Turn Out the Lights

It's been a while since I did any art journalling, but I was inspired by something I read this week to put together this spread:



The page was one I had already prepped with black gesso and I cut the "Turn Out The Lights" from a magazine a while back, knowing that it would come in useful one day!  The reading that inspired it was from a book about Zen koans called Bring Me the Rhinoceros.  I have to concede that a lot of this book is way beyond my level of understanding but there are odd bits that sink in and get me thinking.  This particular koan was about being open to the idea that everything is inconceivable when it comes down to it, so that rather than trying to know the unknown we should "make friends with the inconceivable" and "start an exploration into the unlit realms".  Fascinating stuff and an excuse to break out the metallic pens and silver star stickers :-)

Good Things

My good things spread for last week:



Set myself the target of drawing all the "good things"...which is why they're a bit thinner on the ground than might otherwise be the case :-)

Ah, sewing...!

Regular readers may have been wondering what happened to the sewing part of the "Sew Much Progress"...but I have been sewing, I promise! It's just that it's mainly been hand quilting and that makes for sloooooow progress. But I made it!!! I finished quilting Gman's red and black quilt. I am waiting for a sunny day and a willing and able volunteer to hold it up in order to get a photograph of the whole thing but here's a little taster:



I went for fairly simple, unmarked quilting using pearl cottons and a big needle. I can't imagine going back to tiny between needles and regular hand quilting thread now!

I have also been dabbling in a bit of arty stuff. I painted another spread in my old Eagle annual:



This is made of layers of gesso and watercolour paints. The buildings were constructed by scraping acrylic paint using an old credit card, then details added with a variety of markers. Something was missing so I highlighted a selection of random words from the story underneath and quite like the effect:



I completed the next week's spread in my Good Things Moleskine:



And, of course, there's been more index cards for Daisy Yellow's Index-Card-a-Day challenge. Here's today's:

This Is It and All At Sea

I am finding that my art journalling is greatly influenced by what I am reading. It's a kind of way of putting things into my own words and pictures to help me to understand and digest them.

At the moment, I am reading Jon Kabat-Zinn's "Wherever You Go, There You Are" and have been inspired to put together these two spreads. The first is in my re-purposed Eagle annual:








These pages were put together in several layers, including watercolour paints, dip-dyed kitchen rolls, marker pens, collage, stamps and crayons.

The second spread is in my regular art journal and uses gesso coloured with chalk pastels, then a layer of acrylic paints spread around with baby wipes together with collage elements, stickers and writing.

Good Things

Recently a friend lent me this book:



It's an inspiring and fabulous collection of a variety of artists' sketchbooks. An idea from it that I was particularly taken with was from Christine Castro Hughes who creates a "Good Things" journal for each week, she says to "remind myself what is good and beautiful in the world".



I think this can be something we all too often lose sight of in our hectic lives. So I have decided to undertake this process too, and here's my first week's spread:



And a couple of pics of some of the good things:

Gazanias opening up in the sunshine



Indigo fabrics flapping about on the breeze:





Here's hoping this week brings many more good things!

Playing with Paints

I've dared to start painting in the Eagle annual!!

I prepped the pages with good ole gesso, then tried watercolour painting, followed by a sprinkle of salt for this background:



This one I painted, then lifted some of the paint with scrunched up clingfilm:



I decided the plane was worthy of being kept in and was taken with the words from the story: But at this moment, when escape seems so imminent, his hopes are shattered by a firm inexorable downward pull. Not sure where I'm going with this, but just loved the words!

And if immitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then I am thrilled that both my boys have decided to keep their own art journals. Gman (11) is using his to explore feelings, emotions and poetry, so won't be sharing pics, but Waif (6) is enjoying experimenting with paint, collage and mama's stamps and inks. Here's his first spread:



I think it's fab!

I haven't been able to find any kids books on art journalling, so if anybody knows of any, let me know!

