Art Journal Colorful Tree

 I tend to be drawn to trees quite often in my artwork. I've painted and drawn trees many times over the years, and when possible, I like to have my students create trees too. There are just so many things you can do creatively with a tree. This one went into my art journal recently. 

I really like the contrast between the simple, black and white tree, and the rainbow colored dots surrounding it in the negative space. Just goes to show you, even the simplest things can come alive with a little color.

Art Journal Bird

 Recently I added some spreads to one of my art journals and forgot to share them. This first one is just cute, fat little bird. 

I just felt like doing something with colored pencils. My granddaughter's Crayola colored pencils were close to me at the time, so I grabbed them and got to coloring. He's a rather chubby bird, isn't he? LOL. I like him though. I also like the quote.

The man who has no imagination has no wings. 

Dream Wish Imagine Art Journal Spread

I was looking through the blog and I realized I had not yet shared my latest art journal spread. Not sure where my mind is sometimes. I'll just blame it on the pandemic crisis and leave it that. But here it is: Dream, Wish, Imagine.

This is a mixed media journal spread. I used Inktense Pencils, colored pencils, and a little bit of acrylics as well. Sometimes, a girl just has to dream, wish, or imagine. Don't you agree?

I hope you have a creative weekend!

Through the Rabbit Hole

I created an art journal spread over the weekend, inspired by a prompt on a Jane Davenport group on FB that I belong to. She has a month of challenges planned for April, all based on the theme of Alice in Wonderland. The prompt for April 1st is 'Through the Rabbit Hole.'

I'm not sharing this in the FB group, simply because the group is meant for sharing things created with Jane's art supplies. I don't have many of her art supplies, so it wouldn't be right to share this in the group. But I love the Alice theme, so I'm just going to occasionally create in response to some of the prompts--for the fun of it. 

Almost all of this was created using Neocolor II crayons. I love how versatile they are and I think the pigment is great too. The only thing that isn't Neocolor is the paint used for the little glass bottle. The glass part was painted with Metallic Accents watercolors by Prima. Those are always fun to use because they have a lot of shimmer to them. You can almost see that in the photo. 

This art journal spread also seems timely, because it seems as though we've all fallen into some sort of rabbit hole of late. The world is a weird place right now, my friends. Fortunately, I can escape the madness of it through art.

Stay safe and well!

Fairy Girl and Her Little Bird

I haven't been able to get into my studio for awhile. It's unusable temporarily, so I've not been able to paint in for what seems like forever. I miss my paintbrushes! But I felt like doing something creative this evening, so I decided to work in one of my small art journals.

I used my Jane Davenport Magic Wand Pencils for this. I love how smooth the colored pencils are. And of course, I always love creating some sort of Fairy Art. That's always fun. Just something quick to do while I have the energy and time to do it. One of the fun things about art journaling is that you don't have to obsess about anything, or worry about trying to make it perfect. There's not really any right or wrong with an art journal. It's just about doing what you feel like doing. 

I hope I'll get to use my studio again soon though. I'm kind of going through paint withdrawals. In the meantime, I'll keep doing some art journaling here and there until I can use my studio again.

Just a Little Gnome

I felt like working a little bit in one of my art journals the other day, but I wasn't sure what I wanted to do. I tossed around a few ideas and decided to draw a gnome. Sometimes, just drawing something cute and simple is enough to satisfy my creative urges. 

One of the things I like best about art journaling is that I don't put pressure on myself to do something complicated or time-consuming. I just do what I feel like doing. Sometimes I do mixed media, sometimes watercolor, sometimes collage, and sometimes just a quick little drawing like my little gnome. That's the great part about art journals though: there is no right or wrong. Just create what you want, simply because that's what you feel like creating!

Geometric Portrait

Well, I was in the mood to try something different in one of my art journals over the weekend. So, since I'd been working on Cubist-inspired Fall Trees with some of students the last few weeks, I decided to take a cue from Picasso and do a sort of Cubist take on a portrait.

