Art Journal Plans 2016

 I am participating in a number of groups this year to help inspire my creative juices. Last year I really missed joining in with One Little Word (OLW) and The Documented Life Project (DLP) due to my busyness with the His Kingdom Come community. This year I am already enjoying slowing down and spending time on projects that foster reflection and changing habits, life planning and documenting memories. This is what these two projects bring to the table.

One Little Word is led by Ali Edwards - you can learn more about her on her website here. Ali offers a year full of prompts and ideas to incorporate with your word for the year. The Documented Life Project is a year long project done in a planner that uses prompts and technique challenges to record daily life throughout the year - you can learn more about their project here.

 

Originally I thought I would combine my different art adventures into one, or maybe two, journals. But as time progressed and I got involved in the plans for each group I decided on separate journals. And I decided to actually use the journals each group was offering their members. But then, just because I love making my own journals, I added an altered book journal in which I sewed the signatures and bound them into the spine of the book. I found this wonderfully worn German book at a book sale and the pages were literally falling out of it. It's worn cover and beautiful red spine were calling to me to be made into a journal and I intend to use it for miscellaneous art projects and classes throughout the year. In addition to that I made a small pamphlet style booklet to use as a travel journal on my upcoming road trip with my sister (I made one for her also!).

Here are some glimpses of my various art journals:

One Little Word:

OLW January divider page with my word circled: Rest

The Documented Life Project

Altered Book Art Journal:

Sisters Road Trip Travel Journal:

I will still do art and make recording from my photo walks in my Nature Journal. Who knows what else I'll get involved in this year. I'm just going with the creative flow!

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Meandering 1.12.2016

"Meandering: adjective; the act of following a winding or indirect course. Ramble, roam, zigzag, circuitous. A blog post about a variety of things; a little bit of this and a little bit of that."

Today my meandering is about recent discoveries.

I discovered 2015bestnine.com, a website that will generate a collage of your nine most popular pictures on Instagram for 2015.

Last month I discovered a way to continue my bird watching/photography hobby in the cold winter months. We have an incredible Metropark system in the Toledo area and six of our parks have Window on Wildlife locations. A Window on Wildlife is an indoor room lined with windows that overlook an area that has been set-up as a bird refuge with feeders, water and plenty of trees for shelter. The glass in these rooms are tinted so that the birds don't see you watching them. I discovered the first one on Christmas day. The weather here was 50 degrees. Highly unusual for late December in the upper Midwest! So I decided that day to go to the park closest to my home and take a photo walk. At the end of that walk I peeked my head into the Window on Wildlife and was pleasantly surprised to see so many birds visiting the feeders. I discovered this to be a great way to continue my weekly commitment of getting outside and taking pictures as a way of nourishing my emotional and creative energy. I plan on visiting all six locations over the next few months. So far I have been to two.

Female Downy Woodpecker

I discovered that the male Goldfinch changes color in the fall and winter.

Tufted Titmouse - my first sighting!

White-breasted Nuthatch - I can watch these little guys for hours!

This past weekend one of my god-grandsons asked me if I would help him with a writing and art project he was working on for school. Sai'Vion just turned nine and loves animals and nature so I decided that before we dug into the project I would take him over to the Window on Wildlife at Wildwood Park. We discovered that he really enjoys watching the birds also. He made a list of the birds we saw as I took pictures. He even worked a bird into his report and drew an impressive picture of a Blue Jay. I printed out some of the pictures I took, made a binder with drawing paper in it and place to keep his photos and gave him a bird book to use as a guide for drawing birds. I discovered a nine-year-old who now can share interests in birding and art with me! His story for his writing report was about encouragement. He made up a saying for it that said, "Keep calm and believe in yourself."

Sai'Vion's picture

His model

My birding and art buddy, Sai"Vion

I discovered my word for 2016: REST. I was originally thinking my word would be solitude, as it is a spiritual practice that I want to embrace more. But the more I thought about it I felt like solitude was a part of a bigger picture of a rhythm of life and rest encompasses that picture more fully. I'm not using the word rest as in "I just need some more sleep", but rather as a mindset of developing a rhythm of life that works to better balance all areas of my life: physical, mental, emotional, spiritual, and relational. My job in full time ministry can get overly busy and stress-filled at times and I have been trying for years to find ways to rest in the midst of the busyness in order to keep burn-out at bay. I've discovered in the past few years that the busyness and resulting fatigue and burnout rob me of energy in all areas of my life and I have been developing practices that help refill that depleted energy. So this year that is my focus.Last year I added to my already busy life by taking on being a part of the founding team of the His Kingdom Come faithart community. It was a great experience and one I totally enjoyed and am happy that I participated in. But it didn't help me build a healthier rhythm of life, in fact it just added more to the busyness and that was pivotal in my hard decision to step down form the foundation team. So this year I am slowing down as much as is possible. I am re-engaging in two practices from prior years that I gave up last year in order to make time for my HKC responsibilities. I am once again participating in Ali Edward's One Little Word project which helps me stay focused on my word throughout the year. And I am joining in on the Documented Life Project again this year. I missed being a part of these projects last year and am looking forward to engaging in them in the year ahead. I'll give just a glimpse of what I've done in each so far.

