Playing in My Studio

Wow! My summer vacation is almost over. We fabulous teachers report back to school on August 6th. It will be two weeks before the kiddos come back. There is much to be done and learned before that happens. I am excited and looking forward to another group of wonderful second graders. Yay!

I have had an interesting and most productive vacation. First, I managed to take and pass the Praxis II test which allowed me to apply and receive my Level 2 teaching license. Thank goodness that is over.

Second, I started exercising again. I see a tiny bit of improvement. What I figure is if I do the exercises every day then sooner or later something will happen. That is it on that.

Another bit I did was go on some mini vacations. One to a resort town and the other camping. Both were fun.

Finally, maybe not finally because there were other activities that I did, but I just want to get to the art. I started a fun project using 3x5 index cards. The plan is to draw, paint, collage, etc., on one card daily. At first, it was difficult for me to figure out what to create on them. Those beginning cards are not so great, but hey they do show my progress. I have used a lot of my pens and paints so far on these little cards. Yes, the paper is horrible for some techniques, but still exciting to see what happens. I also write what material was used in the creating of the art piece on the back of the card. That way when I come back to them and wonder what was used to create it the information will be on the back of the card. The project was started on June 18th and as of today, there are 44 cards. Some of the cards I have used in my art journal that was also started this summer. That journal is fun and unique, but that is for another post. Probably when I get more done in it.

Another art project I did was to create in an art journal that I have had for a couple years now. It is a journal that I play in, so it does not matter if there are mistakes. There is no such thing as a mistake if you learn from it and yes, I learned from the mess-ups.

To help jump-start my art heart I watched some artists on YouTube. One such artist is James Burke. He creates wonderful non-realistic drawings of women (mostly). One of his videos shows what he does when he gets new art materials such as paint and markers. He makes swatch dolls or buildings. I loved the idea and because my studio contains so many markers, paints and various types of pens, I decided to create swatch dolls and buildings. Wow! What fun it has been and very freeing. I have discovered fun pens that have been hiding in my stash. Creating these swatches has helped me so much. I can feel the artist child in me screaming with a joyful noise.

The ladies in the picture above were created one day just for fun similar to Mr. Burke. I added my own twist. They are done with artist markers and other pens in the above-mentioned art journal. The journal is filling up with some fun and very colorful drawings. Yay!

Okay, these are just some of the activities I have done during my vacation. It is so nice having a studio again. I have missed it and my artist child is extremely happy.

Be well, Be happy, my friends.

My First Inktober

Yay! I managed to fulfill a drawing challenge. Okay, I did not do the challenge as prescribed by the originator, Mr. Jake Parker. Was not able to even do the prompts. Why? Well, I am a very busy person. My job as a teacher of twenty-six wonderful energetic second graders keeps me very busy. I also have other wonderful people who desire my attention. Anyway, it all does not leave me much time to draw. So I made the challenge fit my life.
I decided to create a two-page layout in my teacher bullet journal to draw 31 tiny ink pictures (32 because day 13 I did twice;-) By having in my teacher bullet journal I knew that it would be easier for me to create a drawing quickly. My goal was to take 5 minutes or less to draw something. As you can tell from some of the drawings my time to draw was less. It was more like 2 minutes. I only used a black Tombow marker because it was able to be in my teacher pen/pencil case. The header is some washi tape that has a pattern of art supplies on it. I used a Crink pen to write Inktober and the border. That is it. Pretty simple design and layout.
I really did enjoy taking those little bits of moments to draw/doodle something. The page is fun to look at, and because it is in my teacher bullet journal I can look at it as often as I like. I might even create another two-page layout in the same journal for the month of November: Noinkber, Inkember, the last one would work for December as well. I think that Noinkber is cool. Perhaps I can challenge myself to draw/doodle using some other medium, like crayon or colored pencil. Whatever the challenge is I better get going because it is already the 4 day of November. I will for sure share whatever creation I do for November. For now, I must go create. Be well, my friends.
Happy Creating!