I started with a general sketch of a face. Then I grabbed an ultra fine Sharpie and started drawing triangle shapes in areas around the face. I just drew a few triangles at a time, and then I free-handed the the repeating lines inside each triangle. I found this whole process to be very relaxing. It's not a style of drawing that I'd really done before, but I really enjoyed doing it. So you may find me doing this type of drawing again in the future.

Face Sketch in My Art Journal

Before I got out of my studio over the weekend, I decided to do a quick face sketch in one of my art journals. I wasn't in the studio for very long because I had other things I needed to get done in the house, but I felt like I needed to squeeze out one quick sketch before I called it quits that day.

Even when I can't spend a lot of time on things, I'm happy that I can at least be creative...even if it's just for a short while. And it sure doesn't hurt to keep practicing drawing faces. But, as you can see, I only drew one eye! LOL. That second eye is always the hardest part...don't you think?! ;) 

Brush Magazine - Let Love Grow

I've been so busy with school that finding time to create in the studio--let alone blog--gets to be extremely difficult. I'm looking forward to summer when I can get in that studio whenever I want to! At any rate, I was about to post a couple of art memes when I got an email that made me smile from Brush Magazine. They were letting me know that one of my art journal spreads had been published in the current issue (#10). I'm so excited, so I had to share it with you too!

This is an art journal spread I did in 2015. The blog post about it was simply titled, Let Love Grow. One of Brush Magazine's themes for this issue was Flowers, so I thought I'd step out of my comfort zone and submit this art for consideration for publication. I was so pleased to see it in the magazine. 

If you haven't checked out their magazine, you should. They have a digital and a print version, and there is lots of great creative inspiration to be found inside each issue. I may even submit more art to them in the future. :) 

Seattle Believe Art Journal Spread

Well I was back in the studio again after a little bit of an absence and I was in the mood to add a spread to one of my Art Journals. I chose Seattle as as my subject, and added a little bit of magic.

First, let me say that this spread was inspired by a tutorial video I watched on the Silas Art YouTube channel. I like hers better than mine! But I still had fun creating this. She has a lot of beautiful art journal spreads, so be sure to check them out if you want a little inspiration. I didn't copy hers exactly, of course. But her video gave me the inspiration I needed to create this. I like the sky the most here. I think I need to create more art with skies!

I chose Seattle for my spread because I grew up partly in the Puget Sound area of Washington state. Went to high school there and was married there as well. I still miss it so much and will always consider Washington my home. So it was an easy choice for this spread. I used acrylics for this, and the fairy images are stamped on. And I just added a little reminder to always...Believe.

Drawing in My Travelers Notebook

I'm planning to get into the studio to paint again this weekend, but for now I've been content this week doing some drawing in my Traveler's Notebook. I have an insert with black pages that I'm trying to fill up. So, I made a couple of additions this week.

I have a thing for flying pigs!

And you know I love fairies!

Here's hoping I fill up this insert in the next couple of weeks! What have YOU been creating this week?!

My Pink-Haired Muse

I don't know why, but for some reason I have this thing about drawing and painting pink-haired ladies. I love pink or blue hair in artwork and I have no idea why, but I do! :). So today, when this pink-haired muse asked me if she could come out to play, of course I said, yes.

So now she lives in my art journal in all her pink-haired glory. When the muse strikes...you gotta go with it!

Outside Art Journaling

I had planned to go into my studio on Sunday, but since it was such a nice day I decided to grab some supplies and an art journal and just go get creative on the porch. There was a nice breeze blowing and the Hubs was working in the yard. And since I was surrounded by flowers I guess that inspired my first bit of journaling. 

I just used some watercolor pencils and water, and a black pen, and just drew what came to my mind. Pink and blue flowers, in this case. :) After that I started working on a fairy. She's not finished yet, but at least it's a start.

So I didn't accomplish a whole lot out there on the porch, but at least I got to be creative. And since I don't have a lot of time for that right now with my grad courses going on, I took advantage of the little bit of time that I had. And that was enough.

