Friendship Journal

I took part in a travelling friendship journal for a yahoo group I am in Blissfully Art Journaling. These are the three spreads I made for it. One was to be about me and the other two something about friendship.

The picture I painted was with gouache. The paint lifts very easily when it gets wet so I was going to spray it with fixative. I tried the fixative first on a different gouache page and it worked fine except the spray wouldn't quit spraying until the can was empty. So for this tea time painting I was goint to use some UV acrylic finishing spray from Krylon that I had. Hmmm, three big blobs hit my page before I could stop them. This time I got no spray; the stuff just bubbled out of the can till it was empty. I don't know if my cans were too old, too cold (the house was between 66 and 68 degrees) or what but I even went and found my spray bottle of hairspray I've had for a few years but couldn't get it to do anything but shoot a heave stream rather than a fine mist. So, the page is going to go as is, with three horrid blobs on it. Thank goodness they didn't blur the paint under them.

Do any of you ever seal a gouache or watercolor page in your journal? I have only done it as a trial effort and on a painted cover to a journal. I figure they don't usually get wet but when the journal is going to someone I don't know, I just wanted to be safe.

Pomegranates

I wanted to paint my pomegranate before I ate it. (Hmmm, maybe I should paint it when it's cracked open too)! I grabbed my general journal and used a drawing paper page which worked okay but not great. I'd pre-prepped the page when I was with my granddaughters and thought it would make a good background for the fruit. The biggest problem was bleedthrough to the other side as you can see on the other pre-prepped page (showing my granddaughter that the cheap paints I had in a palette someone had gifted me were better than the Grumbacher ones she was using which is why I promptly ordered her professional watercolors when I got home. Never expect children to do well with or to love doing art if they don't have good tools. It's really worth the expense at this level in my opinion!) so I am happy with my page. The drawing paper took a very long time to dry which is unusual and then I remembered we are in the middle of a nice, large rainstorm :) and so I happily waited for some of the paint to dry but should have waited till it all did. Patience is a virtue and I am working on it! By the way, since I didn't have patience or correct pre-planning, I lost my highlight so I used some gouache that was sitting in another palette nearby to rectify that problem.

I WILL figure out a page that will go with the bleedthrough or cover it up. It's now a challenge page!

Gosh, Gouache Is Tougher Than I Thought

I found using gouache I'd dried in a palette hard to use for a picture. I've heard people use it this way and some are what I call terrific journalers and painters. So why did I have such a hard time. Well I got splotchiness in spots. In other places I couldn't layer or the color underneath lifted. I ended up accenting with ink to clean it all up. I could sure use whatever suggestions anyone has for using it.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers. It's a quiet day for me with my husband still recovering from surgery. I spent the morning drawing this sketch, then baking a Burnt Sugar Cake which I will have to eat all by myself since my husband doesn't like it and there is no one else around. Aw, poor me, lol. Then I went back to my sketch and added gouache. Now, what to have for dinner is the question. It seems today is mostly art and food for me! My son called to say happy mother's day and I am waiting for my daughter to call later. Life is pretty good.

Tucson VA Hospital

My husband is having surgery soon at the Tucson VA hospital so we had to go down for some pre-ops which ended up including a stay overnight for a cardio-catheterization. I took the opportunity to do a couple of sketches from his 3rd floor room window. It is a beautiful old place and they are keeping it up quite well (the room wasn't so great and the food was inedible but the hospital is lovely).

One sketch is on watercolor paper using watercolor and the other is on some Canson MiTientes brown paper so I used gouache on that one.

Fake Journal - Page Five

Today's fake thing is my plastic flower pot I got from Wal-Mart this year. It looks like ceramic but it isn't. I went for it because of the price and the hope that I could move it if necessary once it was full of dirt.

Hopefully my tomato plant will take hold. The first one didn't as the wind bent it in half. I'm going to get a tomato cage for this next time I go to town. I don't think they are fake yet but they have reduced the number of rings to 3 and I seem to remember 4 years ago.

This is ink and gouache. I like how the gouache covers the background mostly. I'm not using it so thick as to hide all the ink or background but it's not totally transparent either. If you haven't tried the gouache I would recommend it for your tool arsenal.

Fake Journal - Page Four

I have my fourth page done for my fake journal. This page has my fake flowers on it. I made french beaded flowers and put them in clay I had stuffed into this watering can. Then I sprinkled a little dirt over the clay to hide it. I love these bright flowers but of course, there is no real substitute for real ones.

I painted the watering can after a question was asked in the Oils class I am taking with Nel . What color do you paint a metal thimble was the (paraphrased) question. Nel said to paint it the colors reflecting off of it as the metal doesn't have it's own color exactly. Well tonight I needed to paint a metal watering can so I played by using blue, teal, red, orange, yellow and purple in this painting. Didn't it work great? Thanks Nel.

Day 3 of Fake Journal

Well I have a third page done for the idea of fake. What do you think? Is the milk we drink today real? I used Pitt pen and gouache to do this page.

I am working on my first lesson for the virtual trip to England I am taking with Laure Ferlita. I'll post it as soon as I get it done.

Try-out for Fake Journal

Roz Stendahl has a project going in April that she calls Fake Journal Month. I decided to join in and my fake journal is going to be on individual papers. I have them ready. They were made by painting Dr. Martins inks on a sheet of hotpress watercolor paper and then tearing it into 4 1/2" x 6" sheets. I had some extras so I used one to try some things out. I used a nib in a dip pen to try writing with the ink but it was too scratchy and didn't work at all. The gouache worked pretty well although when it's really watery it beads up a bit at first. My Pitt pen worked okay too. So I think these will be my main tools. I might add some collage to the works too.

Now to think of what my fake journal will be about. It's not supposed to be about my life as I put in my real journal so that's something to think about and I only have a few days to do that.

What about you? Do you want to try doing a fake journal? Check out Roz's blog and see.

Fruit in Bowl

Wow. It's been a long time since I've posted something. I really have been busy. I am taking several classes but have resisted signing up for more as it got to be too much.

I am in Fallbrook, California visiting my sister. She was called in to work today so I had some time to myself. I sat down and painted this pear in a bowl that was sitting on her table. I'm very happy with it. I went for wild and painted the shadowy white interior with purple. I felt like gray would have been boring and blah. This looks colorful and makes me happy. I hope you enjoy it too.

Done in my journal on watercolor paper with gouache paints.

Gouache Teacup

I ordered some gouache after seeing what Roz Stendahl does with it. Oh, I know I can't do anything like she does but I like the look of the paint and I like the idea of something that won't wreck my brush like acrylics should I leave it set too long. I bought mostly what she recommended and added a couple. I just got them two days ago.

Last night I was listening to Kaizen Muse 's free audio sessions and I drew the teacup in a spiral notebook that was sitting handy. I should have grabbed my sketchbook but I was just thinking I was doodling so no big deal. Then I ended up liking my teacup so I pulled out the paints I'd set in a palette to dry and painted it. I had fun with the whole thing as I was just playing and not intending to do anything.

Today, still liking my little painting, I put it on a prepainted page in my composition book journal. I didn't realize I got it so crooked till I scanned it in to my computer. Ah well, it's glued in tight and there's no changing it.

Thanks Roz for your inspiration and your list of colors to start off with.