Lettering Apprenticeship

People across the Blogosphere are devouring resources related to improving their handwriting and lettering in order to spruce up their art journal pages, planners, and personal correspondence.

As evidenced by over 200 pins on my "Lettering, Handwriting" board on Pinterest, I am one of those people in search of the perfect handwriting that has eluded me since kindergarten!

Recently, I sat down with a whole screen filled with Stephanie Ackerman's doodles, lettering, and artwork, and put myself into the position of apprentice: studying her style, copying her work, looking to internalize her approach.

My effort, emulating Stephanie's artwork; I included only the first part of the verse.

I love Stephanie's quirky, playful, casual style that incorporates cursive and print, capitals and lower case, colors and black & white.  Her work looks so spontaneous, but those arrangements of words and doodles must be well-planned.

I made slight changes to Stephanie's version, mainly because of the size of my sketchbook page.

I also love how Stephanie works with Bible verses, favorite quotations, and inspiring phrases in her artwork.  There are so many possibilities for creating encouraging artwork based on my own favorites!

I made three different drawings in my sketchbook, and then reduced them by 50% on the copier.  (Once I accidentally reduced the 50% drawings by 50%, and got tiny little artworks from them!)  I cut and pasted them onto one page, and then printed it out on sticker paper.

Next, I cut each of the little stickers for use in my planner.

A couple of them made their way into this week's planner spread:

I added some red marker for "pop" on this one.

This was one of the tiny ones, and got some decorative tape and doodling in order to stand out.

At first, I was embarrassed when my 7-year-old asked me, "Mom, why are you just copying from her work?" But I think that copying can be a valid step in the process of developing my artistic style.  Just like the apprentices of the Renaissance era would copy the masters and even add to their works, I see this stage of copying as one step towards developing content, style, and and approach of my own.

In an article I found entitled, "The Making of an Artist," the author writes of Renaissance apprentices:

"Pupils...then learned to draw, first by copying drawings made by their masters or other artists.  Drawing collections served not only as training aids for students but also as references for motifs that could be employed in new works...Young artists also learned from copying celebrated works that could be seen in their own cities--Michelangelo, for example, copied paintings by Giotto in Florence's church of Santa Croce--and they were encouraged to travel if they could, to Rome especially, to continue their visual education."

What do you think?  Shameless copying, or valid step in the learning process?

If Michelangelo himself employed this method for learning, I'm going to take my chances!

This and That: Tape, Paper, Planners....and Jodi Ohl!

In spite of the promises of snow and my lingering cough wreaking havoc on my plans, I've got lots of little things to share!

First, I am the proud new owner of a set of the bright and beautiful washi tape designed by Aimee of Artsyville.  She has decided to "retire" her washi tape project, and offered a "buy one set, get one set" from her Etsy shop, and my awesome Mom gifted me with my very own set of six.  You are likely to see lots of Artsyville washi on my planner and art journaling pages in the coming months!

Aimee is always generous with her hand-lettered goodies, and included this insert with lots of ideas for using her washi tape.  At the rate my collection is growing, I better be getting some of these projects underway!  I have accumulated a LOT more rolls since I showed you my wooden schoolhouse storage solution.

My mother and I are taking full advantage of living close to one another for the first time in almost twenty years.  We both love art-making and paper, paper, paper, so art and crafts stores are dangerous for us!  But now, when we buy a pack of paper, for example, we split it with one another so we can enjoy even more variety.  My mom picked an autumn-themed collection, and I added the papers above to my stash.  My collection was called Mango Frost...gorgeous!

We used our new paper to work on a project I've been wanting to try since Cloth Paper Scissors published the article, "Folder Journal:  Making Art From Office Supplies," in one of their 2011 issues.

I think I want to add some additional papers to mine--maybe some text pages and vintage images--but for now, here is the booklet I crafted from a common office file folder:

Front

First inside spread

Second inside spread

Back

I am such a HUGE fan of stitched paper, and I love that this project had me stitching front and back sides with no concern for the backsides of the stitching showing.  By using the Mango Frost paper selection, I had guaranteed color cohesiveness...so much easier than digging through my paper collection hoping my colors and patterns don't clash!

Finally, I've been continuing my efforts to perk up my planner pages to add some fun to the mundane task of keeping my time organized.  Remember the empty little planner spread awaiting the beginning of a new week?

