Art Journaling: Steampunk Marie

It's been so much fun following along with Jenny & Aaron's art journaling classes! After last week's super girly page spread, I thought I'd go with something a little different this time! Ever since coming across the Steampunk craze a few years ago, I have to say I've been fascinated by the design side of it. It doesn't really fit my usual style, but it has definitely been in the back of my mind.

A little while ago, I came across some cute Steampunk bird scrapbook stickers on sale. Then a book of Steampunk scrapbook papers, also on sale. I gradually started my collection, but I haven't made anything in the theme yet. Until now!

Per Jenny & Aaron's very good advice, I secured the binding with washi tape (no masking tape to be found). Selected a piece of scrapbook paper from the book mentioned above. Brown with a lightly printed grid and very cool textured cogs all over. Cut it to size and secured it to my Moleskine pages with Mod Podge.

Next, I mixed up some paint. As much as I love my pastels, it was a refreshing change going for dark colors this time. Mixed up black, green, and shimmery metallics. Starting in the lower left of the spread, I dabbed it on with my paint brush, trying to enhance rather than cover up the textured cogs.

Stamped a partial movie ticket border in black on the bottom right side. Mixed up a dark gold-ish paint and stamped up the left page with a hot air balloon stamp. Stamped white & grey clocks. Painted a bit of light grey-blue in the lower left corner. Added a dark Marie Antoinette ephemera image I bought from an etsy shop a while back. Added decorative dark blue-green washi tape. Stuck on another random scrap image on the bottom left. Painted over it some with watered-down paint. Added my Steampunk bird sticker.

Added a tag I bought from another etsy shop plus some cappucino baker's twine. I didn't have any gold washi tape, so I painted over a strip of gridded white & blue washi tape. You can't really see the grid lines, but I used a watered-down gold paint mix to leave them visible. Stuck that at the top.

The tag felt too blank and incomplete, so I drew up a quick beaker + my signature skull design on a white index card (most of the drawings I use for my art are on white index cards - they're cheap and sturdy!). Outlined in pen, then painted over it with my dark green paint mix.

I cut out my beaker from the index card. Took advantage of the dotted texturing on the tag and used the white-metallic paint mix to make it look cloudy. stuck on the beaker. More random paint spots to highlight the cog texture.

It still felt too plain, so I cut out elements from a few more pages in the Steampunk scrapbook paper book. Wasn't feeling particularly creative, so I chose "m" and "A" for Marie Antoinette. Added some handwritten text to the ticket. And yeah, again I couldn't think of anything profound... so "industry" it was! Covered everything in a layer of Mod Podge.

I'm not totally sure what I think of this week's page spread. I am pretty happy with it overall, it's just very different from the kinds of things I usually make. Plus, it's just very brown for me... But that's the point of art journaling, right? To try different things - different themes, styles, whatever. No rules! I'm determined to experiment more with Steampunk-themed spreads in the future. But maybe I'll wait until I pick up some more Steampunk elements as I felt very limited in making this spread. Then again, that's what drove me to add things like the brown tag and the Marie picture, and to draw the beaker. Creativity is born out of necessity, right? Right. I'm going with that.

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Art Journaling is a weekly feature where I share a page spread from my art journal. The idea began with Jenny & Aaron's classes, which they share weekly on Everyday is a Holiday. You can see all of my art journaling posts here.

Art Journaling: Sweet Couture

For this week's art journaling spread, I began with a picture from a magazine. Recently, I began tearing out pages and articles I like from magazines before recycling them. I looked through my pile of torn-out pages and came across a beautiful pink and gold perfume ad. Absolutely loved the color scheme; an idea began to form. I cut out the image and found a beautiful scrapbook page with golden text and overlays of light pink and blue leaves.

Pastel pink and blue is one of my favorite color combinations and it seemed to go nicely with gold. Used Mod Podge to secure my scrapbook paper. Pulled out some pink washi tapes to add. Cut out some fancy glittery shapes from more scrapbook paper. Cut an uneven scallop mini-border.

I had a lot of fun mixing a shimmery blush rose gold paint... and finally, a chance to use my beautiful damask stamp! Stamped up the pages. Secured most of the elements on the page.

