Resuming an Old Handmade Sketchbook "Jots and Tittles"

 So, I finished my other sketchbook, except for a couple of watercolor sketches that need a bit more work, and in looking for one of my new sketchbooks, I found this little handmade book that I made back in 2012 that hasn't been used since 2015.

At the time, we were having to take my father-in-law to the doctor a lot and I spent a lot of time in waiting rooms, so I made this small light weight journal to keep in my purse to sketch in while I waited. I also read in my Kindle a lot, plus I had another small hardback bought sketchbook that I did most of my sketching and note taking in. That explains the long gaps in the dates!

The cover is made from soft unstretched artist canvas, which I stenciled and layered paint on, and I punched four eyelet holes in the edges for decoration and to tie together with waxed linen thread for bookbinding. It measures 6"x9" closed. 

It's been so long that I don't remember what kind of paper I used, but it's a bit thicker than regular paper and is an off-white color. It has two signatures of five 18" long papers folded in half, and they are bound with a simple pamphlet stitch using the same waxed linen thread I used for a tie.

The first four pages are from 2012, and the fifth page is from 2013. 

People I saw in the waiting room that I found interesting

A mandala kept me busy for a whil

Doodled a quote that I saw somewhere

Another mandala practice

Ok, I did a quick loose watercolor sketch in it this morning from imagination, using leftover watercolors and a large brush. The paper does not work well with wet watercolor, and it buckled some. It might be ok using dry brush watercolor, but it seems to be more suited for dry media. Not great, but at least I was painting! 

I had to photograph it because it wouldn't fit on my scanner, being a 6" x 18" long double page spread. I also couldn't make the photo on here bigger, because it wouldn't fit on the published page. Anyway, it's a start on getting my mojo back! Ha!

We are still iced in with very frigid temperatures, but thankfully, we have what we need, and are doing ok. Day #8 with the aftermath of "Fern".

Hope you are safe, warm, well, and creating beautiful things, wherever you are! You don't have to make things perfect to enjoy making them...

Day 23, 24, 25 Sketches 2025

 I counted up and I have missed five days that I didn't sketch this month, BUT some days I actually did two or three sketches (multiple items from life), so I have done more than the month's worth (31) already. It's all good! 😊

Anyway, here are my sketches for the last three days!

The little stuffed snowman and the candle were gifted to me by a friend for Christmas, and I just added the little spray bottle of water for practice.

Yesterday I sketched a saucer with a piece of baked, instead of fried, chocolate pie, a glass of milk, and my father-in-law's flag, which was folded crooked when the funeral home gave it to my husband. It drives me nuts, but we're afraid to try to re-fold it, for fear of making a bigger boo-boo. 😒

Today I've sketched one of our Himalayan salt lamps, a wooden clothespin, and a resin pear.

All but the pear were sketched with my Zig Writer marker except the pear, and I used a dodgy :Uniball ink pen that was about out of ink, because I had moved to my printer desk and it was handy. I did fill in around the stars with an India ink filled brush pen. All of my daily sketches, so far, have been in my 7x10" Canson mixed-media sketchbook.

The book, "Desire to Inspire", which I shared with you in the last post had two sheets of inspirational quotes on cardstock by the various artists participating in the book, so I have cut them out of the book and plan to use them in my collage journals. Cut apart, they will fit perfectly in some of the pockets in the mini journal that I have in progress.

As I said before, this book has many good inspirational thoughts, tips, and exercises from many different artists. I'm glad I found and re-discovered it! It's by Christine Mason Miller

That's it for today! I think. It's too cold for hubby to potter around outside, so I'm not getting anything done in the house either, as far as cleaning. But that's ok. I'm thankful to still have him with me.

I'm thinking I may re-charge my old mp3 player and use it here in the house and keep my newer one in my purse for when I'm out/waiting. I miss my music a lot.

Anyway, enjoy your weekend and do something for yourself! Your soul will thank you for it!

A Couple of Sketches n Wax Crayon Play

 A couple more character sketches from online photos that I did this week (ordinary women, not models), a quote, an ephemera hack, color swatches, and some crayon play!

I thought I got this lady's eyes wonky, but I didn't. Her eyes are where they're supposed to be, but I got her nose and mouth slanted the wrong way. Sometimes I think I have dyslexia for drawing. I often draw things opposite to what I'm looking at. :( She taught me some things though, so she's ok!