Art Journal Inspirations

I have been doing quite a bit of art journalling these last few weeks. When I started, I figured this would be an exciting, creative journey. Quite unexpectedly, it has turned into something of an emotional and spiritual journey as well. The spreads I am creating are really quite personal and private, hence me not showing many of them on here. However, I am also really getting into the painting, collaging, stamping aspects and would like to explore the journalling further and so I ordered this book:



It's an excellent guide for those getting started on creating art journals. There are tips and how-to's on the practical things like choosing a book, adding colour to the page, integrating collage items. This practical advice is supplemented with a series of prompts to give you ideas for spreads and these are accompanied by process photos of the author making her spreads on these themes. There is also a DVD with the book, but I haven't got round to watching this (I have always preferred learning from books).

One of the ideas the author gives is to repurpose an old book to use as a journal. I am just about overcoming my childhood reluctance to write in books (even in pencil) so to paint in a book! And stick things in it! And rip pages out! Wow, that would be out of my comfort zone...but then I found this old Eagle book in a charity shop:



As you can see, it's in a pretty tatty state so I am guessing not worth any more than the £2.50 I paid for it...and it's not really to modern boys' reading tastes...so

I AM GOING TO CUT IT UP/GLUE IT/STAMP IT/PAINT IT. WHEEEEEEEEEE!

And who could resist the collage potential of pages like these:






Marvellous.

Yellow Days

Well, I did it...a week without Facebook, blogging, compulsive email checking...I would love to say that I found it productive, calming, enlightening...but actually I found it quite isolating. As a stay at home mum, and full time home educator to my boys, I think I rely quite a lot on online contact to stay sane. It allows me to be "Viv" and not just mum, on those days when being home is a challenge. So, although I did gain some extra time and peace from my digital detox, I'm not planning to do it again any time soon!

Anyway, back to sewing and stuff :-)


I finished my April journal quilt, "Shine". The challenge for this month was to make a monochromatic (single colour) quilt. I was all set to make a green quilt, thinking of patchwork landscapes, but when I got my fabrics together they just weren't really talking to me. Outside, the sun was shining, the daffodils in full bloom and I just thought "YES! Yellow!!" After dyeing the fabrics I sewed them together in the strippy design, and added the hand stitching with pearl cotton. I was planning to applique the word "shine" onto the quilt after that but then the goddess figure came to me and insisted she be on the quilt. And who was I to argue? I have left the edges raw because I wanted it to be a bit fuzzy round the edge, I felt it was softer and more appropriate.



I have nearly completed the quilt top for my friend's baby quilt. I just have to add the yellow fabric to the tops and bottoms. Yes, I was planning white, but yellow is the new white, don't you know?!



I did a little stitch sample for "Horizontal Arrow Stitch".



And I've completed several spreads in my art journal. I have found the art journalling has turned into a bit of an emotional and spiritual journey, rather than just the creative journey I initially expected. To that end, I'm not sure whether this blog is the right place to be writing about it. I am considering starting a new blog for this stuff but not sure if I have the time and inclination to keep up both! Anyway, here's one of the pages, the others will be in my art journal set on Flickr if you are interested...

Digital Detox Week

I am taking part in digital detox week this week. I won't be blogging, Facebooking, Flickring, foruming...

I am sharing my recent journal pages here to give a bit of insight ;-)





See you on Monday 25th April!!

Viv x

Bits and pieces

I've had loads of mail just lately:

Postcards from Robin and Vicki in the 3CS Gilded Age postcard swap:



Three more postcards from iHanna's swap. These are from Pam, Laurie and April. Go check out their blogs for some lovely arty inspiration.



And this postcard from Chris, for the Black & White postcard swap on Trading Fabric Postcards:



I've made my first attempt at dyeing using Procion dyes. This is muslin dyed with lemon yellow and golden yellow. I scrunched up and dyed in trays. I think I like the effect:



For April's journal quilt, the challenge is to make a single colour/monochromatic quilt. Can you guess what my colour is going to be?



Oh, and, inspired by this book, I have started an art journal: