Color Mists Special

Check out the Color Mists special at 

www.OutsideTheMargins.com

Check out the amazing journal page 

Debi Boring created using the Brite Lights set!

Art Journal Page

New art journal page- 

water soluble oil pastels, gesso & acrylics.

Calendar Grlz September 2010

I manged to finished up 3 spreads for the Calendar Glrz 

Round Robin I'm in. This calendar is French themed and 

for some reason I was really having a hard time getting 

inspired.  It's my second go around with this calendar.

I used a Paris map I picked up somewhere along
with one of my whimsical characters.

Here I combined gouache paints with water soluble oil 
pastels. I tried to incorporate the image that was on 
the page already to give it a billboard look.

Here I used French music I downloaded from Somerset as 

the background and along with French themed postcards

 
Click HERE to view my previous pages.


Artistic Inspirations to help you create!
 

www.OutsideTheMargins.com

Calendar Grlz August 2010

  It's been awhile since I posted.  
School started early this year and 
the Hubster is working "crush" at 
the winery 7 days a week.  Life is 
always chaotic this time of year 
for us until we get into a routine. 

I have, however, had the chance to 
work in my Calendar Grlz Art Journal
(Click HERE to see my past pages)

Artistic Inspirations to help you create!
 

www.OutsideTheMargins.com

Calendar Grlz July 2010

 
I feel like I haven't done much art 
lately, but I did manage to get some 
art journal pages finished this month.

Since the round robin I'm in didn't have quite enough people we get to see and work in our calendars midway through the RR. It's has been fun to see what others have done before I send it back off for round 2.

 Water Soluble pastels 
and Color Mists

 Pen and watercolor

Magazine Packing Tape Transfers

Click Here to view my previous pages. 

Have you done any art lately? 
I'd love to see it, leave me a comment 
with your link to it :-)




Artistic Inspirations to help you create!
 

www.OutsideTheMargins.com

Calendar Grlz March 2010

Here's this Month's art journal 
spreads for the Calendar 
Round Robin I'm in.

This Calendar has a French theme

 Click HERE to view my past 
art journal spreads.



Artistic Inspirations to
help you create!

www.OutsideTheMargins.com

Calendar Grlz 2010

I've started the new year with a calendar swap 
round robin. I decide to use an old 2008 Frida Kahlo 
Calendar that I never used for my calendar.

Color Mists Background
Since I'm still trying to get myself to journaling anything goes as far as arting up the pages.

Sign in page with tags.

I'm not really finished with this spread yet and have one more to do but here it is. On all the pages and tags I used my Color Mists. The butterfly page I adhered a paper towel I already colored with the color mists and mopped up some gesso with.

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Ringing in the New Year!

A New Year. . .

Happy New Years blog friends!
I really don't do resolutions though this past year I had hoped to do more journaling...I tried honest! I did some, and then found it really isn't me....you just can't force it and you know what...it's okay :-) When I was a little kid all my friends had favorite stuffed animals they slept with....I thought maybe there was something wrong me because I didn't have one, so I became set on a mission to make myself have a favorite stuffed animal. Well as you can probably guess it didn't happen, you just can't force something like that and it's okay. I think sometimes when everyone is jumping on one art wagon or another we all think we have to hop on too and if we don't there's something wrong with us, but nope there isn't....I just dance to a different art drummer thenjournaling . That doesn't mean I won't do more its just not something that I'm compelled to do all the time like some people are and guess what...it's okay :-)

Here's a freebie Dover image
I used in the above digital piece.

Click on the image above to
enlarge and download.

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view my newest additions!

Art Workshop Peeve

For those of you who take workshops and for the rest of you who are thinking about it here's some food for thought. Make sure to find out what level the workshop is geared towards by asking. They don't always tell you in the class details. I recently took a art journaling workshop with a couple of art buds and we were all three disappointed. It became apparent about 5 mins into the workshop that we were well beyond the level of the workshop. It was geared for very beginning budding artists. We made the most of it by using the time to create, but what an expensive play day. We could have done that on our own. We should have asked more questions but we were excited to find a workshop in our neck of the woods and about getting together that we didn't think about asking that important question. If you teach workshops make sure you include what level your workshop is designed for and be ready for several different level artists, so they don't come away disappointed. None of us are experienced art journalers but do have a fair amount of experience under our belts and it was really disappointing to not learn anything new or be inspired. Even if its past info we already know, if presented right it could have re inspired us.

Below are a couple of journal pages

I worked on while I was there.

The flamingo page I still need to finish.

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Eye Candy!