Added some paint blotting and shimmer to the pages, along with the key cutout.

More paint. Stamped blue paint. A crackled crown cutout. Shimmery pink paper.

Super girly and sweet, but I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! Can't wait for more of Jenny & Aaron's art classes! Even if you don't plan on art journaling yourself (although I hope you do), check out their pages - I promise you will be amazed. =)

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Art Journaling is a weekly feature where I share a page spread from my art journal. The idea began with Jenny & Aaron's classes, which they share weekly on Everyday is a Holiday. Previous art journal pages:
  - Everything We Can Imagine is Real
  - Carousel Dreams
  - Every Day is Cookie Day

Art Journaling: Every Day is Cookie Day

This week's art journaling was very much inspired by the spread in Jenny & Aaron's second class. I did my own sweet take, but borrowed several elements. You'll see!

I tried out kraft paper this time, as they've mentioned in their classes. Used Mod Podge to secure it. Unfortunately, I don't think I waited long enough for it to dry... oops! Beginner mistake that they even mention. Heh, well now I'll know to wait longer next time! I ended up with little air pockets. So what did I do? Well I actually didn't notice until after I had painted most of it (my own mixes of pastel purples, watered down white, and lightened gold). So I cut the air pockets with an exacto knife, crammed some Mod Podge in the cracks to flatten out the painting, and then painted over it again. Definitely not idea, but I figured I would cover most of it up later with additional elements. Plus, it's an art journal. If there's every a place to make a mistake, it's here, right?

The idea for this theme began to form when I (as usual) browsed through my scrapbook paper packs. I bought this awesome "sweets" pack a while back, which is full of desserts and glitter. I knew I wanted a purple theme. I wanted to use that purple striped paper in last week's journaling but it didn't work out, so I thought I'd start out with that this time. For some reason I felt it went really nicely with a sheet of chocolate chipped cookie paper, so I cut two out and put those together. The "Every Day is Cookie Day" idea came about when I was trying to pick a washi tape and decided on one that lists the days of the week. What better way to tie in the theme?

I wish every day really was cookie day! Drew out some text with black pen and colored it in partially with purple gel pen. Added a little green kraft heart sticker.

I was a bit stumped about what to do with the left side of the page. So I looked to Jenny & Aaron's page for inspiration, and seeing as I love the archway element, I thought I would borrow it. Just needed something to go inside. Well, what could be better than a cookie recipe book? (Except milk, which was Jacob's idea... a good one too). So I cut out some tiny piece of paper, bound them using cappucino baker's twine, and stuck my little book in the archway.

And here it is! I am pretty happy with how this page turned out.

Now on to look for cookies! Just kidding... if there were any in the house they'd all be gone by now. =)

Art Journaling: Carousel Dreams

I was completely floored by the positive, encouraging responses to last week's mixed media collage & art journaling post. Everyone - thank you so much! I truly appreciate it. I'm starting to realize (again) the value of art for enjoyment (as opposed to only making art for a business-related purpose). I've vowed to myself that no matter how busy I get, I will always make an effort to make time for art.

As soon as Jenny posted her and Aaron's first art journaling class, you can be sure I devoured it all. It may have been close to midnight (in Seattle) and I had to wake up early for work the next day, but I couldn't help it. Watched the video, read every word, and thought about what I wanted to do with my journal. Decided on a theme: dreams. And a color scheme: pastel.

After work on Thursday, I immediately started drawing a carousel. I wanted it to feel fun and hazy, like a sweet midsummer dream. I started drawing in pencil from the top. Added detail, then some of my favorite animals - some fantastical, others real. I realize now that for proportion's sake, I should have started with the animals, because as it turns out, I had a hard time drawing them smaller. Ah well, dreams don't have to be proportional, right? =)

Several hours and a black pen later, the basic outline of my carousel was ready. Of course, it was really late by then... so I waited until another day to start piecing it together, but I was excited to have finished the first part. I called Jacob over, and a slightly depressing conversation ensued.

