"Memories" and ICAD #3": Collage

Hey guys! I'm back with yet another page in my journal today. Today's prompt asked me if my life generally got better, worse, or stayed the same. As I was thinking over this very important prompt, I realized something. I think that even though I have had some bad events in my lifetime, I think that my life generally gets better and better. And I realized that was because I tend to look on the bright side of things. When I have a good moment in a day, I add that memory to my brain. And sometimes I'll look back at the day and laugh. At all of the extremely funny things that occur during the day. Funny things that happen, funny things that people say; just adding a new story to tell.

I have decided to allow these small moments in my day to build. I still think about things that happened MONTHS ago. Even years. Because I realize that these things are important. That they are the things that make me happy. At least a part of it.

So that was the thought process behind the page. So now let's go into another part of it; the actual page itself. I decided to go with a purple for this page today, and it actually decided that it wanted to work in my favor. It seems that every time I decide that I want to make my page in a certain color, it evolves into something COMPLETELY different. And I mean completely. I don't even remember what I was trying to do half the time. But this one did work out.

I worked with some more Traci Bautista inspired doodles in the background; you can kind of see them a little bit in this picture here. There's a type of border piece along the left side, and a flower in the upper right. I really like the way these pieces look when they are incorporated into my layers; that's what I love about art journaling. You can literally take tiny pieces from somebody's style and make it your own. Use it with your own style. Make your own little collection of styles. And use it in a new and creative way.

A part of MY personal style that I really seemed to have grown attached to (I think tomorrow I'll try something different) is the cut out letter titles. I LOVE these things. With a lot of my being. It's really strange. But I find myself attracted to the randomness of them; the unique quality, and the knowing that no one can really ever copy it piece for piece. It's just cool. And that's something that I think everybody needs to do. Find a few things that they really think represent THEM as an artist, and find other things that they think do the same. Create their own style, rather than copy others. Even though I realize that I am guilty of that on occasions.

And now, last, but certainly not least, I have your daily ICAD. Love this one today. It seems so simple, but I just love the unequal quality of it all. Nothing really quite lines up the way it "should". And I like that. The prompt that I used today was "collage". This one was super easy, and I think my other two cards could also qualify under this category. But that's okay. That's the prompt I was INSPIRED by today. :) 

I'm going to go now, but I'll speak to all of you tomorrow! Goodbye! 

"Obsession" and ICAD #2: Yellow

Hey everyone! I'm here with the same kind of stuff I had for you yesterday. An art journal page made from a prompt from the 5,000 Question Survey, and an index card for ICAD. But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. Let's start out with the art journal page first.

Today's prompt was "Have you ever taken martial arts?" Oh. My. Goodness. They needn't have asked that question. The whole martial arts thing set me off on this big spew about my life story with martial arts. Liking TMNT and corny ninja movies as a child, and evolving into a person who still loves martial arts and ninjas with all of her soul. Seriously. See all of that journaling? Nobody writes that much about martial arts. Not unless they really like it. Like me. And in case you guys were wondering/didn't know... yes I did take martial arts. And I was rather good at it too, if I do say so myself. My master told me that when I got to be a black belt, he believed that I could be the first person from his school to win a national black belt tournament. Unfortunately, we had to move. It was extremely disappointing, and the cost of living is much higher down here in Florida than it was in Ohio.

But, on a higher note, let's talk about the page itself, shall we? I started out with the page being orange. I wanted to play with opposites, as the Creative Every Day prompt for this month asked of us, so I tried some blue on top of that.

And from there, I tried to work with a Traci Bautista inspired style. But you can see what happened from there. It changed. From that, into my style. Although you can still see some of the creative paint doodles showing through. I did like the way that the page looked, I really did, but the problem wasn't that I didn't like the doodles. It was that I didn't like how it wasn't my style. It didn't match the rest of my journal, so it didn't really work out...