My One Little Word (OLW) binder:

The quote I found about fatigue really sums up well why I need to embrace rest this year!

My Documented Life (DLP) binder:

January divider

Week 1 calendar page

Week 1 mementos 

What I missed about DLP last year was how the practice of keeping memories about my days and weeks kept me more present to the happenings of daily life. It is also an easy art practice that keeps me creative without having to do a lot of planning.

Well, that's it for my discoveries recently. I'm looking forward to the journey ahead this year and what I will discover as I dig into my word for the year and as I document my daily life.

What discoveries have you made recently?

This, That, and A Bit of Calm

Art journaling is an obsession. Art, itself, is an obsession. You begin to see everything through the lens of art and creativity. I have written before about how getting in touch with the creative artist inside me has changed how I see things. Yesterday I was tutoring at the school we adopted. I was out in the hall with a group of second graders so they could read to me. They were reading this story:

I was mesmerized by the illustrations and when the kids were done reading I had to go back to this page and snap a pic on my phone:

This page reminded me so much of an art journaling page. This led to a conversation with the kids about what art journaling is, and then we talked about their hobbies. It was a blast!

For the OLW group our project this month was to design an inspiration board using cut-up magazines and put it on canvas so we can look at it through out the year and be reminded and inspired. (My word for 2014 is "be".) This was my first time putting art/collage on canvas and I really enjoyed it. Something I will pursue more in the future. :)

I stumbled on another version of OLW (here:OLW: Word Up). They provide a word and you are challenged to create something with that word. This month is the word "calm". So, I played with the word in my art journal.

This week the Documented Life Project was to use magazine clippings on a page. So I used the challenge to make this week's collage. 

Week 12 calendar page side 1

I am visiting my sister this weekend. I need a break! I need to relax, have fun and have some sister time! Enjoy your weekend and make some time to be creative. :)

One Little Word ~ January

A recap of my journey with my One Little Word (OLW 2014) for 2014 {BE} for the month of January. Focusing on this word is already having an impact on my perspective. This past month I've tried to just be still and know God and simply rest in that knowledge. Not always an easy task for one who is independent and leans toward doing things "her way". I selected a bird as my symbol for my word this year. The idea of the bird comes from a passage in Matthew (6:25-34) where Jesus speaks of how the birds do worry about their needs and the Father takes care of them. He says, "Are you not much more valuable than they?" (vs. 26) In The Message version it says that the birds are "careless in the care of God" and that is how I see this word "BE". So the birds help me remember to just "be" in His presence and care.

As I wrote earlier in the month, I am including my OLW 2014 art journaling in my Documented Life journal and I am also working on a collage a week for the year. My first collage of the year introduced my word.

Collage week 1: My OLW {BE}

My word' defined, why I chose it and intentions for the year.

My symbol for my word ~ a bird.

Collage week 2

Collage week 3

I'm only slightly behind as I have not finished my collage for week 4. I have enjoyed the insight that has come as I have prayed and journaled this month ~ so much more than I have shared here. I'm sure it will surface in time as I continue to use Ali Edwards' OLW prompts and challenges as a guide to help me stay focused on my word throughout the year.

Mid-month Catch-up

January is just flying by and here we are at the middle of the month already. So far this month we have had record breaking cold - 1 degree for the high on 1/7, not including the windchill - and two snowstorms days apart leaving us with almost 24 inches of snow. The kids here got an additional week off of school tagged on to the end of Christmas break. The city shut down for two days so the week after the holidays we had a short week, which was nice. But it all made for a lot of catching up last week and a feeling of wondering where the month has gone.

On the art journaling front:
I have begun working in my new altered book art journal ~

I am working on the first few challenges for Documented life ~

Week 1 challenge was to use a picture of your front door

Week 1 calendar pages

Also working through the One Little Word exercises for this month, which are going into the same journal with Documented Life ~

I want to play with collage more this year and am attempting to make a collage a week. Here is Collage 2 ~

I added a few more Vintage Paper Packs to my shop including this one ~ full of vintage ladies and gents!

Vintage People Paper Pack

My beautiful daughter turns 34 this week. This also has left me wondering where the time has gone. I am enjoying witnessing what an incredible woman she has grown into and watching her navigate married life. I'm proud of her and am so happy she found such a loving guy to spend her life with!

That's all for today. I hope you are enjoying your week!