Getting Ready for Vacation

I realize that many go shopping for clothes to wear on vacation. Well, not me! As soon as my husband and I decided to go to Oregon on vacation this summer I started thinking about what journal and art supplies should I take. Okay, I did think about clothes and if it was necessary for me to buy new ones. Maybe a new t-shirt or two and perhaps flip-flops to wear on the beach. Other than that I think that what I will wear is pretty much taken care of. Now back to what journal and art supplies should I take.
After searching Amazon.com and checking out the Michael's Arts and Craft store near me for journals I finally found one. I ordered the TreeLine List book from Amazon.com and it arrived a couple of days ago.

The company, Action Publishing has several styles to pick from. It took me a few days to decide on this one. These journals are very different from others that I was considering. The paper is cream colored with both lines and a grid layout. The left side page has the grid and the lines are on the right side. The covers are chipboard made from recycled material. There is much more about them and I will let you go and check it out.

The journal that I got measures 4.25 x 11 inches and has a tree theme. To help gauge the size of the journal I took a picture of it next to a piece of 8.5 x 11 inch cardstock. Why would I get such a strange size for a travel journal? Well, because it is different and will make me change the way I create in it. The size of postcards will be a challenge for me as will other bits of ephemera. I will manage somehow to get them in.
I also ordered film for my instant camera. Yes, instant as in the old fashion Polaroid type film, only these are small.
 The pictures are about 2 x 3 inches and just barely fit on the page of this journal. That is okay, because barely is better than not at all. If I turn the camera sideways then the photos will be printed in the portrait layout. In this layout they will fit on the page. I will take pictures both ways and all will be fine. I do not plan on taking my DSLR on this trip. I want to focus on little photos and most importantly drawing and writing about what I see. If I take my big camera then it is likely that it will be the main focus of my art. Another bit is that I want to have my photos in the journal within minutes of taking them, not when I get home and get around to having prints made. I do not have a lot of spare time at this point in my life to focus on making prints and putting them in my journal later. Most likely I will not get around to doing that. This is why I wish to use my instant camera and getting those photos glued down in my journal quickly. Honestly, the photos do come out quite nice. I am looking forward to adding more drawings in this journal and not as many photos.
Now to pair down or use a better way of transporting my drawing/painting materials. This has always been an issue for me. What should I take and if this pen or paint is left home what will I do if it is needed? I have a difficult time leaving a lot home, because I never know what my mood will be as far as which medium to use. So I take a lot. I do limit it to a small backpack, but still the way it is stored in the pack is annoying to me. I had been using various pencil cases, and although these are good at keeping the stuff safe it is not good for on the quick creations. I have to rummage around in the pack trying to find the bag that holds the medium that I am looking for. It just takes up too much time to do that. Doing a bit of research on Amazon.com I came across a solution. I found these roll-up pencil/pen cases. There are a lot of different styles and sizes to choose from, and yes it took me some time to choose a couple.

        I ended up buying these two. One holds 36 pencils/pens and the other 48. I got them with the intention of putting my Tombow markers in the 48 slotted one and my drawing pencils and pens in the 36 slotted purple one. The problem with this plan was that the Tombows did not fit very well in either one. They caused them to be very difficult to roll up. The Tombows also caused the purple case to come un-stitched, which I had to fix. So for now I have my Tombows in a pencil bag and I am still rearranging my drawing pencils and pens in the roll up cases. Not sure if I will be using both or just the one that holds 48. I have time to figure it out.
Before I wrap up this post I wanted to show the title page of the book. The page is not complete, but it is a least started. I will add more and perhaps take another photo of it when it is done. For now I think that this post is long enough. When we return from our trip I will post some photos and chat about how I did or did not like the journal.
Be well and be happy my friends. Ciao!

