequently and with whom I most connect. They call to me from the deep woods, from the gardens, they reveal themselves to me in the flicker of leaves. It is their cycles and spaces with which I am most in tune and where I am most at peace.

Then this past week, while on my lunch break at work, I had the urge to write a sort of ode to Wild Woman. And so I scribbled on the back of an envelope and once home broke out the journal. I began to sketch and once pleased, inked the line work and painted the pages. I wanted to convey both night and day as well as Earth and Sky in the color work, so the page is colorful and a bit mottled. I've opted to keep the illustrations white for now because I like the contrast with the background:

The text, a reminder and call to all daughters of the Wild Woman:

I am that which dwells in the deep forest, the music of rivers, the scent of moss and mud. I am the glint you recognize in the stars, the changing seasons, the running wolf. I am the soaring hawk and the delicacy of a feather. I am that which tugs at your feet, urging you to dance, to run and the sing your songs from mountain tops. I draw you to bask in sun and to quest by moon. I am Wild Woman, I am all around and within you.

I needed this reminder and somewhere out there, I know someone else will too. Be well, my lovelies.

Work in Progress Wednesday - WOTY

My most recent page in my pagan art journal, a spread dedicated to the Wheel of the Year. I'll go into further detail when I share the finished page. This shows one of the ways in which I work things up though. Coat the old book page in paint, sketch in pencil, ink over it and don't really clean up the pencil all that much. You can click the image above to view it larger.

Catching Up With the 'Ole Altered Journal

It's been so long since I've worked in my altered journal, the big old Reader's Digest Anthology that has been my big journal of everything for the past three years. I finally sat down this week to scan some of the pages I did back in January, as well as create a page for the beer fest we went to last weekend since I collected some seriously great paper goodies while we were there.

I also, much to my chagrin, finally finished up a page I sketched out while Joe and I were on our honeymoon (nearly three years ago). I'm now officially 280 pages into the 536 page book. To be fair though, I have ripped probably 20 pages out and glued others together to keep the binding from exploding.

Being as how it's been a good long time since I shared anything from this journal and I'm working in my pagan art journal with only paint and ink rather then collage, I'd share some of the pages I've done in 2011.

(click on any of these to see them larger on Flickr.)

Inspired by time with the lovely and siblings over Christmas; I'm the one grinning like a dork. Includes some wrapping paper, stamps and bits of cards people sent me.


Celebrating my participation in and completion of the 2011 Sketchbook Project and my theme 'Nightmares'. What is the Fear in Your Heart?


This one was done back when I had a relapse of my eye issue back at the end of March, beginning of April. I had just gotten home from the doctor and was emotionally overwhelmed, exhausted and looked to my journal for comfort. I put no real thought into this; just grabbed my charcoal sticks and various acrylic paints and let myself go. No brushes, no sketching. Highly therapeutic, a bit ugly and not sure what the hell I squiggled on there.


My tribute to the fabulous beer festival. No real explanation needed I think. Watercolor, pen and various goodies.

You know I couldn't leave you without showing you what took me nearly three years to go ahead and color right? ;-) Here is the page I sketched out on our honeymoon:

That's right. Just married and riding a gods-damned unicorn! The image on the right is a postcard from a place we visited on our honeymoon. I chopped two pages down to just strip and glued it in between them then reinforced the flimsy tabs with bits of a card.

This book has gone on various travels and adventures with me and holds all sorts of memories, ideas and quirky tidbits I've encountered over the years. Now that I'm past the halfway point in it, I'm actually worried I'll fill it up soon. How weird is that?

Believe and Nature

I've been keeping up better then expected with the 52 Weeks of Pagan Art Journaling. In fact, it's been my retreat from stresses and I've put together a basket of supplies amidst the boxes in my dining room and keep the book itself either in the basket or on my bookshelf so I can work on it even if folks are sleeping late and I can't get to my desk. It's my bit of alone time, even if I'm working at the dining room table; I put on my headphones and work. It's funny how headphones have become a sort of universal symbol for 'leave me alone' or 'I'm working'. My husband actually has a pair at work that he sometimes puts on when he has a lot of work to get done and doesn't want to be disturbed unless it's important - sometimes he doesn't even plug them in, just puts them on.

More on topic, I've finished a few more pages in my journal based on the topics 'I believe' and 'Nature'.

I Believe...

