Journals!

  

  I have a journal problem.  I have a difficult time resisting the purchase of a new journal.  I can

  rationalize the purchase by coming up with a new reason as to why I need a separate journal.

 

  "I know I have a creative idea journal but I think I would be more effective if I also had a 

  separate journal for photography!"

 

  "I bet I'd do better with losing weight if I had bright and colorful new journal to track food!"

 

  "Oooh pretty..."

 

  "This one is on sale.  It's a sign!" 

  

 My nook.  During my free time, I sit in a recliner in my husband's office and do whatever it is I want to do

 - write, crochet, play on the Internet, read, jot down ideas, edit photos, etc.  This is what it may look like at any given moment.  Notice 3 journals in this one shot.

A stack of colorful journals - all with a different purpose.  And yet, I dream of additional journals.  Maybe a moleskine, maybe something in a fabric, maybe a plain green journal...

One of my more lasting journal ideas.  A Gratitude or Thankful Journal.  I have actually stuck with this idea which is amazing considering my lifelong stack of journals that are maybe a quarter of the way full of something or other.

 

Almost every morning, I sip my coffee and I open up my Thankful Journal to jot down things I am thankful for at that moment.  I try to do 10 per day but sometimes it's less.  There are definitely recurring entries on any given day.  Some days there are a mix of silly with more sincere.  Every day that I do it though, I feel good starting my day.  It centers me and helps me to focus on the good.

  

Inside yet another journal...this one is more of a Misc.  I jot down quotes from different books I'm reading, jot down things I want to read, or ideas I want to remember.  Sometimes I write a more traditional journal entry in it but I'm bad about doing that consistently.  It's a catch all of journals.

 

My more "in use" journals currently.  I keep a small journal to jot down ideas for blogging or a craft show I plan to do.  My Gratitude/Thankful Journal, Misc, and the Buddy Book.  The Buddy Book is something my best friend and I have had going since 2004.  It deserves its own blog post so stay tuned for more on that.  It's a really fun way to stay connected and document our friendship.

I've always wanted to be the kind of person who journals my life and have volumes of journals documenting my entire existence.  Over the years, I've made the decision that I will journal every day NO MATTER WHAT.  I think the longest I've gone with that is maybe a week or two.  I realize that my daily thoughts and events are quite boring to read.  Now I try to document my life more with photos and I figure historians one day can piece together hundreds of journals with quotes, weird things, ideas that didn't pan out, and will come to this conclusion..."Who is this girl and why the heck are we wasting our time reading this stuff?"

So that's my journal addiction.  I may have more floating around here and now I have an urge to go shopping to find more.  Fortunately today I am without a car so I guess the journals I already own will have to do.

  

Written

A couple of months ago, I read the book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller.  At its core, it is about the story we are each currently living and the story we actually want to live.  I found it to be so inspirational and read it very quickly.  As I read, I would jot down quotes that impacted me.  There was one that stood out to me the most and I found myself reading it over and over. 

I decided I wanted to remember that quote and be inspired by it every day.  I knew I wanted to frame it but didn't want to just print it, paint it, write it, etc.  I loved the idea of some kind of fiber version of it on my wall so I tried my hand at embroidery.  Now, I have been playing with embroidery for just a few months and make up the stitches on my own.  Below is my version of this quote:

"I feel written, my skin feels written, and my desires feel written."



I started out by writing the quote in my own handwriting (no frills) on muslin and stretching onto an embroidery hoop.



Then I stitched the words in black thread and used some white thread to highlight a bit.



I embellished around the words in a circle.  Then I cut out the circle and stitched onto a piece of cream colored felt.



I kept with the circles around and around.  I wanted to add color but wanted the words to stand out on their own so avoided going overboard.



Ta-da!  The finished piece framed on my wall above one of my other photos.  Simple, imperfect but the words stand out. 

What books and quotes inspire you?

Folky Fiber Book

My mom is a quilter.  A few months ago, she came to visit and we had lunch and visited a local fabric shop.  I've always been drawn to colorful and patterned paper, beads, markers, felt, yarn, and anything else that is colorful.  Only recently have I caught the colorful fabric bug as well.  The problem is that I don't really sew and I don't quilt.  I don't have a clue how to use a sewing machine.  Regardless, I've gradually started incorporating fabric into different projects. 

This particular fabric shop was like a candy store - colors, patterns, textures - it was intoxicating.  My mom insisted on buying me some fabric (and who am I to refuse).  I brought it home and then it sat here for a bit because I wasn't sure what to do with it.  I tend to do that sometimes.  I am mostly self taught in many different arts and crafts.  I am always wanting to learn something else.  I am often envious of people who have just one passion and excel at that one thing.  Lately though, I started thinking about the different mediums and things I know how to do.  What if I started to find ways to pull it all together?  Photography, writing, crochet, embroidery, chainmaille, jewelry, recycled materials, etc.  That is what set the idea of this blog in motion.  Maybe my passion is to combine art forms into one that suits me.

As that idea came together, I started this project as a gift for my mom.  She was my inspiration.  I wanted it to be colorful, full of texture, use mediums that I know she likes, and full of positive words.



I started by crocheting the front and back cover for the book.

I then worked on each page of the book.  I'm new to embroidery and I kind of make it up as I go along.  I worked a word into each page, embroidered on fabric, and then sewed the pages onto 4x4 pieces of felt or crocheted 4x4 granny squares.

The pages started to stack up as I went.  I worked on this over the course of a couple of months.  I wasn't always consistent with how often I worked but I tend to work that way.  I would prefer to finish a project I love as it comes to me, rather than force myself to finish sooner and then not be crazy about it.

Music always helps the process flow.  I was digging Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros quite a bit during this project. 

More pages...one is a textured felt background and the other is a granny square of the same size in white acrylic yarn.

Putting it all together was the tricky part for me.  I started out by binding the pages to a sturdy piece of felt.  I figured this would be a good way to bind the pages and make sure they are secured and can still be turned easily.

Once they were bound to the brown felt, I crocheted the spine and sewed the felt with the pages to the spine.

The bound pages from the inside of the book.

The spine attached to my cover.  It must be my folk roots but I love a rustic feel to my projects.  I left the edges of the fabric on my pages frayed and I crocheted the edges of the spine to have a frayed look too.

The front cover and the finished product.

My mom loved it and I was really pleased to see my idea come to fruition.  I'm excited to try some other ideas for mixed media fiber books.  I'm thinking about incorporating some different chainmaille techniques for a more industrial look and maybe trying to incorporate fiber and paper collage art.

First blog post complete!  I have more projects, ideas, and snippets of things I'm working on in store.  Please feel free to share my blog with others.  Thanks for reading!