So, from there I added a thick layer of white paint over top of the whole thing. I was thinking about letting it dry that way, and just starting over, but I didn't really like the idea of all of my precious paint doodles going to waste over the surface. So, in any of the places that I had doodled with paint the various circles and flowers, I picked up the white paint with a paper towel. Just blotted it up. Then I let it dry that way.

Then, after that, I went over the entire thing with yellow paint. And that's where I got my final layer. I loved the way it turned out, and I really think that this page is a whole lot more me than the other one was.

Here's one last close up of one of my flower doodles. It's not quite the same as it was when it was more Traci Bautista inspired, but it's a lot more distressed and cracked. Totally my style. I love.

And here is my ICAD of the day. I used the prompt 'yellow' for this card; I painted the back of an index card with bright yellow paint. Then I took a deep yellow color and used a pallet knife to spread it all over the background. Then I used a rust colored porfolio oil pastel to draw the doodles on the edges. The photo is from a magazine and the word is from a printed out collage sheet I got off the internet. 

And, quite honestly, that's all I have for you guys today. I'll be back with all of you guys tomorrow! See you!

ICAD #1: Newspaper + "Rise Above It"

Okay. So here I am with yet another prompt page. Today's question asked me which song I thought best represented how I felt above my life right now. I chose the song "Rise Above It" by Switchfoot. Love that band. I feel as if I could be saying these words to all of the people surrounding me in my day to day life; this is honestly how I feel most people feel like. And I feel as if I could have been the author to this song. It's very much how I feel my life is like. Not for me personally, but for people that I know. That I am around. I cut today's title out of various newspaper and junk mail papers, as I have been doing for the past few days. I just love the effect that it gives.

However, I'm not quite so sure how I feel about today's page in general. I mean, I love the way that it looks, but I don't like how thin it is. Today my paper just decided that it wanted to wrinkle up; so much so that I find it difficult to even want to maneuver around it. I am hoping that tomorrow's page, working on the back of this one, will straighten everything out and totally thicken the page itself. 

Today I again used circles, as I keep finding myself drawn to them. But I'm trying to use different colors. Less blue and green, and more warm colors. That's what I was trying to achieve with this page. The journaling is also very much my personal opinion on a topic. I love the way that always turns out to me. Even if I don't like the look of a page, I can always count on the journaling to cheer me up.

Something else that I wanted to share with you today is my ICAD card. This is my very first one, as the challenge started today. Here I used my favorite colors, and felt a whole lot more in my comfort zone that I did with my other page I did today. I also used one of the prompts that she suggested, which was simply "dictionary". So I used some dictionary paper on this card. 

Here's just a little bit of a better view of it. I know that this post is a little bit shorter than the rest of the posts I've had this last week, but I'm pretty tired, and am just throwing this together before bed. Hopefully tomorrow I'll come up with a bit of a longer post for you guys, and even this one isn't TOO short. So yeah. I guess I'll see you guys tomorrow!

"Extreme" and "Artfest - Cover"

Okay. Today I have two pages for you guys to see. And they are both very, very different. That's the way I like to work though. I feel that if I'm not limited by just one style or medium, then I'll always have countless ideas running through my head; endless miles of ways that I might be able to roam. I love that aspect of it. It's so inspiring. Anyways. The first page I have to share with you is from a prompt, like the last few pages have been. 

Today's prompt asked me the last thing I had said. And that was a single word. Extreme. I know it's kind of weird. But then again, I'm kind of weird too. And I'm proud of that. I kind of took this word out of context however, when it came time to work on the journaling. When I had actually said it, I had used it in the context that the case of hiccups that I had just got over was kind of extreme. But in the journaling, I focus more on the aspect of my personality that forces me to go to extremes to get things done.

For example, I was supposed to leave my math exam at noon today, but I wasn't finishes. So I stayed two and a half hours afterwards so that I would be able to finish. My teacher didn't mind. She said that she liked the company.

I wasn't super fond of this page personally. I like the way it looks, but it really doesn't seem to scream me - not the way the rest of my pages do. It's too subtle. Too delicate. Plus, I think the title "Extreme" kind of calls for something more bold and edgy. But it's too late now. I do think it's pretty. I just don't think that it goes with my style.

 Here you can kind of see, on the right side page, a little bit of what MIGHT be coming tomorrow. Since the flowers are in the very first layer, they could very well be covered up by the time I get to the blog. However, I do have a little bit of a plan. So we'll see. Those flowers, by the way, were made up of the excess paint around the edges of a stencil I used. Just flip the stencil over, and you get a negative space image. Pretty cool, huh?

And here we are. With yet another page. Actually, it's a cover. But that's beside the point. I made these magazine journals a little while ago, and I posted them on the blog back in August. And they have just been rediscovered. By me of course. The moment I saw them, I knew that I had to work in one. A new one. Brand new. From the start. And I wanted it to be interesting. I had just finished the previous page, and I knew that I needed to do something bolder. Edgier. More me. And this certainly accomplished that for me.

The colors are a little bit darker than I've been using lately, but I really like the way this turned out. I love how the circles are so imperfect and wonky - I dislike everything being even and perfect. To me, this is just more appealing to the eye. More interesting and intriguing. If you think otherwise though, that's fine. Not all art journals need to be messy and put through a lot of wear and tear. If you want your art journal to be even, pretty, and have everything to a tee, then that's part of your style. This is a small part of mine.

And I'll leave you guys tonight with a bit of a better view of the title for this journal. I printed this out from an online source; it has the title "Artfest" being signed out in ASL (American Sign Language). I just thought that it was cool, and it really jumped out at me when I was searching through my little box of collage goodies to find a title for this page. And with that, I wish you a good evening, and many more happy, arty days!

Balanced

So I'm back with you again today, a little earlier this time. I was off of school today, since I exempted most of my exams. The way they do them at my school is that on Wednesday they do 1st and 3rd period exams, and then Thursday (tomorrow), they do the 2nd and 4th period ones. I exempted all of my exams except for 4th period, as that is my math class, and my teacher doesn't allow anyone to exempt, no matter how good their grades. So tomorrow I have to go at 10:10, and then get to leave at noon. It's nice. And today I didn't have to go at all.

Yep. Today I was working from yet another prompt. This one begged the question. Are you more child-like or childish? I spent quite a bit of time considering the answer to this. I eventually came to the conclusion that I thought I was a little bit of both, especially depending upon who I'm talking to or hanging out with.

The idea for this page initially sprung from the primary colors. I was going to do my page with just those colors and see what happened. As you can see from the pictures, a lot happened. Not a lot of any of those colors actually show up in the finished piece. 

You see, what happened was, I had just started the page and I thought it was looking okay. I thought that it looked a little weird, but I decided to continue on anyways. Bad idea. The more layers I added, the worse it got. Seriously. It was really bad. So I just went over the entire thing with white paint. Some of the red from my previous layer got caught up into the white, and gave me a pink tint. I decided to just go with that and start over. Let's just say that my journaling in the first layer is extremely secure. Nobody's going to be reading that sucker. 

In this picture, you can sort of see a close up of the texture I used in this piece. Since I've started working in my journal a few days ago, this is probably the most texture I've gotten on a page. I simply love the way it turned out. Even though pink is definitely not my favorite color in the world (it's blue, in case you're wondering), I do seem to love pink paint. I don't know why. I just do. 

The journaling in this page, like in my previous page, really means a lot to me. I don't know where I get some of this stuff from, I just pull them out of the air. I seem to love taking cool words and merging them together into deep, meaningful sentences. To me, writing is seriously an art in and of itself. As it is to many other writers. 

I'd like to leave you with a link. This is where I've been getting all of my prompts from. They originally weren't supposed to be for art journaling, but the moment I saw them, I knew that they would be excellent art journal inspiration. It is called the 5,000 Question Survey. 

Some of you may have heard of this before, and others may not have. That's what this blog is for. For me to share with you guys new things. And new ways of reusing old things. And with that, I bid you farewell and an excellent evening.