A page that speaks to just a few of the things I believe to be true or to hold value. Initially, riding the coat-tails of February's fairy fever I was going to devote the page to the wee folk however when I sat down to paint I was called to greens and blues and the Earth Mother and Sky Father took shape on the pages.

As a witch, I've always focused heavily on balance and the dichotomy of the Divine as relates to the God and Goddess/Male and Female aspects of Nature. Even before Lugh whispered to me that I should honor and work with him and I had no specific male deity that I worked with, I honored the God along with the Goddess during rituals and blessings.

I believe in divinity, in balance, in love, in magic and most importantly; in myself.

Nature

As you can tell from my previous art journal post nature is at the forefront of my path and has already played heavily in my journal. To keep from being redundant with my pages, I decided to use this page to highlight why I choose old novels to hold my journals. I blocked out this particular page with acrylics leaving only the blurb:

"This book has been produced
for the conservation of paper, metal and other essential materials."

You'll notice the block of white between the two sentences where it seems something was previously written? It was initially a line about government regulations which I chose to emit. I reclaim old discarded books for my journals in an effort to reduce the amount of wasted paper, if I don't buy a new book and keep an old one out of the landfill then I've made a teeny tiny step to conserve our natural resources. The government doesn't mandate that I do such and so I chose to white the line out.

I chose to keep the artwork simple, merely highlighting a small part of the reason I try to protect and do as little harm as possible to Nature. Nature is about connections; it is to be revered, protected, admired and nurtured. If you sit still, listen and watch Nature can teach you, or offer a safe quiet place to lean when you need it.

So my dearies, you know a bit about what I believe as well as a little bit about what role Nature plays in my path. What does 'I Believe' and 'Nature' spark in you? Feel free to share here in the comments or on your own blog, but be sure to leave me a link in the comments if you do so that way I can come visit!

Pagan Art Journaling

After a bit of thumb twiddling when the idea was first announced, I decided to join the 52 Weeks of Pagan Art Journaling at Aradia's Cauldron. If you haven't heard about it, click the link on my sidebar to see what it's all about.

For lack of a better terminology, I am a shameless journal whore. Be it art journals, sketch journals or written journals; I love each and every type and have at least one that I'm working on at any given point. It just so happens that this was the reason why I wasn't going to join this journal fun originally. I've been slacking enough in my massive art journal (which I've hit the official halfway mark of 250 pages in) but as serendipity would have it I found the perfect old book from the 1940's that I got for free at a book sale while cleaning up my shelves. It's small at 4"x6" and only has 141 pages.

Some folks hate that I work in old books, but I'd much rather give them a new life then see them end up in the landfill or the fireplace! So, with no further rambling, here are my first two pages based on Aradia's prompts:

Intention: What are my intentions, what do I hope to get out of this experience?


Heart: What fills my heart? How do I feel about love and how does it relate to my pagan path?

(Why yes, that is indeed an anatomical heart merged with an acorn.)

I've decided to go all art with no collage in this book for two reasons. The first being that I want to keep from stretching and destroying the binding like I did in my other art journal and the second is so that the only things that are put into this book flow freely and entirely from within myself. I'm tackling each of these pages with no preconceived ideas of what I might like to put on them; I lay down a layer of thick acrylic to cover the text (I seem to be out of Gesso) then grab my pencil and just sketch. Once done, I make a sloppy watercolor mess (as watercolor does not absorb into acrylic at all).

So far, I'm really enjoying the project and I fully intend to journal if anything pops into my mind outside of the prompts as well.

Will you be joining in as well?

Camp Journal Pages

July has passed by with the arrival and too swift passing of Lughnasadh, but I'm going to keep sharing pages and tips with all of you as I have them and hope you'll continue your journaling journey as well. I've had such a wonderful time stopping by and visiting all of you and seeing what you've created, everyone's journals have been unique and beautiful!

When we went camping last weekend I brought a pouch with several colored pencils, a few pens, my moleskin sketchbook and my journal. I left the paints, glue sticks, scissors, etc. at home and just did some sketching. Once I came home I added color and very few embellishments. Here they are:

This one is about the deer who visited our campsite, who appeared to be adorable and gentle but ended up being jerks. First, they stole our fruit when we had our backs turned. Then while we slept that night and had locked all of our food into our cooler and a sturdy plastic tote, they proceeded to ransack our camp site. They chewed holes in our water bladder, rendering it useless. They also scattered our dishes around in the dirt and knocked our lantern off of the picnic table denting it but blessedly not breaking the glass.

We have never, ever had issues with wildlife being pests or disturbing our campsite before so I chalk this up to campers leaving food out or feeding the deer a bit too frequently. When they thought I had food they let me get within a foot of them, but once they realized I wasn't going to give them handouts they bolted.

Anyway, the writing reads 'Deer will steal your heart and your plums. When the plums are gone they'll ransack your camp. Deer are cute - but total jerks.'

The right page features a sketch I did quickly in my moleskin while munching on appetizers at a local restaurant. I colored it and glued it and some bits of an ad for the place in once I got home.

The left page are sketches of critters we saw, but that I was unable to snap a photo of. Once again, I drew them on the island but colored them once I was home.

Lastly, I did a sketch of the Hunting Island lighthouse.

We had planned to climb the lighthouse Monday morning before heading home, but unfortunately I had developed a sizable blister and didn't think I could make it up 170 stairs. Next time we go though, it'll be the first thing I do!

B is for a multitude of things...

Sometimes I enjoy journaling about random things and other times I journal about how I feel. My newest spreads are a good example of this...

The Letter B

B is for beige, blue, bear, black and white photos, Bettie Page, bridge, bicycle, bee, button, beer, ball of yarn, berries and birds. Oh, and bowler cap as demonstrated by Mister Bear.

B is also for 'Bad Tummy Feeling' which is the childish name I've given to the feeling I get in the pit of my stomach before something bad happens. A lot of peoples premonitions come to them via their 3rd eye in foresight, dreams or visions... mine comes to be like a sack of rocks jumbled with gas in my stomach. It has never, ever been wrong and I am having a tremendously bad fit of it today. So, like anyone with a stomach full of anxiety would do, I tried to distract myself. By making a page about it...

This is a mixture of watercolor, acrylic paint, felt tipped markers, a stamp and some vintage illustrations I printed out.

While I like the dark, dramatic colors and odd eyeballs in the 2nd page the subject matter of the first was definitely more cheerful.

Journaling on the Move

There comes a time in your journaling adventure when you may not want to leave your journal home while you go on trips, vacations or expeditions. Depending on your journal style and trip, art journaling on the go can be very simple.

Above are the things I typically take with me while traveling, except for the globe who normally stays home. I take my book and a small pencil pouch filled with a few basic items:

- Pencils
- Pen or two
- Felt tipped marker or two
- Craft knife
- Glue stick
- 2 to three paint brushes
- Small watercolor set

If I don't feel like I'll have the time to sit down and paint or want to travel extremely light I will sometimes paint the backgrounds of pages before I leave the house. While I'm on my trip I'll rip or cut up pieces of brochures and add them to ticket stubs, writings and doodles on the pages. This method can cut my on the go supply kit down to a glue stick, knife and pen.

Sometimes I'll leave the pages blank and the watercolors at home and see what I can come up with using only a few colored pencils, a pen and a glue stick. It's an interesting challenge to see what you can come up with in your journal with such a limited amount of supplies. Keep in mind, you can always add that missing accent or two when you've returned home.

The above journal page was done while I was camping in Eastern Pennsylvania. The drawings are simple pencil sketches and the leaves are all things I found and glued onto my page. The berries were simple outlines that I filled in with color using crushed berries.

Some other techniques to keep in mind when you're traveling with your journal and want to keep you packing light:

* You can antique your pages and give them that beige tinge with a used tea bag or spent coffee grounds. Go ahead and rub them on your page being careful not to accidentally ruin any of your previous work. If you let blobs of coffee grounds sit on the page for varying lengths of time you can acheive different shades of brown. Upi can use this technique for accenting the page or to create an entire background.

* You can blank out some pages (or sections of page) in your journal with white acrylic paint or gesso to create a blank drawing surface. Use this space to sketch things you see on your trip such as funky architecture, beautiful birds, seashells, a person riding the bus with you... anything you might want to document. A simplistic style can be cathartic and relaxing.

* Collect random bits and bobs from your day's activities and tear, cut or leave them whole and paste them into your journal to create a spur of the moment collage. Don't over think it, just go with it. This can be a raw and wonderful way to document your trip.

* Do you remember any techniques you used to create simple art as a child? Things like chalk rubbings, spore prints, berry dying? Try them out while you're on your trip!

