Art Journal – Plans Altered

Hello Everyone. When I started sharing my art journal journey with everyone I was hoping to post something a little more regularly than I have been. Life has been different than I had planned some of it was my doing; some of the other stuff was influenced by the outside world. It is times like those that get me to turn to my art journaling as a way to try and bring some calm back into my life even if the pages don’t go according to plan.

This page is a great example of a plan not turning out how you thought. Even now as I am blogging about this page I still don’t love the page.

The design that you can see through the words is what I was originally working on but the colours didn’t work together at all. My first thought was to rip out the page but then I thought maybe I could save the page. I think that the thing that is bothering me the most about this page is the writing – it didn’t turn out correctly or at least I don’t think that its right. If I try something like this again in the future I think that I will print out the letters and use them as a mask then I can play around with the placement before committing to the final design.

I worked through another idea after the first one failed and ended up with a page that reminds me to not give up on a piece. BUT also next time step away for a little while before proceeding so that you don’t have the emotions of the failure swimming in your head while you are trying to work out a solution.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my art journal page. I hope that you find time to be creative in some way today.

Until my next post,
Remember to be kind to yourself and others.

Laughter Imagination Dreams

Hello Everyone. The project that I have to share with you today is a little bit different. I love making cards and I love using sketches but I have started getting into art journaling and mixed media. So when a challenge came up from Just Add Ink I checked if they accept off the page creations – and they do 🙂

This is a close up of my final piece. Because the influences for this piece also came from a card sketch that I had been creating as a design team member of the Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge.

So which elements did I chose from the Just Ink Challenge – well you could say I chose all 3. But I would mainly say flower and paper. The flowers are made out of an old book which I stamped the flower image onto and then cut out with my small scissors. The leaves I drew freehand in pencil before cutting them out.

I roughly figured out where I was going to place the flowers and painted some black flower outlines with black acrylic paint and then I edged each with a white acrylic pen. I glued all of the elements down with Mod Podge and once this was dry I drew around each of the flowers and leaves with coloured acrylic paint pens.

Looking at this now I think that I would put a wash over the area where the quote is just to help it to stand out more. I don’t like my handwriting but I am getting braver in using it instead of just using my computer and printer to do quotes for projects.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my off the page project. If you have any tips on how I can improve my writing on these kinds of projects I would love to hear them.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.
Tracy B.

CHALLENGE LINK:
Just Add Ink Choose 2 Challenge – which I am entering
Atlantic Hearts Sketch Challenge #467 – which you can enter

Have Patience Art Journal 3

Hello everyone. It is Monday and I have another of my art journal pages to share with you.

This page I made by copying a YouTube video by Lindsay The Frugal Crafter called Whimsical Landscape Zentangle Tutorial. Which you can watch using this link

I had never done anything like this before and Lindsay made it seem so achievable that I decided to try and emulate it. After watching it; I went to my art desk and decided to have a play with my supplies and even be brave and try my unloved watercolour paints as I didn’t have any watercolour pencils in my stash.

Watercolour is a different beast entirely from acrylics. I have to admit that I almost gave up on this page, but I took some time away from the page and when I came back I actually liked what I saw. So then I went onto the doodle/zentangle part of the project. I have done some in the past but definitely not on an art piece. I didn’t follow the same patterns that Lindsay used as I was away from my computer by this point so I just went with what felt fitted that space. I am really happy with how this turned out. Thanks to Lindsay willing to share her talent and letting others follow her example. I may dabble in the watercolour palette again in the future without so much hesitation.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my art journal journey here on my blog. I hope that you will consider doing some kind of crafty pursuit during your day.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

Art Journal Journey 2

Hello Everyone. My art journal continues and now I am back to share with you a new page.

This page has a lot to do with how I was feeling at the moment when I created it. This layout has many layers to it, about 5 from memory. I just couldn’t get it to where I liked it so I just kept adding layers. One reason I love using acrylic paint – you can just continue to add layers. The quote deals with how I am feeling now about sharing my pages too a wider audience. I am not one to share a lot of my creations even though I have this blog and I am on social media platforms. Most of the time I doubt my decisions about what I have used and how I have put things together while I have been creating. So I just don’t share a lot of my work even though when I gift those creations they are appreciated.

It is true what I have heard from many people say and read that we are our greatest critics when we really should be our greatest champions. That is actually what started me on this art journal journey in the first place – I found that I didn’t really like what I was telling myself so I decided that I should change the narration of my thoughts. I still find myself falling back into the not so nice stuff but not as often. I also try to remember that I have Jesus on my side all the time and His father God loves me and thinks that what I do is worth something because it comes from his creation – Me.

So I am trying to have more courage and share more of my creations and to this end; I will be sharing my other love which is yarn crafts. I spin fibres pre-prepared by others to make into yarn that I can use in mainly my weaving. I weave using a rigid-heddle loom from Ashford Handicrafts; at the moment I am trying to weave 65 items by the end of November to give to an aged care home to use as Christmas gifts with an included handmade card. I hope to be able to figure out how to photograph these to share and too also keep a record of my crafting during the year.

Thanks for stopping in and looking at my next journal page share. I hope to inspire others to share their work so that we can all celebrate our unique creations.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.

Art Journal Journey

Hello Everyone. I hope that this post finds you happy and doing things in life that you love and maybe something new. This is mainly what this post is about today – my art journal journey. This new to me form of art came into my life partway through last year I haven’t really shared a lot about it but I have been encouraged by others to document my journey – so here is the start of it.

Most of my works are now in a solid bound book which I purchased at the beginning of this year. But some previous works were just pages that I did not think would go anywhere. Here is my first share

This one started as a colouring in page from one of those adult colouring in books that have been a craze for awhile. I am still working through pages and sometimes they end up in my art journal other times they end up going onto a card. I like this aspect of these books that these pages can be used for something else later if you wish.

When I was considering using this page in my journal I had come across this quote by Thomas Jefferson and I thought that it suited my new journey. Sometimes my pages can start with the image and sometimes it is a quote or bible verse that starts it all off.

Thanks for stopping in and having a look at my art journal page. I hope that you have a wonderful day and end up doing something that you love.

Until my next post,
Be Kind to Yourself and Others.