Gesso Book

Yesterday I was working in my gesso book...... an old Gregg Shorthand book.

These pages are mostly inspired by the Misty Mawn class... Full Circle Workshop.

But I find that I use this book for all my classes to a degree.

Need to do the cover....

So............. this is to say that I am doing a few things..... but mostly just my art journals.... which

is what I consider this book to be.

Those round face waifs I love...

I'm taking "Permission to Play" by Mindy Lacefield.

You can visit her blog Tim's Sally.

This was a journal spread we did...

I need to add some words....

but that may not happen for a few days 

and my blog was feeling very abandoned!!!

Journaling a scrapbook

These two top and below.... are in the burgundy journal...

which is so large I'll be working in it when I get to Assisted Living...

But at least I started!

above is my beloved father-in-law that we lost in May...

From last year when he and a lady were King and Queen of Mardi Gras

in their assisted living facility!

These are the kinds of things that I think need to be in my journals!

Now....to my current Remains of the Day journal...

I am using it to save notes from my blogging buddies!

It's filled with notes from all of you!

If you ever sent me something and wrote a note with it...

I most likely have it in here!!!

Love my blogging friends!

Journal Insides

 I showed you a stack of my journals here.

Someone said they would love to see inside.

So.... because I'm desperate for blog fodder at the moment...

I'll show you!

 These are four that aren't toooo private..... and I've been working in them a long time....

These images are from the one with the blue cover - which is my daily journal...

My journals are also my scrapbooks.  I'm not a "scrapbooker".... but I do like to glue things in and keep them.  Things like tickets to events and current events....

 ...and yes, I draw sometimes.... my girls are based on Teesha Moore....

 The page below was obviously written during the winter:

The next pages are from the Day Book that says 2008 on the front...
 pages  from Christy Tomlinson's Three Hearts workshop....

more scrapbooking....

 from Christy's She Art workshop.... I tend to work in my journals instead of on the canvases she suggests. I'll get some of those done eventually...

More to come!

Make A Journal!

Carole taught a video class on making a journal last year.

Here are the photos of my book.

I made it small... I just love the size!

I am using it to put notes from blogging friends in there...

that they send me in snail mail...

It's such a treat to get things in the mail from your blogging buddies!

I always save their little notes and so I'll have a representative number

in this little book and I can write my notes in the pages telling about them!

Carole is starting another class on April 2nd...

You can go here to sign up!

My Life in Pages

I've kept a journal or at least a "detailed calendar" since (apparently) I could write cursive!

Here we are peering into a box of finished journals.... see the old first diary on top!

Below are the four journals I'm currently working in.....

that big red one will probably never be finished! Especially when it comes to writing in it... It is fun to make collages in there....

I always get excited about journaling in January, don't you?

And there are so many art journaling classes available right now...

even free ones!

Okay..... one last thing today...

I'll be at the Cotton Bowl tomorrow night....

look for me!

(I'll be in maroon!)

Open Your Door!

My QB5* friend, Carole, has an online, video class starting June 14!

You should REALLY consider taking it.

If you just click on the picture it will take you where you need to go!

I'll be there.... we can sit together... it'll be lots of fun!

I've seen the intro..... you know she's in New Zealand.... and she has the cutest little accent!

It's worth taking the class just to see Carole!

But...seriously.....

it's a journal class....

and it's summer (at least in my part of the world)....

take a class!

*QB5 is short for Queen Bees...and there are five of us... just a fun little swap group we made up for ourselves. Are you in a little swap group with one or two others? If not, you should start one!

There Has Been Born for YOU a Savior!

My Silver Bella buddy,

Natalea,

celebrated 400 blog posts

by having a giveaway in November here!

And..... I WON!!

So I sent her a favorite quote ....

More of Natalea's work can be found in the next issue of Art Journaling, published by Stampington & Company, which will be on newstands January 1, 2010!

I am NOT sticking that in a journal!!!

Inspiration again!

I'm doing Teresa's current Ezine A Journal of Interest

and Pam Garrison

showed us how to do her pages.

Now she's shown me before...

on her blog and also in the publications I go to the stores and buy.

But finally....it's starting to sink in.

So here are two pages I made yesterday -

when I should've been working on a swap.....

I'm also hosting a swap on Christian Paper Artists called The Joy Jingle Banner!

We have a template size,

and the color scheme of pink/orange/yellow

and it must have a jingle bell affixed to it.

Well....Miss Lynn at Create Breathe

has a picture of her contribution to it....

I am continually blown away by the stuff she makes...

and here is just one more awesome thing!

Go check her out!

Remember my stitched sampler a few posts below?

Well, I believe I told you Amy was my inspiration for that.

Her sampler is completed and below is a peek at it.

Go to her blog Inspireco

and see the entire gorgeous, exquisite creation!!!!

You are going to L O V E it!!

Who is inspiring you these days?

Journal Wannabe

I don't think there is any better way to show up naked on your blog

than to post pictures of your journal.

So be kind.

I drool over Pam Garrison's..... see the bird below....it's a Pam Garrison wannabe, too.

I think my birds are too long...

they need to be shorter in width.

I've kept a journal of some kind most of my life. I have the diary from my elementary years.... first entry I was about 8 years old...told what I got for Christmas.

These days I keep an "art journal"!!!

Yeah.... I do...

Mine often becomes a bit of a scrapbook.

If you look on the page above on the right...you can see

the little slip of paper from Early Voting in the last

Presidential Election....that will

be valuable one day!

I usually put those little silver tape things that

they put on you for your mammogram in here, too.

Nothing is insignificant.

I like to print out pictures of my blog and put in

my journal!

I like to play with different mediums...

writing with paint.

Do you keep a journal?

Junk Journals Still

I'm STILL making those junk journals....

I have started piles for 3 different ones.... one is going to be about polka dots and circles, another is blue and another is pink - I know a lot of pregnant women right now.

Below is my desk....I have one other journal that I just completed for a friend..it's on the left. And to the right is the possible beginnings of another... just thought you'd like to see my desktop. I like to see your desktops!

See below how I fold the insides in.... someone taught a class on that ... or one of Teresa's Ezines or something. Anyway... not my creation, but I like it as it makes the paper a little stronger where you bind it.

In the above background you can see where I've started making some little baskets out of peat cups. Saw that on Artsy Mama's A Year of Color.

...and below is the journal I received from Mardi in the Christian Paper Artists Yahoo Group Cereal Box Journal Swap that started me making all of these non-stop! I leave mine pretty blank that I give away.... Mardi's is more embellished.

Cereal Box Journals

I'm in a cereal box journal swap

on

Christian Paper Artists Yahoo Group....

This is what I made yesterday to send off...

I really like it and want to make more, more, more....

what a great way to use up stuff.

And some of my favorite papers that I don't want to use -

I need to make one of these for ME!

Then I can just sit and hold my favorites in a book form

and one day maybe I'll actually write in it!!!

The page below with the woman and the quote

is torn from an Anthropologie catalog.

I added the little rubber stamp on the bottom corner.....

zettiology/Teesha Moore -

who actually inspired us to make these.

...go make one and show me!