I'll be spending my weekend camped out with the husband on Hunting Island State Park and my journal will be coming with me. With any luck I'll be returning with a few pages done and some sightings of varied wildlife, including alligators in the wild (yipes!). I'm hoping I'll have some good stories to journal about, but nothing involving reptiles anywhere near my tent! ;)

Resistance Painting

Today I thought I'd share with all of you lovelies a simple, but effective painting technique that I enjoy using in my journal as well as some of my mixed media artwork. It's called resistance painting and it is so simple that I learned to do it back in elementary school.

All you'll need is a good old waxy crayon and some watercolors. I personally like to use the often over looked white crayon on my pages to hold blank areas, but experiment to your heart's content with this!

Now that you have your crayon and your watercolors, grab your journal and doodle something with the crayon. Press hard to leave good solid waxy marks. If your pages are on the thin side, go over the same lines gently a few times. Good build up is key!

Then, take your watercolors and paint right over the entire area of page you want to be that color. If you're only using one color... paint the entire page.

Did you notice that your paint isn't sticking to particular parts of the page? Namely the parts you drew on with your crayon? Wax resists water, so while your paint may bead up on it, a gentle swipe with your finger, cloth or a dry brush will clean it up. This is a great method for keeping white space on a page, or for building up mediums.

You can use this technique for various effects, such as line work or blocking out large chunks of your page. If you only push gently on the crayon as you go, the lines will be less bright as there is less wax between your paint and paper and it will still bond to an extent.

Here are examples of a few pages I've used this technique for:

As background mushroom stems...


As the focal point of my design. If you click this one, you can view it larger and see where I pushed harder or more gently on the crayon as I drew.

Go ahead and give this a try. Let me know what you think!

Putting Together a Collage Page

In my journal I primarily work with a mixture of paints, inks and collage. I tend to be relatively systematic with this style of page, as in there are 3-4 steps or more depending on how in depth the layering on my page will ultimately end up being.

I've outlined the steps I took to create my newest page and am sharing it for anyone who is interested in how my pages evolve or is curious about how to get started on their own pages:

Step 1: Base Layer

Typically the base layer consists of just the big blotches of watercolor paint that will become the background. I scanned this a step later in the process after I had added some simple ink outlines and a few more touches of watercolor.

Step 2: Collage Layer 1

This is my main collage layer. Pieces I glue down here are typically the biggest, chunkiest elements on my page.

Step 3: Collage Layer 2

Not much has changed in this step, but you can see that I've added my smaller collage elements as well as a chunky element that I wanted on my top layer. If you click on this image it will take you to my Flickr page where you can view it larger.

Step 4: Final Touches

If you wanted to do more than 2 layers of collage, those steps would come before the finishing touches. Here you can see I've added a few final inky phrases and details, such as writing on the wee polaroid photos, the departure and arrival time of my move and other statistics. I've also added a heart shaped button over my home and a shiny star over my new town. I also added a piece of rick-rack to help frame out and balance my spread.

I hope this is helpful and that you're all having a great time working in your journals so far!

What is an art journal and what do I put in it?

Welcome to the first day of Journaling in July! I hope you'll join me as I pick up my book and create. My goal is to have at least 4 pages done this month. That's one per week, so I hope you will all strive to meet that goal with me! Post your pages on your blogs as you finish and at the end of the month I'll share them all here for everyone to see! If you're going to be journaling along and you don't see your name on the side bar, or it doesn't link to the correct blog (I know some of you have a few) let me know. Let's all try to visit each other throughout this process. Encouragement is key. :)

Are we ready to embark on our adventure? Good! Onward to the information!

An art journal can be any number of things to a person. It can be a pictorial diary, cataloging daily adventures and ponderings letting pictures speak instead of words. An art journal can be a travel journal filled with tickets and photos or writings about trips, a dream journal to record the ones you remember, a day planner of sorts filled with things as mundane as the weather and as lofty as your goals. It could even be your Grimoire or a place to simply try out art techniques and styles. It can be all of those things or none of them.

The beauty of art journals is that they are completely 100% your own. Do what you will! You can have one ultra large journal like I do and put all sorts of things in it, or you can keep several small journals with individual themes. I drag my book every where with me. You never know when you'll be struck by inspiration.

As for the type of book you use, that's another one of those personal preference deals. Some folks use sturdy sketchbooks, some use journals they made themselves from recycled paper, some (like me!) use old books that they find at garage sales.