Stars Beauty Mixed Media Girl

Last year I created a post about the art journal spread I was doing after buying Jane Davenport's book called Beautiful Faces. After I had finished that spread last April, I had gone in a few months later and added some stars to my mixed media girl I'd created in the spread. And as I was flipping through some photos today, I realized I never shared the updated creation. So I'm gonna share that with you now.

I just thought that my background was a bit plain, especially considering that most of the time I add torn paper or something to the backgrounds of my paintings. I wasn't feeling like adding solid color, and I didn't want to distract from the face too much. So I decided that stars would be the way to go. It added a sense of texture and just a little something extra to make it feel more finished. I like her much better now. Sometimes you just have to step away from something you've done for awhile, and then come back and look at it again with fresh eyes. It can make all the difference.

Don't Forget to Fly Art Journal Tutorial

Since I haven't posted any tutorials for awhile, I thought I'd create one for you. So while I was in the studio over the weekend, I decided I'd make it an art journal tutorial--since I was going to be creating a new spread anyway and using some new fun supplies to boot. Who doesn't Love (with a capital 'L') new art supplies, right?! And all the more artsy fun to use them in my art journal.

Sooooooooo--this is the 'Don't Forget to Fly' art journal spread that I created, along with the fabulous new (and not-so-new) art supplies that I used in the process.

Artsy Materials: Faber-Castell Gelatos (Snow Cone and Kiwi colors), Prima Finnabair Elementals 'Bubbles' Stencil, Prima Finnabiar 'Don't Forget to Fly' Cling Stamps, Tim Holtz Distress Ink (Faded Jeans color), Stayz-On Ink (Black), Faber-Castell Pitt Pen (Black), Uni-Ball Signo UM-153 Gel Pen (White), white acrylic paint, Liquitex Gesso (White), Liquitex Matte Medium (Fluid), and Tissue Paper (not shown). Oh, and I'm also using a Strathmore 500 Series Mixed Media journal; it is hard-bound and has 90lb paper pages that are deliciously smooth and perfect for the mixed media journaling that I love to do [and makes me feel like a real artist when I use it, ahem].

I will preface this all by saying that I had no real plan for this art journal spread when I began--other than that I was going to use my new cling stamps, and some Gelatos. Most of the time when I'm art journaling, I like to fly by the seat of my pants...which seems appropriate for the theme of this spread anyway. :)

Artsy Deets...OK, let's get this art show on the road!

1.  Gesso the pages. I almost always gesso my pages if I'm doing mixed media. If I were doing watercolor or just simple drawing, I'd leave them as is. But I wanted the pages to be ready for whatever I might do here, so I gesso'd [that's right, I just used 'gesso' as a verb--I'm crazy like that]. And that's what you see here in the photo--two primed pages, ready for anything. I also used my heat gun to speed up the drying process on the pages. What can I say? Patience is not one of my strong suits.

2.  Crumple up the Tissue Paper and adhere to the pages with Matte Medium. I decided I wanted TEXTURE on these pages. And I love to use tissue paper to add texture! So, in the next few pics that's what you see--the crumpling process, and the adhering process. And again, I sped up the drying process with the heat gun.

Crumple.

 Add Matte Medium to the pages.

Add tissue and then add Matte Medium over it.

This ensures the tissue is well-adhered to the page.

  

3. Gesso the tissue-covered pages. Since I knew I'd be using Gelatos, I wanted a good, non-porous surface to work on with the Gelatos. So I gesso'd over the tissue-covered pages to make them ready for the Gelatos...and for whatever else I might do or add to the pages later on. Check out that texture, people! It looks cool, and it feels cool too, and it's so easy to do.

