Caatje's Artsy Stuff

Patterns in the snow

2012-02-17T17:36:00.000+01:00

You may have guessed by now I like taking photographs. I'm by no means a 'photographer'. To me a photographer is somebody who actually knows what they're doing and can tell you something about camera's and shutter time and aperture and all that stuff. I'm more a documentalist than a photographer. By that I mean that I like to record things, be it writing or in images. To me that's what photography is, a way to very quickly record an image, not a search for the perfect settings. And I just happen to be one of those people that sees images everywhere! ;-)

One of the things that fascinate me are patterns. I don't know why this is, but I always end up taking pictures of things like tree bark, wood grain, fencing, structure, repetitive items etc. The recent snow gave me the chance to take some pictures of patterns left in the snow or affected by the snow. So here's a little sample of what I'm talking about.

Now the last picture has little to do with patterns, but I just thought it was cool. This is a shadow of me and some trees cast on a frozen pond. Wouldn't this make an fun painting?

As you can tell I'm having a hard time letting go of winter. It was so short lived, wonderful, but short lived. I wish it would return so I could explore it a little more. Oh well...

Winter or no, I wish all of you a wonderful and artsy weekend!

And...the word verification is off again!

2012-02-17T13:00:00.000+01:00

Well, looks like blogger has joined the ranks of the unreadable word verifications. I don't know why they've changed the setup, but it's pretty annoying. Unless they're secretly trying to push everyone to turn the verification off. (I'm nothing if not paranoid)

Until now I found the words quite easy to read and didn't mind it so much and as I've said before: spam is overflowing when I don't do it. Blogger does have a pretty good spamfilter, so the spam doesn't show up on the blog, thank God, but... it does show up in my mailbox and I don't want it there.

So now I have to give in and change things around again. I have set up my comments now in such a way that I no longer will receive an e-mail when someone comments, which by the way I'm not too happy about. That's how I've kept up with my comments until now. Now however I will have to logon to blogger to see if I have any comments. Oh well, at least my readers will no longer have to go through the trouble of typing in five or six extra letters, so for you it's an improvement! Enjoy! ;-)

What are you up to Wednesday - part 38 (woyww 141)

2012-02-15T07:00:00.000+01:00

I have a confession to make. Last week I posted my woyww post, but did not visit one other desk, except for our hostess Julia's of course. I just didn't have the time. So I'm extra amazed when someone comments on my Wednesday posts claiming they are visiting all other participants. That's close to 200 blogs! How on earth do you do that? The way it usually goes with me is that I will randomly pick about 10 to 20 blogs and look and comment on them. I cannot be the only one who does it that way, at least I hope not, or I would feel really guilty. By picking different blogs every week I will cover most of you over time, but not all of you every single week. I hope you understand. I don't want to make blogging my full time occupation. ;-) I do love looking at other people's workdesks though, so if you feel te same go visit Julia's blog and check out some (or all if you're braver than me) of the other participants.

Here's how my desk looks at the moment:

Sorry about the dark quality of the photo. It was getting a little dark when I took it and I don't have a flash on my phone.
What you're looking at is my Studio Book, the sketchbook I keep in my studio. I'm testing out some pens and markers on both white and black paper to see how they perform. I just received a package of wonderful UniPosca paint markers and still have to test those. I'm thinking of doing a black paged doodle book, so I need markers that show up on dark paper.
You can also see little bottles of craft paint. Those I'm using for the altered atlas which pages are finally getting some colors on them. I intended to do this with a credit card, but found it too time consuming, so now I'm using baby wipes, which goes really well.

As a bonus I want to give you a last look at the fields of ice around the island. I say a last look, because since Sunday it has started to warm up and most of them have melted away already. All the snow is gone too. It's amazing how fast that can go. Anyway, this is how things looked last Saturday.

There's still ice in the Wadden Sea though and the ferry still has an adapted schedule, but I don't think this will last very long anymore. I'm sorry to see Winter go again and there's no way of knowing if it will return this season or if Spring will start to move in. I will miss all that crisp whiteness and the crisp air. But I have tons of images to remember it all by.

Wishing you all a very artsy Wednesday!

First spreads from the In Between Journal

2012-02-13T17:32:00.001+01:00

As you all may know by now I'm working in what I call my In Between Journal. Last Friday I posted a tutorial on how I prepped this journal with simple watercolors and a sponge and today I will show you some of the first spreads from this journal.

The journal came into being because my second remains of the day journal ROD2 was finished, but the journal I had planned to use right after it was not nearly ready for use. I like my journals to have a base to work from. This is mostly because I work in my journals early in the morning and I just don't have the time then to also have to paint and color a spread. I want to get straight to writing and decorating when I actually journal.

The In Between Journal is a small sketchbook that I bought years ago at the National Gallery in London (only my favorite city in the whole wide world!). The cover of the journal has a painting on it, but I figured I would make it my own by adding some penwork and some stickers. Here's how the cover looks now:

I sincerely apologize to all Gallen-Kallela fans for this blasphemous act! ;-) The paper in the sketchbook is a mediocre drawing paper. Not very flimsy, not very thick, but just fine for my purposes. I enjoy the smallness of this book after a couple of rather profound journals like the altered atlas and ROD2. I feel like I'm going back to basics a little and that is nice.

The In Between Book is the first journal I have ever dedicated to anybody else. That is to say: I have dedicated it to all the generous ladies who have given me wonderful collage fodder and other ephemera over the past year or two. There's a lot of that ephemera in this little book and it was extra fun to put that in. I put an elaborate dedication on the first spread and that felt quite special. Maybe I will dedicate more journals in the future.

Now without further ado I'll just show you the first eight spreads of this journal. Some have little interactive tabs and I'll show those as well. I'll just let it all speak for itself.

A commenter on my tutorial asked what I do after the watercolor prepping and basically I do what I do in all my journals: I add writing and images and decorative elements. That's all. My journals are decorated diaries, they are creative and fun, but not necessarily art journals (or what I consider art journals, but that's a matter of perspective, not fact). I use stickers, magazine images, rub-ons, pretty papers, found every day items, tape and my own photographs. There's no rhyme or reason as to why some things are put together. I don't plan these pages out or anything, they just happen. The writing often has very little to do with the images.

Well, I hope you enjoyed looking at these first spreads. I will show more as I go along.
For now I wish all of you a very happy and artsy week!

Tutorial - quickly prepping a journal with a sponge and some watercolor

2012-02-10T07:00:00.000+01:00

When I first started art journaling (around 2003) I used these really cheap notebooks with blank pages in them that I bought for 1 or 2 euro's at a discount store. To not be so intimidated by an empty page and also to have a little color in the book even if I would just write in it I sort of by accident found a technique for very quickly preparing a journal for use.

The In Between Journal all prepped and ready to go

Today I would like to show you this technique that is so simple I even hesitate to call it a technique at all! In any case this is a really easy and cheap way to fill a blank book with some color and because of that I think it's perfect for beginners who don't want to spend too much money on a new hobby like art journaling, before they even know if it's for them. I have used this technique again recently on my current journal, the In Between Journal, because I needed a journal to work in quickly as I was literally between journals (one finished, the other not yet ready for use).

What you need:

a blank book (or just blank pages, if you work on seperate pages)
a cheap box of watercolors (I often use children's watercolors for this)
a piece of sponge (take an ordinary household sponge and cut off a cube with scissors)
a bowl of water

I came across this technique when I quickly wanted to fill a journal with color and figured a sponge would cover a bigger surface than one of my brushes. It wasn't until I put the sponge to paper that I saw it left a wonderful texture. Like this for instance:

For the above just rub the wet sponge over the watercolor of your choice and 'stamp' with it across the page. You can make a checkered pattern like above, but you can also fill a larger piece of the page by 'stamping' an area full of watercolor.

You can create effects by masking off an area. In the next photo I have placed a piece of paper sort of sideways over the page and dabbed the sponge around it.

As you can see this leaves a nice straight edge on the page. You can vary this by putting the paper in different directions or sections of the page or taking different shapes and sizes of paper.

You can also use stencils or templates. For instance I used a cutting template for a paper cutter full of circles and just placed it right on the page.

It's really just a matter of masking or stenciling or just creating your own shapes with a sponge. Couldn't be easier!

In the next one I used a small card to mask of a piece of the page to create these white 'boxes'.

Here's the checkered spread all done.

Another thing you can do is put the sponge on the paper and give it a twist. You then get these circles that always remind me of roses.

In the next one I used a letter stencil. The watercolor and wet sponge will make the stencil less perfect, but that's actually a bonus for me.

Of course you don't have to 'dab' or 'stamp'. You can also use the sponge by dragging it over the page as an alternative to a brush. In the next one I masked the bottom half of the spread and then moved the sponge away from the mask upward so it painted the color all over the top op the spread.

You can make marks with your sponge as you do with any brush. Here's some quick stripes for instance.

Or how about creating a grid?

The possibilities are endless of course and if you have more time you may want to put several colors on one spread for even more fun effects. The point of this is however that it is fast fast fast. Because you use a sponge (you have to wring it good, it shouldn't be dripping with water) it dries almost instantly and you can move right ahead to the next spread. I did the above journal in one sitting.

It's the most basic base for an art journal I know and I like that it puts something on the page to work on. Remember this is just a little technique to step away from a totally blank page. What you do with it next is up to you!

I hope you enjoyed this little tutorial and if you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 37 (woyww 140)

2012-02-08T17:33:00.000+01:00

My two major projects right now are the altered atlas and the making of my third Remains of the Day journal, ROD Square. And yet the table in my studio looks like this:

I just finished another ribbon and circle drawing in my studio book. They are such fun to do and sometimes you just need a break from the big projects, right? The thing with big projects is that they take time to get finished and sometimes you just want to finish something quickly so you have something to show. I keep doing these ribbon drawings in my sketchbook and I'm sure I will show you some more in a seperate post sometime soon.

As for the atlas, there's not much to see. I'm in the final stages of the gessoing of the pages and will probably get around to adding some color either tonight or tomorrow night. Anyway, it wouldn't make for an interesting picture, just white pages. ;-)

But in my sewing room I can show what happened to the stash of pretty papers I showed you last week.

They have turned into four square signatures for ROD Square! This is going to be a thick book! The base of the pages is now done, but I still want to add little bits and pieces to the pages to spice them up a little. After that I will have to start thinking about the cover. This is the first time I'm making a journal like this where I make the pages before the cover.

On a completely different note and in case you were wondering: winter is still with us on the island. Big piles of ice are gathering on the south side. It looks quite spectacular. I took some black and white pictures of it today. It's like fields of ice all crammed up together.

The pictures don't do the vastness of it any justice, but at least you get an idea. I'm taking photographs by the dozens (did I say dozens? I meant hundreds) these days, because I don't want to miss one image now winter is still here. There's talk of it warming up starting this Sunday, so I'm taking every shot I can.

Well, that's it from my side of the world this Wednesday. Hope you are all having a wonderful Wednesday too!

Stolen Ideas Project 1 - Dyeing paper and fabric

2012-02-06T18:17:00.000+01:00

As I've told you in some of my Wednesday posts I'm starting a 'stolen ideas project' in which I take books from my own stash as inspiration to try new things or work with prompts and things like that. I made a box with the names of all the books I would like to work from sometime and use it as a kind of lottery system to draw a book title.

Well recently it was time to really get this project going and draw my first title. It turned out to be the book Arteffects by Jean Drysdale Green. A wonderful book if you want to know what different kind of materials can do and how they interact with each other. I cannot recommend it enough.

The first chapter of this book deals with inks and how you can use them. An idea that I liked was folding paper, dipping it in ink and so creating different kind of patterns and decorative papers. Only problem: I had no suitable inks available in my studio. The only inks I have are a few little bottles of drawing ink. Dip once and it would all be gone. ;-) So I decided to think up an alternative.

I got out four colors of acrylic paint and put a dab in a bowl with a lot of water and mixed it up so it became really fluid. Those would serve as my inks now.

Now it was time to get some paper and fold it and dip it. Well, I soon found out I didn't have suitable paper either. For this technique to work you either need a fluid that really clings to the paper or a paper that really sucks up the fluid. I didn't have either. I was kind of bummed out about that.

But then I remembered how Traci Bautista uses paper towels in her work and I figured that nothing absorbs fluids better than paper towels, so why not give that a try. And before I knew it the floors of my upstairs rooms were covered with boldly colored paper towels! (I put plastic underneath them of course)

Some I folded like the book instructed and that resulted in very nicely defined patterns and lines. But what I really liked was just crumpling them up and dipping them on different sides. The patterns that emerged then were way more interesting and unexpected. I was also surprised at how bold the colors still remained. I had expected them to become lighter and less bright because of them being diluted so much with water. But just look how bright they are.

After I had my hand on a couple of dozen paper towels (and my floors were filling up) I figured this would be a good time to try doing something I'd wanted to do for a while already, namely dye pieces of fabric. I tried dipping the fabric first like the paper towels, but found the fabric I used didn't absorb very well either. So I got out my paintbrush and just started coloring them that way. I ended up with nine pieces of fabric of approximately 30x30cm (12x12 inches).

You can see how the colors on the fabric turned out a little less bright than on the paper towels. I guess this has to do with the absorption factor. It was interesting to see what you can do. When you wet the fabric with one color you can for instance drop another color on there and it will spread out a little and merge. It gave some really nice effects.

I left the paper and fabric to dry for a few hours and at the end of the day I had pile of these:

The papers are a little wrinkly, but I understand you can iron them. I'm not sure I want to do that however, 'cause I like the rough effect of how they are now. The fabrics, as you can see below, were a lot less wrinkly, probably because I had not crumpled them so much when dyeing them.

So after a three hour session in my studio I now have a small stash of really brightly colored papers and fabrics. I have no idea what I'm going to do with them yet, but I think they would go nice with some machine stitching or collage like endeavours.