Drawings~36th World Wide SketchCrawl-July 14 and Creating Art with my Son-July 19

 Last weekend I participated in the 36th World Wide Sketch Crawl with other artists at SketchCrawl.com.  I had just finished my first semester in graduate school and needed to treat myself to something. Instead of food as a treat, I took myself on and Artist Date.
I posted a notice on the SketchCrawl.com forum inviting other artists in my area to meet me at a local library to draw and then travel on to another spot to create. That was the whole point of the activity. Gather some friends and go out and sketch together. At the end of the time agreed upon the group is to meet at a local coffee shop or whatever to share their thoughts and drawings.
I posted a time and place to meet and then waited to see if anyone wanted to get together. People read the post, but no one posted that they would meet me there. Well, I decided that I would still show up and hope that someone else would also.

1st drawing~Sugar beet sculpture

2nd drawing-Fireplace inside of library

3rd drawing~Emigration Creek

I arrived at the library a little after 9 am and started to draw the Sugar beet sculpture that sits in front of the library. No one showed up, but at that moment I realized that it did not matter to me if anyone would. What I wanted was to draw, to add art back into my life. Yes, it would have been nice to have an artist friend to share with, but it did not happen. However, I really was not alone, because all over the world there were artists sketching, painting and so forth at the same time that I was. They have shared their artwork on the forum and I will also. It was a great day and I enjoyed every minute of it.

4th drawing~Annie, my dog hanging out by the creek

 July 19, 2012~ Creating Art with my Son

My son and I created these drawings of a Purple Coneflower that was found near us.
We both created our works of art using Prismacolor drawing pencils and paper that my daughter makes. (Walk Through Water Creative Arts) 
Once again it had been a long time since I had used colored pencils, but the flower turned out great, but not as well as my son's drawing. I like his better. He had not done any creative work for a long time either. I really do not know why we ignored our Artist child for so long. We will not be letting that happen any longer. The Artist child in us needs to be given more opportunities to create. We will create and have a lot of fun doing our creations together. Here all along I thought that I did not have anyone to go out and about to draw with. My drawing companion was right there in my son and I should have had him go on the sketch crawl with me. Now I know better and we shall go and create.

January 2010 Art Journal Project

I have ventured into yet another project. Milliande of Milliande Art Community for Women has started an art journal project in which we, those that wish to join in on the fun, will do a daily entry (with prompts) into our art journal for January. It is to start the year off with art. You can read more about it here and watch Milliande's fun videos of her doing her pages. It has been a challenge, but a exciting one to say the least. I am a day or two behind but that is okay, because there are to be no worries in this project. Anyway, here are photos of the pages I have done so far.

First and Second day: I made the Journal, which is a Teesha Moore 16 page journal  made out of a 22"x30" piece of watercolor paper. It is a fun and easy way to make a journal. After I got the journal together I pre-painted all the pages using  artist's acrylics in blue, red, green and some black to make the pages different shades of purple. Once the paint was dry I created the cover. There is a whole bunch of stuff going on in this layout, stamps, ink, embossing powder, collage, stickers....and so on.

Third day:  We were to add a large circle to our layout. I took photos with my cell phone camera while I was outside having coffee and reading. The photo on this page is of the sun and printed with my new Polaroid Pogo printer. I added a bit of white on the first few days work over the dark purple. The star is cut from a Christmas card and has glitter on it but the scanner does not pick up that very well.

Fourth day: This is a layout using a Pogo print of my cup of coffee. The challenge for that day was to add a checkerboard pattern to the layout. I cut a square from a styrofoam meat tray and then used silver metallic paint on the stamp. The stamp was used around the edges of the fourth, fifth and sixth day pages as well.

Fifth day: The assignment was to add a piece of old calendar or journal page. I just made a new journal page and wrote a bit about my day then I did some collage work on the page. 
Sixth day: Draw a tree was the task of the day. I drew three winter trees using pastel pencils. It took me a couple of days to finish this page because I wanted to find a quote from Thoreau's Walden. I just knew there would be a good quote in one of his chapters based in the winter. Here is the kicker. I did not just want to read the chapters, I wanted to read them while I sat outside. I live in Utah, Northern Utah where the high for those days that I sat outside was only 29 degrees. On one of the days there was a slight breeze, very slight but enough to make that 29 degrees feel a lot colder and because we live on the bench of a mountain there is still snow in our yard. At least the sun was not blocked by clouds like it usually is. Despite the cold though, I did manage to find my quote: Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads. I wrote the quote on a piece of plastic, added a bit of gold beads and then used my heating tool to shrink the plastic a little. The page also has some vanilla inked 'snowflakes' with clear embossing done on them. The snowflake stamp was made out of a cork from a wine bottle (thank you, Gretchen;-).

Seventh day: Add a smile to your page. Well, I added three cute little smiles to my page. The photos are of my youngest son and my two grandsons and their funny little smiles;-)

Eighth day: Journal about our word or phrase for the year. I want to be creative every day, not just in art but in my writing as well. Thus far I have been doing very well at creating art and writing daily. Of course, it is only day twelve of the new year, but they say it only takes a few weeks to create a habit. If I continue at this rate my Create Daily creed will be a habit. Not just an "Ah, do I have to do it again!?" type habit, but a habit that I enjoy and I do enjoy it.

Well, that is all the days I have scanned into the computer. There will be more soon, I promise! For now, I wish that you all have a word or a phrase that will carry you through this year and perhaps beyond and that it is a joy.

Now go create something!

Busy, Busy, Busy!!!

There are times of the year in which many people become over loaded with what needs to be done and this month holds the biggest event in most peoples lives, Christmas. I have tried over the years to not get bogged down in the "to dos" of the holiday season. For the most part I have succeeded. My children have learned only to ask for gifts or a gift that is around a hundred dollars, not counting stocking stuffers. I really only have two younger boys to buy for because my older children are adults and I try and make them something cool.

The other people I make things for are neighbors, only a select few, five to be exact. What is important is the act of making the gift with those whom you have in mind to give to. I enjoy the process of coming up with a nice thoughtful small gift for my neighbors who are there for me if and/or when I need them. Last year it was a cool Christmas card book made out of a paperback (you can see it on my Flickr page, the link is on the right side of blog). It took a bit of time to make and because of my Fibromyalgia I was in a lot of pain, but it was worth the effort because those special neighbors loved the card.

Today and the rest of the week I am working on this years gift for neighbors and children. I have my pain under control so there will be even more joy in the making. Once the season is over I will post photos of the gifts I made. I pray that your holiday season is full of fun, family and friends and that you can leave the stress out of it. Enjoy the season!

Now about these two photos. These are the work I did for my online Creative Lettering class. We were to pick a bit of a song to use over wavy lines that were to be left in the final piece. The top piece is part of the song Kodachrome by Simon and Garfunkel and the second piece is a couple of quotes that I like. I loved writing on black paper. Some time this year I am going to make an all black papered journal and use cool pens to draw and write in. I have a sort of black journal started now but it is a place I put my Haikus and poetry in. I want and all black journal to draw in. But that is going to have to be put on my "to do" list for next year, for now I am off to work on my Christmas gifts.

Have a great and very creative day!

If Only I Could Get Back in the Habit ;-)

I plan on getting back in the habit of posting on my blog. Lately, I have been really bad about putting my creations up on here and that is making me feel crazy. From now on I promise to post at least once or twice a week, even if I do not have any work to show. Most of the time I have work to show and want to share it with my followers or those who happen to stop by. I promise!!!

I am still working through the lessons for my online art class and I also joined another art class that is learning how to make our lettering more creative. Being more creative with my lettering is something I needed to work on and this class is helping me to realize that goal. One of the main bits of information I have learned is that I must draw a light guideline with pencil in order to keep my lettering going in the direction I want it to go. My hand still shakes at times and the lines help me to keep on track, so to speak. The other bonus is getting to use different kinds of pens. I love using colorful pens when working with my lettering. My favorite is pens that are made for children, like Crayola markers and glitter pens. Really fun and because they are not expensive to buy I can enjoy using them.

