Tag Archives: art journal

Wednesday Wonder – The Documented Life Project – 2015

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Whether you are new to art journaling or an experienced pro, you’ll want to be sure that The Documented Life Project is on your radar. 2014 is the first year this project took place. It was headed up by a group of the five women who make up the Art to the Fifth Academy; Lorraine Bell, Sandi Keene, Rae Missigman, Barbara Moore, and Roben-Marie Smith.

The project was free and was designed as part planner, part art journal. Most people used Moleskine journals. A prompt was issued each week and these five women shared their take on the prompt. A Facebook group was started and by the end of this year, it had grown to over 7,700 members! People shared photos of their pages and the inspiration and comradery was phenomenal!

The good news is that there will be a new project for 2015!

You can find out about it HERE.

I hope you will join the experience!

Cheers to YOUR Artful Adventures!

KS

Mini Summer Art Journal

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Have you ever seen a handmade art journal that has decorative edge cuts as part of the page design? They are beautiful — and time consuming! I adore their appearance, but don’t usually have the time to devote to their creation.

In recently going through the handbook of one of my Cricut cartridges, I decided that instead of cutting one of the little booklets from card stock, I would use mixed media paper. That way, I could create the small size I wanted, yet use it for whatever suits my mood! I have a large pad of Canson watercolor, 90 lb. paper, which I had picked up on sale. It is heavy enough to take whatever I decide to dish out on my pages. It is 12×18″ so it was easy to cut a 12×12″ sheet to place on the cutting mat. So that’s what I decided to use.

I used the Artbooking Cricut cartridge from Close to My Heart. To maximize my paper, I cut the pages at 5 inches. Now I have a sweet little booklet to use however I want. I may even just do background treatments and still put some little photos in it.

Mini summer art journal from Cricut Artbooking cartridge

Notice the bonus letters from the cut-outs of “summer” and “fun.”

Once I picked out which pages I wanted to use, it was a breeze! I love the fact that there are various sized page heights. I could have made two of the scrolled pages and flipped them opposite ways! Maybe next time.

Check out all the cuts you can do in the Artbooking handbook, and pick yours up here.

What would you do with a little summer art journal? Draw, paint, use it for photos….? Share your ideas in the comments!

KS

Monthly Art Journal Diary Page – March

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Some of you may remember the pages we did for a monthly calendar, using a cross between art journaling and scrapbooking. Here was last year’s March layout. This year, I am doing something a little different. I have been participating in Joanne Sharpe’s wonderful online class, Draw Your Awesome Year. We are each working on a journal, and each month we are creating an artful layout to use in documenting little bits about each day.

This is great for me, because I don’t typically journal every day; at least not a full page. That’s why just a snippet of info is a great way to keep a bit of info so that I can look back and remember the year.

March daily calendar art journal.

This particular spread’s design was created with Inktense pencils and a water brush. Isn’t it great how you can create something by only coloring in the negative space? I love these pencils because they are so vivid and not too messy!  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not opposed to being messy!

I pulled out my greens and just went to work. Not a great idea! I should have looked at my color swatches and realized that “Leaf Green” has a brown tone in it! Yes, I dove in right around the title of my page, and it was hard to get that color toned down. I tried to pull it into other areas of the page, but the top of the right page has a little too much more my taste. The background and design are done, and for me, it’s time to move on!

Do you often find that you spend a great deal of time trying to “fix” something you didn’t plan on happening in your art or crafting? Share your stories so I don’t feel like I am all alone!

Word for 2014

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I can’t believe today is the last day of January 2014! What kinds of wonderful things are you planning to accomplish this year? Whatever you plan to do, wherever you plan to go, I wish you the best year ever.  Now I am waving my fairy godmother wand over you, so you know you have the power to go out and do it!

I have a theme this year of “More Doing, Less Thinking about Doing!” Towards the end of last year I really got sidetracked with so many things that were going on around me. I did so much more thinking about doing than the actual doing of the things I wanted to get done.  That brings me to something many of you have heard of, or may do yourself, which is select a single word for your year.  My word this year is “NOW!”

Here is a dictionary definition

Now – adverb

1. at the present time or moment

2. without further delay; immediately; at once

For me, this goes along with more doing and less thinking about doing! However, it is so much more. I want to make sure that I enjoy the moments of everyday, being in the present, being in the now. Each day I wake up to a new day, enjoy it now!  Each day I have with my family – enjoy them now. I want to be grateful for all the little things we take for granted – now. I don’t want to put things off that I want to do – so I want to work them in – now! If I can’t actually do it now, write time on the calendar to make the time.  I’m sure you get the picture!

This page was done in an online class I’m taking with Joanne Sharpe, called “Draw Your Awesome Year.” It was colored by using Inktense Pencils, which are a water soluble ink. If you like using bright colors and water – you would love these!

Have you selected a word for the year? Please share it in the comments!

Now-word of the year-Kristie-Sloan

Heart Punch Shamrocks on March Art Journal Calendar

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Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-Heart-Punch-ShamrocksI always love it when I can show you something and get a project done at the same time!  Today, I’ve got yet another way to use a heart punch or die cut.  We are almost to March this year, and St. Patrick’s Day brings Irish inspired design to many things during the month of March.

These were made from vellum so that they did not completely cover up the background layers.

For this March art journal calendar scrapbook page:

VintageSt.PatricksDay
  • Used a green piece of 12×12″ card stock for the foundation piece.
  • Die cut “March” from a printed paper, and inked the edges of the letters
  • Arranged the vintage greetings and adhered them.
Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-March-Project-Layout
  • Toned down the greetings with a bit of white craft ink.
Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-March-Project-Inking
  • Punched hearts from heavy vellum card stock
  • Inked the edges of the hearts
  • Arrange the hearts into shamrocks
  • Adhered just the points with a bit of glitter glue
  • Topped off the center of each shamrock with a bit of Crystal Effects, to make sure they adhered securely.
Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan-Heart-Punch-Shamrocks
  • Drew stems on the shamrocks with a marker.
  • Numbered the petals of the shamrocks to be used as a tiny journal spot for each day.

Artful-Adventures-Kristie-Sloan_March-Art-Journal-Calendar-Scrapbook-Page

Don’t forget to join us over at the Artful Adventures Facebook Group and share your completed items!  There will be “lucky” prizes drawn in March for those who have uploaded something they have created. You never know when those drawings will be held!