I think my first Stolen Ideas Project shows how a little nudge from a book can lead you into a totally different direction. That's exactly what I had in mind for this whole ongoing project. Experimenting and seeing where the materials lead you, not so much literally copying things from a book. I really enjoyed this process and am quite happy with the results. And...I learned something new!

Wishing you all a wonderful and artsy week!

Snow Island

2012-02-03T17:07:00.000+01:00

Well, it took its time this year, but it seems that Winter has finally found us! All of November, December and January it seemed that winter would just be another autumn with lots of fogs in November and lots of storms in December. But as of this week the cold has found us (and not in a shy way!) and today I walked to work to the sight of this:

It was snowing! I couldn't believe it! I have been jealous all winter of all you blogsy people telling me about snow and we've had tons of it the last two winters so it seemed very unfair not to have any this one (how quickly we get spoiled). Well, last Monday it snowed a little, but it was the kind of snow that looks like a little layer of powdered sugar. What I wanted was real snow. You know: the kind that makes the world white!

Looks like I got my wish for later at work the view from my office was like above. It snowed for hours on end and I couldn't stop looking outside and wondering about leaving work early just so I could go for a snow walk. Well, I did do that of course! And I brought my phone as well to take some snapshots for you, because you may have gotten a tour of my island already, but there was no snow then. So today I present you Snow Island!

The Wadden Sea is starting to freeze over. Well, not completely (it's not that bad), but there's plates of ice moving in there and it means the ferry has an adapted schedule and the fast ferry doesn't go at all. The past week was really cold and it looks like the coming days will be no different. The snow is oddly enough a little reprieve from the cold. I don't know if you can see it very well, but here's a snapshot of the Wadden Sea at low tide where you can see how icy it is here right now (this was taken before the snow).

All in all I'm loving all this winter! I know not many people feel like that about this kind of weather and I don't like the idea of having to walk over slippery roads (and they will be slippery when all this snow turns to ice) any more than the next person. But, come on, who can deny the beauty of winter when there's views like above to be had?

Wishing you all a wonderful weekend!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 36 (woyww 139)

2012-02-01T17:52:00.002+01:00

Today I'm cheating a little. This is a what's on your workdesk Tuesday, Wednesday and a while back post, but it's just 'cause I want to show you some things I've been up to and they just weren't all on my desk at the same time.

Let's start with my desk the way it looked at some point last night:

It's the atlas that I'm transforming into an art journal. I had left it lying way too long and am now picking it up again. I'm still in the stage of gessoing the pages. I'm about halfway done with that, so no wonder it's nowhere near ready to serve as my journal yet. When the gessoing is done I think I will add color to the spreads by applying acrylic paints with a credit card. I like the smooth surfaces this gives. But...it's still early in the game and I may change my mind several times before anything is decided. We'll see...

Now here's what's on my desk right now:

I already announced I want to make a third remains of the day journal, but this time in a square format. I'm going to name it ROD Square, haha! It will probably be about 20x20 cm (8x8 inches). Yesterday I picked out some papers from my enormous stash and now I'm cutting it to size so I can start sewing the base of the pages. I love handling all that gorgeous paper. It's all double sided paper which is perfect to make books from.

Now when I pick papers I don't go through some lengthy process of trying to fit papers together or anything like that. I just drag out a couple of paper packs, randomly take out some papers from each pack and then mix them all without really thinking about if they go together. I have found that with these kinds of journals pretty much anything goes together. That's what makes them fun!

Finally a little update on something I mentioned in a previous post about doing a Stolen Ideas Project. The idea is to put a load of book titles on pieces of paper, put those in a box and then like a lottery draw a piece and work on something inspired by that book. That way I will get to try some new techniques or finally work with some prompts that I've wanted to work with for a long time. The idea really is to make use of all the wonderful books I own. Well, here's the box (as it was on my desk last week)!

About fifty book titles are in there and more will follow as I still have some books lying downstairs that I haven't read yet, but that may be very well suited for this box of possibilities. I don't have any illusions that I will ever be able to do everything from every book. The plan is simply to work with them and surprise myself in the process. I'll keep you posted for I will soon do my first draw and get this project going! For now I intend this to be an ongoing project for 2012, but who knows, if I enjoy this way of working it may last longer.

That's all for me today. Hope your Wednesday is artsy and happy!

ROD2 completed

2012-01-31T18:30:00.002+01:00

I know, I promised you the conclusion of ROD2 for yesterday, but life got in the way, so today's the day! Better a little late than never, right? Right! ;-)

About a week ago I finished my second Remains of the Day Journal and today I'll show you the last spreads and how the journal now looks standing up and brimming with stuff. As before you will get the before and after pictures. Here we go!

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After (sorry about the glare)

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Well, that's all folks! I'm proud to have filled it up so well, but I'm sad to see it go, even though of course it's not really going anywhere, since I'll cherish it forever. I just won't work in it on a day to day basis anymore, so I will miss it. But...my new journal, the in between journal, is already on its way and I will show you more about that one soon and look forward to that. I'm also working on a tutorial based on that journal, so stay tuned!

I hope you enjoyed watching ROD2 get filled and I also hope you will have a wonderful artsy week.

(PS, thanks for the responses to my last post. I'm thinking about which option I like best and will get back to you on that. I do aim to make commenting as easy as possible, but that has to go for myself too, haha.)

To verify or not to verify? To verify!

2012-01-27T08:49:00.000+01:00

Just a little in between message from me to you.

Those of you who have been commenting on my blog may have noticed I took the word verification off for a while. I know that word verification stumps some people from responding at all (I don't really get this, but so be it), so I figured I would make it easier on you and take the verification off and see how I liked it. After all it seems like more and more people take the verification off and they seem to be faring well.

Well...after about five days of it I can safely say: I don't like it at all! Hello spammers! Blogger has a pretty good spam filter and doesn't publish the spam messages, but...it does send them to my mailbox where I check regularly to see if there are any comments on my blog. It's not fun when you happily open another comment just to find another spam message up there. If it was just once in a while I wouldn't mind so much, but when the amount of spam equals the amount of real comments it becomes pretty annoying.

So commenting blogsy people, you will have to go through the trouble of typing in a fake word (aren't those a hoot?) and clicking on a mouse. It's not rocket science and it really shouldn't take more than a second of your time. Hope you understand.

Finally: if anybody knows of a way to stop blogger from mailing the spam messages to my mailbox while still sending me the real comments I'm open to learning new things, 'cause that would be wonderful. (I don't want to take the sending of comments to my mailbox off completely, because that's how I keep in touch with the comments in the first place.)

And that's it for now, so...get back to being artsy!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 35 (woyww 138)

2012-01-25T07:00:00.000+01:00

Can you believe it's Wednesday again already? Where did the week go? Sometimes it feels like I just blink my eyes once and woosh, another Wednesday has come around! Somehow these woyww posts make me very aware of the quickly passing time.

Now, without further philosophical ado, let's look at my workdesk!

What you see is the result of my altered atlas not being ready for use by far as my next journal. As I told you in my last post, my ROD2 journal is almost full (I will probably finish it tomorrow). Now I need something to get me over the time between my current journal and the new altered atlas. So, I sat down to do a quicky journal.

This is the inside of the journal without the extra's I'm currently adding. This is so easy to do and very fast too. This took about half an hour! All you need is a piece of household sponge, some watercolor or gouache and a bowl of water. I took a lot of pictures and may yet do a tutorial on how to really quickly prep a journal this way. But that's for another time.

The journal is actually a little sketchbook I bought at the National Gallery in London. It depicts one of my favorite paintings, which is Lake Keitele by Akseli Gallen-Kallela. As you can see I have very disrespectfully drawn right over the painting and the back of the book with a black marker and a white paint marker. I didn't want to make the painting unrecognizable, but I did want to add a little personal touch. As you can see I called this journal, very aptly, "The In Between Book". ;-)

Right now I'm adding little tags and pockets to the journal pages with washi tape and then it will be ready for use. It will be a simple journal and I have no idea yet how the pages will look when I start filling it up. But I'll be sure to keep you posted on that!

Wishing you all a very artsy Wednesday!

ROD2 continued

2012-01-23T17:42:00.005+01:00

I have only a few more spreads to go before ROD2 is finished. I enjoy this journal so much and it's really a pity it's almost full (I think I say that about all my journals though). Plans for another one are already in my head and I'm thinking of making my next ROD journal in a square format of 8x8. We'll see. ;-)

Today you get to see another series of spreads. These were made around the holidays and my vacation. As before there will be before and after pictures to give you an idea of what I added while journaling. Hope you enjoy these spreads, I certainly enjoy the comments I get on this journal from all of you!

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Keep in mind that many of the cards and photo's I added can be lifted and have writing on the back. Sometimes a little tab or card that you can lift can be very handy to hide words you don't want everybody to read. Which doesn't mean there are deep dark secrets stored behind every picture though! ;-)

Next monday I will probably be able to show you all the rest of ROD2, since I'm hoping to finish this journal this week. By that time I also hope to have a new journal lined up. It will probably not be the next altered atlas yet, because I still have way too much to do on that one before it's ready for use. So it will be a surprise, to me as well, what I will use next. I'll keep you posted.

For now I wish all of you a wonderful and artsy week!

Playing with gouache and a brush pen

2012-01-20T08:30:00.000+01:00

I spent more time in my studio during my recent vacation than on most of my vacations, but I did find I couldn't do anything too concrete, too specific. I just wanted to play around and not really make anything. I used my studio book for this.

It just so happens that I also was reading Quinn McDonalds book 'Raw Art Journaling' of which I intend to do a book review sometime soon. It's a nice book with simple ideas about filling journal pages with marks and shapes and words. There I saw the idea of ribbons on a journal page (hers look very different by the way).

This sort of got the juices flowing for me and I started to draw lines with a brush pen and filling them in with gouache. I love my gouache box, because of the bright opaque colors. I didn't mix any color for these drawings, they came straight out of the box.

Once I had some lines on paper I started drawing other shapes and I filled some of the pages fully with color. But I liked the ribbons best. There's something very relaxing about them and they are beautiful too.

I also got to thinking about my word for 2012. I never had a word before, always resolutions that were way too ambitious. I had first chosen FUN, but then I read a quote with the word FLAMBOYANCE in it and I really loved how that sounded. It's like fun for the more experienced. ;-) So I filled a page with a mind map about that and featured the word in a drawing to see if it would fit me.

After trying some plain ribbon drawings I started adding circles. Don't ask me why, it just seemed like a good idea. And I like how it changes the images and makes them come even more alive.

I still have no idea what these drawings mean, or even if they mean anything, but they sure are fun to do. It's just playing with colors and a brushpen and it's so relaxing. I'm sure I will make many more of these in the future.

I wish all of you a wonderful and artsy weekend!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 34 (woyww 137)

2012-01-18T13:00:00.000+01:00

It's been a while since I did an official what are you up to post, but here I am with my first woyww post for 2012. And there's a little extra too. First let me show you my workdesk as it sits in my studio right now:

My table is full of books. I'm working on a little (or big actually) project for the coming year that I want to call "The Year of Stolen Ideas". The point of this is to finally start using all those fabulous art books I have, to try out projects, new techniques and prompts that I come across and that intrigue me. Of course it's impossible to work through every book I have so I'm going to do a kind of lottery system.

First I am going through all my books to see if they are suitable for prompting ideas and projects. Some books are just show and tell really, and those are not the ones I'm looking for. I write down the titles of all the books I think will be interesting to 'steal' ideas from. I will write all those titles on pieces of paper, fold them and put them in a box or something. Then I will draw a piece of paper and whatever book I draw is the one I will have to get my next project from.

Now it's not my intention to really steal ideas (as in copy somebody elses work) of course, but more to try out new things and just get my mind working over something I might see or finally give some techniques a go that I've always wondered about. I still have no idea exactly how this all will work out, but it seems like fun to me to kind of surprise myself with projects/ideas and work from there to make something original. I'll keep you posted on how it all goes.

Then I wanted to show you the only art I did in my vacation that was outside of a book. At some point halfway through my two weeks off I had the need to just play with materials without wondering about the outcome, so basically I made a background with a whole lot of different mark makers. After that I turned it into a mysterious forest.

The paper is a little warped and so is the picture, but you get the idea. I had a lot of fun making this and the end result is actually somewhat darker than you see here which gives a better atmosphere. I keep finding it hard to make good pictures of these big sheets of acrylic paper that I sometimes use. But oh well...;-)

I find it interesting that when I don't know what to do with a piece of background I always resort to trees or faces. Somehow those are always fitting to me. I'm still not sure if that means I have a distinct personal preference or if I'm a little afraid to try something new. Maybe it's a little of both. Is there something you resort to when you don't know what to do next or maybe a certain symbol or image that always turns up in your work? I'd love to read about some of your personal imagery.

And of course I hope you're all having a lovely artsy Wednesday.

Spreads from ROD2

2012-01-17T19:42:00.000+01:00

After all the photography of last week I'd say it's high time I showed some artsy stuff again. I want to thank all of you for the nice responses to my Vlieland tour. I really enjoyed it.

I have a truckload of journal spreads to show you, but I won't do them all at once, but spread them out over three posts in the coming weeks. Today you get to see eight new spreads from my second Remains of the Day Journal, ROD2.

Just like last time I want to show you the before and after of the pages. The before being the state they were in after I finished making the journal and the after being the pages all done. Let's go!

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

All these pages were done at the end of december 2011. Even for me it's interesting to see the before and after difference. I sometimes am under the impression I don't change all that much, but that does not seem to be true and it's good to see how the adding of tape, images and text can change the whole outlook of a page. It's kind of like the difference between a showroom and a home that's actually been lived in. I like a journal that's been lived in! ;-)

I hope you enjoyed these pages and hope you are having a wonderfully artsy week!

