Category Archives: Journal 1

The secret of life…

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I’ve used this spread as the header for my blog because these were the first pages that I was realy happy with. They have lots of layers because I kept doing things that I didn’t like, then I would paint over them, or try to remove the hideous layers (with a baby wipe). This is what Paula (aka Journal Artista) calls ‘Working through the Uglies’. If I hadn’t heard her say that on her Ustream channel I think I’d have given up. But I persevered and I’m happy that I did, I like these pages 🙂

I also like the words on these two pages – the secret of life is to enjoy the passing of time. It’s very true, from the moment we are born we just keep getting older. When you are young time stretches before you like infnity but as you get older it really speeds up and you realise that you have to enjoy each moment as much as you can. When I was young I thought that being the age I am now (mid 50s) would be awful, but the truth is it’s really fine, I’m OK with it, I’m content.

The very first layer on these journal pages, which probably only I can see now, are some shop receipts from a local shop from the 1920s. As well as trying to be creative I also have a passion for local history and heritage which you can check out (if you are the slightest bit interested) at this website: www.rshg.org.uk. One day I intend to almalgamate these two interests and produce a Heritage Art Journal.

I’d like to thank the many, many people who put online ‘Free to Use’ collage sheets and images, people like The Graphics Fairy, Vintage Moth and many more too numerous to mention (and because I forgot to make a note of the names when I downloaded the images – sorry!). Every single one of you is so generous and so inspiring. Thanks!

Big love
AJ 🙂

It’s a new beginning

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Hello!  I’m AJ and this blog is about my adventure into art journaling.  I’ve always loved looking at ways of being creative and discovering art journaling earlier this year has been a wonderful and inspiring experience for me.

Its A New Beginning

I was first inspired to start art journaling when I watched the YouTube videos of Teesha Moore earlier this year. 

A few years ago I attended a Lomographic Society World Congress in London, I was on my own and a little nervous but on the first day I was fortunate to meet up with Teesha’s husband, Tracy, and their daughter Trista.  Tracy and Trista looked after me and we became friends. As well as lots of cameras Tracy carried about with him a beautiful hand made journal which he encouraged everyone he met to draw or write in. I knew that Tracy and his family were all very creative and artistic people but I didn’t understand about art journaling until I discovered Teesha’s video turorials about art journaling. I was blown away by her work and inspired to have a go myself.   Teesha creates wonderful, vibrant and fantastical journal pages as you will see if your visit her website. 

Since then as well as experimenting and trying to find my own style for art journaling I have searched the internet for inspiration, ideas and more tutorials.

Paula Phillips aka Journal Artista has been hugely inspirational.  Paula is so generous with her time, sharing her ideas and encouraging newbies like me. She has a Ustream channel and records programmes every week about her art and creativity. She is an absolute treasure so please check her out. Right now Paula has a little competition going on on her blog, you are supposed to use a stencil to enter, but I haven’t got any, in the image on my header I did use a masking tecnnique with Post-it notes that Paula demonstrated, I wonder if that counts?

The image above is the first page of one of my first journals and is called appropriately It’s A New Beginning. It was a start and I’m hoping that things will improve as time goes on. 🙂