These two pages are from lesson two in which we were to draw a guideline and then write a quote on it. One we were to erase the line and the other incorporate the line into the design. The Durrant quote is my line left in layout. The line erased layout is very bright and a lot going on in the design. I am still having a bit of trouble getting my letters to be equal in size, but at least I followed the line;-) I cannot wait for this weeks Creative Lettering class assignment. Not sure what she will have us do. All I know is that it will probably be fun.

I will add my other art class completed lessons this week, but for now I just wanted to get some images and words up on my blog and to put out there in the cyber world that I plan on doing a better job at posting to my blog.

Have a fun and very creative day!

It Has Been Too Long!

What Have I Been Doing? Well, for one thing I have been neglecting my blog. It has been too long between posts, I am truly sorry for that. I promise not to go so long between posts.

Now as to what I have been up to for the last couple of months. All the normal mom/teacher/wife stuff and my new job as bill collector for my doctor, which has taken some time to sort out the files of who owes what. As far as my art goes I joined another class on the Yahoo group Artists of the Round Table. The book we are following this time is Artists' Journals and Sketchbooks by Lynne Perrella. We are on lesson 4 now which is to create ATC cards that are journal prompts. I will be working on them today and/or tomorrow, but for now I will share some of my completed lesson projects. There will be a lot of photos to look at because of the amount of work I have done lately. Just wanted to warn you. I hope you enjoy them.

Lesson 1: We had to create a journal. I made mine out of black poster board and other various materials. The baby journal is a piece of embossed cardstock with various papers in it. It was fun creating these two journals.

Lesson 2: Take one image and do a different treatment eight times. The first image is the one I used and instead of photocopying the image I used my inkjet. One must always remember to use fixative on inkjet images otherwise the ink will run! I learned that lesson on the version that is on silver. I had forgotten to use fixative and when I glued the image down it made the ink turn green. I pulled off the image from the background and used a marker to add more green. Lesson learned! Some of the images I tweaked in Print Shop Pro X instead of straight printing. You know me I am a computer artist as well as all the other types, so I had to change the image a bit.

Lesson 3: We had to search through Perrella's book and find a page layout that we really liked and create our own version of it. I chose the page in which an artist made a journal just for her Haiku and poetry. I began the project by finding an image in a magazine and then writing a Haiku for it. After writing the Haiku I did the page similar to the inspiration piece in the book. Lots of stamping and inking went on. I used a piece of cardboard as the background and that is why it soaked up the ink even though I had painted the board first with a brown glaze. Oh well, it was a lot of fun creating the page. The page fits in the middle part of the journal I made (see above) and a bit of the page sticks out. The next pages I make outside of the journal will need to be on thinner paper, otherwise they will not all fit. I plan on putting some kind of fiber on the upper edge and not in the same place as the Haiku page. I think it will look cool with the many strings and such hanging out the top.

Well, now you know about some of the activities I have been doing the last little while, okay, long while. I will add my ATCs to my blog ASAP. I hope your days are creative, fun and full of joy!

My "The Decorated Page" Workshop Lesson 6 (final lesson;-<)

Well, I think that I am done with the workshop I have been involved in. It has been fun coming up with page elements to fit certain applications and layouts. The hardest application for me was 'changing forms'. It just took a bit of thinking to come up with some design that fit both the theme of my art journal and the application. The final page is a story about me getting my driver's license. A road with trees and then writing. I used my brayer to make the road and dauber ink stamps for the trees. Getting the yellow for the divider line on the road was difficult because it did not show up well. I ended up using a glitter pen. The irony of the story is that I loved driving and up until four years ago I drove everywhere we went. Now I am driven around because of my illness, which by the way is getting much better. Soon, I hope, I will be able to drive more and more. I miss getting up and going when ever I wanted to. In due time I will be off again.