Scenes from Vlieland - part five: random goodness

2012-01-14T13:00:00.000+01:00

Today we will conclude our tour of my beautiful island. I know, I sound ridiculously possesive when I keep saying 'my island', after all it's not really mine. It's more of a loaner really. ;-) But I've loved it ever since I moved here so it feels like it's mine, if only a little, even though I have to share it with over a thousand other people.

We will end the tour with some random pretty pictures that really didn't fit into any categorie, so I'm calling it 'random goodness'.

This is the name of the only town on the island. About 1150 people live here.

This is the lighthouse, it stands on the highest dune and is therefore small.

The lighthouse is actually the top of a bigger lighthouse taken from the main land.

This eagle statue watches over our town, behind it is the Wadden Sea.

The town as seen from the dyke along the Wadden Sea.

Our very pretty church, a lot of concerts are given here (some by candlelight).

A view over some communal gardens. In the distance the ferry arrives.

Just an old shack I liked, nothing more.

The marina. In the summer it's filled to the brim with boats.

Mostly sailboats like these.

Well, that's about it. Of course I have hundreds more pictures I could show you, but I think you get the general idea now of what my island looks like and how lucky I am to live here.

Next week we'll get back to the artsy stuff and I'll show you some of the things I've been doing during my vacation like in my sketchbook and my journal. I hope you enjoyed the tour of Vlieland and I wish all of you a very artsy weekend!

Scenes from Vlieland - part four: the trees

2012-01-13T13:00:00.000+01:00

As I said yesterday, Vlieland is basically a big collection of dunes that forms an island. Originally there were no trees here, but to protect the town from the inblowing sand several patches of woodlands were made. This means there are no really old trees here. The oldest are a little over a hundred years old. It took the planters some time to find trees that could thrive here and in the end there was a specific kind of pine tree that seemed to work well.

Here are some pictures of our forests!

The wind can make trees that are exposed to it move in strange directions.

The beginning of a path I walk on a lot on my hikes.

Ah, the shape of trees against the sky!

Which way to go?

This is a big pond on the edge of the forest close to my house.

The trees may be relatively young, but they are pretty tall anyway.

One of the wider pathways through the forest.

What I like about our forest areas is the many many paths that have been made in them, so even if the amount of land covered isn't all that huge you can still feel like getting lost in them and even after eight years of living here a new path can still surprise me.

Tomorrow we will move on to the next and last part of our tour which is all about some random goodies on my island!

Scenes from Vlieland - part three: all those dunes

2012-01-12T20:19:00.000+01:00

Often where there's a sea and a beach there are dunes and Vlieland is no exception. In fact one may consider the entire island just a big collection of dunes thrown together. Here's some pretty pictures of the landscape.

Kooisplek - when there's been much rain the water forms pools like this.

One of the many sandy pathways that lead to the beach

It's winter, all the bushes and trees are bare.

Except for the pines of course.

This is basically how the entire island looks when it's not cultivated.

Just endless rows of dunes with a bush here and there.

I love the dead trees in the middle of this picture.

When the water is frozen in winter, some people will skate here.

On one of my last posts Teri asked if I used some photo-editing program for these photo's. Nope. These are simply the effects that the app RetroCamera gives to them all by itself. You can pick different settings and than it's just point and shoot with no influence at all. The only editing I do is making the pictures smaller so they don't take up so much memory space and download faster.

Hope you enjoyed this segment of our tour! Tomorrow we will visit the woods!

Scenes from Vlieland - part two: when it storms

2012-01-11T00:00:00.000+01:00

The past few years we had some real winters here, which is quite rare as the island has a more temperate climate than the main land because of the ocean's influence, but this year it seems that winter is passing us by and is being replaced by a very long autumn. Okay, the trees are bare and it's a little colder, but that's about it. And...we get many many storms.

Of course in a place like this it's always windy, but the real storms like the past week with forces up to 11 and even 12 beaufort winds can really keep you awake at night and...they give spectacular roaring seas and high waters. Last week we had two big storms in a row and I got a chance to take some pictures of the extra high tides.

Because of the high water this car has to almost ride sideways against the dunes.

These poles usually stand on dry land.

These are part of a dam. I sometimes sit on them when the water's normal.

The water is covering a road here that runs next to the Wadden Sea.

Kids were enjoying biking through the water.

Sandbags were put in place as a precaution against the water.

And some people have these boards that slide into premade slots.

Here you can see the damage to the dunes when the storm calmed down.

The water was not extremely high, we've seen much worse, but the weather was rough enough to prevent the ferry from going to the main land. We were isolated for an entire day last week.

I don't know why, but there's something cosy about being seperated from the 'real world'. ;-) It's one of the charms of living in this place. Nothing can be taken for granted.

Scenes from Vlieland - part one: the sea

2012-01-10T22:24:00.002+01:00

As promised, starting today, this week I will show you some images from my island that I took during my vacation. It will give you a bit of an idea of where I live and it will give me the opportunity to show off one of the most beautiful places in the world (I'm not biased, of course not!).

Today we will focus on the sea. Vlieland is an island that is situated north of the Netherlands in the Dutch Wadden Sea and as one may expect with any island it is surrounded by water.

The North Sea on the northeast side of the island

The Norh Sea on the north side of the island

The Wadden Sea as seen from the south side of the only town we have.

The North Sea beach on a quiet day at low tide

I love it when the beach is empty and wide!

The beach at the Wadden Sea, in the distance the entrance to the marina.

As you can see the beach was pretty wet when I took these pictures. Those are leftovers from several big storms and extra high tides we had the past weeks. Usually it's a bit more 'dry'. Tomorrow I will show some pictures of the results of high tides and storms.

I'm back with some seals and a cat

2012-01-09T18:55:00.000+01:00

Oh my, how wonderful to be away from it all for a few weeks and how wonderful to be back again!

I missed you all, but I didn't really miss the computer all that much. I have not kept up on anybody's blogs, I have not kept up on any discussion groups and I have hardly checked things like facebook, so I'm behind on everything. Some people even started wondering where I was! ;-)

Here I am!

Well, blogsy people, I had a lovely vacation on my own island. Two weeks of sleeping late and living at my own rythm instead of the office life sure is good for a person. I only wish it could have lasted longer.

I spent my time mostly alone, apart from a visit from my dear friend Monk who came to stay at the island for five days, so of course we had to hang out together. I went on many hikes and walks, I spent some time in my studio, I read magazines and books (though not as many as I wanted), I journaled in ROD2 and I took hundreds of photographs! It seems that the vacation was a perfect time for me to try out my retro camera app on the smart phone. Fun fun fun!

And the occasions were plenty for taking pictures. There were many storms and high waters to admire. The landscape changed every day and the ocean was wild and loud one day and calm and content the next. Sometimes the beach seemed endless and sometimes the beach seemed to have completely disappeared! I really got to appreciate the place I live in all over again just by paying attention to the scenery and walking for hours taking it all in.

I think I will get slowly back into the groove of blogging by showing you some pictures I took during my vacation in the coming week. Just think of me as that annoying person that wants to show you all of their holiday slides, whether you're interested or not. ;-) It will give me a chance to show off this beautiful place I live in while gradually getting back into my daily routines. So bear with me, okay?

I'll start with something extraordinary, namely seals! Okay, seals aren't really extraordinary in this region, but they do not actually reside on the island but on a bank of sand several miles away from it. When the weather is really bad and there are young sometimes one of them will get swept away by the waves and get stranded on the island with its mother until the young is strong enough to swim back home. But this winter an entire group of seals decided to make the local beach their home and it was a wonderful sight! About ten of them have taken up temporary residence here and it was a wonderful opportunity to take some photographs.

There were three of these cute little babies. Don't be fooled by the cuteness of seals though. They have sharp teeth and a horrible temper, so it's important not to get too close, especially to a big one like the first picture (this one was huge!). I know he (she?) looks like he's smiling friendly, but he was keeping close watch of everybody who came by, ready to strike if necessary. Because they were all lying too far apart I couldn't really take a picture of the whole group, but it sure was a wonderful sight!

Now for another cutie. My new cat Peer and I have been getting better acquainted the past few weeks. He's a character allright. He is so fond of food he looses all manners and I'm slowly convincing him that in his new home this is not appreciated. But he also is so sweet and affectionate that a few minutes later everything is forgiven. He likes to be around me and keeps a close eye on me, which makes me feel very important and special, right until another person comes to visit and he showers them with the same attention. Peer is not a choosy cat. ;-)

But still, he seems pretty content to me living in my house, what do you think?

I'll share some more photographs of the island the coming week and of course I'll also show some of the artsy stuff I've done and pages from my journal. ROD2 is progressing nicely and I have quite a few pages to show. All in it's own good time though.

I hope all of you had a wonderful holiday season and I'm hoping we will join each other for another artsy year together! May it be a productive one!

It's that time of year again

2011-12-22T10:22:00.000+01:00

Yup, just like last year I will be taking a break from blogging during the winter holidays and the coming of the new year. It's my annual little break from the world, to get back to me, myself and I (and this year there's a new cat involved too, haha).

Starting tomorrow I will have a two week vacation and I want to skip on all my online artsy stuff for that time, so I will be going no mail on my yahoo groups and putting a hold on this blog too. I will be back the week of january 9th!

I will of course check my mail from time to time, so if you have a question or remark about anything, feel free to e-mail me at c.m.j.winkelman[at]home[dot]com.

Wishing you all a wonderful christmas and an amazing new year. Hope to see you again in january for more artsy fun! Until then! Love, Caatje

It's beginning to look a lot like christmas....cards

2011-12-19T08:00:00.000+01:00

Well, my sewing machine has been working overtime (and so have I) to get them finished, but here they are: 30 christmas cards all ready to send out! Don't they look colorful all together like that.

I am so relieved they are done. I love stitching paper, but when you're kind of working against a deadline it also becomes a chore and the chair at my sewing machine is not really a good one, so my back starts to ache pretty quickly.

Maybe I should put a new chair on my wishlist for the new year. I do like sewing a lot and I would get more done if I could sit more comfortably.

I love how the cards turned out though. And also how they are all unique and still follow the same kind of format. I'm thinking they would make a nice gift for someone. An idea to put on the back burner for next year.

I hope the people who receive them will like them too. I myself love receiving handmade cards. I like it when people put in that little extra.

On an non christmassy note, which is probably only interesting for the Dutchies among you: I will be a guest blogger at a dutch blog this week! I have always wondered about how guest blogging works and now I get the experience of being one. Very cool indeed! ;-)

It's a blog called Round Robin Notebook and is mostly about and for a group of dutchies who are sharing a round robin notebook experience and art journaling. You can find the blog here. I will be posting on Monday (today), Wednesday and Friday.

I was very honored to be asked and I hope the readers of that blog will like my posts. Please take a look if you want, 'cause they have had some wonderful posts in the past and also some very interesting guest bloggers.

On the cat front all is well. Peer is so sweet, but also a little reckless sometimes, especially when he smells food. He just literally jumps right into things! ;-) But already we are enjoying nice cosy couch sessions together where I read and he cuddles up next to me. Boy, I missed that!

Wishing you all a wonderful artsy week!

Meet my new furry companion!

2011-12-17T13:34:00.001+01:00

Those of you who have been reading my blog for a while may remember that in september 2010 I had to say goodbye to my cat DJ and in last april I had to do the same to his sister Mara. You can read about it here and here if you care to take a last look at the two sweetest cats that ever were.

Because I was so attached to them it was really hard to let them go. They had been my steady companions for over eight years (I got them when they were seven years old) and it was strange to be without any furry companions all of a sudden. I knew I would eventually get another cat, but I also knew I wasn't ready for one right away. So the past eight months I have been catless.

But no more! Slowly but steadily I started to look around, visiting websites of animal shelters and I even got some offers from people to adopt cats or kittens (which I refused). And at some point I just knew that this time of the year would be a good point to adopt a new furry friend. This has nothing to do with the christmas spirit, but with the fact that I will soon have a two week vacation and the new cat and I would have some time to get to know each other without too much interference.

Anyway, yesterday was the big day! I went to the city of Leeuwarden and visited the animal shelter over there. I was absolutely overwhelmed by the amount of cats they had available. About 120 cats reside there right now and most of them are found somewhere and never claimed by their owners. Unbelievable, because most of them are also absolutely wonderful. So before I say anything else about the cat I took home with me I would like to call out to anybody who considers taking in a cat to go an animal shelter first and see what's available. So many really cool cats are looking for a home that it just broke my heart that I could only take one. I must have seen dozens of cats who I would have been just as happy with.

In the end however I chose this one:

Hello, blogsy people, I'm Peer!

This is Peer! For you non-dutchies, it is pronounced as 'pair', not the English 'peer'. The people at the shelter named him so and I think it fits him, because there's a Dutch expression that goes something like "he's a good old peer", which means "he's a good old chap" ;-). Peer is also a first name for males in this region, so it fits him double. ;-)

I chose him because he was the first cat I saw in the first cat room that really stood out to me. He was demanding attention even through the glass window he was behind. After that many more cats appealed to me, but I simply chose him because he was the first. All the others would probably have suited me just as nicely, but it was impossible to make a fair choice other than on instinct.

This is my extra seductive pose!

He is incredibily sweet and affectionate. In fact he's so affectionate it's hard to get away from him. He demands a lot of attention and purrs all the time. A funny fact was told to me by one of the shelters staff. When Peer was being checked out by the vet it was impossible to get a good listen to his heart, because he simply purred too loudly! I would say his heart is working just fine then! ;-) Here's a cat who's so sweet he beat the stetoscope with his charm.

Other than his behaviour showing how sweet he is, we don't really know much about him. They don't know where he came from and who he belonged to and because of this they also don't know what his age is. I'm guessing he's not very young and not very old. Somewhere between 6 and 8 years probably, but who can really say?

