Art Journaling

Made my first attempt at an art journal this evening. I've been ruminating about doing one for a long time, but didn't want to use up my stash of watercolor paper or go out and buy an expensive journal. For the last few days, I've been thinking about using my stash of National Brand Eye-Ease notebooks as journals. This was just a thought floating around with no impetus toward action.

Yesterday, while waiting to renew my car registration at the BMV, I wished I'd thought to bring a magazine, which of course made me think about buying a magazine or two before heading back to the office. A quick stop in Hastings, and I was armed with two Stampington titles, Take Ten and Art Journaling. I'd barely looked at either before purchasing.

Imagine my surprise last night upon picking up Art Journaling and finding that the first article was about using inexpensive composition books as journals! This evening, after pulling dead tomatoes and zinnias from the garden, I found one of my unused Eye-Ease notebooks went to work . So far, no art, just set up. I used Studio Multi-Medium (from Claudine Hellmuth's line of Ranger products) to adhere "signature" sets of five pages together. I figure that the signatures will be thick enough to stand up to paints and embellishments, but thin enough to punch through if needed. I've glued only two sets of pages and have used baby binder clips to hold them together while the medium dries. I'll do another two sets and so on until all are adhered.

Have to say that I'm not really sure where the art journal is going. I'd like to use it to try out card, tag, and ATC designs; work on techniques such as image transfers, silhouettes, and backgrounds, and just plain write. Meanwhile, I'm going to immerse myself in all that there is to learn from Art Journaling magazine.