Random journal page with an ephemera hack, a quote, and color swatches from a box of Faber Castell Jumbo Wax Crayons that I uncovered among my supplies a couple of days ago. I had completely forgotten about them! Anyway I decided to play with them in my journal a bit!

No idea why I made her hair so thick and square at the top, and I didn't notice it until just now. Oh, well, I was just playing and experimenting. Funny how the mistakes don't show up until you post them online, and then they JUMP out at you! :o

Just random mark making with the crayons. I got the bright idea that since they were wax crayons I could melt them with the heat gun after I finished, to give it a softness, and I tried, but it didn't work, so it's an accidental abstract, I guess. You learn from your mistakes and failures what doesn't work and what not to do the next time!

It's been kind of sad for me this week. My mama died unexpectedly seven years ago yesterday, the 6th, and I still miss her so much and always will. We did everything together, and she left a huge gap in my life. I knew I would really miss my parents if something happened to them, but I couldn't begin to imagine how much. The world is a much lonelier scarier place without them. I was blessed with good ones, and I am grateful.

PS: The version of this abstract above was too dull and pale to suit me, so I re-worked it this morning! Tuesday (6-11-24) I like it much better!

Try some experimental play with whatever you love to create. You never know what will come out of it, and it's good for your soul!

Mixed Media Pinkish Abstractish

 Another mixed media, sort of abstract, piece in my journal for practice and experimentation.

The sentence in the middle is a line of a prayer that my mama printed off (her handwriting) and I made a copy of to use here. It says, "Oh, Lord, please forgive me, I pray, as I throw my self made halo away."

I may, or may not, be through with this one. I feel it's lacking something. I'm waiting for it to tell me what!

Update: I added some white gel pen and a bit more detail and lightened it up. I think I'm quitting on it now! :D

2021 Calendar Pages

For the last three years I have published calendars of my creative endeavors for the "special" people in my life. This year's calendar is kind of a hodge podge of past art, as was the first one. Calendars two and three contained work I finished that year. For much of this year, my creativity has been blocked and what I have done is still in progress, so I went back and picked out some of my favorite quirky doodle sketch/paintings and a couple of altered album covers, and put captions under them. Things that I thought would make the receivers smile a little.

I didn't re-photograph the art, and the original photos aren't all that great. In fact, a couple of them printed too dark, but I'm hoping the recipients will still enjoy the final result. I think the florals/words on the design I picked out matched my artwork pretty good. At least, I like it! 😀

Most of the art was painted with inktense or watercolor pencils and water on mixed media paper. A couple were painted with watercolors and a brush pen on watercolor paper, and three of them (altered album covers) are mixed media collage on cardboard record album sleeves.

Hoping this year's calendar is enjoyed, hoping I'm still around, that my muse comes back, and that I have some new art to print into a new calendar next December. Who knows, the way the Coronavirus is raging? Praying that it goes away soon!

Stay safe and well!

Current Bulletin/Inspiration Board

 So, I bought one of the perforated metal bulletin boards, which allows me to use thumb tacks or magnets, either, or both! I love it! However, I bought it and stood it on a table easel to use for making photos of my creative stuff, and it has quickly turned into an inspiration/bulletin board, which is not a bad thing, but it defeats the purpose I intended it for. 

Currently, to inspire me, it has a Blessed magnet, a photo of our beloved little dog, Kibbles, whom we lost in 1997 and still miss every day, a bookmark about writers and words (I love the swirl and swing of words, as they tangle with human emotions"), given to me by a dear friend, who enjoys my writing, a printout of journal pages, also the header photo for this blog, with cat stamps on it (love these stamps!), a printout of some practice portraits with charcoal, stabilo pencil, and water, from a free class called Petit Portraits, a sticky note about changing your life by changing one thing that you do every day, a printout of a journal page painting where you pull the images out, from a class called She Tribe, picture of old timey peonies (I love peonies, especially white ones!), a page torn from an old almanac, a page of little Christmas stickers torn out of some book, because I love some of the little characters on it, and a black and white card with a touching inside note sent from the same dear friend. Oh yeah, extra magnets and thumbtacks, two of which have clips for holding other stuff! 