Am I cute or what? Pet me! Pet me now!

It was really exciting bringing him home and I was a little nervous too. No matter how sweet he is, it's like bringing a stranger into the house that you still have to get used to. Unfortunately for him he got seasick on the ferry and I felt so sorry for him. He was behaving so wonderfully and kindly and then the waves just reduced him to a bundle of misery. Luckily he felt much better as soon as he got into his new home.

He wasn't nervous at all and immediately claimed a spot next to me on the couch acting as if he'd lived here for ages already. Slowly I introduced him to the entire house and he knew within five seconds where his food could be found! Turns out he's a great food lover, which inspired my sister to say he will fit perfectly within our family! ;-)

I make a great blogging assistant too!

So, now I can change my profile again and say I live with one cat. How we will get along in the future will be a matter of time. We still have to get used to each other as I have to get used to the fact of having a pet again at all. It's all coming back to me slowly! ;-)

Hope you liked meeting Peer and hope you have a wonderful artsy weekend!

A little test

2011-12-15T18:07:00.001+01:00

So I have a smart phone. So I have a blogger app. So I have retro camera too. And so I have to test all of this. :-) Some scenes from last weekend.

What are you up to Wednesday - part 33 (woyww 132)

2011-12-14T20:36:00.001+01:00

High time for another Wednesday post, especially since I skipped last week. This week the desk in my studio looks like this, a bunch of paper scraps.

Better late than never I have finally started working on my christmas cards. Most of last night was spent picking out papers and loose elements that I wanted to put together on a card, and folding cream colored paper into the base of the cards. The cards will be square shaped.

Above is my first try for a lay out for one of the cards. I guess you could call this my test card. I really wanted to do stitched cards this year, so....that's what I did! ;-) I love stitching paper to paper. I have no idea why, but there's just something about it that just really makes me very happy. It took me a while to figure out what look I was going for, but eventually I had a concept that I liked which involved a patterned paper background, some loose paper elements and a piece of ribbon. I stitch those together and then stitch the little collage on the card. So far I have only finished three cards.

I really like how they are turning out. Each card will be unique, but all done in a similar style. I will make about 30 cards in total, so I still have 27 to go. I'd better get going tonight, 'cause I want to have them finished this weekend so I can send them in time for christmas.

Hope you are all having an artsy Wednesday too!

The first spreads from ROD2

2011-12-12T19:28:00.000+01:00

There are so many people who have taken the Remains of the Day (ROD) class with the wonderful Mary Ann Moss that looking for images of them is a piece of cake and might actually put you into sensory overload. So many beautiful journals, so many different ways to interpret the class instructions. Not one journal is the same. I love looking at them and if you do too I strongly advice you to enter the words 'remains of the day journal' into google or flickr. You will be rewarded with hours and hours of eye candy.

But...what is somewhat harder to find is what people actually DO with these journals after they finish making them. How do they fill them up? How do they journal in them? What do they use them for? My first ROD journal was filled last spring and I showed some of the finished pages over here. At that time I hadn't taken up the habit yet of showing all my journal pages, the way I did with the altered atlas. But now I have started using ROD2 I wanted to show you the progress of that journal as I am using it. In order to give you a little impression of what I've done to fill the pages I intend to show you the 'before' and the 'after' pages of the journal.

Now the before pages already have stuff on them, because that's how the journal is made. If you want to see all the spreads of the journal the way they were before I started journaling on them you can go to my flickr, where there's a special set dedicated to ROD2, right over here. I will add the used spreads, after I fill them up, to this set as well, so all of ROD2 will be together in one set.

About time I stopped talking and started showing you some pictures. Here are the first eight spreads of ROD2!

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

Before

After

As you can see I add writing, stickers, images, tape, labels and everyday stuff that I want to keep like postcards and tags from things I bought. A lot of the extra's can be opened and there's often writing underneath or on the backside. The ROD journal always invites these sorts of interactive elements.

I hope you enjoyed looking at these first spreads, there will be more to come in the future as I fill up this journal.

Wishing you all a wonderfully creative week!

Good mail week!

2011-12-09T06:00:00.000+01:00

This week I'm being showered with wonderful stuff that's coming through my mailbox and I'm not talking about the one online! Let's take a look at all the goodies, shall we?

First one that I ordered myself. As you may or may not know I am an ever growing tape addict and my favorite place to shop online is Pretty Tape on Etsy. They deliver fast and they have a wonderful selection of washi tapes and other pretty tapes. After buying tons and tons of patterned tapes I really wanted some plain colored tapes. Here's what came into my mailbox:

Okay, so I still ordered two patterned tapes, but don't you just love that set of 12 colored tapes?

Another wonderful envelope came from Loes (see my last post if you don't know who she is). Here's what she sent me:

A pretty envelope and handmade card and the original version of the newspaper article about the free twitter drawing class. But what I loved the most is the thing on the bottom. It's a handcarved butterfly stamp! Isn't it gorgeous? I love it when people send me handmade things I can use in my art, and I love butterflies, so this is the perfect little gift. Thank you so much Loes!

I'm saving the best for last, because this one is going to take a lot of pictures to fully show. As you may recall (and if you don't, check my tutorial section) I did a tutorial on how to make mixed media houses a while ago. Every now and then people will still contact me about it and this is what happened with Kay Dixon. Not only did she say she liked the tutorial (which of course totally strokes my ego the right way), she also sent me some pictures of what she and her friend Sheri had made with it. This is what they did:

Kay's houses

Sheri's houses

Is that cool or what? I cannot tell you how it makes my day when people show me what they do with the tutorials or just tell me about them. This is exactly why I do this stuff, to let other people share in the fun that is art making!

Anyway, Kay not only showed me the beautiful art they made, she also said she wanted to send me some stuff through the snailmail to use in my art. That was a few weeks ago, so I kindof forgot about it after that and then I found this in my mailbox:

A beautifully decorated envelope filled to the brim with goodies. To prove just how much was in there I will tell you that I cheated a little on the above picture. I took it after I had already seen everything inside and wanted to put it all back in, but it wouldn't fit! So not only is Kay incredibly generous, she's some kind of miracle worker! ;-)

Take a look at what's inside and try not to loose your breath like I did!

Yup, that's right, seven packages, a nice notecard and a pretty bookpage!

One pretty envelope full of labels and tags.

One translucent envelope full of collage ephemera.

One doily full of ribbons and fibers and lace.

One blue envelope with collage images.

A gorgeous decorated envelope full of labels.

And another gorgeous envelope with beautiful tags made by Kate's friends.

As I was unpacking all these goodies I kept saying things like 'No way!', 'She's crazy!', 'This is too much!' and the word 'Wow!' may have been repeated about a gazillion times. To make a long story short, I am absolutely delirious with joy over such generosity and all these goodies. Thank you Kay, thank you so much!

That's my show and tell for today. ;-) Wishing you all a wonderful artsy weekend!

A free sketching course for people who cannot draw (through twitter)

2011-12-07T15:57:00.001+01:00

Well, I've sort of made the press again, in a very small way this time, but for a very fun reason.

My friends Monique (Monk) and Loes are the organizers of the Dutch Sketchcrawl in the city of Gouda and as you know I have attended this lovely event several times now and hope to attend coming january as well.
Anyway...they have now come up with the brilliant idea of offering a fun free drawing class on twitter. It's especially for people who think they cannot draw. To prove everybody wrong, the participants will get their sketching diploma up front! ;-)

For the Dutchies: here's a newspaper article about it (if you look very closely you'll see my name is mentioned too, oh my, I'm so famous right now, haha). The woman in the picture is Loes. She makes wonderful meticulous art, which you can see here. Monk you may already know from some of my previous posts, you can find her stuff here.

My friends wrote the prompts and tweets in Dutch, but they wanted an international version too and that's where I came in, because they have asked me to translate the tweets into english. Now I'm not a twitter person at all, so I will not really be a part of any further organization, but it was fun to see what they will put out there and I think many people will be inspired by it. So in short, this is a shameless piece of promotion for my two prolific friends. If you're interested you can join them at twitter over here. Enjoy!

Cell phone case

2011-12-02T06:00:00.000+01:00

As one of the last people on the planet (okay, I may be exaggerating here) I got a smartphone this week. I was ever so thrilled with my new toy, except for one thing: how to protect that big screen from unwanted damage?

For my last phone I had an actual phone sock, that I bought at a store, but that wouldn't fit this new phone, because for the first time in my sixteen year career as a cell phone user my new phone is actually bigger than my old one!

Now I know you can buy all sorts of cases, but the problem is that I won't be anywhere near a store or market where I can get them anytime soon and online the prices were so ridiculously high that I simply refused to buy one there. What to do?

These are the times when it's good to be a little creative. I figured: why not make one myself? Indeed, why not? So off I went to my sewing room, gathered some small pieces of fabric and some ribbon and voilà: here's my very own handmade cell phone case!

It's a really simple design.

I stitched the ribbon all over the case.

The inside is a contrasting fabric with fiberfill for extra softness.

It ties with a ribbon.

I'm quite proud of my little 'design'. It was really very easy to make. The only thing I may not care for so much is the ribbon that ties it up. If I had my choice I would have used some velcro or a press on button, but I didn't have any of those in the house and I needed something NOW. But I may yet make another one in the future that has a little more practical closing.

For now however it will serve me well in protecting the screen of my brand new toy. Yay!

Wishing all of you a very nice and artsy weekend!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 32 (woyww 130)

2011-11-30T13:00:00.000+01:00

I didn't do a Wednesday post last week (for obvious reasons see my last post), but this week I am back in the studio. The state of my worktable is like this:

What you are seeing is a map of the moon. It comes from the atlas I am preparing to be one of my next journals. The map of the moon is divided in all these sections and those I am coloring in with metallic pencils. I have just started this, so there's not much to see yet, but I'm hoping to get a nice colorful checkered effect with the map of the moon still showing through. The end result will be used for the back cover of the atlas.

You may remember from my last Wednesday post (two weeks ago) that I was working on another image from the same atlas, which was a picture of the earth in space taken from the moon. I filled in all the black space with metallic pencils. That image is done and has been attached to the front of the atlas. The front cover now looks like this:

The atlas is lying on a pile of stuff next to my worktable (I like my piles of stuff at hand, haha). I covered the image with a sheet of acetate and then attached it to the cover with duct tape. The sheet of acetate will protect the image from damage and I like the rugged somewhat industrial effect of the duct tape, as if the whole thing is held together by it. I will do the back cover in the same way.

If you want to know what other people are up to this Wednesday, go check here.
Wishing you all a wonderfully artsy Wednesday as well!

Closing the atlas

2011-11-28T17:33:00.001+01:00

I've been missing in action for a week. Well...action. Lack of action is more like it. Sometimes we can want all sorts of things, but our bodies simply won't allow it. That was the case with me last week.

My neck muscles were so cramped up it felt like a chore just to hold my head up to keep it from falling off!

I was suffering from vertigo and headaches and this left me feeling so dazed I decided to take a few hours off every day, just to get some rest. This has been going on and off for a while now.

I suffer from migraines and they can cause the same symptoms, but then it's usually done with after a few days. Now, it just won't let go. Very very annoying! :-(

Last week it was so bad that I went to see my doctor. All these things are probably tied to each other. It also turned out my ears were clogged up (which can affect your balance), so I had to have those washed out this morning. I've had water in my ears all day, but it sure feels clean in there! ;-)

The cramp in my neck muscles can also cause the dizzyness, and measuring my blood pressure also showed differences between sitting up and lying down and that may be the cause too. In short...we're just guessing here. If it keeps up I might need physical therapy for my neck.

All in all it was not fun. But I am feeling somewhat better now and most importantly my head feels clearer. Like I can actually think again. So...let's take this opportunity to show you the final pages of my atlas!

I finished the atlas about ten days ago (and have already started my next journal, but that's something for another post). It was wonderful and sad at the same time to close this amazing book.

I've had such fun working in this journal and it was a completely new format for me. It even inspired me to do my three parter easy peasy journaling tutorial!

It was my steady companion for four and a half months! But no book can last forever. So I finished the last page and also made an opening page (I saved that for last). The inside covers are perfect for storing loose items I want to keep.

As you can see I dubbed it the US Postal book, because as you may remember the cover was made from a US Postal bag. You can see it here.

The next atlas is already waiting to be prepped, so this will not be my last atlas. I already look forward to altering another big book to use as my journal. Let's hope I keep feeling better and can get some work done this week!

Wishing you all a wonderful artsy week!

Monks Owly Book

2011-11-21T13:00:00.000+01:00

Before I really begin this post I just want to thank each and every one of you for your wonderful responses to my being published both on and off the blog. Your support and cheers make everything even better than it already was (and it was pretty good I'll tell you!). Now, let's get back to bussiness shall we? ;-)

Remember how I've been saying that I was making a gift for someone and couldn't show anything about it until they had received it? Well, it's finished and she has, so now I can finally show it off. ;-)

The birthday girl was my dear friend Monk (go check out her blog if you haven't done that yet, she is a really good sketcher and photographer, and she has a cool cat). Seeing that we are both fond of blank books and journals, of course I had to make her one!

The cover is pink and has some owls attached to it, hence I'm calling it Monks Owly Book. I had the intention of NOT making something cute, because she doesn't really do cute, but I just couldn't help myself. It sort of turned out cute despite myself. Sorry.

The owls are ready made store bought iron on applications. I was a little worried they might not stick well, but they were quite clingy, so I'm hoping they will stay that way.

As a contrast to the outside I used a more busy fabric for the inside cover.