Here's a few pieces I created on Sunday my one day I try to make a point of creating guilt free! It doesn't always work out that way for one reason or another but this weekend it did.

Journal page depicting how painful my tongue felt after loosing part of a filling and a pointing piece kept rubbing against my tongue!
Still working at drawing faces and people. I combined this with a digital layer.

This one is my favorite. I named them The Deedles....don't ask me why but that's the name that came to me after I drew them LOL I combined it with some digital magic to finish it off.

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Starting to feel human again!

I'm finally starting to feel human again though I still tire easily, but whew! Thank goodness, 'cuz I was starting to go stir crazy! Did I mention that my baby laptop is back home again and up and running, yay! I thought I'd share a picture of Tungsten....hey don't you name your computers too? Our desktop computer is named Bob...the kids named it years ago LOL

It sucks to have lots of time, but not feel well enough to want to do art even! Just to get my art MoJo going again I did a couple of fun journal pages. The one above was first done with watercolors and then I added some elements digitally.

This one I used a quote from a wild woman calendar my sister gave me as a prompt. I thought it was a funny quote after having been sick. The quote was said to Christine Keeler, who was a prominent prostitute, by her doctor. Of course I don't hope to be back in bed LOL!

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Paint Brushes

Sometimes it's the simplest things that make us happy! Here's a picture I took of a set of new chunky brushes I bought. It inspired me to do an art journal page using it. I just love my new chunky brushes, and had been wanting some larger ones then I have (these measure just about 2 inches across). What fun I plan to have using them!

I came across this thought provoking poem appropriately titled Paint Brush. I think the combination of the picture and poem would be a great motivator for an art journal entry....If it inspires you, please let me know, I would love to see what you created just post a link back to your piece :-)

Paint Brush

Bettie B Young ©

I keep my paint brush with me wherever I may go, in case I need to cover up, So the real me doesn't show. I'm so afraid to show you me, afraid of what you'll do, that you may laugh or say mean things,I'm afraid I might lose you.

I'd like to remove all my paint coats to show you the real, true me, But I want you to try and understand, I need you to accept what you see. So if you'll be patient and close your eyes, I'll strip off all my coats real slow. Please understand how much it hurts to let the real me show.
Now my coats are all stripped off, I feel naked, bare and cold. And if you still love me with all that you see, you are my friend, pure as gold.

I need to save my paint brush, though, and hold it in my hand. I want to keep it handy in case somebody doesn't understand. So please protect me, my dear friend and thanks for loving me true. But please let me keep my paint brush with me Until I love me, too.

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My Art Challenge Answer...

I am so thrilled, amazed and inspired by all the comments people have posted in answer to my art challenge question & blog giveaway! Honestly, each and every post has been very insightful and inspiring for me, thank you, thank you to ALL who have posted!! I wish I could send each one of you a prize for taking the time to post! Please know though that your comments, I am positive, are inspiring for others as well! If you have a moment take the time to read through the comments HERE.

So in answer to my own question the ART challenge I want to accomplish in 2009 is to stick to keeping an art journal. Ideally I'd love to do a page a day, but realistically if I at least do a page every other day or two then I will be satisfied. Being realistic in your expectations of yourself is an important factor to sticking with your challenge, so keep that in mind. If your challenges seem too huge and unrealistic try breaking them down into smaller goals and tackle them little by little....at least for me this works, otherwise I get overwhelmed by the larger picture and give up completely.

I have several sketch books where I draw ideas and designs, but keeping an art journal will be different then that for me. In my art journal I will be journaling feelings and thoughts as well as ideas. I've never been comfortable in keeping a diary/journal its always felt too evasive....this blog is as close as I've come to that, so this will be a good challenge for me pushing me outside of my comfort zone just enough.

So with that said I have posted my second art journal page. It's a preliminary sample of what I plan to paint on my front door this spring after hubby gets the door fixed and prepped for me. Its taken me a couple years since we first painted our brightly colored funky farmhouse for me to decide on how I wanted to paint the door. Once I'm done painting I will roll on a layer of PYM II to seal it from the sunlight just like I did with my mailbox which has not faded after almost 2 years. I cannot say enough about how awesome PYM II is! I have solely used this product on my art for almost 2 years now and swear by it! I also cannot say enough about how wonderfully nice, and helpful the creators Doug and Donna Shepherd are to work with!

Art Journal Page

Front Door Sample

I started by sketching the design with a black micron pen and then used a travel set of watercolors and watercolor pencils to fill in. Once that was dry I went back over it with Shiva paintstiks (the squares are representation's of the windows that are in my front door just in case your wondering...what the heck those are! lol).

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