The next layout and application was Borders and Storytelling. It is the story of my birth as well as that of my twin brother. I did an earlier page of me as a baby, which is just on the other side of my twin's page. I do not have a baby photo of him, only his high school graduation photo. Which shocked me when I found it because my 23 year old son looks just like my brother. It is very amazing how much my two older boys look like my brothers. My 15 year old son looks like my little brother. Scary! but good;-)

The final page is a map of the places I have lived up until now (and for a good while). I really do not like to move, but I do like seeing and living in new places. This is why I wish to travel in a motor home around the the USA and work as an on the road artist, writer and such. I need to get healthy first and that means it will be a couple of years before this can happen. I can dream though and work on getting better. Practice my art and writing and enjoy being where I am, the here and now.


I will miss working on these workshops but will continue with my art journal autobiography. There is many more pages to fill in this journal and probably many more journals to fill. I will post my pages as I get them done. Now go create!!! ;-)

My "The Decorated Page" Workshop Lesson 5

I have done three more layouts for my Decorated Page workshop for the Yahoo group-Artists of the Round Table. This workshop has been a blast and using the theme of an autobiography has made making the pages sentimental. As I go along not all the memories of my childhood are good, some are even scary to remember, but I have to do it. This is a book that I want my children and their children and so forth to enjoy, even if they know of the horrible things that have happened to me. AT this point I am not sure I will make pages for those memories. I might just write about them and I may or may not leave them in the open. One of the exercises of this workshop was to insert an envelope as a page, so I may put the stories in there and leave it up to the reader to decide as to whether or not he/she wants to read them.

The layout of the two little motorcycles are done using the Diagonal and Springboard layout. The point of the springboard is to put objects that will remind you of a story. On the blank pages after this layout I will write the story of me and these two motorcycles. I loved these bikes a lot and they are the part of my childhood that bring me great joy.

The bookshelf page is done using the Columns and Information Gathering layout. I used a gold pen but the scanner cannot translate it. The writing is some of the authors I have read. The photos of the books are the ones I enjoy reading over and over except for Jasper Fforde. I have only read his books once through, but I enjoy reading the books in his series. I love to read, among other things and this love has thankfully passed onto my children (hubby loves to read also). I was privileged to teach two of them how to read (wish I had started teaching my children at home when the oldest was starting school) and that is one of my favorite accomplishments.

The final page here is actually the next to the last page in my book. I am saving the last page for my 50th birthday, which is next May. The page layout is using Organic Shapes and Decision Making. Once again the scanner did not pick up much of the shiny pink flowers. The paper I used was a 12x12 scrapbook piece that I thought was very pretty. I did antique it a bit in order to fit the theme of the page. I love antiquing paper because bright whites bother me. My fingers are still burgundy from the inking I did on the background. I should have scanned my fingers, they were a big mess. Hey, they looked like artist's hand;-)

I only have three more layouts to do (I think) for this workshop, but many more pages planned for this art journal. Fun! Fun! Fun!

Have a happy and creative day!

The Weekly Challenge - Stamps

The Weekly Challenge - Stamps is for another artist's Yahoo Group I am on called: Blissfully_Art_Journaling. There are several challenges given often and this one sounded fun.

We were to do an entire page using only rubber stamps and ink. I also used embossing powder in gold, which may not show up on the scan I did. I also used my children's alphabet stamps to stamp out the quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson. I could not use his full name because of two reasons; one not enough room and two there was one letter missing from the alphabet stamps and that was the letter D. A bunch of other stamps were used and several different inks.

Not perfect, but a good challenge to do. Limiting the materials or tools is a good way to get the brain thinking of different ways to use them. Sometimes when we have too many tools or too much material to use we get lost and cannot focus on what it is we want our page to say. Perhaps I will do this again and see what comes out of it.

Have a fun and creative day!