I didn't feel like that fabric needed anything extra. Nor did I want to make too much fuss about the pages. Mostly because I want Monk to put her own mark on this book. The book is filled with beautiful handmade papers in natural colors with here and there a more colorful page. I have used my sewing machine to sew borders around the pages. I varied the types of stitches and this was a great opportunity to try out the different settings of my sewing machine. Here's some samples of the spreads in this journal.

I'm hoping that by the time she's finished with it the journal will be unrecognizable and filled to the brim with all sorts of stuff. I hope she enjoys using it without being afraid to ruin it. In fact: I want her to ruin it!

I used a piece of beautiful lace to tie the book up. This adds even more cuteness of course but like I said, I couldn't help myself. ;-) And with all of this I considered the book finished. I'm hoping she loves it.

Wishing you all a very artsy week!

I'm published!

2011-11-17T20:45:00.001+01:00

For the past few months I've been keeping a little secret from just about everybody except one partner in artsy crime. I didn't want to jinx anything and mostly I just didn't know exactly how it would turn out. But today there's no more doubt, because for the first time in my life some of my artsy stuff has been published in a magazine! And not just any magazine. It just happens to be one of my favorite magazines, Flow!

This is the special winter edition in which my stuff is published.

I have talked about this magazine before because it's a great source for collage fodder and actually quite a few journal spreads of mine have pictures or words from this magazine, especially where the altered atlas is concerned. It has a really nice unique style and philosophy and sometimes a quite retro feel to it. What I also like about it is that it's the first Dutch magazine where I've seen things like Etsy get mentioned or people like the wonderful Keri Smith.

Out of the blue, a few months ago I was approached by a journalist from this magazine who wanted to write on art journaling for their extra winter edition about mindfullness. She asked if I would be willing to answer some questions about it, and of course I was game! I mean, I've never (NEVER) seen any Dutch books or journals write about art journaling and it just happens to be my favorite thing ever and when my favorite magazine wants to know more about it, of course I want to pitch in!

This is the spread in the article where my work is shown. Six pictures, wow!

At first I simply assumed I was part of the research and that was that, which was fine with me, but after a while the journalist asked me for some images of my journals, saying there would be no guarantee that any of them would be published. That's when my nerves started to come alive a little, I mean, the idea of having my journal spreads in a magazine just made me giddy. But I didn't want to get my hopes up too high.

I knew the magazine would come out this week and I also knew I would be getting a free sample, but to my surprise one of my friends saw the article before me and texted me about it. I was completely stunned to not only be quoted and have my blog mentioned (which I already knew about, because the journalist sent me a trial version of the article) but to have not just one, but six (SIX!) images of my journals in the final article.

Close up of right page

So today I just had to have the magazine in my hands. Never mind that I will still get one for free. I would never cut up that one, because I want to keep it and treasure it. So an extra issue for collage purposes would be a good idea anyway. So I ran to the bookstore and got it. I was so psyched about it all I showed the salesperson my pages! I was so happy I even bought some chocolates to treat my coworkers and have them share in my giddyness.

The article is seven pages long and has some beautiful journals of other artists in it, which of course I cannot show as it's not my work, but the Dutchies among you should really check it out. It's a really nice story with some very good links and book titles for people to peruse. I'm really pleased to have been a part of this.

Close up of left page

I'm also curious if this will bring some extra traffic to my blog of course. I have no idea if something like this affects traffic or not. But mostly I hope that some Dutch people will have that revelation that I felt when I first heard about art journaling. I was just blown away by the idea that you could do other things in a blank book than just write in it! If just one person finds their way into art journaling through this it will be worth it.

PS
On a totally different note: the above inspired me to finally finish my about-me-page. If you have a moment to spare you might like to check it out, just click the tab above. Thank you!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 31 (woyww 128)

2011-11-16T17:32:00.001+01:00

The weeks just fly by, don't they? Here's the state of my studio. I've made a little nook for myself the past weekend!

I surrounded myself with my studio table and my easel, because all of a sudden I had this incredible need to paint! Not that I had any masterpiece in mind, I just needed the feel of the brush and the paint on the canvas. It's been months ago since I did anything on canvas and even then they were little bitty canvases for my 'sad girls'. Remember those? Our mayor won one! Anyway, I needed to paint so paint I did. I splashed on many layers and then I decided to do some masking with contact paper. Here's the current state of the painting:

I like the effect of the masks, but have no idea yet how it's all gonna turn out. The only thing I've decided so far is that the petals of the flowers will be painted pink. Otherwise I have no clue, but that's how I like it, so that's okay. ;-)

The other thing I've started on past weekend and am still working on is this:

The red book is one of the books I bought at the local thrift shop. I wrote about it here. This book is another atlas that will be turned into a journal! I have taken out half of the pages (more collage fodder!) and I have strengthened the binding with some duct tape. Now the left over pages need to be covered with gesso and then colored with paint so they are ready for journaling. This will take some time to finish, no doubt. But time I have since my next journal wil be ROD2.

On my table is one of the pages that I tore from the atlas above.

It's a picture of earth as seen from the moon. I liked all that black so much that I decided it would be a great background to try out the metallic pencils that I found on sale ages ago while shopping. You can't really see the metallic nature in the picture, but trust me, it's there. I still have to fill the rest of the page and it's a very relaxing thing to do. I may use this image for the cover of the second altered atlas, but I'm not sure yet. We'll see how it goes.

The thing I was working on last week but didn't show, the present for my friend, is finished and sent to my friend who had her birthday last Monday. I hope to show it to you next Friday, so keep your fingers crossed it has arrived safely! I always worry about stuff like that.

That's it for me today. Plenty to do, plenty to see. Now go check out other workdesks and make the owners happy with a comment!

The atlas continued

2011-11-11T19:58:00.001+01:00

My altered atlas journal has about a week worth of journaling left in it and then I have to close this book. Today I wanted to show you some of its latest spreads. I'll just let them speak for themselves.

Hope you enjoy these peeks into my journal as much as I enjoy filling those spreads!

Wishing you all a wonderful artsy weekend!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 30 (woyww127)

2011-11-09T21:24:00.000+01:00

Another Wednesday, another workdesk. Here's what's on mine as we speak.

What you see is a little doodle I did on some leftover paper last night before I went to bed. It was just a thing to pass the time, but it made me think that it might be a cool idea to do doodles like this on beautiful handmade papers and then include them in collages or stitched collages. Isn't it strange how even the smallest unimportant things can lead to an idea?

Here's the doodle up close. You'll have to forgive the quality of the picture, I just took a detail from the photograph above, 'cause I forgot to take a seperate picture. Hence things look a little crooked, but it's just to give you an idea of what I was doing.

Actually this piece of paper is a remnant of what I'm really working on right now, which is going on in my sewing room. But I can't reveal any of that, because it's a gift for somebody and I don't want to ruin the surprise. Just know that I've been a busy bee the past few days!

I also still owe you a picture of the finished inktense flower drawing that I showed some hints of in my past Wednesday post. So here it is:

I finished it sometime last week and I'm only moderately pleased with it. I don't hate it, but I don't love it either. Its...okay. I do love the colors though. In any case I'm glad it's finished and I can move on to new pages in my sketchbook. ;-)

Hope you are all having a wonderful and artsy Wednesday!

Score! (Some Kreadoe Loot)

2011-11-07T21:48:00.000+01:00

I'd known it was coming for a year. I'd been saving for it for months. I'd been looking forward to it for weeks. I had to leave home for it for days. And my sister and I traveled to get to it for hours. Last Saturday finally it was time for our annual visit to the Kreadoe, a big craft supplies fair in the city of Utrecht which is in the center of the Netherlands.

We went there by train and when we left the train station this sign was standing outside the escalator to tempt us to travel to any European capital we could think of. It's got nothing to do with the fair, but I just had to take a picture of it.

Anyway, we could not be tempted, we had plans!, so we followed the crowd and walked to our destination of the day. They hung out the flags for us. We wouldn't have settled for anything less. ;-)

The Kreadoe was being held in the Jaarbeurs,which is a big complex of halls where all sorts of events are being held all through the year.

But we came for this one. (I'm so glad some of you Dutchies told me you hated the name too, makes me feel very validated.) For the non Dutchies: the word Kreadoe has something very childish and belittling to it. It's a word sandwich from the words for 'create' and 'doing' and it just sounds...yucky, like we're a bunch of five year olds who get to play with old cardboard boxes or something. Bleh.

Coming into the entrance hall it was clear we weren't the only ones going. We arrived just before the fair opened, which was at 10 am. It was going to be a long day.

We always start out with coffee and apple pie at one of the several catering services in the halls. We were smart enough to move forward to another hall, which was still very quiet at that time. I took the following picture to give you an idea of the size of the thing. This picture was taken in the central isle of the second hall. There were eight isles in this hall and where I am standing when taking the picture is about halfway through. There were two halls filled with stalls. Do your math people! It. Was. Big. ;-)

It stayed this quiet for about ten minutes and then every nook filled up with people. Apart from that moment early in the morning we did not get to sit for one minute until about 5 pm when we left. We had ourselves a seven hour fair!

Meet my sister! This is somewhere halfway through the day. She's showing off her shopping bag. Everybody got one. I can't show her loot of the day, but trust me, she left happy and broke, just like me.

And this is pretty much how busy it was all day. At some points people were crawling over each other like ants. But it's all worth it and it's not so busy that you can't reach or see anything. Still, in all, sister and I agreed that it was even busier than previous years. And we have years and years of experience to go by. ;-)

Enough about the fair. Let's get to the important stuff. Time to show you all the things I bought. It's a lot. I threw cash around like it meant nothing to me. But I'd saved for this event so it was okay. Wanna see what I got? Here we go!

I was overcome with joy at finding these gorgeous stencils. They had so many that I drove my sister crazy going back and forth changing my mind again and again. I wanted them all, but decided on these four. The other two are templates for banners and paper shapes that will come in handy.

I got some very cute collage sheets with vintage images. Those will go in my collection. I always make color copies of sheets like this to save money and keep the originals for reference. On the top are some sticker sheets and elements that will probably be used in my journals.

No visit to this fair is complete without me buying some pretty papers. In the front is some 8x8 inch paper in sweet colors and in the back are two K&Company stacks and one Graphic 45. The last one was a wonderful find for me. It's the "On the boardwalk" themed pack that I have been looking for for ages now and was sold out everywhere I looked and here it was just lying on a table ready for me to snatch it away!
The bottom (christmassy) stack is actually only half a stack as I shared this one with my sister. We each got one piece of each paper in it. I'm not a traditional scrapbooker, but I love all the supplies that scrapbookers can choose from. I use most of my pretty papers for mixed media or collage and for making books of course.

The next thing is a something new I am planning to try this winter. It's two little packs of polymer clay. I have the book Mixed Media Mosaics by Laurie Mika and it's amazing what she does with this stuff. So I figured I should give it a try sometime in the near future, just to see if I can do it too.

The fair was overflown with stamps. One more beautiful than the other. It's a good thing I know from experience that I won't use ready made images in stamps. I prefer alphabets, patterns and textures or just little decorative elements. So I got three texture stamps and one little alphabet. I also got some new color stazon ink pads (I love love love stazon), some sparkly spray inks and some distress stains. The latter I've never tried before, so we'll have to see if I like them.

It's the curse of the mixed media person that we can use everything. So I also had to have some fabrics. The bigger pieces are 'real' fabrics, the little rolls are more like a kind of artificial fiber material. I'm sure it has a name, I just don't know what it is. Anyway I bought it all for the pretty patterns and colors.

I can't say enough how much I love ribbons and lace. I didn't get any of the latter, but I did get plenty of ribbons and I also got some small trinkets like fake cameo's and plastic butterflies. And there's also a small collection of Hello Kitty pendants in there that will be nice to decorate a journal with.

Last but not least I got two books. The doodle book I've been eyeing for a while, but it was out of print. Probably because of this I got it on sale. The other is a book on watercolor that I was very surprised to find as it is a Dutch translation of Heather Smith Jones' Water paper paint! It's so rare that these really cool books get translated, so I was over the moon with this find.

All these goodies will have to last me for a while. Not that I won't buy anything until next year, but I won't have a shopping spree like this, that's for sure. I'm sure you can imagine that sister and I were exhausted after all this walking and shopping and gawking at beautiful things. We were very happy when we got home and found my brother in law had already bought some Chinese food for us to enjoy. I slept really well that night!

Hope you enjoyed my little show and tell and wishing you all a wonderful artsy week!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 29 (woyww126)

2011-11-02T21:14:00.000+01:00

I've been a lazy artsy girl in the past week and not much got done. I prefer to work in my studio every night, but it seems that the more I don't get around to it the less I feel like it. But tonight (as I write this) I am in the studio again, so things are turning around. Also it doesn't mean I don't do anything at all, it's just a lot less than usual and it makes me a little cranky! ;-)

First, here's the downstairs table. Everytime I write about my different tables and work spaces I get this sense of being really spoiled, but in a good way. It really is my ambition to turn my entire house into a studio and I'm well on the way to that, haha.

On the downstairs table, also dubbed the art journaling station, is the latest spread of my altered atlas that I finished this morning before going to work. Somebody asked me what all those little flasks on the side were, well, they are little bottles of acrylic paint. Maybe I should do a tour of my work tables and show off my artsy stash sometime. ;-)

The studio table upstairs is not much changed, but I figured I'd take a wider shot so you could see the entire table instead of a detail. Here's what's on there now:

Yup, it's still the same drawing as last week. The difference being that this time it's completely colored in. It's not done yet though. It needs more details and shading and things like that, but I do like the look of these big pink flowers. I did another inktense drawing in my other sketchbook. I will show both of them when they are fully finished.

Now I may not have been as artsy as I like over the past week, but I do have some great plans for the weekend, even if they are more of a materialistic nature. In the city of Utrecht there is an annual fair for hobby/artsy/scrap supplies called Kreadoe (Dutch people, am I the only one who cringes at the name of this fair? I mean really, who came up with this ridiculous name?) and me and my oldest sister have a standing arrangement of going there every year. We don't have to plan it beforehand or anything, we just know we are going. It's a little sisterly tradition.