Me: "Can you tell what the animals they are?"
Jacob: "Yes, I see a dragon, a horse? Wait, it has a horn, so it's a unicorn... a flamingo, a shark... and either a sheep or a pig."
Me: "..... a SHEEP or PIG?"
Jacob: "Yeah, I don't know! What is it supposed to be?"
Me: "Try a cat? Panther, to be specific."
Jacob: "That was my next guess."

Yeah, sure. Either I need to brush up on how to draw a wild cat, or Jacob needs some animal flash cards. Possibly both. To be fair, my panther didn't have whiskers yet. Initially, I had intentionally left them off, seeing as it was a dream panther and it didn't feel right for some reason. But you bet I added the whiskers in after that conversation.

Cut my design out with an X-Acto knife to prep it for my page.

We spent most of the weekend packing for our move (instead of visiting family and friends in Portland as we had originally planned, sadly). In the evenings, while Jacob played video games, I retreated to my creative space to continue working on my journal. I colored in my carousel with a set of gorgeous colored pencils Jacob's mom gave me. I mixed up my pastel paint colors, lightening some further with white paint and adding a tingle of shimmery silver or gold paint to others. Following Jenny and Aaron's tips, I also watered the paints down a bit, which really helped the colors flow and gave it a dreamy feel. Then for the fun part. Loose "stripes" of paint in various colors, some of it overlapping and blending, with strokes of shimmery metallics lightly brushed over parts of the surface.

 I let that dry and then used Mod Podge to attach and seal my carousel. Painted on two fluffy clouds.

A few days went by while I took care of more business preparation and moving-related tasks. Finally, tonight, I had another chance to sit down and finish my piece. Added dream/thought bubbles made out of glittery white-ish scrapbook paper. I had also thought up a quote earlier in the week, while contemplating carousels (yes, I really just said that), so I included it in my spread. Per Jenny and Aaron's class suggestion, I added a decorative faux stitching border to the bubbles.

Made one of those adorable mini banners that I seem to see everywhere these days (no complaint from me!), using buttercream baker's twine from The Twinery and little triangles of patterned paper.

Lastly, two mini hearts. Finally a reason to use my tiny heart-shaped hole punch from the $1 bin at Michaels!

Have you done any art journaling lately? I would love to see it! I have been having so much fun checking out the blogs that are linking up to the art journaling classes. I love how Jenny and Aaron are starting this little blog movement, encouraging art journaling and providing guidance. I love seeing people participate, overcoming any fears they might have about their own art abilities or about posting them for the world to see. This kind of art is truly for the artist, which is possibly why it speaks so strongly to me. It is just so genuine. If you are on the fence about wanting to start your own art journal, I really hope you check out their classes and just go for it. And leave me a link here if you do! After all, what's the worst that could happen?

=)

My Creative Space

As you may or may not know, I bought a house recently! This weekend was busy, full of packing, shuffling things around, cleaning, taking pictures for a potential renter, etc. If all goes well with closing, Jacob and I will be moving in a few weeks.

I thought I would take this chance to show you my current creative space / art studio before it all gets packed up, dismantled, and inevitably set up differently. I spent a lot of time setting everything up just the way I wanted (except for the part where I still haven't framed any of my artwork collection, ugh!)... and it looked great for a while. Then I bought more supplies. It got cluttered. I built three IKEA dressers, added them to the room, and rearranged. That worked for a brief while, but again my craft supplies grew, while the desk and storage space, of course, did not. It also doesn't help that my studio doubles as our guest bedroom.

So, I am very excited to be moving into a new, bigger space, with plenty of room to house my growing collection. (That and I'm determined to start selling off my spare & unused supplies more seriously.) But as much as I wish I had more space, I have grown rather attached to my little studio, and it will be really sad to see it go. It's just never quite the same, you know? Without further ado...

Once I added extra dressers, it became quite the task to remember what went where. Enter post-it notes with fully sticky backs. Seriously, I would consider it one of the best organization tools ever.

Things you may spy in these images: artwork by Callow Lily, Hannah Lynn, V is for Violet, and me.

Yeah, that's our extra couch/guest bed (it folds down). Also known as home to my cupcake, ice cream, zebra, and geisha pillows.

