July 4 + 5: Almost there (art journal every day)

Only one more spread left in my 'stuffed to the gills' moleskine hard cover journal that I have been using for my art journal everyday project since May 1st. I got the idea to do this from Julie Fei-Fan Balzer. Julie is very inspiring and has lots of info to get you started. Below is a peek at my second-to-last spread in this journal.

This is how I started, yesterday.

I don't know where the idea came from but I thought it would be great to start my background with little squares punched from various papers.

There is scrapbook paper, images from classes with Mary Green of Green Paper (map, florals, bugs, ledger), plus text pages from old books, hand-painted scrap papers and women from ARTchix studio.com.

I decided to color the white page with a plum watercolor crayon at this point, working around the squares.

I misted the page with water and used my finger to blend it; then added a bit of white paint in streaks on top, turning the background more lavender.

I added a sprinkling of perfect pearls pigment powder in the color pearl,

by tapping it on with a dry brush, while the paints were still damp.

I began misting walnut ink . . . on both sides of the spread and added leftover tissue paper from the previous spread to the left side (the advantages of not tidying up!).

I stopped working (playing!) at that point and planned to finish the next day. This morning I got up and soon afterwards I thought my charcoal pencil would do the trick and give me what I was looking for on the right side. I outlined the squares, and later went back and smudged the marks I had made.

The right side was inviting me to journal . . . . I have done a little bit of writing in this book and it felt right.

Finally, a scan. Funny how the colors are diffferent. I would say the scan is truer to reality.

One last spread and then maybe the cover??  I will definitely be continuing in another journal after this. If you click on the scan you will be able to easily read how I feel about this project! 

Thank you for following this art journey and for all your thoughtful comments.

: ^ ) lenna