This means I will have the opportunity to go through hundreds of stalls with the most beautiful papers, paints, decorative elements, markers, tools, beads, fabrics, etcetera etcetera, and score some gorgeous stuff for my ever growing stash of supplies. The visit to this fair is my annual splurge feast where I may buy things not only because I will definitely use them, but simply because I like them. I save coins all the year round so I have some spending money on this day. I really look forward to it!

Hope you all have something fun to look forward to and are having a very artsy Wednesday!

Fall Beauty

2011-10-31T19:36:00.000+01:00

Autumn is here and nature is showing it. The woods on our island are boasting spectacular colors all around and I can't get enough of looking at all that fall beauty.

I love autumn. I've read some blogs where people state they love autumn, but hate that it's a prelude to winter. I'm not one of those people. For me the fact that winter comes after fall is just a bonus. I love dark days, I love the storms that visit us this time of year, I love that the clock is at it's normal rythm again (I just don't get daylight saving time). I love that it gets colder. I love it both outside and inside where finally the time is coming to burn candles and make things extra cosy. In short: I'm a winter person, not a summer person.

Every autumn I walk around with my camera and shoot the leafs. Mostly I take shots like these:

I'm fascinated by the variation of patterns and colors on leafs. I take close ups and shoot from a distance too so I can photograph groups of leafs.

But this fall my attention was also drawn to those leafs that had already left the tree they used to live on. And once my attention was drawn I saw beautiful fresh fallen specimens everywhere.

Such beautiful reds and yellows no artist can do better. And then I saw some real street art! I was walking this biking trail and noticed how the leafs that had fallen a while ago were sort of starting to merge with the ground. I found it breathtaking and there I went again klick klick klicking away on my camera.

It might be interesting to try to get this effect on an actual painting or mixed media piece. For now however I will just enjoy the way it looks in real life. Art really is everywhere! Keep your eyes open and you might see it too.

What are you up to Wednesday - part 28 (woyww125)

2011-10-26T17:46:00.001+02:00

It seems that long before Jen Osbon started her "What are you up to today" thing (see sidebar) there was Julia Dunnit's What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday (also see sidebar). So I figured I might as well join that too. So here's a big hello to those of you who are on that blogsy involvement thing (I have no idea what the word is for something like this). Anyway, for me this is my 28th what are you up to post, but my first WOYWW post. I hope it's okay if I just keep calling it What are you up to Wednesday, cause I so like the sound of that.

Anyway, here's what's on my workdesk in the studio:

It's not a great picture, but you get the idea. What you're looking at is my Studio Book and my new big inktense pencil box (still in love). I'm doing another flower-with-background-drawing. I have already colored in the background and now have to move on to the flowers themselves. After that I will try to ad some shading and details so it's a little less 'flat'. I do enjoy the colors of these pencils, they are indeed in(k)tense!

On my worktable downstairs the situation is like this:

On the left is my out-of-the-studio book with a big doodle/zentangle thingy. I have finished the black and white, but still need to shade with a pencil. When it's done I will show it more up close.
On the right is the altered atlas journal with a spread that is half finished. This one has some of my own photographs and some glitzy stickers to liven it up a little. And writing of course, always lots of writing.

So this Wednesday it's all about the sketchbooks. I have some bigger projects lining up, but I feel more like just playing around a little and not thinking too much. Some Wednesdays will be like that. ;-)

Wishing you all a very artsy and happy Wednesday!

More journal spreads from the atlas

2011-10-24T18:05:00.000+02:00

In between everything else I do (or don't do as is sometimes also the case), my journal is one steady factor that almost quietly continues.

I may sometimes feel like I'm doing nothing artsy at all, but in the meantime I still journal.

I sometimes may skip a day, I may even skip two days, but it happens rarely and when I wait too long I become grumpy and grouchy like the grinch who stole journaling.

Journaling has become second nature to me so much, that I hardly consider it anything special anymore.

But it is special of course.

Putting my journal on display helps me realize just how fortunate I am to be able to express myself through my journal.

I love the visual aspect of the images and the colors. I love the words that just flow out of my pen, straight from my mind to the page.

I'm creating a reflection of my life and in doing so I can reflect on my life.

It's a good tool to have and I'm grateful for it.

Sketchcrawl Gouda - what I sketched

2011-10-21T13:00:00.000+02:00

I have been raving about the Sketchcrawl all week now without actually showing you any sketches! But today's the day for the big reveal. Ahem...drums please...;-)

I filled ten pages in my sketchbook last Saturday and most of them are simple line drawings done with a pitt brush pen. No masterpieces were made, but I did have a wonderful time doing moderately quick drawings of what I saw. I hope you will enjoy them.

I started out with some people sketches at the meeting point (the windmill).


People always look at me funny when I paste a tea package in my sketchbook!

I had lunch on a bench by this canal.

There was an industrial complex near the windmill. Another world.

The only sketch I colored in.

If you really study this drawing, you will see it makes no sense. I got lost in the lines.

The tower of a church. I drew the same one last january.

Pipes in the distance and a chair sideways.

I like doing these quick sketches of people most of all.

The guy on the right is the miller, he volunteered to pose for me!

All in all it was a pretty productive day, which is good, but still the best part of a sketchcrawl is to be around fellow sketchers. It's just wonderful to be around people who actually get you and who are enthusiastically looking at each others books. For that alone I would recommend a visit to a sketchcrawl. The next one will be in January and I sure hope I will be able to attend.

Wishing you all a wonderful and artsy weekend!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 27

2011-10-19T13:00:00.000+02:00

This Wednesday it's all about scoring (almost) free stuff! Yay!

As you may know my current journal is an altered atlas and it is in its final stages. I think it will be finished in two to three weeks. After that I will switch to my ROD2 journal, but since the last one was filled so quickly (a mere six weeks for an entire journal is pretty fast for me) I am already on the lookout for the one after that. Also it takes some time to prepare a book for journaling the way I do, which means gessoing the pages and putting color on them before I start using it, so it's ready to go. So off to the local thrift store I went. And look what I found:

It's two huge books! They are even bigger than the atlas! How cool is that? The red one is a family world atlas from the seventies and measures about 26.5 x 32.5 cm. The beige one is a huge book on ancient civilizations. It has some wonderful illustrations in it and since I will be tearing half the pages out (to leave room for collage), I will have some great collage fodder of it as well. This second book measures 26 x 35.5 cm.

These two books together set me back 5 euro's, which is next to nothing for such wonderful books, so I was very happy to find them.

Then the mailman came and brought this:

A big envelope from across the Atlantic. It was a generous offering by a fellow blogger, namely Pat from Art Kerfuffle. She has been showing off some incredible handmade books she and her friend Gaye are making with the use of security envelopes. It was Mary Ann Moss who put my attention to the amazing patterns that can be found in those envelopes, but...over here in the Netherlands they are mostly just bland grey or blue. I go through tons of mail at work and it's very rare to find anything interesting at all. I complained about this on Pats blog and wouldn't you know it: she offered to send me a selection of her collection of envies. Wow! Was I ever happy about that!

This is one of the most wonderful things of the internet and blogging: you get to 'meet' some really generous people who for no reason at all send you wonderful things.

Now let's open the envelope, shall we?

Two packages! Looks like there's more in here than just some security envelopes. Let me say up front that I'm already smitten with the popcorn bag. (Is that weird?). What could possibly be inside all this?

Oh my, it's generosity overload! ;-) Not only is there a ton of security envelopes in there, there's also a lovely piece of fabric, a sweet little book of tags, some sheets of braille paper (yay!) and some wonderful pens which are said to write on anything! And of course a nice note from Pat. I am just in heaven with this truck load of stuff. So...thank you so much Pat!

If you don't know Pat you should really check out her blog. Not only does she make wonderful things, especially books, but she also has an irresistible sense of humor. So hurry on over there and leave an admiring comment!

Now all that's left to do is wish you a wonderful artsy Wednesday!

Location location

2011-10-18T20:44:00.000+02:00

Location, it's supposed to be everything isn't it? Well, it helps, that's for sure!

The location for the sketchcrawl of last Saturday was absolutely gorgeous. It was an old windmill in the city of Gouda that was situated near the city center. Because I didn't take many pictures last time I spent most of the morning there taking photographs.

I know I know, I was there to draw, but I'm a person who sees images everywhere and then drawing can be frustratingly slow. So, here's a little photographic impression of the beautiful city of Gouda. I'll just let the images speak for themselves.

We were allowed to climb the windmill and that's were you got the most beautiful vistas. As you can see the weather was really good as well. It had frozen in the morning (we were quite surprised by that), but the afternoon sun was pleasantly warm. It was like a perfect day.

I know you're all wondering what I drew that day and I will show you that on Friday. I just couldn't resist showing off one of our beautiful Dutch cities. Hope you enjoyed it.

Butterfly Book Winner!

2011-10-17T18:36:00.000+02:00

Well my dear blogsy people, here's the moment you've all been waiting for, well a lot of you anyway. It's time to pick the winner of my Butterfly Book of Questions! I was overwhelmed with the response to this giveaway and I want to thank each and every one of you for your kind comments on my book. Here's one more look at what the winner will be getting:

The winner will also get a pitt brush pen.

I had over 70 comments, but there were one or two doubles in there, so I wrote every single name on a piece of paper, so every wannabe butterfly book owner could only enter once. Here's all of your names:

There were 68 contestants in total. Wow! I cut up the pieces of paper to make a little ticket for every name. Then I needed something to put them in and I couldn't find anything, so I emptied a little basked that I usually store some pens and rulers in and put all the names in there:

I know, the white's just a tad overexposed, ahem...

I closed my eyes and started rummaging through the papers with my right hand. You'll just have to take my word for that. I didn't peek or anything, promise.

And here's the lucky winner:

Even with this unfocused picture (I just couldn't get the camera to focus on the little piece of paper) you can see the winner is Janet Plant! Congratulations Janet! I hope you will enjoy this book very much. I will try to contact you, but feel free to contact me first on c.m.j.winkelman[at]home.nl with your snail mail addy.

For the rest of you: thanks for playing. Maybe next time you will be the lucky one!

I want to finish this post with something completely different. Past Saturday was another Sketchcrawl day and I was lucky enough to attend the Sketchcraw in the city of Gouda, which is in the center of the Netherlands. It is beautiful there. I took a lot of photographs and I filled ten pages in my sketchbook. I still have to go through the pictures though and scan my sketches, so I have nothing to show you right now, but it will be coming some time this week, I promise.

However, my friend Monk and her friend Loes were the organizers of this sketchcrawl and they put up plenty of pictures over here and here and there's a flickr group too over here. Enjoy!

For now I wish all of you a wonderful and artsy week!

Inktense

2011-10-10T17:21:00.000+02:00

I had not been drawing in what feels like ages, so when my big box of inktense pencils arrived I figured it was time to get out the sketchbook and play a little. This weekend I found some time to do this.

I made a fantasy landscape with some big flowers in the foreground and a little town on the horizon. I made the drawing with two drawing pens, one with a medium point and one with a brush point. After the drawing was done it was time to ad the color and what better way to do that than with my brand new inktense pencils. I started coloring the hills and sky first and that led to this:

I must say that I liked the effect of the black and white on all that color so much that I was very tempted to leave it as it was right then. But of course my artistic inability showed. I mean my inability to leave white spaces or just spaces of any kind if I can help it. I am in total awe of people who can do that, you know: minimalists and those that say that less is more. I can say it and I believe it, but I can hardly ever apply it. But just to compare which was best I decided to at least take a picture of the half colored drawing.

And then it was back to coloring with my pretty pencils. Full color this time! By the way all the colors were wetted after applying them to paper, to really make them pop. Here's the final version of the drawing:

I think I do like the full color one better after all, but frankly it's a close call. There's something different about the half black and white one that I might like to explore in future drawings. Tell, me blogsy people, which version do you like best?

In working with the pencils I found out that the Derwent people have not exactly been very precise with the labeling of these pencils. By that I mean that the color on the pencil is not always representative of the color of the pencil. So I decided to make a color chart for the pencils in my sketchbook.

I drew a circle for every color and colored them in and then wetted them, so I would get the full color, cause the colors are not so bright until they are wetted. I put the number and name of every color beside the circle, so I would be able to find it again in the box. And by doing this I found out that in naming the colors the Derwent people were a little off sometimes too. For instance 'light olive' is anything but light.

In fact if you look at the color chart you may agree with me that apart from the yellows (and the white of course) there's not really any light colors at all. Even the yellows aren't really light if you look closely. This I found a little disappointing.

It seems the Derwent people think that light and intense don't go together. But to prove them wrong I wish they would just take a look at acrylic paints or the beautiful Neocolor II watersoluble crayons. Instead of all those dark browns in the second column from the right I would rather have invested in some cool pastel colors, some light blues, greens, reds and pinks. I would also love some light greys. In a box with 72 pencils I expect more diversity in color and the funny thing is that I also have their big box of colorsoft pencils and there the color range is fantastic.

So, Derwent people, if you ever read this: I love love love your inktense pencils and I am by no means sorry I splurged on the big box, but if you want to make me really happy, make an extension set or something in light colors. I think I will not be the only one you will be pleasing with that.

On a very different note I want to tell all of you how happy I am with all the responses to my butterfly book giveaway. To know that so many of you would like to own it just rocks my world! Thank you!
For now I wish all of you a wonderful and artsy week!

