Art Journaled Quotes

I love quotes.  

I love how a few words can come together to make an impact-filled statement.

And lately, I love combining favorite quotes I come across with a little bit of artistry to create my art journal pages.  

I whole-heartedly agree with Dieter Uchtforf's declaration that the desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul.  I feel it in myself.  When I am impatient, short-tempered, tired, unmotivated it's nearly always because I have pushed creating aside.  I remember that I need to refuel my soul--need to recharge by spending time with paints, paper, glue, yarn, the camera; need to get messy and just create something.  Anything.

This week I brought some paints, brushes, pens, bubble wrap, and some collage items to my parents' when I visited my brother.  I was deeply hoping that he would join me in creating some art.  He was a talented sketcher when he was younger, and I'm sure that gift is still within him.  He wasn't ready yet, but I created this:

Art Journaling--it's therapeutic

My heart and mind have been so heavy with thoughts of my brother.  I decided to set them free and put some of them to paper in my art journal.  Here are the results from one day of free therapy:

Thank you Michelle, for helping me see this as a "middle moment" in my life.

I had a clear vision for this page with red surrounded by darkness to tell the story of my brother's injury.

And after I got those two pages out of me, I was ready to move onto the light and colorful: 

a couple of mandalas with pen and watercolor:

Created the top one while the boys were at school, and the bottom one with them drawing at the table with me.  It reminded me that we need to take more time to create together, inspiring each other.

Then on Friday, I quickly did up this page in response to Ali Edwards' Creative Lifts prompt 

Did it completely spur of the moment, without censoring or over-thinking.  Art journals are perfect for that.

Then I have this page sitting in my journal waiting to be finished:

Broke out the light board and graph paper for this b/c sometimes I like to measure and get all analytical and engineer-y (get that from my dad).  

Thanks for letting me share my art journal with you!

Hugs!

Art Journal Wks 4-6

Art journaling.

I'm so green...and unsure.

But I'll keep creating them because I can't give up

I want to fill up this book

I want to play without any rules

I want to learn and try new techniques

Someday I want to have beautiful art like these

For now, here are the past three weeks (and yes, that means I am all caught up!)

Week Four:

The base is pages torn from a holiday Anthropologie catalog.  I simply added in some sketched stars with a Sharpie, and then colored in  some of them with shades of colors (also Sharpies)

Week Five:

This page began as a little experiment with some 7Gypsies color washes I've had for forever.  I tried to make the drips look better by outlining them with black pen.  I didn't like it so I gessoed over it.  Then found string writing on Donna Downey's blog and decided that would be perfect to cover over the mess I had made.

Week Six:

  Just playing with some new mists and the negative leftover from punching the hearts for week 5.  Oh, and some new Smash washi tape--love, love!

 And I'll leave you with these photos of my new baker's twine stash.

Have a beauty-filled day!

Art Journal Week 3

My littlest guy and I took some time to create last week--I in my art journal, and he on a painted birdhouse.

Here's an Instagram of our beautiful mess:

And here's my week three page:

Played around with crayon pastels (the little old Crayola kind), some watercolor paint (again, Crayola), and writing with a fine brush and acrylic.  I like doing that, but need to practice to get a more consistent line.  

2012 Art Journal

My dear artist friend gave me a beautiful art journal last year for my birthday.  It has sat on my shelf in wait of the perfect project.  

This is it. 

 This year I hope to create a page a week.  One page, seven days, fifty-two times.  I can do this.

week one:

week two:

For these first two weeks, I was inspired by two quotes that I had found recently.

I'm excited for this project--looking forward to seeing how my art journal evolves over the year and to try out some new-to-me techniques and products.

creatively productive happiness!

Happy Monday!  I have a few projects from the weekend to share with you today.  

 A frame:

Papers from Scrapbook Heaven April Kits, Stamps from Stampin' Up!, Rosette Die from Tim Holtz for Sizzix

A little art journaling with office supplies--reinforcements and circle labels:

Flowers from Prima, Butterfly Punch from Martha Stewart

Doodles and Watercolor Crayons:

A layout for Paper Craft Planet's Scrappy Sunday challenge.