Personally, I enjoy the fact that using a book filled with text adds another dimension to my work. I'm also a big fan of the fact that I'm repurposing something that would otherwise have ended up in the trash. The down side to using an old book is the pages are thin and don't always hold up so well to large quantities of paint. To get around this, I like to glue two pages together to double the thickness.

As for what to put in your book? Anything your little heart desires! You can use magazine clippings, paint, fabric, computer print-outs, ticket stubs and journal about anything that flits through your mind.

However, if you're anything like me, jumping into an all new project completely blind may lead to creative shutdown. To prevent that from happening lets take it slow.

Firstly, what sort of journal are you looking to keep?
- An all purpose journal housing a hodgepodge of everything?
- A day to day journal with doodles and paint and writings about your day
- A Dream Journal
- A nature journal
- An experimental journal for art techniques
- A themed journal which creates a story over time (Put your own spin on an old fairy tale perhaps?)
- A travel journal, chronicling your worldly adventures
- A travel journal, chronicling your emotional adventures, struggles and triumphs
- A Book of Shadows or Grimoire, with pages devoted to deities, holidays, etc
- Something completely new and unusual!

Don't stress this part too much, ok? I did and it kept me from starting my journal for a solid two months. If you aren't sure where you'd ultimately like to go with journaling, go with option 1... a hodgepodge, limitless book where you put no restrictions on yourself. You can always start another book, or two, or three later and if you absolutely hate a page, you can always collage, paint and re-journal over it!


Now that you have an idea about the types of journals some people keep, what the heck do they put in them? Well, anything pertaining to the theme of their journal really.

If your journal doesn't have a theme, even better because you can put anything your heart desires in there! Each page can be about something completely new and different. Every page can have a completely new technique and medium on it.

Here is a list of themes to get you started. Some are ideas and some are techniques, art styles and color theories:

A Foreign Language
Acorns
Adventure
Black and White
Bugs
Chakras
Circles
Circus
Collage
Comic Books (either the story or the style of)
Curiosity
Cut Outs
Crytozoology
Dreams
Fairies
Fairy Tales
Fear
Flight
Forest
Home
Hope
Melancholy
Monochromatic (A single color only!)
Mushrooms
Music
Mystery
Mythology
Nature
Ocean
Primary Colors
Psychedelic
Quotes and Sayings
Rain
Rainbow
Reading
Sabbats
Science Fiction
Secret Door
Self Esteem
Sleep
Stars
Stripes
Surrealism
Tea Party
the number 13
Time
Turtles
Vintage
Watercolor
Weather
Whimsy
Witches
Words

If you're indecisive like me, a good trick is to put all the suggestions into a hat and pick one or two (or three if you're really adventurous) to use on your page! You can always put them back into the pile for next time or put them aside until you've worked through several themes. If there are some themes you'd like to see on the list, let me know and I'll add them.

Let the creating begin!

For anyone interested, the journal page I posted at the top is a completely random one I did after picking the themes 'vintage' and 'psychedelic' out of a hat. See what sort of funny little things a list and a hat can create?

Journal Supplies and a Bummer

Today's been kind of a bummer. It started out when I rolled out of bed on my day off with a killer migraine. After my headache had begun to subside I hopped online to check my email because today is the day I hear back about the craft show I applied to after much badgering from my husband to do so. I'm tremendously shy when it comes to these sorts of things and as such have never applied before. I went ahead and did it, fully expecting to be rejected, as it's a juried show with only 50 spaces available.

I clicked on the email from the committee and sure enough, I didn't make it in. And although I'm proud that I made the effort to apply and was expecting to lose out to more experienced crafters on the show circuit, I'm still a bit bummed out.

Luckily though, I had many lovely comments on my tea party post to cheer me right up and my Journaling in July blog party to distract me. Speaking of which, I'm so happy that quite a few people are going to journal along with me! Anyone who wants to join in, just let me know and feel free to snag the blog button on the original post and on my sidebar.

While the real meaty entries will begin on my 1 year blog-o-versary on July 1, Dirgesinger had a very good question I'd like to address... what exactly do you need to join in the journaling mayhem?

You will need:

A Book
Any sort of book will do! From a sketchbook, to an book you picked up at a sale but will never read, to a moleskin notebook. If you're comfortable with making art in this book, it's the book for you!

Art Supplies
This can be anything at all! What are you comfortable working with? What do you have laying around? Anything from crayons, to magazine clippings to paints will do.

What do you want to use in your journal? Do you enjoy painting? Do you enjoy collaging or mixed media? Do you want to try out something completely out there? Go gather up whatever it is you might want to use and use it!

The last and final thing you'll need is... your imagination and a willingness to give this a shot.

That's it. Short and sweet. :)

Journaling in July, Will you be joining in?

Do any of you like to journal but often times not feel like writing? Ever have those days when you need to get something down but can't find the words? Do you just want something a little more tactile and messy than blogging? Maybe you just need a few minutes every now and then to absorb yourself in something just for you?

Any of those ring true?

Well my dears, perhaps you should try out the wonderful world of art journaling! Don't you even dare think you aren't creative or paper crafty enough, I won't listen to it. Don't give me any nonsense about having nothing to journal about either because there is inspiration everywhere.

I began journaling two years ago when an artist named Phizzychick began an altered journal along over on craftster. A small group of us got together and brainstormed themes and techniques and shared the pages we created. It was a wonderful introduction to this awesome medium and I was going strong on my book until this past fall when I began to neglect the poor thing. That ends now. I'm going to attempt to work on one spread a week, if not more and I'm hoping this post will inspire at least one of you to join me while I 'Journal in July'.

I'd like to offer you all the same sort of introduction I had. If you're already journaling, jump in and join us! Post what you're up to in your own blogs and feel free to snag the button for the blog party.

I'll be sharing information including what the heck an art journal is, techniques, supply gathering, themes and inspirations throughout the month of July.

Let me know if you'll be journaling along with me let me know, I'll put your name over on my side bar! All you need to participate is a book of some sort, art supplies, a sense of adventure and an open mind!

If there is anything specific you'd like to hear about or if there are any theme ideas you'd like to see on the big list of theme ideas that will be in the first post leave me a comment. Anything from supplies to art styles to a specific word to a more general theme is fair game, so let's brainstorm.

Who's Journaling In July?


Alpha Betsy

Andréann

Anna

Antitwilightsang

A Pink Dreamer

Bird

Bleumoon

Dirgesinger

Faerwillow

Justine

KJ McLean

K.Michelle

Mama Jen

Mel

Lisa

Lisa Plummer

One Pink Fish

Róisín

Sydnee

The Blakk Duchess

ZombieQueen

A change, will do you good

Happy Sunday, Valentine's Day, Chinese New Year, Evening lovelies! The past two weeks have been a flurry of emotions ranging from excitement to terror to anxiety and I've been neglecting my blog and most internet activities in general.

I had a birthday Wednesday that was marked by the most snowfall New Jersey has received in years. While the snowfall kept me from going to see the Tim Burton art exhibit at the MoMa in NYC, I still made the most of my day. The lovey and I played in the snow, ate strawberry cake with dinosaur sprinkles and he was even sweet enough to make me dinner. So all in all, a good day.

We're still waiting to see what will happen with our living situation. At the current moment, I'm positive we will be packing up and heading south but I'm refusing to start packing until lovey has signed papers and has a start date. As it stands right now, we will be traveling to South Carolina on Thursday night so he can meet with the HR rep to 'finalize the paperwork' on Friday and we can look at apartments. We'll be returning with a verdict and a game plan late Sunday night. I'll also be holding a huge moving sale in my Etsy shop if we get a 'yes' on Friday.

I'm still breathing. Thank you all so much for all of your support and kindness on the last post. :) I'll have some artwork, photos and pagan posts soon enough!

Art Journalling And Preparations

I finished up two new pages in my art journal today, bringing my total new pages up to six. Now, when I count pages in terms of art, I count by subject matter. So a two leaf spread to me counts as one page. No? Too bad!

In the normal world of page counting, I'm 173 pages into my 537 page book. Still a long way to go! To be fair though, the pages are sort of flimsy, so I sometimes glue 2 pages together to double the thickness. With the amount of bulge going on in the book already, I don't know if I'll be able to fill all the pages without it looking like one of those vintage Reader's Digest Christmas Trees. I may need to just start painting and using thin paper bits on a lot of pages instead of collaging everything. We'll see.

For the mister's birthday


Gypsies


Asbury Park, NJ


Page about the Protests in Iran after their election.


The Letter A


Magpies, based around a fortune from a cookie.


Detail. The fortune reads 'Where your treasure is, there is your heart'.

We're going camping this weekend and I plan to bring my journal along. Hopefully I'll get some journalling done. I just need to remember to bring my book, small watercolours, pen and a glue stick. Never know what you'll find to glue in your journal.