Tuesday 11 October - Afternote
I have sent a link to this blogpost to the Derwent people. I'll let you know if they respond.

a short while after that:
Wow! I must say kudo's to the Derwent customer service! They responded very quickly. I like that.
Here's what they had to say:

Dear Carin

Thank you for your email and the link to your blog; your review is
great. The Inktense range is designed to be bright and vibrant. You can
achieve more paler/subtle shades by applying less colour to the paper
and diluting it more by adding water. We have no plans to change or
extend Inktense at the moment but if you would like more lighter/paler
shades then I would suggest using Inktense with our Watercolour Pencils.
Our Watercolour range has 72 different colours that are lighter/paler
than Inktense and both of these ranges work well together. Please visit
our website where you can find out more about our Watercolour pencils
and download a colour chart.

If you have any more questions let me know.

Many Thanks

(I left the name of the writer of this mail out for privacy reasons.)
I had kind of expected this answer. I replied (after thanking them for their quick response) that I choose the Inktense pencils because they are waterproof after washing, which can not be said for watercolor pencils. I also hope they will change their minds about the lighter colors. Who knows, maybe someday they will. Keeping my fingers crossed. ;-)

Presenting the Butterfly Book of Questions - a giveaway

2011-10-07T16:01:00.000+02:00

Time to give something away to my blogreaders, may they be old faithful ones or new ones. ;-)

Later than I hoped, but sooner than I feared I have finished the Butterfly Book of Questions. If you want to know how this book came into existence you can check one of my what-are-you-up-to-posts from a few weeks ago. It kind of happened spontaneously just because I wanted to make some pretty papers! That's the cool thing about art: one thing can lead to another and before you know it you have something entirely different than you started out with.

Anyway, here's my latest baby: The Butterfly Book of Questions!

Isn't she a cutie? The cover is made of two different fabrics and both inside and outside cover are adorned with butterflies that were ironed on white cotton with transfer paper. The book closes with a beautiful ribbon and both top and bottom were made a litte romantic with lace.

The book holds three signatures of handpainted pages. All pages have a different color and are patterned with pattern rollers using gesso. Because I used watered down acrylics for the colors, the pages do not stick together.

Each page has a machine stitched border with zigzag stitches. There's 96 pages in total, so there's plenty of room to write, which is a good thing, because I did not call it the Butterfly Book of Questions for nothing!
Every page has a question on it to use as a prompt for journaling. These questions were all taken from The Complete Book of Questions by Garry Poole. That book is a great journal starter by the way even if it is originally meant to start conversations.

To give you an idea of how the spreads look, I'll show you a few samples. I would like to have taken a picture of every spread, but the torture of having to size down almost 50 photographs in Photoshop made me think otherwise. I'm sure you'll get an idea by looking at these:

The first and last page are for information about the (future) owner and the maker (me me me), but the rest is all prompts! That means 94 prompts to journal with. How cool is that?

So, now for the giveaway. The winner will receive this book of course and I will throw in a little extra by adding a pitt artists pen with brush point. This is because not every pen will like to write over the somewhat textured background. A brush pen will have no problems with it however, so to be sure you can write in the book I will give you one of those too!

If you want to win this book, all you have to do is comment on this post. That's all. I will pick a winner on Monday 17 October, so be sure to comment before then if you want to win this journal. Make sure there is a way to contact you, so I can let you know that you've won. I hope somebody will be very happy to receive this book! I want my baby to be adopted by a proud parent! ;-)

For now I wish all of you a very happy and artsy weekend!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 26

2011-10-05T21:33:00.001+02:00

Last week I skipped my what-are-you-up-to-post. I guess what I was most up to that day was being relieved that the tutorial for the Easy Peasy Journal was finished the day before. ;-) By the way, I want to thank all of you who have taken the time to respond to it either on this blog or through mail or discussion groups. It is good to know that my tutorial is useful to some of you and it motivates me to keep thinking about other stuff I might put up on my blog.

For now however I've moved on with a project that I started a few weeks ago: the Butterfly Book of Questions. Here's how my worktable looks right now:

I have finished putting a zigzag machine stitched edge on all the pages and I have bound the signatures in the cover. Now I am putting in the questions/prompts for journaling and the butterflies. I will show everything more up close when the book is fully finished and as you may remember, it will then become a giveaway on this blog! It's a lot of fun putting this book together, but as always I underestimated the amount of work involved. Especially cutting out all those butterflies takes a lot of time! I cut about 160 now, but I'm not sure if they will be enough, so I may be cutting out more later tonight. ;-)

For no reason, except that I'm so very happy with it, I also wanted to show you a new addition to my enormous stash of art supplies. Because I live on an island I don't get to visit art supply stores often and usually buy my stuff through the internet. One of my regular online stores had a discount I just could not refuse. Here's what I got:

Oh my, couldn't you just die? It's the beautiful wooden case with all 72 colors of Derwent Inktense pencils! It was sold at 40 euro's under it's regular price and since it was on my wishlist for a long time I took my chance. It was still a huge amount of money, but for that I now have these babies to drool over (and draw/color with) whenever I want. Money well spent, haha. I have had a small set of 12 of these for a while now and I really like them, but the color choice was limited, so now I can't complain about that anymore. For those of you who don't know them: they are watersoluble pencils, but different from watercolor pencils. After the pigments have fully mixed with water the colors become waterproof! The colors are really intense too, like inks, hence the name! I will enjoy using these!

But first we must get back to the butterfly book and see if it can be finished sometime this week.
For now I wish all of you a very artsy Wednesday and hope you're up to something good!

Back to the atlas

2011-10-03T18:11:00.001+02:00

After all the hard work for the tutorial, combined with a rather full schedule of work and personal things I was in big need of a break. So I took two days off at the end of last week and ended up having four days to myself with no plans and lots of rest.

It had been three weeks since I had a day to myself so it felt like I was being surrounded by incredible luxury. It felt like a holiday! ;-) Really, it doesn't take expensive vacations for me to feel like that, just lots of uninterrupted time with no obligations and no plans will do.

I did all sorts of that unimportant stuff that can be very good for the soul. I read stacks of magazines for instance. I slept really really late (and when I say really really late, I mean really REALLY late!) and then also took naps later in the day.

I did some no brainer work in the studio like cutting out images and sewing the rest of the edges for the butterfly book. It's coming along nicely by the way. I can put the book together, but still have to work out some of the details and cut out more butterflies.

I took long leasurely walks that lasted for four hours, but might have only taken me two if I hadn't spent so much time sitting on benches or just admiring views or the overload of mushrooms that always come with the fall season. Did I mention the weather was more like summer than fall? It was quite warm and very sunny.

I also worked on spreads in my atlas. After all that work on the tutorial it was a big relieve to just work for me. I decorated quite a few spreads, but most of them have not been written on yet, so I will show them to you later.

But what has been finished between my last atlas post and this one can be seen in the images on this post. I hope you enjoyed looking at them!

Well, the long weekend is over. Back to work, back to reality. It's okay. I feel much more rested and look forward to getting my hands going again in the studio. Wishing you all a wonderfully creative week!

Easy Peasy Journal Tutorial - Part three: writing

2011-09-27T20:51:00.000+02:00

Better latethan never. Here is part three of my Easy Peasy Journaling Tutorial. It'sanother lengthy one! I have tried to beextensive in my writing about writing, but If anything is not clear or if youhave any questions, please let me know in the comment section so others canprofit from it too.

I wouldalso like to thank all of you who have commented on the other two parts of thistutorial. Believe me, if only one of you gets something out of it, it will beworth my time. Hope you enjoy this last installment!

THE EASY PEASY JOURNAL PART THREE - WRITING

It seemsthat when I post my journal pages the one thing people are most intrigued by isthe writing. There's so much of it and it seems so neat and straight (I dareyou to put a ruler to my pages however and you'll see I'm not so perfect afterall, haha). How do I do it? Whatever doI write about? Where do all those words come from? My life can't possibly bethat interesting, can it?


This is how the Easy Peasy Journal front cover looks all finished. I added some writing in longhand and my signature. I don't usually write on my covers, but I had left some space empty, so why not? I'm pretty happy with how this journal turned out, although I believe it's become more of a journal sampler than an actual journal, but I suppose that is to be expected if you use a journal to illustrate things you want to show for a tutorial.

Writing byhand is quickly becoming one of those mysterious acts of the past, a lost art.I notice it when I sit in a public place and write. People are amazed andcurious, they stare at me and some even comment on my handwriting. Reallypeople, I'm not fishing for compliments, nor am I trying to be modest when Isay: my handwriting is nothing special. I work in an office where people haveto file for local taxes once a year and around that time I see a lot ofhandwritten filled in forms and you would be surprised how much more beautifulmost people write and also...every personal handwriting is unique and special.I think the point really is that hardly anybody does it anymore, writing by hand I mean. So when you do, thatalready sets you apart from the masses and makes you look special. Keep that inmind: if you write by hand you're alreadydoing something special, no matter what you write about or how your handwritinglooks. Isn't that a great way to start this tutorial? Just like with allthe other aspects of journaling: journal writing is something you cannot failat, there is no right or wrong way to do it. Just as long as you do it!

Still, ifyou never write you may be completely mystified byit and I hope to give you some ideas for writing today. This tutorial will beabout the two aspects of journal writing. One is content and the other is form.I have decided to do it in the following way: I will do a lot of writing on thecontent of writing (what to write about)and I will illustrate the form (howto write it all down) with examples from the Easy Peasy Journal. I will also give some resources at the end of this post.Let's go!

This is basically how I journal about 99% of the time. I just write long straight sentences in my preferred handwriting. Sometimes I will write longhand, depending on my mood or my position to the paper. That it looks pretty straight and neat is not the result of any trick, but just of practice. I have written for years and years and at some point left behind the ruled books for blank pages. In the beginning my writing was much more all over the place, but somehow I have learned to write in a more consistent way. If you don't write that way naturally don't fret. Just write how your write. Don't try to emulate someone elses handwriting, try developing your own. You can only do this by writing. A lot! If writing in straight lines is very important to you for some reason, you can always put down lines with a pencil and a ruler and erase them later. But don't feel you have to do this. Keep your own style, it's usually the better choice.

What you need

Forjournaling there's really not that much that you need. This is the mostextensive list I could think of:

· Yourjournal

· Somethingto write with

· Anopen mind

You mightlike to have some different types of pens for colour effects or differentlines. I find that ballpoint pens will write on just about anything. Experimentwith markers, gel pens, felt tip pens, paint markers, pencils, etc. etc. Somebackgrounds, especially when very structured and layered can ruin some pens. Inthat case try pens with a brush tip, they work like a charm and don't getdestroyed by too many rough effects on the page. As with the other instalmentsof this tutorial, you will have to try and find out what works best for you.There's no one pen that fits all situations.

It can be very interesting to consciously not go for straight lines, but choose for diagonal or wavy ones instead. On this spread I used a marker to draw wavy lines diagonally across the pages. After that I filled those line with writing. In this case I filled up the entire space between the lines, but you can vary the size of your handwriting. It can however give an interesting effect to try to oversize your lettering by filling the space between the lines. You can use a different color for the lines and the writing, but you can also use the same color. You could also do these lines in pencil and erase them after you're done with your writing. Experiment and see what you like best.

Stream of consciousness writing

I am oftenasked what I write about and when I post pictures on my blog or on websitespeople are always wishing they could read what it says. I think they are underthe impression that my writing is full of profound prose, deep feelings andfascinating ideas. Let me burst that bubble for you: it is not! ;-) What I dois called stream of consciousness writing. This is a very neat term forsomething very simple: write down your thoughts. Note that I don't say: "writedown your deepest thoughts", or "write down your most brilliantthoughts", or even "write down the thoughts that matter". No! Just.Your. Thoughts. Whatever comes to your mind, write it down! I truly believe that anybody who has thoughtscan write, and I dare you not to have any thoughts! You're not an air head are you? ;-)

Want toknow what I write about? Most entries start with observations about theweather, about how I slept, about the day behind me and the day ahead of me.It's full of trivial repetitive drivel. I often write in the morning and I hategetting up early, so guess what some of my very first thoughts are about? Yup,there's usually some complaint about not being able to sleep late or aboutbeing tired or feeling dazed and a curse on the daily grind. Fun stuff, right?;-)

What stopspeople from writing is not that they have no thoughts or ideas, it's that theycensor them before they go to the page! They think they are not page worthy.This is a big mistake in thinking. It's thinking of journal writing assomething that will be read. But journal writing is not about reading, it'sabout getting it (whatever it is) out of your system. It's writing for writing'ssake. It's the act in itself that matters. It's expression. You're clearingyour head by putting your thoughts down. That's all. You're not writing a novelhere. You're not trying to win a Pulitzer or a Booker Prize. Don't look at your journal assome kind of sacred spot where only the most profound and deep feelings have aplace. Look at is as a dumping ground for everything that's in your head. Spelling,style, grammar and all that stuff have no importance in the journal. You're notlooking to publish, you're looking to get it out of your system. Journaling isultimately an instrument, a tool, it's not a purpose or goal. The point is tosit with your thoughts and get them out in whatever way they presentthemselves. If anything else, consider this: how can you ever get to theprofound thoughts and feelings if you don't clear away all the crap that's infront of them?

On this spread I used my normal everyday writing in my normal every day straight lines. But after I was done I took a different color pen/marker to outline and underline specific words. This can give a nice visual effect. For a more muted look you can do this with the same pen you were writing with. You can put circles or squares around words, underline them with straight or wavy lines or use dashed lines. Try to doodle a little around your words and see how that makes the text look. Some accents can really liven up an otherwise bland text. On the side of the spread there was some space left that I filled up with some bigger lettering in a bigger marker. Don't forget you can write in any direction you want!