Product from Scrapbook Heaven's April Kits

 A card for Clean and Simple Challenge via Paper Craft Planet

Product from Scrapbook Heaven's April Kits

I {heart} creatively productive weekends!

Art Journal Friday

Went all week with hardly anything to show in my art journal.  Week two would be way to early to flake on this commitment, so I grabbed some watercolor paints and dusted off the chalks to create a couple of pages:

First, I need to say that I can not draw for beans (ok, maybe I didn't really need to say that, you can see for yourself).  It makes me sad to think that as child I really didn't care for art class.  There was a lot of drawing involved, and drawing frustrated me.  My eyes played tricks on me and my hand wouldn't listen.  I could never get my drawings to match what I saw in my head.  I gave up on "art."  As an adult, I still can't draw, but I have learned to embrace my non-drawing-self.  And every so often I'll put pen to paper and attempt a little drawing.  I've learned to be OK with whatever the outcome is.  Maybe someday I'll take a drawing class...

 
Tried out some new Smooch Spritz earlier this week.  Did some drips and some ink blowing, splatted a bit of metallic and pearl alcohol inks.  Really just throwing some mess down.  Just a little experiment.  Got me thinking about these mediums a bit, and got me inspired to try out some other ideas I have.  Sometimes you just need to play with no real concern for the outcome--that's the beauty of an art journal.

Happy Friday!  Hope you will take some time to play with your creative side this weekend!

Art Journal Friday

I am declaring Friday to be Art Journal day on my blog (at least for February).  I like to take these things in small doses.  I know I can't last with the photo a day thing, so I do it for a month.  Or the word of the year, mine is a month.  It's not that I'm easily bored, or that I might run out of ideas.  I guess I'm kind of a commitment-phobe.  Or, there are just too many ideas out there and I like to try as many as I can, and let's face it 24 hours in a day is just not enough time!  Anyway, onto this week's art journal.


I was super inspired by the new SMASH product from EK Success Brands, and their super cool video, so I made a smash page of stuff from my desk.  I didn't get up from my seat (rare for me, I usually create standing up), everything was within arms reach--it was helpful that my desk was a mess when I made this!

Lot's of little pieces of creative nothingness.  I love that most of the stuff on this page would have been tossed in the trash, but now it has a forever home.


I actually did two pages this week, in my effort to catch-up from a bad art journal January.  This page's background is torn from an Anthropologie catalog, dry brushed with white acrylic, and then I wrote and doodled around the edges.  My doodles are a work in progress.

If you are looking for more art journal inspiration, visit Julie Fei Fan Balzer's blog.

Art Journal Week One

I have not forgotten about this project, I just haven't worked out a way to fit it into my schedule.  It's like anything else: exercise, quality time with the hubby, reading a good book; creative time has to be worked into the schedule.  I'm pretty settled on the idea that I'll create a page for my art journal every week.  I may be able to create that page in one sitting, or it may take me all week to get 'er done, but I think one a week is an admirable and achievable goal. 


Here's my page from week one:

It's a page from Jessica Sprague's Inspiration Everywhere class.  The bottom portion of the page is a booklet that opens to hold a list of my New Year's resolutions.  I'll keep adding to this list throughout the month, and heck maybe I'll keep it ongoing throughout the year.  Who says resolutions have to just be for New Years?!

Create Everyday

One of my resolutions (yes, I love to set resolutions) for 2011 is to be creative everyday.  I feel like I already do this, in one form or another.  Sometimes it's an entire layout, or a card, or an embellie for a future project, or a bit of crochet.  A lot of the time it might be an entire project, but sometimes it's just a little something that let's me say at the end of the day, "I was creative today."

Tonight I am so thrilled to have visited Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's blog (I just adore her art) and found her endeavor for 2011:

Oooooh, I am giddy with excitement.  I've never kept an actual art journal.  I've done a few pages here and there, and they're scattered in different books and journals that lay unfinished (I'll share them sometime if I get brave).  But I've never kept an art journal for an extended period of time, and certainly not one that I worked on daily.  This is my year, and if it might be your year, too, please join me (and the hundreds of others).  I'm so excited to see where this leads!