Art Journaling Every Day
March just got away from me!No excuses! I posted a link over at The Divas – if you want to see more tangles check out the list over there.
The kids had an extended Spring break and then March was over! I can tell from the number of days I didn’t tangle – or didn’t manage to finish a tangle – that we did not chill out together at the end of the day. This is good and bad – good because it meant that we mostly dropped into bed and conked out at the end of an adventurous day…bad, well not bad, but I didn’t do as many tangles.
I showed you March 1 through 3 at the end of February, so here I started out strong, trying out several new patterns. 
Kept going into the second week – tracking new patterns and trying to ‘string’ several squares (or tiles) together – still having fun. Then we ran into a performance with a couple of extra rehearsals leading into it…great performance, but I missed several days.
I didn’t have time to look up new stuff, but carried the tangle-a-day calendar and a pen with me so I could still do bits at a time.
Tried to make a Shamrock out of hearts for St. Patrick’s Day and then didn’t do much again until the following week. Then I ran away with a girl friend to a Tai Chi workshop – we did a lot of Tai Chi – and we did a lot of other things too. Sadly…
the tangle-a-day wasn’t one of the things. 
Hmm, well one thing I’m getting is that I did more tangles than I thought I did. I guess the press to make one a day makes what you didn’t do – more significant than what you did! No Zen there. Sheesh. 
Again no time for looking up patterns, but these were pretty fun and just came together out of my head (and hand).
I got caught without a good pen so was reduced to lots of spaces…but I liked it in the end. On Easter we went on our annual First Hike of Spring and were gone from dawn to dusk…nothing left over for drawing.
Hope spring is making you feel happy and rejuvenated…thanks for reading.
Absolute CHAOS here! What with moving the studio/office (still unpacking), fomenting fun over at Art Camp for Women and updating that website, getting my first art and post together for the design team at Artistcellar and adapting to getting kids to school, chorale and dinner on a full time basis…I suspect you have heard before how much I dislike being bored. HA!
So to make sure I am still having fun I have signed up for about 6 classes online…what was I thinking, uh, who was thinking…
Someone gave me a Gelli Plate
Today I want to show you what I am doing in a quickie class with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer. Julie is doing a whole series of “Getting Started with…” classes. You can buy the series or a single class. This class, Getting Started with GelliPlates, is a ridiculously reasonable price and so far – packed with how to-s, tips and ideas.
Could I write on those wavy lines?
I am always looking for ways of making the elements needed in my art journaling. This is lesson #1 so it was just practicing and using things we already had to make designs.
Figuring out how much paint to use and how hard to press in
Most of this lesson I printed on deli paper. If you buy it at Costco you get 1000 sheets for around $10.00 and they don’t have the fold in the paper like you get from anywhere else. I recommend going halvsies with a friend…that is a LOT of paper.
This was about the 3rd print on this plate basically to clean the paint off
I got a little bit obsessed (Can you be a little bit obsessed?) with making lines that would work to write on later as a journal page.
Well I’m off to play some more. I will do my best to post more from this class – if you are wavering-just do it.
Most of you know that I am part of Art Camp for Women. In October we had the huge privilege of working with two fantastic women artists Kelli Nina Perkins and Carla Sonheim. You can see more about the classes on the Art Camp Facebook page and in our blog.
It was kind of hard to make that first cut!
BUT – today I want to show you the “Purse Journal” that I made in Kelli’s class. We made the journals using a random collection of maps, dictionary pages, water color paper, directories etc. sewn into covers made from our self-portraits. We sewed them together with a simple pamphlet stitch and added ribbons and charms as dingle-bobs.
Yes, the dingle-bobs are caught in my teeth.
My g-kids moved in with us this summer and I find myself waiting for them here and there and everywhere. The little self-portrait journal is the ideal size for a little art-on-the-go. You know, sometimes its 15 minutes and sometimes 2 hours of waiting.
I always have a few pens in my purse...
My car art kit is getting a big upgrade this week [as I am using it a LOT as the remodel* goes on] so I will be pages and pages, may be even finished when you see this post.
The teabag was in my purse too - so a pocket was born.
The different page and paper types occurring in such a random fashion also add dimension to this silly little journal. AND instead of fretting and begrudging the time in the parking lots and coffee shops, I find myself looking forward to the waiting periods – scheduled and unscheduled alike!
* remodel update the cold slowed the floor down but we have warmed up again so moving right along.
Insulation in - red concrete poured and curing under board and black plastic.
Colliding ideas make me happy!