Medley

So I worked on another page today. Today's prompts was to consider where you think you are in your life right now. I had a good, long think about this topic, and finally came to my conclusion. I think that I'm in a place where I like to think about things. I want to make sure that they're right. And, most of all, I want to have an opinion. That's something that many people don't know about me. And that is, that I am a very opinionated person. I like to consider all of the possibilities, and then come to an overall conclusion. I like to know that I'm being accurate in my decision, and make sure that I'm correct in the way that I'm thinking.

This is an overall page view of the whole layout/page that I did today. When I started out, I thought that I was going to be using mostly red. That gradually changed into pink, which turned into brown with pink accents. And orange. Orange accents.

There were a lot of layers to this page, and I love how this turned out. One of the problems that I will sometimes have are all of the colors in my page muddling together. I don't like that. However, sometimes, on some days, on some pages, I think it's okay. And I think that this is one of these pages. The way that the different shades of brown and pink merge together add a lot of texture and depth to the page, and I love the way that it blends together.

Also, I thought that I'd share with you the finished spread in my journal. I know that these two pages are two separate pages, but I just thought I'd share something with you. Some people, when they are new to art journaling, struggle with single pages. Their reasoning for this is that they don't like having to make sure that the two pages go together. But here's the thing. With an art journal, it honestly doesn't even matter. In this spread, one page is on the cool side of the color spectrum, and the other page is on the warm side. But it's okay. It looks fine. And nobody's going to judge me because they don't go together. Even if they do, I wouldn't care. My art journal is about what makes me happy! The same should be true for you.

I'm going to leave you today on a rather thoughtful note. I'm going to type out my journaling. I really like the way that it turned out, and I think that the thoughtfulness aspect of it truly represents me.

I have a very unique style. I am composed of a variety of things that make me happy. Me. Not anyone else. Actually, I could care less what other people think. I am a medley of all things me, not a collage of all things everyone else. Some people might consider my style eclectic, while I prefer to consider it mine. The point I feel I am in right now, in my own life, is a time when I think everything through to the extent that it needs to be. I am always thinking about my own take on things; always considering a new aspect to life. To my style. To my medley of me.

And that would be that! I hope you guys have a good rest of the day, and I'll talk to you later!

In Five Years

In five years, where do you want to be? Interesting question, no? I managed to scrape aside some time today to work in my journal, and I forgot how much I missed it! Sometimes I don't realize how much I honestly need my art time, when I'm so busy in my day to day life. I've been so busy with school that I really haven't done any art at all since the last time I posted, which was a while ago. I think that I need to make sure that I set aside some time each day, especially during the summertime, to work with my art. Maybe even get up an hour earlier, so that I have a nice, art filled morning as a nice way to start my day. And then I'll make sure to come on over here and share everything with you. :)

This page had quite a few layers on it, and you can kind of see the journaling in the background. That's how I've liked to start out quite a few of my most recent pages. It kind of gets you in the mood to work on the page, and, for me, as I've been writing out how I'm feeling about the topic, I start getting ideas on how I want to work the page. For example, as I was writing the journaling for this page, I got the idea to do this page mostly in blues, as that is my favorite color, and this page is very much about me and my goals.

On this page, I decided to do a little bit of a collage on top of the painted background. Sometimes it's kind of hard for me to decide what to do on a page, especially when I haven't worked in a journal for a while (I kind of forget what choices I have!!), but this sort of came naturally to me. I sorted through some of my images that I have collected over the years, trying to look for some interesting black and while images, and any with a blue or purple tint. I had some other pieces that I had culled, but I decided not to use them. That's fine too, just put them back where you found them, and save them for another page. Normally they end up just sitting on my desk until I decide to use them, but maybe you'll be able to work up the motivation to tidy your stuff up. ;) Also, I used my typewriter from the '50s that I got for Christmas to type up some of my journaling. I also hand wrote some of it, to add a bit of an eclectic style to it.

So that's what I have for you guys today. I hope to be back on here tomorrow, and I'll see you then! But, for now, Adios!!