4. After you finish admiring your texture, it's time for Gelatos! I had no idea what colors I'd be using at this point. I have many Gelatos and I love them all equally (we don't want any of them to feel left out, after all). But something drew me to the Snow Cone blue color, so that's what a grabbed from my stash and then I just scribbled it around the edges of the page. Again--I had no plan here. I just decided on the spot where I'd add the color. And after adding the Snow Cone, I grabbed another color--Kiwi--and added it too.

 Snow Cone blue added.

 

Kiwi green added.

5. Ponder the colors. Then blend. Once I had those two colors down, I wasn't sure what I wanted to do next. And what do you do when you're not sure? That's right: you ponder. So I did that for a bit and then I decided to blend the colors with a spritz of water and my finger. BUT....I didn't like it. So, I grabbed a baby wipe and blended with that instead.

 

(Dang, that's perty, I thought.) So I blended it all on both pages. And I was so into what I was doing I totally forgot to take a pic of the finished blending. I'm not used to stopping to take photos during my art journal time, so I got a bit distracted. :) But you'll see in the next pic how it looked as I began the next step.

6. Use the Stencil to create circles of Negative Space. I loved my blended Gelato colors, but I wanted to do something before I started doing any stamping. So since I had a new stencil I hadn't tried yet, and I still had a baby wipe in my hand, I decided I'd use the stencil to create some negative space. All I did was use the baby wipe and wipe away color in some circles through the stencil while the Gelatos were still not dry. Gelatos are permanent when dry, but before then you can really play with them, wipe them off, etc. So that's what I did here.

Wipe away color.

 Now you have Negative Space circles.

7. Use some Gelatos to add a darker color around the circles. I used the Snow Cone Gelato for this. I just scirbbled a bit on my non-stick painting mat. Got a thin liner paintbrush wet with water and wet the Gelato color a bit. Then I took the brush and just sort of outlined the circles in a subtle way, to help them pop a bit more.

8. Stamping time! Next I grabbed my stamps and had a ball. I did the fairy lady stamp first, then added the circles and butterflies.

9. Scrape some paint with a credit card. Before I moved on to add some details to the pages, I felt like I needed to see a bit of white here and there. So I grabbed an old credit card and some white acrylic paint and scraped the paint on here and there. I just held the card at and angle and scraped it to hit the high spots of tissue paper.

If you look close, you can see it.

10. Add details and embellishments. I used my Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pen and my Uni-Ball Signo white gel pen to add details. You won't see them all in the next photo...again, I got so focused on what I was doing that I missed another photo opp. But you'll see them at the end.

11. Add more cirlces using Distress Ink and the Stencil. As I stood back and looked at the journal spread, it just didn't feel finished to me. I liked it, but I thought it needed something more. So I grabbed the stencil and the Faded Jeans Distress Ink and added circles all around the pages. 

12. Don't Foret to Fly...the happy ending! After the circles were on I was happy. But I did add some thinned out gesso to a few of the stamped circles here and there for some contrast. And then I knew it was time to call this journal spread complete.

Final thoughts on this journal spread...

I made mistakes along the way. The fairy lady, for example. When I first stamped her I accidentally moved and the image was blurred. Urgh! But i didn't fret. I simply gesso'd over her, let it dry, added the Gelato colors again, and then re-stamped her. Mistakes happen in art. Sometimes you can fix them, and sometimes you just have to find a way to love them for what they are. I have never re-done an art journal page. To me, however the page ends up when it's finished is how it is meant to be. An art journal is just like a regular writing journal, in my mind. I'd never re-do a page my writing journal--so why would I re-do a page in my art journal? Even though I can look at this journal spread and see a few little "mistakes" that I don't totally like, it's finished and I love it just the way it is.

You have to learn to love your art, flaws and all. An art journal especially is not meant to be perfect, so perfection should never be your goal. Nor should you compare your art (or art journal) to the art of anyone else. Your art journal should always be, first and foremost, your means of creative self-expression. And as such, it can never be wrong. It's Y-O-U!  

Love it.

Love yourself.

And Don't Forget to Fly!

