Art Journal

Art Journal

I have an addiction. One to paper and journals. I just can't resist buying artful paper, hand made journals, doing handmade journal swaps, making art journals. I have a stack of writing journals on my dresser. My biggest downfall is that I tend to not write in them. All these pretty books begging for words to fill them. Ahhhh, I'm getting better.

I am starting an eight month long project - another art journal round robin. I was in one, on another art group, and got burned before - never got my journal back. I really like and trust the women in my altered art group, so I decided to join in. Robin, the hostess, sent out a 12 month, 6" x 8" calendar to each participant. We are responsible for getting the pages prepped, do a front (pictured) and back cover and one page of our own art work. The pages were a pain to cover. I tried sanding the shine off, gesso, paint... Finally I resorted to covering a bunch with different neutral papers; maps, tissue paper, paper bag. I added some gesso to tone them down. I didn't really want to influence the artist's choice on the page, but it was the only was to get them covered.

I am mailing my journal off today to the first artist that will work in it. I am waiting to receive one. We have until the 21st of each month to get two pages of art done and get it mailed to the next woman on the list. We even had an international artist participating. I'm looking forward to the project.

Meanwhile, I have three other art journals going for my personal use. One is filled with art and I am going back and writing in it. The other two are works in progress. I like to have a place to experiment with different techniques. Some pages are good and some stink, but I don't care because it is mine. It is relaxing to go down to my work room and start a background between dinner, laundry, homework, errands. It is my little oasis during a busy day!

Mail Art

MAIL ART
Everyday you get your mail. Most times it is full of boring bills, ads and occasional letter - yes some people still write letters! Now image opening your box and seeing these envelopes. Much more exciting! These two envies are for a mail art swap. The fronts and backs are shown. The mermaid/fish is painted with a crayon backbround. The owls, a favorite of my daughter, is done in sharpie.

Yes, people do actually take the time to art up an envelope. I am hooked. After doing these for the swap, I painted a large padded one for my art journal round robin and started doodling on some business size ones. This is very portable and something I can work on whenever I get a few minutes. I doodle on napkins and paper, why not envelopes. Maybe your day will be brightened by one of these or try your own! I figure it at least may make a postal worker smile.

Sadly Neglected!

Wow - four months since a posting! I need to get back into the habit of posting my art work. I have slowed down a lot in regards to swaps and my art has taken a back seat to color guard competitions, baseball, teaching, new business, housework and my newest adventure with my hubby - soap making. We will have different hand made, cold pressed soaps for sale soon (they take weeks to cure). If you are interested in natural soap, contact me to see what is available.

Here are two photos. The button fairies were for a swap I hosted on my Yahoo art group. They have hand painted faces and wings and are strung on wire with buttons. I think they are so happy and colorful! The tea pot was my contribution to a tea pot fat book recipe swap. It has a collage background with layers of paint and a hand painted mug. The recipe is on the back for my very yummy chocolate chip muffins - a favorite around here.

Our family continues to "green up" and eat better (mostly without knowing). We joined a new CSA (community supported agriculture) farm so we are looking forward to fresh veggies all summer. I'm running a craft table for the kids during the open house this weekend, at the farm, and will be teaching a journal making class next month to the member's kids. We are also hosting an art night for our small group, so I'm looking forward to see how creative they are! So even if I can't get some personal art done, I get to share what I love with others! Look for some more frequent posts!

One Small Change Challenge

I have two new favorite sites, SouleMama and Hip Mountain Mama. Hip Mtn Mama has issued a challenge to make one small change each month to help the environment. Here it is:

"Our vision with Hip Mountain Mama is much larger than selling environmentally friendly products. We are passionate about educating others about sustainability and passsionate about building community. Our desire to create a community of individuals who want to make a possitive change has led to the creation of our One Small Change project.

We want to challenge each of you to make 1 change each month leading up to Earth Day (April 22, 2010). It can be small or it can be huge, but all we ask is that you decide on something you will do to make a positive green impact and follow through with it. If everyone makes 4 changes between January and April, this can have a huge effect. If you want to be a part of this amazing and life changing challenge, please see below for details.

How does it work? On January first (or soon after) you will decide on what change you want to make for that month and blog about it. For the entire month you will be conscious of this decision and follow through with what you decided on. Then on Feb. 1 you will write another blog post explaining how the month went with your new green change and also write about what you will change for that month. You will do the same on March 1st and April 1st, then will have one final post on April 22nd listing all the changes you made and the differences it made in your life."