Organization cubes from Michaels are the best - I use them for most of my paper storage. You may spy my art journal with last week's spread. =) And part of my postcard collage/collection. There are plenty of more I wanted to post on the wall for inspiration, but I didn't have space! Hopefully that will be remedied in my new workspace.

Tokidoki calendar & my fancy mirror from Urban Outfitters. And a Hannah Lynn ACEO collage, although you can't see all of it here. You can see a necklace from my upcoming collection below also! And erm... some Christmas ornaments Jacob and I made but forgot to bring for the gift recipients last Christmas. Oops.

I got a free banner with a printing order, below. And my wall calendar that has been sadly neglected... but that I hope to start using again someday. Above also happens to be my shipping supply center, with all sorts of bubble wrap, bubble mailers, and jewelry boxes packed into those dressers.

Couldn't resist just a small peek into one of my prettiest boxes. I have so many supply boxes, most from Michaels. This, however, was a repurposed box (I believe it used to hold cards) and I love the compartments. So I made it into my embellishments & twine box!

And... let's be honest. The first few pictures of the entire room were taken when I had cleaned up the studio a bit for rental photos. This is more what it usually looks like:

I know the pictures are a little small, but if you have questions about anything, let me know! For example:
Q: Where did you get that awesome dead unicorn trophy that's hanging on your wall?
A: From Shana Logic, of course! (It's made by Cherrybox Studios.)

=)

I promise to post some more pictures when I have my new studio space set up (which could be a while). By then, hopefully I will have most of my artwork framed and up on the walls as well.

P.S. After Jenny & Aaron's art journaling lesson last week, I was inspired to start a new spread this past weekend. I am really excited with how it's turning out, but it's not quite done yet. Stay tuned!

Painting & Art Journaling

I spent a very inspiring Saturday with my friend Junko - we were neighbors for a few years, we went to the same middle school, high school, and college... even the same study abroad program in Rome. Junko is an awesomely creative person. When I heard she was in town, I happily made plans to have lunch with her. We had a buffet lunch at Araya's, a vegetarian Thai restaurant we both love, talked forever, and ended up walking around the University Village. While browsing around, we came across "The Art Study," a small, well curated art & art supply shop. They sold Moleskine journals, which Junko highly recommended, and I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to begin my own art journaling. I first heard of and saw it on Jenny's blog (she did a great post on art journaling basics here). The shop also had practice canvas boards for $1.25, so I picked up one of those.

I have been itching to do mixed media/paint collages and art journaling, but to be honest, I was intimidated by the paint. I am not particularly good at painting (and very much admire those who are). Brushes don't feel comfortable to me - I like control too much, and I just don't have the skills (or the right brushes, probably) to feel like I'm in control. But sometimes, with lack of control comes freedom. Last night, I was a combination of a few things: inspired by my day with Junko, ready for some art journaling, stressed out by everything I need to do in the next few months (the home I purchased is in the closing process, I am launching a new website, I have to move, busy at work, etc.)... and you know? I felt like I needed it. Needed to let myself just be, let out some stress and the pent-up creativity that's been constantly on my mind lately, stop worrying about what I'm good at and what I'm not, and just... experiment. And see how it goes. So I started with the canvas.

I picked a piece of pretty scrapbook paper out of my ridiculously massive collection. Cut it to size and used mod podge to "glue" it to the canvas.

Then... I just did what felt right. Added blue washi tape to the right border. Mixed up some paints and painted in the borders blue, gold, and pink. Painted a peacock feather stamp hot pink and stamped my piece. Stuck a gold scrapbook border sticker to the bottom. Added 3D flowers with rhinestones glued in the middle. Used mod-podge to attach shimmery pink paper-punched swallows.

Added glitter. Painted a heart. Stuck on a butterfly. Added more flowers and rhinestones. Stuck a blue & gold border sticker on the left side. Secured everything with more mod podge. Glitterized lots of it.

Added a little rhinestone trail for the butterfly. More random paint touches and pink glitter glue.

