Artful Grid Lines

I took a little hiatus from working on Joanne Sharpe's Letter Love eCourse, but have jumped back into it to make sure that I don't lose my momentum.  I enjoy every lesson I do, and I walk away with projects each time that I'm pleased with.  I think that's a great testament to the quality of Joanne's instruction and assignments!

In one lesson, she has us creating artful, or "groovy," grid lines to use as a backdrop for our lettering.  She encourages using all different media, especially watercolor paints.  I kept it easy and tidy, and stuck with my markers for creating my lines.  In the future, I will try paints, but I was really pleased with my results using markers alone.

I created thick lines across the page with two different colors of markers, and then added additional lines with a thin black pen.  The black pen lines were the guides for my letters.  I used a Marc Chagall quotation:  "If I create from the heart, nearly everything works; if from the head, almost nothing."

Before I filled in the open spaces of my letters with blue, I took some pictures of the page, because I was afraid the blue might ruin it!

Do you like it better with or without the letter spaces filled in with blue?

Here are a few more close ups:

For my second page, I chose different colors and a different quotation.  Here it is without the open spaces of the letters filled in:

I used the e.e.cummings quotation:  "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are."  Love that!  And here is the final product, as well as a close-up:

Finally, I did a third page, with a different color scheme:

This is a Ralph Waldo Emerson quotation:  "Do not go where the path may lead.  Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail."  When I went to my mailbox this afternoon, I found another postcard from Shannon's swap, and it had this very same quotation on it!  (I will feature the postcard in a future post!)

These projects were great fun, and I am generally pleased with how the pages turned out.  One thing I love about Joanne's writing is the freedom and spontaneity of her letters.  My lettering still looks very labored and forced.  I think that is fairly obviously because I am so new to it, and with additional practice, it will look more natural.  It's always good to have goals, right?

At first, I was really loving the portability of this class, because all I needed with me was my notebook and my little zipper case of pens.  But as my pen collection expanded during the course, and as I decided to keep all of my old pens together with my new purchases, things have gotten a little bulkier:

But, oh, it is delicious to keep all those colorful pens and markers together in one place!

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I got some very fun news via email the other day!  I entered a giveaway on Regina's web site, Creative Kismet.  She was offering a spot in a new online course running in April called the ART*FULL Sketchbook with Dana Barbieri, and I WON IT!  Now, I probably need a new online course like a need a hole in my head, but I just cannot resist the opportunity to learn new techniques, receive new inspiration, and meet new online friends with similar interests to mine, so I'm very excited to be a part of this class!  If you would like to learn more about it, check it out here!