I have several ideas in mind. One for this month, I use recycled bags at the grocery store, but nowhere else. I feel guilty bringing home all that plastic from Target or WalMart. I pulled out some pretty fabric yesterday and am going to sew up some bags to take to non-grocery stores. My sister gave me a book for Christmas from Soulemama on recycled sewing projects, including shopping bags. She knows how I comb the thrift stores looking for things to repurpose. If I didn't have such a large fabric stash from when a fabric shop went out of business, I would be buying old curtains or sheets for this project. I'll post some photos when they are made

http://hipmountainmamablog.com/one-small-change/

Affirmation Cards

These five cards are for my Affirmation Card Swap. The idea was to create five different affirmations. They get sent to the hostess and I get, in return, four more sets of five cards. If you want me to do the math, I'll finish with 25 inspirational cards. This was difficult for me because I am an act of service person, not words of affirmation, but once I got going, I found I am looking forward to receiving the returns. I was so inspired that I am making my mom-in-law a set of affirmation cards for Christmas with Bible verses. I played around with art paste and oil pastels for those - photos in the near future.

The cards were all done in craft acrylics. I added some gel medium to help the paint spread better. My copy of "Grateful" pictured here ran a bit when I applied the gel medium to seal it. The scan didn't turn out well - two of the girls have pink hair.
I purposely kept them simple and bold because I thought it created an uplifting, happy look.

ATC Swaps

Here are a few ATCs for upcoming swaps. I have two goldfish for a partner swap. One done in fluid acrylics on an oil pastel background, the other in watercolor on paper background. The blowing wind is for "Up in the Air" done in fluids and the door is for "Doors and Windows". Colored pencil on paper. The door does open to reveal a fairy.

Greetings from Florida!

Thought I would post something quick from Florida. I know I need some new stuff on this blog. I have been bogged down with teaching, home schooling, my newest cause, fostering dogs, and now I'm in Florida, so my art has slowed down. I have a bunch of swaps coming due, so I hope to post some of my current work when I get back home. Check back over the next few weeks.

TAB Choice

When I took over as art teacher last year at my son's school, I changed the entire curriculum for seven classes. I wanted the projects to be fresh and to be ones that I tested. I got a lot of compliments on the work that was produced and the kids enjoyed the projects. The only problem was, it was cookie cutter art. Most looked like my examples. A teacher that I met through one of my art groups (our schools swapped ATCs) told me about TAB - teaching for artistic behavior. I started researching it over the summer, joined another Yahoo group dedicated to it, got a book on it and was convinced it was the way to go. Fortunately my principal is very cool and open to new ideas and gave me the go ahead.

So what is TAB you ask? It is a choice based art room filled with art centers where the students move from station to station creating their own art work. Studies and experience from other teachers show that the kids are more invested in their work because it is their work. The art may not be as pretty, but it is real and creative. Centers include; drawing, painting, fiber arts, collage, print making and short term stations like paper mache, book making, puppet making. It puts less pressure on me to create new lessons and gives the art back to the kids and gets them thinking like artists. Mistakes are a good thing as kids learn what works and what doesn't. I give a short demo each class on a technique and then step back and offer individual instructions or help when needed.

I didn't want to go right into this, so we started the year creating murals. I gave each grade a theme and let them work together to plan and create the murals. It went over very well and we had some great art work on the wall for open house. I followed this with the drawing and collage centers. The younger grades embraced this new system and really wowed me with their work. Kindergarten produced some books, first and second grade some very cool paper sculptures. My ADHD student was so engaged, he had no trouble focusing and produced some cool art. This past week I had a set lessons and second grade was dissappointed that the centers were not open. The upper grades were the ones that were lost. They have spent years being told what to draw/make, that they were unsure with this new freedom. I think they will need baby steps!

I hope to be fully switched over to a choice based room by December. Kindergarten will continue to alter between choice and lessons. I want to make sure they have help with basis skills such as tracing, scissor work, painting and drawing. I have a few kids that can't cut - they keep saying the scissors do not work. I am looking forward to this year and seeing what great art work the kids come up with.

Let it Go

My blog has been ignored for over a month! I have been crazy busy and blogging, Facebook and Yahoo have taken a back seat. I decided to add a piece that I did in August. It is a mixed media done on a recycled hard back book. The background is covered with assorted scrapbook papers, gesso, paint, stamping and images. The girl is done in fluid acrylics. I have done about five paintings with different sayings, but this is my favorite! I think we all have something in our lives to let go.

Art Journal

Here are a few pages from my newest journal. All are heavily layered pieces; papers, tissue paper, gesso, fluid acrylics, images, stamping. The two girls are aged versions of my daughters.