And... this was the result. I wouldn't say it is the best piece ever, but you know what? It was me. It was how I felt at the time. I only felt comfortable using paint as an accent this time, but maybe I'll start experimenting with paint more in the future. I've always been a fan of mixed media, so this works for me. I glued a piece of baker's twine to the back of the board, taped over the glue with washi tape (the back of the board deserves to be pretty too) and signed it.

By this point in time, it was probably around 2am, but I was feeling inspired. I itched to create more, so I started my very first art journaling endeavor! I cut another pretty piece of scrapbook paper to size and attached it to a page spread in my new journal.

Then... let's be real. It was late and I couldn't think of anything clever to say, but I felt strongly about doing a piece with text. So I googled quotes. First "art," then "dream," then "imagination." Bingo. I found a Picasso quote: "Everything you can imagine is real." Loved it, so I just changed it a tiny bit and began painting. I had my stencils out (see upper left corner of the picture below), but then I thought... Don't be afraid of the paint or the brush. Text is simple enough - you can do it, and it will feel more real and cathartic if you paint the words yourself.

I will admit that I actually meant to keep his quote exactly as is, but I wasn't reading the quote when I painted. I had it in my head as "we," and it came out as we. And I like it.

The "Real" text looks like it's pockmarked, but I promise it's really pink glitter!

It was 4am by the time I was done. Again, I wouldn't call this the most brilliant art journaling in the world, but I loved it. It was practice. I have bigger, better ideas for next time. I need to make time for this kind of thing, because otherwise it grates at me, eats at me not being free to just do whatever the heck I want, creatively. I love, love, love making jewelry and I am beyond excited to be launching my jewelry collection. But while I like having uniform collections with themes, it is hard for me sometimes because I just want to make things, whatever comes to mind, whatever I feel like that day, and sometimes that doesn't fit into a box or collection. So I need to make time, whenever possible, for personal art and art journaling, because I need it to stay sane and focused. I need to learn to not be afraid of painting and sewing and all of those skills that sound so daunting... but that I really, really want to learn. Things take practice, so that's what I'll be doing.

Expect to see more of this in the future! Do you enjoy doing personal mixed media/painted pieces or art journaling?

Love and Sequins

Gala Darling's blog is one of my favorites to read. She is positive and all about believing in yourself... and she always posts fun, gorgeous, colorful pictures from the almost-ethereal photo shoots that seem to be a regular part of her life. Her bright tattoos have made me reconsider getting my own future tattoo(s) in color... but that's another conversation for another day. The point is, Gala wrote an eBook (which she also recorded as an audio book) called "Love and Sequins," available here. It's all about self-affirmation, finding out who you are, and your place in the world. I have to say - I have never been the type to go for "self-help" books or anything of that nature, but I love Gala's attitude and writing... which led me to this project.

A very good friend of mine is going through some rough times, and I felt that Love and Sequins would be perfect for her. I also enjoy projects and making things for people I love. So Jacob and I purchased Love and Sequins for our friend and then I printed it out and made it into a book.

I had a chance to put some of my numerous craft supplies to use, including delicious glittery sorbet print  cardstock, a string of Christmas Sequins (fitting, I thought), some pop-up alphabet stickers, pink glitter glue, maraschino twine from The Twinery, colorful rhinestones, washi tape, and other fun embellishments. I made a mini flag banner as well - something I have been seeing on lots of handmade cards recently.

Love and Sequins is a hefty twelve chapters. I personalized it by writing a thirteenth chapter, specifically for the recipient. I didn't quite make it to the 10,000 minimum word count promised by Gala in each chapter... but hey, four pages is not too bad, right?

I added colorful chapter separators and compiled the book. Then hole punched everything and bound it with more maraschino baker's twine. Here is the resulting book.

My chapter. =)

For the audio portion of the eBook, I burned twelve CD's - one for each chapter. They average around an hour each, so trust me - only one chapter fits on each CD!

The final product! I hope my friend enjoys reading/listening to Love and Sequins as much as I enjoyed working on this project. I was very rushed on time, so I did not have a chance to photograph the steps in greater detail, but maybe I will do a book project tutorial sometime.

Also, a Kelsea Echo ice cream shoppe jewelry set is part of a giveaway on Miss Indie's blog today, so be sure to head over there if you are interested!

XOXO,

Kelsea