Idea number one: Dye the white muslin cushion covers for my office couch. I am moving my business office to the half of my studio that looks like a storage unit.
Idea number two: Use my hand-carved Large Leaf stamp to make a therma-fax screen and then use that on the couch cover.
Idea number three: Test the patterns in my Altered Ledger Journal that my Art Journaling Every Day encourages me to use!
Black patterns on green and white background
You have seen my large leaf stamp previously – the stamp I carved after being inspired by a fabric pattern I saw. I love the Large Leaf stamp so much that I carved a sister stamp in the shape of a Large Flower. My office couch has a black wooden frame and currently sports a red cover. But, when I bought the couch it came with an unbleached muslin cover as the standard cover. That cover now lives in a storage crate. How much would I love a small couch with this pattern on the cushions?
If you like that stamp pattern – how about making another?
Dahlia Stamp on Sponge-painted Background
The couch is quite small so I could probably get away with this wild pattern. Or maybe I will just do the pillows that are the back and leave the seat and armrests plain. Or make two pillows like one pattern and two pillows like the other! Oh the possibilities are endless.
I will have to clear out the space, put in new drywall and paint before the cushion project moves ahead by too much. So I have time to work out some ideas before that end play. In fact, what if I carved a dahlia stamp that was only an outline like the Large Leaf stamp and the Large Flower stamp? Hmmm?
Do you have an opinion? A preference? Another idea? I’m still in the inventing stages so just about anything can be considered. Makes the enormous job of moving the office kind of fun and challenging AND makes me want to get to it instead of putting it off!
I am still wildly in love with my Altered Ledger Journal. Even with Art Journaling Every Day – at the rate I am going – this book will last me into my eighties! 
- Altered Ledger Journal (Can you see these were the wild poppy pages?)
This set of pages is August up until now as I am making separate altered books for my California vacation and another one for my son’s wedding, so about 10 days of August are not here. Thus the spread only covers about 2 weeks worth of happenings as this is the 22nd.
I came back from vacation to three non-functioning printers – sigh. This has cramped my style because I cannot print photos for this spread or for my altered books. I am itching to put them all together and must wait for repairs.
Altered Journal Signature Removed
In the meantime I stopped stalling and figured out how to remove a full signature from the ledger. I was really worried about compromising the integrity of this sturdy old book so I borrowed a trick from Julie Fei-Fan Balzer (the trick of tape and gesso is in that post) and after removing the signature I taped over the inside seam with masking tape. I also added tape to the previous and following pages for extra strength.
Inside Seam Taped - I will seal with gesso too
I feel like the above page spread is just about finished so I have started doodling up the next set of pages. I have doodled in a tree for the Kingfisher to sit in and somewhere along the line I added some circle stamps.
Altered Ledger - Going in Circles
I expect I will be able to print within the next couple of days and will be able to show you the altered books as well as the first spread here with the last couple of images.
Thanks for reading.
Altered Ledger Art Journal – Art Journaling Every Day!
Altered Ledger Journal finished pages
Does this look familiar?
This book is working really well for my Art Journaling Every Day with Julie Fei-Fan Balzer.
I am going to California next week for my son’s wedding. Suddenly I am obsessed with nice clothes – sheesh. Once I got clear about what I want to wear by drawing some pictures and thinking about the weather I found several pieces for reasonable prices (free – but that’s another story). It hadn’t occurred to me to use my journal for thinking through something like wardrobe, but when journaling every day, it seems the natural place to figure it out.
I also carved my own ‘raindrops’ stamp because we had such a weird weather week with monsoon type rain. What better place to test it out than in my everyday journaling?
Multi-layers - starting with daily morning pages.
Morning Pages
With the pages above I started doing my modified morning pages on the gorgeous big ledger-sized paper. My version of morning pages alternate between 15-minute timed writes and doing one page. I have found several places through out the ledger that have one-third of the page left blank (15-minute write), as well as several sets of fully blank pages. So I will have plenty of these big creamy pages to fill over the next year. I no longer do three pages a day as per Julia Cameron’s prescription.
Now the pages start out looking like this
Morning pages script, a layer of gesso, a raised border and the first layer of color...
This is incredibly fun!
I cannot decide if it is because of the super-fine paper, the giant page size or just because I get such satisfaction from finding a new use for this gentleman of a book or maybe it is a combination of all those things.
The Ledger Journal
Big thanks to everyone who made suggestions on the last post about my Art Journaling Dilemma. I decided just to start and go from there. The book is so huge that I am sure I will change directions more than once before it is full, but I won’t get anywhere until I just start.
