craft

art journals.

tried my hand at some abstract journaling.

Ever since I had the ability to write (non-sensical scribbles of a four year old count) I have kept a “diary.” I don’t know where the compulsion to keep a list of the daily mundane activities as a child: “Today I had rice crispies for breakfast…” The older i got, the more they developed into a living memory box of my life at that moment in time; and perhaps it started as my first paltry attempt at creating a sense of order from my distracted thoughts and messy brain. I have over 30 completed journals, which is roughly one per year. The style and format of my journals adapts to the seasons of my life. During college and Graduate school, my journal functioned as my day planner and the keeper of my sanity. During periods in my life where I have been happy, I notice that I do more art and very little journaling. During tough times however, my journals are filled with sad song lyrics, to-do lists and life questions.

Do you like to look back at your journals? If so, do you do it often? Is creating a written record of your life to reflect back on a reason for your journaling? I am very interested to know. I can honestly say that, that is not the case with me, as writing for reflection at a later period of time would require to much forethought and planning for me. My journal has become one of my few necessities which I carry with me at all times in my bag. It is given the impossible responsibility of keeping me sane (emotionally balanced and organized enough to survive) ..so when I complete one journal, I see it as a memento of the craziness which is my life- maybe one day, when I am normal, I will want to look back at my journals to feel sorry for my crazy self.

Here are a few of my own art journal pages:

my art journal page

my colorful cacti

one of my favorite quotes

Frida and Virginia from my journal.

Anyways, I love nothing more than seeing pages from other peoples’ journals. I feel like I am getting a naked glimpse at their soul. I am always so amazed and inspired by the creative, beautiful things that people put down onto pages. One of my favorite artists, Geninne Zlatkis, has the most beautiful and awe inspiring journal pages. I love all of her work and I also LOVE how she adapts her art journal entries into a day planner. Genius!!

Geninne’s Journal Page

from her flickr account (October Days)

more of Geninne’s beauty

Here is the link to her flickr account for you to check her out more!: https://www.flickr.com/photos/geninne/sets/72157594514015991/

Another one of my favorites is Guilherme Dietrich. I fell in love with the bright, bold colors and vivid pieces. I had to pick my jaw up off the floor after I saw these. Unfortunately, his flickr account is no longer active and the website I found him on, isn’t either. But here are some of his beautiful pages to feast your eyes at (pangs me to know I will never create something this beautiful)

What inspires you? Why do you journal? I would love to see!

Simple DIY planters Idea

Since Spring has sprung, I have been feeling like my house is in need of some life and so I decided to buy some house plants. ( I went with Cacti because I figured they needed the least amount of attention) I searched and searched for the perfect planters and couldn’t find them. So naturally, I decided to make my own. I bought this set of three wooden planters at Michael’s craft and chose three colors. Right now, I am really into the corally orange-ish red color, so I got that, a lime green and a turqouise. (also a darker blue for an accent color).

I repainted them about three times until I kind of got something I liked- I still wasn’t sure about them until I put the cacti in the planters and then I thought the simple and rustic designs kind of went well with the cacti. Painting the cacti planters made me want to branch out a little. So, I bought another plant (this one requires more attention- so we will see how long it lasts 😦 )

Artist Trading Cards!

Ever since I got the “ok” to teach my art class, I have been WAITING for the session where I taught my students how to make Artist Trading Cards. And this last week, was FINALLY the time to do it! I was so impressed by the results….I loved all of them, they worked so hard on them. I was a little worried they wouldn’t take it seriously and give it %100 of their efforts but I stressed the importance of each card being like a mini-artwork….I loved how hard they worked and how unique all of them turned out….

How cute are these owls???

….I did a mini-lesson on creating “mixed media” pieces and showed them a couple of my favorites I have found via the web as well as some of my own ATCs. These are a few of mine:

I brought in tubs of different materials including: magazine pages, fabric, yarn, glitter, watercolors, pens, markers, buttons, pom-poms…

I loved that each card never failed to showcase each students’ personalities…Here are a few of the ones the boys in the class did…they mostly stuck to markers and pens:

We are looking to SWAP with another classs….if you are an art teacher and have done or are doing ATCs with your students! Email me at jsheffield@kenilworth38.org

diy recycled wall decor

This is my take on a recycled magazine pages wall decor project that I saw the other day when passing by the window display at J. Crew. These are my favorite projects to do because they are CHEAP (well, basically free!) colorful AND green! A big BANG for a little bitty price.

Here is J. Crew’s current window display that inspired me:

Of course, they have done about a MILLION, so I have a LOOONG way to go until mine looks like that…and let’s just be honest…I probably will get bored of doing these, or find something else I want to do before I get enough to make a wall decoration!

All you need are some old magazines, rip out the colorful pages and accordian fold them. I used a glue gun to insure they would stay glued and to give it some rigidness.

I would love to see any pics of any diy art projects you have done lately around your house!

The Artsy Alternative to the Wedding Guestbook.

http://www.etsy.com/listing/71379172/custom-made-hand-drawn-fingerprint-tree

I must admit, I “borrowed” this idea for my own wedding from a blog I found.It was love at first sight. As funds were tight, I had to create my own (and okay… being a bit of a control freak).

I was very pleased with how it turned out! I’ve seen fingerprint trees like mine for $200-$300, but was able to create mine at a fraction of the price.

http://www.etsy.com/listing/71379172/custom-made-hand-drawn-fingerprint-tree?ref=pr_shop

All you really need to make this project happen is a large piece of high quality parchment paper (mine was approximately 20″ x 22″), a pencil, a GOOD eraser, ball point pen of your color choice, (watercolor markers are optional if you want your names and your wedding date on the poster), and water based stamp inks that compliment your wedding colors.

Gathering all the materials is really the easy part, as you probably have most of them somewhere in your house…the more difficult part is donating the time and energy to creating a draft, tracing the drawing, outlining in ink pen and so forth…

…I was thinking this would also be a cute idea for other special events like baby showers, bridal showers, graduation parties, anniversaries, and family reunions.

It is a truly unique way to record the presence of your loved ones who are with you during your most important moments in LIFE.

If this craft project has set your heart a flutter but you lack the time to devote to creating the project (time which I had too much of as an unemployed graduate student!), I have started selling a custom, hand drawn, fingerprint tree at my etsy shop for $75.00.

http://www.etsy.com/shop/jessbobess

Almost EVERYTHING on the fingerprint tree can be PERSONALIZED and made custom for your event, including: the paper size, the colors of the ink and dye, the design of the tree, the color of the paper, names (or no names), dates, ect.

You just tell me what you want and I’ll do the rest. I won’t send it until you have seen pictures of the final product and approved of them. I don’t care how many times I have to do it,

you wont get less than perfect!

Also, just for the few of you who might actually read this blog AND be interested in purchasing the fingerprint tree, I’ve created the following coupon code:

“BLOGGERLOVE” for you. Use it and save 15% off your entire purchase.

Here is the link one last time to view the listing at my etsy shop: