Art Journal Pages - New Beginnings

I've been making time every couple of days to paint two pages in my book at a time, and I find it really satisfies me.  The reason I got this book in the first place was to spread my wings a bit and be able to be free with my paint without the pressure of a canvas or having to make a complete work of art.  It's just casual, just an experiment, and I can make mistakes and play around, having fun, learning myself, and teaching myself at the same time.  I am also trying to find my voice in my paint, so this is a good book I can use to practice techniques I see that I love and try to translate those into something that is truly me.

And, quite by accident, one of these pages ended up being my first entry for the Mixed Media Monthly Challenge.  The challenge for August is Stencils and Pastes.  I made some of my own stencils, used them to add paste to some watercolor paper, and added some Dr. Ph Martin's Hydrus Watercolors to them.  You can find that post here.  I wasn't sure what I would do with these papers, but I ended up using the following one on this page.

Here's how this page started out.  I knew right away I did not like these colors together, and regretted using the brush I did because everything seemed messy in a bad way. 

Here are some lovely little messy hands.  I got paint out for my kids while I painted since my daughter had begged all day to paint.  First little Lula's hand.  She is turning five tomorrow!

And Grayson's hand.  He is two, and trying to get a picture of his hand was like herding cats!

I painted over some of the previous brush strokes with a different brush, but I didn't like the colors I used!  I stenciled some hearts on with my handmade stencil and added black brush strokes.  Still hated it!

Then I played around with my handwriting and doodling with a white Sharpie oil based paint marker and a pink Elmer's Painters paint marker.  I'm loving both of these right now so much!  Seeing my doodles helped, but I wasn't happy with the colors.

I put down some crackle medium and waited for the required hour.  I think the waiting helped more than anything.  Then I added some Caribbean blue, orange, and pink paint.  I also brushed the word "new" on the page.  I added strokes in green with turquoise pluses on them.  

I painted the opposite page black and placed a rectangle I cut from a gelatin print page down with matte medium.

Then I used my white Sharpie paint pen to doodle around the edges.  I'm not sure what I will put in the middle.  The pages are about new beginnings since my daughter will be starting kindergarten this week, so maybe a picture of her or a silly Lula quote about school.  

I thought the other page needed something else, so I doodled a bit.  I drew this cute flower, but I really took it too far by adding these big black dots.   I hated it!

I tried painting over it, but it didn't look right, so this is where I ended up using some of my modeling paste paper from the other day.  I cut it out into the shape of the curve and put it down with matte medium.  I waited until the matte medium was dry to trim the edges to the shape of the corner.  I really like it!  Looks like these are done for now, but I will probably add more stuff later on.

The Mixed Media Monthly Challenge is also on Instagram, user name @mixedmediamc, so follow them there too!  This is the third challenge, and I look forward to seeing what else they come up with.  Go check them out to find inspiration from their creative team as well as the followers who share their art.  

Art Journal Pages - The Least of These

A few weeks ago I worked on a large painting for my dining room, and I mixed up a really cool color of blue; a really dark, deep, midnight blue that almost looks black.  I wanted to use it in my journal, so I made up a bit more of it today.  I covered a whole page with the color, then brushed a bit on the other page with a wide brush.  I added a bit of leaf green and sherbet green to it with a smaller brush.

Looking pretty good already, but this color begs for a bit of pink next to it, so I put some down with that same brush.  

I always end up with extra paint, so I have been using it up on loose pages.  These three are just about ready to use for a collage I think.

I thought some pink lettering would look nice, so I bought an acrylic paint pen.  This is one of my favorite scriptures, a reminder that while our love for Christ is important, we must never forget to love and serve others.  

Art Journal Pages - For the World

I worked on a couple of journal pages tonight, and I am pretty pleased with how they turned out.  I started out with the page above and added some more color to it.

I think I would like to try and recreate this on a large canvas.  I love working on my abstract and non-representational art in this journal.  It gives me a chance to play without the pressure of creating on a canvas.  

I wanted to do some lettering on the other page, so I started by painting the whole page with white paint.  I picked a gelli print that I thought matched my other piece well.  

I worked pretty hard on the computer to get the font just right, and ended up using Alpha Echo.  Then I ran out of colored ink, and my darn printer would not print, even in black and white!!!  So I used a piece of printer paper, placed it on the computer screen, and traced the letters onto the paper using a pencil.

I placed the paper over the gelli print and cut through both pieces.  I love my little pink X Acto knife, it is easy to control.

Part of my letters cut out.

I fixed these to the paper using matte medium.  I went over the top of them when I was done to make sure they would stay down.

All done, but I think they need some doodles too.

Oh yeah, they totally needed doodles. All done!  If you are wondering, one of the mottos we use in our church is "In God, with others, for the world" and I like it a lot.  I'm practicing right now for some larger pieces I intend to make to auction off for some of the mission work our church is involved in.  

Published in Cloth Paper Scissors PAGES 2012

Last year when the premiere issue of Cloth Paper Scissors PAGES I was thrilled to find out my mini books would be included in the publication.  I have come a bit further this year with a full length article featuring my paintbrush books featured in the 2012 edition of PAGES.  I can't tell you how excited I am!  This has been a goal of mine for a few years now, something I have been working hard toward.  I received my copies of the magazine from the Interweave staff a few weeks ago and seeing my work in print is a dream come true.  I hope you guys will check this out, PAGES is a wonderful magazine and I am so blessed to be part of it.

Go here for more details or to check out the table of contents.

Cloth Paper Scissors Pages - My Art Published!!!!!!

So excited to share with you guys that my art has been published in the premiere issue of Cloth Paper Scissors Pages!  I just received my complimentary copy of the magazine today!

I have been reading Cloth Paper Scissors since the first issue in 2004.  I love the magazine and it has been a dream of mine to have my art featured in it.  These books were originally sent in for the Mini Book challenge that was published in the Jan/Feb 2011 issue.  I was sorta bummed to find I was not published with the challenge until I found out that my books might be published in Pages.



The magazine is awesome!  It is so bright and colorful and features tons of books and art!  My favorite article so far is "Vintage Inspiration" by Renee Rogers.  I can't wait to get some of my vintage papers and books out and give it a try.  If you need inspiration, Pages is packed with 144 exciting pages of it.  You can order it from the Interweave store here, or check out your local bookstore to see if they carry it.  I know the Books-A-Million in our county does.