Observations

If writingdown your thoughts the way they come to you seems scary or just impossible, youmight like to try getting out of your head instead. How about looking aroundyou? When you sit down to write, you areprobably in some place that's familiar to you, but have you ever really looked at it? What does your table looklike, or your pen, or how does the chair feel that you are sitting on? Whatcolor is the wall in the room, what patterns present themselves? Look aroundyou and tell your journal what you see. You don't have to write how you feelabout it, although you might get to that eventually. Something you see can triggerall kinds of thoughts and feelings. You can choose to go with those thoughts,but you can also choose to ignore them and keep your writing observational.

An example:when I use a new pen or other material or start a new journal I will oftenwrite about how it performs. How does the paper feel, the size of it, how doesthe ink look on the page, how does the pen move across it. Stuff like that.

This kindof writing is especially nice if you are in a place like a museum or onvacation. What does it all look like, smell like, feel like, behave like? Youare writing down clues for future reference, you are putting a memory on paper,how wonderful! The most ordinary thing can become interesting if you reallytake the time to observe it.

You couldtry to seperate your senses when you do this. What do you see? What do youhear? What do you taste? What do you smell? What do you feel on your skin? Haveyou ever just sat for a few minutes, eyes closed, and listened to the soundsaround you? Try it and write down what you hear. It may give you a whole newperspective on your surroundings. Try it in different locations too.

Anothercool thing about observations is that it gets the hand moving on the page.There's a reason that about 90% of my journal entries start with an observationabout the weather. It's simply a place to start. The first words have found thepage and I'm off! The page is no longerblank and scary.

What yousee can trigger emotions. Why not write about them? Now we come to another kindof observation: the internal kind. The one that answers the question "Howdo you feel?" My, you could just write pages and pages on that questionalone, right? You can observe how you feel and you can even dig deeper and askyourself why you feel that way. Maybe that will trigger memories or ideas youcan also write about. I feel that writing is a lot like painting. You cannot betoo concerned about the final outcome, because you don't know the final outcome. You just have to start with a color (orword or sentence) and see what happens and don't be afraid to try a differentcolor (or word or sentence). Don't think too much beyond the layer you areworking on. Just go with it and let it evolve. It doesn't have to make sense,really it doesn't.

If you can't think of anything to write, you can always resort to the words of others. Try quotes from literature, poetry or (as in this case) songs. There's a world of beautiful lines out there ready to go into your journal. I wrote this quote from one of my favorite songs in big bold letters that I later decorated with a paint marker. Try drawing your own letters by first making a simple letter and then making parts of it fatter with a marker. You can easily decorate them by outlining them or putting dots or other marks on top with a contrasting marker. If you want to do more elaborate lettering check out the resource section at the end of this post. There are some very cool lettering books out there. You might also want to try a search on google or see others do lettering or calligraphy on youtube. If all else fails: use stamps!

Questions and prompts

For some itis really hard to just write out of the blue without a specific thing to write about. They need a little (or big)nudge to get the juices flowing, because they are just stumped for ideas. Iguess there are as many different kinds of writers as there are people. For youthe gods of journal writing have invented questions and prompts! Yay!

Think ofprompts as specific subjects to think and write about. They can be elaborateand intense or very simple and straight forward. There are websites devoted tojournaling prompts (check the resources below this post) and there are bookswith questions or prompts in them that you can use. Someone like Kelly Kilmerhas online classes where she both teaches her (wonderful) style of journalingand gives loads of journaling prompts to write with. I'm sure there's othersout there who do this too.

Another wayto get prompts that I have used in the past is to read interviews withcelebrities in magazines. See if you cannot answer some of the questions theyare asked for yourself. Of course not all questions will apply to you, but alot of them will or you can adapt them to your personal situation. Think of itas the big interview with yourself. It's fun!

Here's someexamples of prompts that I just make up as I'm writing this:

· Where do you live? How long have youlived there? What does your town look like? What do you or don't you like aboutit? Is this the place you want to stay forever? Why? Why not?

· What do you do for a living? How didyou come about doing this? Is it your dream job? Why or why not? And if not,what would your dream job look like?

· What's your favorite color? Why?What does it remind you of? Do you surround yourself with this color? If yes,in what way? If not, why not? Do you ever wear it?

Get thepoint? A question can lead to another question and another and another. Thereare so many interesting things to know about yourself and your surroundings.Why not write them down and enrich your knowledge of self or expand yourhorizon.

A variationon the prompt technique can be asking questions yourself. Not answering them,just asking them. A few years ago I read the book "How to think likeLeonardo da Vinci" by Michael Gelb, which has a wonderful amount ofexercises in it to broaden your mind and one of those was thinking up a 100questions. You can tell a lot about yourself by the questions you ask. Youmight try it and see if it doesn't strike an interesting nerve. Write aboutthat nerve! ;-)

I made this page to show you how different markers can affect the way your handwriting looks. Thicker tips make for thicker letters and this affects how you can write. Also try to experiment with your handwriting itself. Try longhand, try print letters, try capitals. How does it affect your message? Try writing in different directions on the same page. Try following the outline of part of an image. Everything has a different effect and it makes the writing fun.

Conversation / dialogue

This is avery interesting technique if there's a specific problem you want to tackle.Talk to it! Huh? Yes, that's what I said: talk to it! Have a conversation onpaper with a person, an object or an idea. It may seem silly, but it can reallyclarify things for you in a way you may never have considered. Maybe you have adistorted relationship with your body for instance. Why not start a dialoguewith it and get to the bottom of things. By putting yourself in the position ofthe 'opposite party' you may gain a new perspective on the situation. Ifanything it will help you get out of the vicious circle of your one sided thoughts.

What you dois that you put on paper both sides of the conversation. You write down whatyou say and then you answer through the 'mouth' of your problem/object/person.This is not about what they would say or think, it's about what you think theywould say or think. Get the difference? It's all in your head!

Letter writing

This is ina way a variation of the dialogue, except it is one sided. Write a letter towho or whatever you want to. This can be for a deep troublesome reason, toclarify your mind, to get out your anger at somebody, whatever. But it can alsobe a very light hearted exercise. How about writing a fan letter to a long gone moviestar or a fictional character? Or it can be to stir memories. How about writingto a lost loved one? Or an old friend? Or how about writing a letter toyourself? The possibilities are endless! You could even use pretty stationaryand clip the envelope to your journal pages. You could even mail a letter toyourself. We are getting close to thenext possibility now, creative writing. Just remember, that whatever you write,the person you write to never has to read it, so you can be free to writewhatever you want.

On this spread you can see two techniques side by side. On the left you can see I made straight (well sort of) lines with a marker and then wrote on them. But the way I wrote was not straight forward, but ever changing in style. Different letters in different sizes. Alternate between big and small letters, between capital en regular letters. Decorate some of the letters. In other words: go for lots of variety in one piece of writing. It makes for a very visual page. The same goes for the technique on the right. Here I started writing close to the central image on the page and just followed the outline of that image again and again until the page spiraled full by itself. This may be a good technique if you want to show your journal, but don't want everybody to read everything. To make out this kind of writing someone has to go through a lot of trouble and most people will be too polite to try this when you are watching! ;-)

Creative writing

If you arenot one for traditional journal writing, but the idea of putting pen to paperstill appeals to you, how about doing some creative writing? You could writepoetry for instance, or a small story. You could turn your life into amelodrama by writing all dramatically about it and using big words. Write inthird person about yourself and see if it changes your perspective. You coulduse your imagination on anything you see or hear. You could note down overheardconversations and imagine how they would proceed after you left. Creative writing is a whole other realm ofwonderfulness and there are some very cool books about it. (see the resources section below)

Privacy

Keep inmind that nobody has a right to read what your are writing, your journal is foryou alone. As I said above, it's all about the writing, not about the reading.In fact, keep in mind that a journal is personal. It's not a scrap book, it'snot a show album. It's for you and it'sto be used as an instrument for self exploration. Nobody else has any businessreading it. This does not mean that you should not let anybody read it ifthat's what you want, but who readsit is up to you, not to them.

As you cantell I show most of my journal pages, because there is not much on them that Iwouldn't say out loud too, but there are some pages I will not show, somewriting I will not share. My thoughts are my own. If a loved one thinks he orshe is entitled to read your journal ask them to think how they would like itif everybody could read their mind 24/7. That's what a journal should be, amind uncensored. A free and safe zone.Who you share that zone with is completely your choice.

Next to writing in different forms of letters, try writing with different color markers or pens. Combine different styles with different colors and see how it affects your pages. If a certain type of color is not very visible on the page (as is the case with the pink marker on the right hand page) you can always outline it with a contrasting color to make it visible again. See your journal not only as a place to express your thoughts, but as a place to play with visual effects. Experiment with the materials you have at hand, before you go out buying all sorts of stuff. You might surprise yourself!

Resources

Websites for prompts:

· http://journalingprompts.com/

· http://www.squidoo.com/journalwritingprompts

· http://creativewritingprompts.com/

· http://www.souljournaling.com/prompts.php

Books on content:

· Howto make a journal of your life / Dan Price (I dare anybody not to want tojournal after reading this little gem, it's my favorite journaling book)

· Theartist's way - Julia Cameron (she encourages stream of consciousness writingevery morning)

· Thenew diary - Tristine Rainer (the best book on journal writing ever by far, ifyou get only one, get this one)

· Journalto the self - Kathleen Adams (journaling as a therapeutic technique)

· Thecomplete book of questions - Garry Poole (questions for conversation that areeasily used as prompts for journaling)

· Truevision - L.K. Ludwig (this book about art journaling has many prompts in it aswell)

· Theright to write - Julia Cameron (a book about the love of creative writing, withexercises)

· Ripthe page! - Karen Benke (fantastic book originally meant for young people, butfull of fun writing exercises for all ages)

· Thepocket muse - Monica Wood (very cute little book with creative writing prompts)

· Howto think like Leonardo da Vinci - Michael Gelb (not really about journaling,but about curiosity and interest in life, a good thing for every journalwriter)

Books on form:

· Howto be the best bubble writer in the world ever - Linda Scott (on lettering,originally meant for children)

· Thescrapbooker's handwriting workshop - Crystal Jeffrey Rieger (on lettering, withpractice sheets)

· Modernmark making - Lisa Engelbrecht (this is more calligraphy style)

· Scrapbooker'salphabets - Ruth Booth (on lettering)

· 1000artist journal pages - Dawn de Vries Sokol (it is what it says, no text, justpictures from hundreds of journalers, all these pages give you a wonderfulinsight into how varied journaling can be)

I guess you can tell I was quite relieved in finishing this journal. I had a lot of fun doing this tutorial, but boy, did I ever underestimate the amount of work that would be involved! So the final words of my Easy Peasy Journal speak for themselves. If you have a small but strong statement to make, try drawing your own letters and embellishing them. I did this in a very simple way by writing the letters with a white paint marker and then outlining them with a black pen. After that I added some lines across the letters for some more decoration. Of course there are much more elaborate and beautiful ways to embellish letters, but this is the Easy Peasy Journal, after all. Check out the resource section for books on lettering. Also check out websites on art journaling and other people's blogs. You can learn a lot from them just by looking.

Final words

And here wecome to the end of our three part art journaling tutorial. I hope you enjoyedit. It was fun, but also quite challenging to put it all together and it'salways much more work than you expect it to be. Still, this blog is a work oflove and as long as it stays that way I will try to keep pushing myself into newdirections.

If you haveany suggestions for future tutorials I would love to hear from you. Until thenI wish you lots of fun trying some of the techniques and ideas from the EasyPeasy Journal. Let me know how it goes!

What are you up to Wednesday - part 25

2011-09-21T17:48:00.001+02:00

This Wednesday I'm exhausted! I have pictures of my work table and the sewing room, but they have not been touched for days. Well, I was in the studio working on the third part of the art journaling tutorial on Monday night, but that was about the only hour I've had since last Thursday and I was so tired then I actually almost fell asleep over the table. ;-) Anyway, this is how I left the table on Monday:

I am filling the spreads of the Easy Peasy Journal with different forms of writing. I so want to do a good tutorial on journal writing and I just don't have the time or energy this week. Both last weekend and coming weekend are filled with family visits on the main land and this Friday (the day to post the tutorial) I will be on the main land too for a doctor's appointment. This means I'll be away from home and studio for three days in a row and living where I live these are long days and long trips (think 5 hours long to get somewhere and 5 hours back the next day, if I'm lucky, last weekend it took me 7!). So I'm simply running out of time this week for the tutorial.

I'm not one who handles things well when I have so little time to myself, especially when I get too little sleep like has been the case the past two weeks. I think there's a hermit in me who just can't stand being around people so much without having some time to breathe or just rest. I get cranky and whiny. It's not the people (they are wonderful), it's me!

So I've decided to cut myself a little slack and instead of spending the coming two nights working like crazy to get this tutorial done before Friday, I will just give myself a little more time to finish it. This means the third part of the art journaling tutorial will be delayed for at least a few days. I hope you understand.

Now here's the other project that's kind of on hold right now. The butterfly book of questions. Here's how I left the sewing room last Wednesday (!).

I'm working on the pages by sewing a zigzag border around them. I already finished two signatures and was working on the third when the bobbin ran out of thread. So I had to fill it up again first before I could continue, and it was really late already so I decided to go to bed instead. ;-) Since then I haven't been back to it yet, which goes to show how little time I've had, haha.

Here's a close up of the page lying on top of the sewing table, so you can see what the edges of the pages will look like.

I like the effect and it's so simple to do. I swear a whole new world opened up for me when I learned you can sew paper with a sewing machine!Who knew? (Well, everybody, except you, Caatje!)

In the meantime I'm still cutting out butterflies (see the first picture) and putting them in a bowl. They will be added to the pages too. Can't wait to see how it will look when it's done. But that won't be this week, that's for sure.

For now I'm going to kick back and put my feet up and just do nothing for a while. Go to bed early for a change and catch up on sleep. I won't be blogging again until next week, so this is an early wish for a happy and creative week and weekend for all of you!