Follow Your heART

It was a busy weekend, but I did manage to get into the studio for a bit yesterday and create a new spread in my art journal. Tried some different techniques and fun with with texture by using molding past. 

I decided to limit myself to just a few colors, and I wouldn't let myself use pink or red (because I use pink a lot). So I decided on turquoise and brown, and black and white. I started by using a stencil and molding paste on the left and right sides of the pages to create the smaller circles. Then I sprtized some water on the pages and used some Mr. Huey's Color Mist sprays to create the background color. I did this by unscrewing the the spray nozzle and just dripping some color at the edge of the page. The water on the page helped the color spread, and when it needed help I just sprtized some more water on. I also picked up the pages and let it run down toward the center. 

Once that was done I used a stencil and some acrylic paint on a dauber to create the heart. I embellished it a bit with brown at the edges, and then used a white acrylic paint pen to brighten the design inside of the heart. I used a another stencil with brown ink to create the wee small circle textures here and there on the pages, and another stencil to create some small floating hearts. I used my round dauber and the turquoise acrylic paint to put circles on the pages. I created more circles of white using a cardboard tube. Then I just added some embellishment here nad there to various circles...outlining some, adding dots, cross-hatching, etc. When I was happy with the background I finished it off by stamping 'Follow your heArt.' The arrow with writing in it is also a stamp.

I really love how the background turned out in this spread. I hadn't done anything quite like this before so it was fun to do something different. And I love the color combination too. All I knew when I started this spread was that I was going to create texture on the edges of the pages, and that i was going to use the heart stencil. Everything else just evolved as I went on. So that really was me following my heART in my studio. :)

Hope Art Journal Spread

I have a job interview on Wednesday with a nearby school system for a grades 3-6 Art position. I am very excited about the possibility of teaching again. I'm trying not to get my hopes up too high, but I am all about having a little hope and a positive attitude. So my journal spread for the weekend was inspired by that hope.

Hope is the thing with feathers

that perches in the soul

and sings the tunes

without the words--

and never stops at all.

-Emily Dickinson

Here's to hope. And maybe new beginnings.

Let Love Grow

I was in my studio on Saturday instead of Sunday over the weekend. That was a nice change. It left my Sunday free to spend with my husband on a beautiful Spring day. I was thinking about flowers this week--hoping to plant some soon. So that is what inspired this week's art journal spread.

Lots of Mixed Media here. I used acrylics for the background; I first rolled on my two blue colors with a brayer, then scraped them on with a credit card, and finally used a baby wipe to blend the color in some areas. I used a stencil in the background too, and some acrylic paint pen. The flowers were created with a combination of acrylics and Neocolor II crayons, markers, and a touch of black ink. The lettering was stamped on with clear acrylic alpha stamps.

Let Love Grow, y'all!

Blue Fairy Art Journal Spread

It was a beautiful Spring day yesterday and I spent it painting in my studio with a cool breeze blowing in on me. It was wonderful! Spring truly is my favorite season of the year. And as I was in the studio, a fairy came to life in my art journal.

I used another technique from Jane Davenport's book, Beautiful Faces, this time using Gelatos to scribble in colors on the face and then blend it with gesso for a more painterly effect. I did the background with a stencil, and some sprays from Dyan Reavely. I also stamped on a few flowers too. 

Notice that I did blue hair this time, instead of pink! :) It was a wonderful, creative day!

Butterflies Art Journal Spread

This weekend's art journal spread was brought to you by the beauty of butterflies. They are such beautiful little creatures, aren't they?

The background on these pages was created using Inktense blocks. The large butterfly is a die-cut that I've enhanced a bit with Inktense and ink. The flowers were created with mixed media: Inktense and clear gesso for the centers, my fave black pen by Scarlet Lime for the petals and details, and a white Uniball Signo pen for the accents. I also used a little bit of Gelato to create shadow for the large butterfly.

I love this color combo on the pages. It was a dreary, rainy day yesterday--so I just wanted to bring a little sunshine into my studio. :)