Sisterhood of the Traveling Sketchbook-October, Eva

Its been quite awhile since I had a sketchbook to work in.  I'm actually kinda thankful that some of them were delayed as the last part of 2011 was a bit busy without the stress of getting entries done and out in a timely manner. 

This book belongs to Eva and I hope you'll visit her blog and see all the lovely things she does.  I seem to have a skip in months as the last one I did was for August and this book came ready for me to do the October spread.  Not a big deal, but I had formulated some basic ideas for September and hadn't for October (Crap!!) so I had to do some serious thinking before I could start painting.  It was odd to think of Halloween when the world is inundated with Chocolates, hearts and all things Valentine.  This October I spent quite a bit of time working in a haunted house so I thought it'd be cool to try to bring some aspect of that to life for my entry.  Spooky old house with huge lit windows.  A monsterous harvest moon with tree limbs outlined in its glow.  And of course a black cat on the fence.  I really liked working on this once my idea was in place. 

I wanted to try something new, something I hadn't seen before but had an idea for, and thus the fishing line spider web took shape over top of the journal spread.

 

And then I had to incorporate something with the web on the reverse side where my thoughts on October reside.  I wrote different things that I love about October along the spider web on this spread to give it a bit more depth and interest.  I also gave my not so creepy crawly spider green glitter eyes!

This book will be sent of to Lisa later today.  I always have so much fun doing these entries and it is so wonderful to see the great art that each of them holds.  I can't wait for the next one to arrive!

Thanks for stopping by!



A Portable Art Journal Kit

I've been having a wonderful time in my new "Art Palace." While I have spent some time working on arranging things to where they are more conducive to accomplishing my projects with less hunting around, I have also been working in my Art Journal. I was skimming through the book "Journal Spilling" by Diana Trout and came across the concept of putting together a journaling kit with the bare basics so that everything truly required is within arms reach. I thought that was a great idea since I have the worst habit of starting something, deciding I need such and such, going to find it, getting distracted with something totally different and never really finishing my journal pages.

I had this old Whitman's chocolate tin lying around (somehow it survived the purging of stuff from the basement) and its just the right size. I base painted the sides of the tin, collaged the top with some awesome art paper I had laying around. I used chipboard/plastic letters I've been collecting to put "Art Journal Kit" on the front and then painted my name above it because I didn't like the open space at the top. I had a face I sketched Sunday while waiting for a bible class to begin laying nearby and I glued that on as well. I then added some rub and buff to soften the edges of the face. I went around all the lettering with black marker to help the words stand out from the busy background better. Its got glue sticks, pens, markers, pencils, scissors, some lace/ribbon scraps, gum wrappers, etc. inside. I can't say that I still dont reach for things outside of the kit while I'm journaling, but this has definetly helped me to get started without a 10 minute gathering of materials ordeal.

What tricks or pointers can you share with me to make art journaling more spontaneous? I'd love to hear from you. Thanks for stopping by.

Good Friday and a Snow Storm

I started a new art journal today. I have always drawn my pictures in my journal and then either pulled them out and painted/colored them, or copy them and embelish the copy. This new journal is more of a true art journal. I opened it up, dumped a bunch of blue paint on the pages and began. I didn't use a pencil at all, just started painting. I have a bouquet of tulips on my table right now that I was using as inspiration, but I think my painting looks more like poppies. Either way, it was fun to just dive in first thing with paint. Sometimes a new approach works out so well. I'm going to try to do my art both ways for a bit and see if I what I produce varies depending on which way I go. The flower inspiration was from Suziblu's prompt for the week. I've never done her prompts either. I guess I'm just in a mood to try something new this week.

I sent out my first art entry of my life this week. It is for a poster contest held by the Breast Cancer 3 Day. The contest is only open to 3 day participants. Anyways, I worked on my entry for over a month, asked a few people for critiques, worked on an artist's bio, signed my rights away in a waiver and posed while my hubby took my head shot. I FedExed the package on Wednesday and was almost in tears letting it go. I'm not sure what came over me. I made the art specifically to submit, but still freaked out sending it off. I guess I've never worried about someone "judging" my art before and now I know people will be for the contest. Anyways, I was and still am perplexed to my emotional response. I guess I'm just weird.

We're getting another snow storm today. Can you believe it. They're saying 5"+ for my area! I love snow but even I am getting tired of this. I want to see the tulips out in the yard, not in a vase. I want to go dig and tend to my roses. I want to take a walk not bundled in many layers. I want to lay in the hammock with a good book. OK, enough whining. I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter weekend.