pages

one page at a time. trying to get back to art journaling, to make it a routine again, not only once in a while.

“Journaling is like whispering to one’s self and listening at the same time.”

Mina Murray

A pop of colour

winter blues
it's dragging me down
bright colours

lifting up
creativity
stagnation

Middle of January is always difficult, winter blues guiding to lack of creativity. I hadn’t worked on any art page for so long, today I decided to add yellow and pink to a page. A pop of colour to lift my mood. I like my choice of colours: yellow and pink! Yellow means happiness and reminds me of sunshine; pink is related to self-care and love. This reminded me to buy flowers this weekend!

Haiku poem for Tanka Tuesday.

Spooky

“I love Halloween, and I love that feeling: the cold air, the spooky dangers lurking around the corner.”

Evan Peters

“Nothing on Earth so beautiful as the final haul on Halloween night.”

Steve Almond

“The farther we’ve gotten from the magic and mystery of our past, the more we’ve come to need Halloween.”

Paula Curan

WQWWC

kindness

kindness
holding a door
a smile

a smile
a cup of tea
thank you

thank you
sending flowers
love you

love you
I'm listening
kindness

Tanka Tuesday – Kindness is the theme prompt for this week. I’ve written this poem but it doesn’t fit any of the classic poetry forms, at least that I could find. I love it, so I decided to be kind to myself and share it anyways. It is a syllabic poem, so I think Colleen will like. The form is 2:4:2, the last word of one stanza is the first of the following on and the first word of the poem repeats as the last one. I am thinking a name for it, but first I’d like know from the poetry experts if there isn’t already a form like this one.

Another gesture of kindness I’m sharing here, is a self-kindness. A few minutes every morning I give to myself to play with colours, images. It’s a ‘me time’ that I use for art journaling.

Hope you enjoy both of my creativity forms.

resilience

“I tried and failed. I tried again and again and succeeded.”
Gail Borden

my art and me, me and my art. i’ve tried many media and styles over the years. sketch, canvas, collage, water color, acrylics … but what i really like is messy art. to give permission to the colors and pieces of paper to talk by themselves.

“You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.”
Margaret Thatcher

my messy pages are like therapy, i let my feelings pour on them. most of them i keep to myself, but a few i post on IG, i share with my friends in there hoping to inspire them. once a posted a collage and tagged art page. someone left a comment saying my page wasn’t an art! sadness took over me and i didn’t post for a while.

“Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.”
Confucius

many thoughts later, i understood the problem wasn’t on my page or with myself, but with the person that commented. up and down, resiliency, and time to take the stand and enjoy my art, messy art!

WQWWC

A random page # 17

Good Morning! Here are a few pages from an IG art party this weekend:

It’s the journey that’s important, not the getting there.
John McLeod

Today is starting #100dayproject, where we choose one creative project and stick with it for 100 days. I’ve joined it for many years and it’s great to see all the work done at the end of the project. This year I’ll make an art card per day.

Have a great and safe week!

A random page # 15

Journaling is helping me to stay grounded during this time of lockdown. I’ve been up and down with my feelings, but in a way or another when I sit at my desk and start to write it’s like the world is back to its usual flow.

I haven’t done much art journaling recently, but here are the pages I did a few weeks ago.

And you? How are keeping your sanity these days?

a random page # 14

Happy Women’s Day!

The new season is coming and it’s time for changes. Starting by changing the clocks today, this means more day light, more outdoors activities, but the self-changes are the most important: our body, our mood, expectations …

With the Spring knocking on the door, it’s time to get rid of what doesn’t serve us anymore and make space for new things. I’m not talking about material stuff, but thoughts, regrets and old ideas. I try to live a minimalist life style, so I don’t have many things to get rid off. I don’t like cluttering, when I buy something new, the old one has to go out. What I need is to apply the same style to my mind, generally I keep everything in there, and I’m tired of the mind-cluttering.

I need to make more space for the things that make me happy and give me pleasure. More writing, gardening, cooking delicious and healthy food, in summary I need to nest the good thoughts and get rid of the bad ones.

And you? Any plans for the new season?

Creating

Art journal, visual journal, collage journal… there are so many names for it. I don’t know which one I prefer to use, but I do enjoy to express my feelings adding images to the pages of my notebooks.

This weekend I joined a art party on Instagram, few hours creating together with other ladies from around the world. Three prompts in 2 hours.

The first prompt was Polka dots. This is my new journal, you can see the cover on the first photo (bottom right). I was using it for the first time, it’s not easy to start a new journal, the first page is always a challenge. I wanted it to be messy and full of possibilities to give me freedom to work on the other pages without boundaries.

Second prompt was about travelling. Places we want to visit. This is a difficult one, I want to go to many places from deserts to mountains. Of course, beaches are always on the list.

The third and last prompt was a quote by Oscar Wilde “Memory … is the diary that we all carry about with us.” We always want to carry good memories, things that have made us happy and loved. Tiny moments along the road.

I’ll be co-hosting next month art party, please let me know if you would like to join it.

A random page # 13

I joined an IG art party this weekend, a much needed time to play with collage and relax a bit. Here are the prompts and my take on them. Hope yo enjoy and be inspired by my pages.

Prompt 1: River

Prompt 2: A quote: “My work is loving the world. Am I no longer young and still not half perfect? Let me keep my mind on what matters which is my work, which is mostly standing still and learning to be astonished.” Mary Oliver