Well, this is one example of how the embellishing happens over the course of a week:

The stickers, the tape, the clip art, the quotations, the comments about my day, the sticky notes--they all make it that much more interesting to keep track of my days.

A great simple quotation from MLK, Jr.



As this week draws to a close, here's the spread that has been growing over the past five days:

Since I don't maintain a daily art journal, this is a simple fun way to infuse a little color and creativity into my life when I don't have time for a full-fledged project.

Finally, I wanted to share a link to a post by Jodi Ohl.  Via her eNewsletter, Jodi asked her readers to submit "burning questions" about art-making and the artist's life.  She wrote a post responding to the question I shared with her, and I would love for you to check it out.  Here is what I wrote to her:

Hi Jodi!  I met you at the CREATE Mixed-Media Art Retreat in 2013, and I have a piece of your artwork hanging happily in my art room!  My burning question has to do with balancing artwork created for business versus artwork created for personal pleasure.  Once you become a professional artist, do you still have opportunities to create art simply for personal pleasure, or does it pretty much always have to serve some purpose--for a show, as a demonstration, as a commission, etc.?  And how is your process affected?  Is your process different when you are creating a piece for a specific purpose, versus just messing around, having a fun, trying out a technique, etc.?

You can read her response to me here.  If you have a question for Jodi, she is still accepting "burning questions" to respond to!



Pumped Up Planner Pages

I have always been a paper-planner girl.  Ever since my days of carrying an assignment book around in my high school backpack, I have put pen to paper to create lists, schedules, and reminders to keep life running as smoothly as possible.  I love my iPhone for making calls, taking photos, and updating Facebook, but I'll just never be an Evernote girl!

Until I read The Artistic Mother by Shona Cole, it never occurred to me to beautify my planner pages or make them anything other than plain and utilitarian.  In one of her projects, Shona guides us through the process of creating beautiful backgrounds and art action plans in the form of lists or calendars, using stamps, oil pastels, punches, and printed words to decorate the pages.

From there, I watched online as Julie Fei-Fan Balzer and Effy Wild created gorgeous daily art journal entries.  Then along came The Documented Life Project, integrating art journaling techniques with a daily planner.  I also watched as a number of the bloggers I read and follow created their own self-designed planner pages to sell in their Etsy shops. 

Finally, I began a Pinterest board called Daily/Weekly Plan Books, and pinned all sorts of fun and gorgeous planner pages in Martha Stewart binders, Filofax and Hobonichi planners, Moleskine journals, and Erin Condren Life Planners.

I made my first effort to beautify my planner pages as I was getting ready for 2014, when I added washi tape and stickers to brighten up the pages.  I didn't change the way I used the book, though, so I ended with my same old scrawl and cross outs surrounded by pretty tapes and stickers.  Not much to look at by the end of the year.

This year, after soaking in the inspiration from my pin board, I'm off to a better start.  I still need my planner to function as a workhorse...I need it for my week's menu plan, doctor's appointments, and things my girls need to take to school with them.  But I am using stickers and sticky notes to record some of these things, and using open spaces for pretty tapes, interesting quotes, and brief notes about the day.

It is still an all-utilitarian planner for me, because I can't afford to give up that functionality.  But it has color and interest that makes me smile when I look back over the pages, and enough information to serve as almost a little diary of some of my days.

See the flowing-haired woman on her stationary bike up there?  I typed "woman riding stationary bike" into Yahoo Images to get a reference picture to sketch for my spin class appointment.

The next time I went to spin class (above), I drew my water bottle resting on the handlebars!  It's kind of fun to look back over my pages and see the little sketches and other "fancies" that brighten up the pages.

When the week begins, my planner is a plain and lonely-looking space:

Sometime next week, I'll show you what this week's spread ends up looking like once it's gotten full use!

Playing Catch Up

I have a number of smaller projects that have crossed my craft table over the past month or two that I've never shared here on the blog.  Today's post is a random collection of some of those projects to show you what I've been up to.

You may recall the cereal box books I made based on a pin from my Pinterest Book and Journal Making board.  Another pin led me to make tiny little pocket notebooks using everyone's favorite shipping tags. 

The project is quick and easy, but the books are probably just a bit small to be practical for everyday use.

I did another version of the project with a final result that looks even cuter, but is unfortunately just as small and impractical!

I've never met a little notebook I didn't like, though, so I'm sure these will be put to some use!