My plan is to decorate a few spreads ahead and then do my Art Journaling Every Day on the prepared pages.
The above spread was from a technique I learned from Carol Sloan at Art Camp for Women. She had us stencil and stamp with gesso, let dry, rub over with Distress Ink Pads and then burnish with a handy wipe. At least that is what I remember and I love – love – love the effect it gave on this page spread.
Ledger Journal beginning pages
Turns out that starting is WAY fun! This spread was stenciled with gesso and let dry, then sprayed over with Dylusions Ink Sprays from ArtistCellar. The Dylusions Ink Sprays are delicious colors and even have delicious names, such as Melted Chocolate, Lemon Zest, Bubblegum, Squeezed Orange just to name a few.
Ledger Leaf Spread
I first gesso stamped and sprayed this page. I was not satisfied with the pale markings so I re-stamped the chevrons and the leaf with white acrylic paint. I expect I will add many more layers but so far the first three page spreads have been fun, satisfying and I can’t wait for them to get dry!
Carol (Sloan) also suggested removing some pages and she is absolutely correct. Not only will it give me great ephemera for other mixed-media art, it will keep the binding from cracking. My altered ledger is already beginning to swell.
Pomegranate Stencil on Ledger
You may have noticed that this blog has been languishing for the last couple of months. Not only has it been WAY busy for Art Camp for Women, the outdoor weather is delicious – just made for playing, and I am working through some things with my Art Journaling.
Here is my Dilemma.
Parallel Lines Stencil-Orange
I want to make this ledger book into my next art journal. I want to tape and gesso the center seam ala Julie Fei-Fan Balzer and work on a double spread over the course of a week or so. The ledger is late 1800s and early 1900s and has the smoothest, most scrumptious writing tooth imaginable. It has absolutely no value as it is and no one has any historical interest in the entries. The book could conceivably last a couple of years worth of entries. So it is just perfect.
The Dilemma?
Tree Swallow in Rafters
Lately I have had a goal, more like an intention, to write everyday. I am often away from home so need to have a journal that is easy to pack along with me. I usually get the time and place to doodle and decorate my small pages as I travel along. Can you see me lugging the ledger along on a trip? Even a car trip has it’s limits! And I suspect the ledger would get as battered as the little Moleskines that ride in my purse.
What Would You Do?
Moleskine June 2012 - Painted and Doodled
Just in the in the process of writing this post I have come up with a few ideas.
- I could make a sturdy envelope pocket to put a Moleskine in when completed.
- I could pull the pages made while traveling and tape them between the appropriate pages in the ledger.
- I could haul along the ledger – not gonna happen.
Do you have any other ideas? Have you had this dilemma? What’s a girl to do? What would you do?
Linked to Julie Fei-Fan Balzer’s Art Journaling Every Day.
Aacckkk! Just too much to do once we get warm spring sunshine – sitting inside with the blog is just not going to happen in the daylight. Today we are having our third rainy day in a row so I may get caught up!
I am testing and practicing making sample covers for Art Camp for Women. See below for previews!
Stenciled and Collaged Art Journal Cover
This cover uses a Julie Fei-Fan Balzer stencil, Pan Pastels, and a collaged bird all sealed with gloss gel medium.
Stenciled and Sculpted
First I put down a layer of gesso, then stenciled with modeling paste. I used a stencil by Julie Fei-Fan Balzer from The Crafter’s Workshop, colored with Pan Pastels. I then tried some sculpting with an old credit card for more texture to the left. Then sealed it all carefully with gloss gel medium.
Textured and Stenciled Cover
On this cover I textured the gesso first and then stenciled with modeling paste. Again used Pan Pastels for the color and sealed with gloss gel medium. This stencil is an Artist Cellar design. I get The Crafter’s Workshop stencils and my Artist Cellar stencils through the ArtistCellar online store.
Organization Week has turned into Organize Every Week
Stamp Drawer with Foam Core Boxes
This week I made foam core boxes to organize my stamp drawer by using the tutorial my business partner, Lorri F wrote. I did not like making the boxes – but BOY do I love having my stamps organized in a way I can find them and use them easily.
The other organizing thing I did this week was to make a small chalkboard to leave my man a message when I run an errand.
Chalkboard message from the G-Kids
Chalkboard & Art
I painted the side of the cupboard with chalkboard paint and glued an old picture frame around the painted area. Then I hung it between my studio & my man’s office. This was a very fun project and I want to make chalkboards out of everything now.