The longer it sits there, the more stuff will accumulate on it. I took down a lot of stuff when I moved from the old cork board to this one. Inspiration boards are good. Sometimes, they inspire you in ways you wouldn't have thought of otherwise!

More WIP Journal Pages

I'm working some every day in my wire/plaster Wandering Muse journal, from Jeanne Oliver's class, along with my stitching and wire wrapping, which I do while watching TV. It may be only a layer painted, or glued, down, or a few marks, but I do something to it! My journal stuff is on the dining room table, which lets me stand up to work on it and stretch my legs at the same time, as I think of something to add. A good thing, because I tend to sit too much! 😀

Right now I have something on about half the pages, so they are on their way! The rest are still the textured white with marks made in the gesso/marble dust while it was wet, and a few have a tiny bit of collage, or a word, which may get covered when I actually start working on them.

I shared the first pages in progress in a previous post. Here are three more that I have started progress on since then. I have actually done a bit more to the first one since I took this picture. 

There's no theme here, and I journal intuitively, having no pre-conceived ideas when I start pages, or as I work on them. I just go where they tell me to go on this fun adventure, and some of my wire-wrapped beads will be added to the spine, and maybe a couple of other places when it's done!

This spread has two failed magazine photo transfers on it, but I am making it work! To start with, I drizzled Sepia acrylic ink all over both pages! I like it! 

This spread may be done. Not sure yet. That's a real wild turkey feather on the right page and little bird cages at the top. The quote says, "God loved birds and invented trees; Man loved birds and invented cages." by Jaques Deval 

Not sure what I'm going to put on these pages yet, but they started out with the cute little bunny collage on the left side!

I shared these pages before, but I added the bird and the rose since then. These are printed copies of two of my favorite pictures of my parents and me in the fifties (I was around 5-6). The girl on the right page is my older cousin, by 8 years, Kaylean, whom I idolized when we were growing up, and though she moved away when she was eighteen, and I never saw much of her again, I stayed in touch and never stopped loving her. She passed away in 2017, four months before my mother died, and I still miss both of them every day, and always will.

The words say, "Don't Believe Everything Your Mind Thinks!", torn from a magazine. The bird and rose were torn from the front of greeting cards and pasted on. I'm not sure what else I'll do to this one. I kind of like the simplicity of it like it is. We'll see!

Still praying for the Coronavirus pandemic to end soon! Stay safe, well, and creative! Thank you for visiting! 💓

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! 2020 Calendar of Stitches-2 Versions

Wishing you all a healthy, happy, creative, and blessed New Year!

I debated on whether to share this on the last day of 2019 or the first day of 2020 for my blog book, and decided that the first day of the New Year was more appropriate.

For the last two years, I've published calendars of my paintings as gifts for my best friends, my aunt, and some special cousins that I grew up with, and, of course, one for myself. They seem to enjoy them, so this year I published two versions of the stitch meditations I started doing in July of this year. I ordered eight of each version from Vistaprint during a half price sale, and this time, instead of just having the photo, I used the templates with Bible verses and inspirational quotes. I'm very pleased with the outcome. 😉

I didn't do it intentionally, but when I looked at the calendar page photos, as they came up on my computer screen, many of the quotes matched the meditations perfectly, which makes me happy. I hope the recipients see that, as well.

Sorry about the slight light glare on some of the photos. I got two new floor lamps with daylight bulbs, but don't have them set up for good photography yet. The other half page is just the days with large squares for writing down appointments, etc.

VERSION 1 Cover of Calendar 2020

January 2020

February 2020

March 2020

April 2020

May 2020

June 2020

July 2020

August 2020

September 2020

October 2020

November 2020

December 2020

VERSION 2 of Calendar 2020

January 2020

February 2020

March 2020

April 2020

May 2020

June 2020

July 2020

August 2020

September 2020

October 2020

November 2020

December 2020

When I had the calendar published a few weeks ago, I had thirteen stitch meditations done, exactly how many I needed for the calendar pages, and that is what I used. I am now working on #21. Each meditation has it's own post here, if you're interested in seeing better photos/details of them. Just click on stitch meditations in the labels on the sidebar!

Prayers for spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical healing for us all in the coming new year! May the Lord bless and keep us, and give us the strength and courage that we need to face whatever comes our way each day, and may we always be grateful and give thanks. No matter how bad we may think it is, it can always get worse.