Fleur de Trois

"Beauty, to me, is about being comfortable in your own skin. That or a kick-ass red lipstick."

~Gwyneth Paltrow

There's nothing like sitting down and letting it all out on paper.  That's what I allowed myself to do last week.  I turned on my iPod, opened up my home-made journal, picked out a few acrylic paints, gathered a few pens and colored pencils, and sorted through the pile of magazine clippings that I've been collecting.  I let my music take over and quickly forgot all about time.  How did it feel?  It was amazing (and the first real time I've used my craft table since moving to my new apartment last August)!   

Before I started anything, I used a brush and primed my blank pages of my funky homemade journal with Gesso. And although you can't tell from the picture below, I used a sponge stamp for the large fleur de lis on each page, so there is a bit of tack and texture to those areas of the paper.   

Shades of green and a bright red were my choices of colors, and I went crazy and got my fingers and hands all messy.  On the left side, I wanted to mainly collage and play with mixing the beautiful greens.  Adding the bright red color was actually a pleasant after-thought once I glued down the magazine clipping of the lipstick/hand/and number 3.  I used a red acrylic paint on a rubber stamp for the fleur de lis in the upper left-hand corner.  Below is a picture of the left page of my journal.

On the right page of my journal...I wanted to write...write...write.  So I let my iPod take me away and Dido and Nine Inch Nails also helped me purge what I felt about the images I selected.  The fleur de lis turned out great on this page.  If you look close, you might be able to see the tack behind the use of gesso on this side better.  I outlined the fleur with red acrylic paint and used a red marker to journal my thoughts.  I also used a red colored pencil to do some shading on this page.

Yes, it felt great!  As you can see, I love to spread out and just let loose!  And the use of my great new Ott Lite helped me see what I was working on without straining my eyes.  I also worked on the backgrounds for a few ATC Trading cards.  I hope to tackle those in my next upcoming project...stay tuned!  Happy creating!

If you enjoyed this blog post, you might enjoy this post:

My Homemade Journal - Learn how to make your own very own homemade journal with just a few supplies.  I learned how to make this journal with the help of of a very crafty artist/blogger named Samantha Kira.  I think I made this one for under $5.  Visit my post to see my finished product and to watch Samantha Kira's step-by-step You Tube video.  You may already have some of the supplies at home!

My Homemade Journal

About a month ago Soulcomfort and I got together at her house, and we made our very own homemade journals. Although both were made by hand, they were very different from each other. Mine was simply a journal made from a Composition Notebook with manila file folders sewn into the cover of the notebook. Rita's was a bit more homemade than mine and had a Coptic stitch that is really neat. To see both her journal and mine, you can visit her blog entry from Tuesday, May 27, 2008. She's even got pictures of both of us and the outcome of our afternoon. It was a fun time! And for someone like myself, who can barely sew a button on a shirt, it was fun to say that I was able to make my own hand-sewn journal!

About a week after making the journal, I decided I wanted to cover it with some paper and make it pretty. Off to the local scrapbooking store I went. I picked out some funky paper and took out my Mod Podge. After covering my journal, I dubbed it my Pop Culture Mixed Media Journal. Here are a few pictures!

It may be hard to tell but the two black objects on the left hand side of the front cover are cassette tapes. I also bought and added the rub-on transfer "This Girl" to the cover.

Here's a shot of the pages. That's right - they are plain old manila file folders. Good heavy duty and thick paper. Perfect for collaging and mixed media art!

Above is a close-up shot of the paper and the front cover. Pretty funky huh? This paper really caught my eye in the store. It has keys, airplanes, light bulbs, cassettes, and even spacemen. It's a lot of fun!

Where did I get the idea to make this journal? From a great mixed media artist on YouTube by the name of samanthakira. She's a very creative lady! Here's a link to the first part of her instructional video to make your own "Easy-Peasy Journal." It was cheap (less than $10), easy, and a lot of fun!

I followed her directions for the most part. I made my own adjustments, of course. For example, I took and cut one file folder to the size I wanted them all to be, and that file folder was my template for the rest of the pages. She cuts them crazy with an Exacto knife. I wasn't that brave. I just sat with a pen and my scissors. I used my template to mark each file folder and cut them one by one.

I haven't started filling the pages yet but will very soon! I also bought a few more composition notebooks and a box of file folders to make another journal...or two...or three! :)

Happy Journal Making!