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Original on the left, photocopy on the right

Maybe I'm imagining things, but it seems like everyone is creating their own planner pages these days.  I love the "planner craze," though, and discovered an entire subculture of Filofax keepers once I started putting together my Daily/Weekly Plan Books board on Pinterest.

Original on the left, photocopy on the right

Just for fun, I created some 8-1/2"x11" weekly planning pages that could be used in a full-size binder (and I'm in the process of creating some smaller size pages for 6"x8" binder, which is my new favorite size).

Original on the left, photocopy on the right

I used watercolor paint and oil pastels on Bristol paper to create the originals.  Then I raided my collection of letter stickers from my scrapbooking days to identify the days of the week in different styles.

A closer look

The photocopied calendar pages are bright, smooth, and colorful.  I could definitely imagine having fun with them, though I have a smaller-sized planner that I'm committed to for the rest of this year.

I could imagine making these my daily planning pages!

It could be fun to create a kind "creative planner" to make sure that I am making time through each week for creative pursuits.  These colors would certainly be inspiring and eye-opening, don't you think?!

These fiery squares would wake me up to my To Dos in the morning!

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And, finally, I've made some postcards from a stash of metallic papers I purchased awhile back from a craft store.

The snows of winter moved quickly into the cold rains of spring, so there haven't been too many bright cheerful colors to inspire me.  About the brightest I could come up with was metallic, which isn't generally a preferred look for me.

I thought the metallic papers gave a lovely haunting look to the postcards, though, especially the two I've posted here.

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So, while I've been a little MIA around the blog, I haven't deserted my art room completely! I find myself spending more time on spring cleaning, church involvement, my Living Stones group, and the same old carting of the kids to school drop-off and pick-up.  I am hoping that if the warmer temperatures and longer days of sunshine DO finally arrive, they will bring with them some additional inspiration and motivation for art-making.  It has been a truly long, long winter!

Artful Organization for the New Year

When I started spending time on Pinterest, I discovered that just as there are entire communities dedicated to art journaling, mail art, and drawing Zentangles, there is also an entire community that shares and shows off its daily and weekly planners.  I created a board entitled Daily/Weekly Plan Books, and pinned picture after picture of delicious planner pages using washi tape, stickers, sticky notes, tabs, markers, and illustrations to keep track of the owners' day-to-day lives.  I was hooked!

My weekly planner is a workhorse:  it keeps my head on straight when trying to keep track of all of the drop-off and pick-up times; play dates and meet up; parties and meetings; paperwork, phone calls, and emails; errands and shopping needs.  While I have a great book (from Martha Stewart Home Office for Avery from Staples), and used pretty scrapbooking papers to create fun monthly dividers, beyond that, my calendar pages have always been a mess.

For 2014, I decided to change all that!

One of my pins came from Jennifer at My Purpley Life.  Week by week, Jennifer shares (through both posts and videos) how she prepares her Filofax pages to make them personalized, colorful, and fun.  After watching just one of her videos, I raced to Staples to purchase 2014 calendar pages from Day Runner (which I prefer over the Martha Stewart format I've used this year, with long columns for each day), and settled into decorating my own planning binder for the new year.

Basically, I set myself up in front of evening TV with my stash of decorative tapes and a big bag of stickers, and just played around for two evenings.

I've gotten about 2/3 of the year decorated at this point.

I just know that using these pages in the new year is going to brighten up the task of planning my days!

I even have used some stickers from my sticker collection from when I was a little kid!

Does anyone remember Glurfs?  (Notice the 1981 copyright!)

Does anyone still have stickers left over from when they were a kid?  I adored my sticker collection!

I had to leave enough space to keep the planner usable, of course; it won't be worth much if I don't have room to write in my appointments, after all!  But I added enough color and whimsy to infuse more creativity into what has been a very bland and boring part of my life.

Take a look at my Daily/Weekly Plan Books board on Pinterest, and see if you don't get inspired to do some artful organization for the New Year!

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Do you receive emails from Beth Kempton of Do What You Love?  She just sent out a free, downloadable resource entitled New Year's Revolution:  A Practical Kit to Help You Make 2014 the Year You Do What You Love.   I printed out the whole 24-page packet, and am enjoying looking through the writing and goal-setting prompts, and the calendars for each month of 2014 to help us keep ourselves on track towards our goals.  Visit the Do What You Love web site, and click on the prompt at the top to download your own copy!