For as long as I have been an artist, and before that as a paper crafter, finding my artistic “voice” has been a struggle.  Or maybe it’s not so much that finding my voice that has been a struggle, but expressing my voice – letting the “real me” out.  Fear of failure, fear of not being good enough, fear of the “silence” – i.e. you share something you create and nobody says anything – so you take that to mean they don’t like it. But then I remind myself that in art at least there is no true failure – instead it opens the door to learning, and plants the seed of opportunity. And really, art is something that is very personal.  I have to remind myself that I’m not creating for anyone else but me, and what is really important is that I like what I create.

It is through my art that I constantly remind myself of these truths. Because unfortunately, no matter how many times I tell myself, doubt always creeps in – so I use my art as a constant reminder for me – to move forward and to stop looking over my shoulder, to stop second guessing myself, to stop worrying, and just be.  Allow myself to just be an artist, & to have fun with my art.

The page you see here is one created about a year ago, around the same time as my “In Search of Balance” page – and it was the result of some of my “play time”.  I had purchased a Visual Journal from Strathmore with watercolor paper inside and was playing around using my dye ink refills as watercolors. Before I layered on my colours I stamped along the sides with a Stampin’ Up! Baroque Motifs Flourish stamp in VersaMark ink and clear embossed it, so that when I layered on my colours, it created a resist effect. I combined Stampin’ Up!’s Pumpkin Pie , Rich Razzleberry and Melon Mambo Classic ink refills and used them to create a wash across my pages and then brushed them along the top edge to create some drippage (just like Donna Downey, I LOVE drip page LOL). 

The hearts were die cut out of a book text style patterned paper and then coloured with a wash of Pumpkin Pie ink refill to give them color.  I collaged them on the page and then traced around them with a combination of my Faber Castell Black Pitt Pen (an awesome journalling pen) and my Signo White gel pen.  The letters for the word art, are actually the negative of the die cut letters – I had die cut the letters out of book text for my “In Search of Balance” page, and had the negatives left.  I collaged them onto my page and colored the inside with a water-colour of Pumpkin Pie Classic ink. Most of the remaining words on my spread are cut out of magazines – I love keeping my old magazines and using them for journaling – a trick I learned from Christy Tomlinson during her She Has Three Hearts Online workshop.  Although a couple of the words I used to fill in the “Have Fun, Be Free, Be You phrase” were die cut using one of my Sizzix Decorative Strips. The sequins along the bottom of the pages I thew in for fun – I had some in my stash, loved the color and shiny they were, so I collaged them on top of some Stampin’ Up! patterned paper.

So how many of you have discovered the wonderful world of art journaling and mixed media?  Please share as I’m contemplating putting some tutorials relating to that here on the blog, but would love to get a sense of interest level. I know many of you who are my readers and followers started off reading my blog when I was with Stampin’ Up!, and have followed my evolution since then.

Anyways, here’s a few more close-ups of my pages:

Oh wow!  Has it really been almost 2 months since I last posted?  It’s funny because I actually think about this blog and think about all that I want to post on this blog almost every day – it just seems that by the time my “work day” has passed, I’ve spent so much time on all the other aspects of running my online business that I end up putting it off “until tomorrow”.  The next thing you know almost two months of “tomorrows” have passed.

That’s why I thought that today I would share with you an art journal page that I created almost a year ago – one of my earlier pages when I first began my art journaling journey.  As you can see, even then I was searching for balance.  How do you balance passion and practicality?  

Whereas once I used to dream of my cards and scrapbooks, my class planners and card kits, now it’s my art I dream about – my paints, my inks, my sprays, my ephemera, my canvases, my art journals.  When I think of my stash, instead of thinking about what kind of card I want to make, I think about how I can use it in my art. It’s like I’m watching an evolution in the works – my evolution from a paper crafter to an artist.  Don’t get me wrong, I still love my paper crafting, and I still love all that I’m doing with Paper Crafter’s Library, but at the same time, I’m starting to feel frustrated.

Every day I dream about getting my hands messy with my paints and inks and spending time in my art journal, but I tell myself that before I can do that, I first I have to take care of all the myriad of things that are involved in running my online business. Next thing I know, it’s 5 pm, time to close my door on “work” and transition into my “wife”, “mother” and “homemaker” roles.  But because there is always more work to do than time in a day, the cycle begins again the next day.  First I have to finish my work, then I’ll have time to play.  The problem is, that more often than not, there ends up being no time to play.

I wish I could tell you that I’ve found the perfect answer – unfortunately I haven’t.  I have found an answer though, and it’s the same answer I employ in my personal life (why I didn’t think of applying it to my art earlier, heaven’s knows) – and the answer is that the only way I’m going to have time is to make time. To make the choice to make time for my art. So my plan is that every day (Monday to Friday) I’m going to “finish” work 30 min early and spend the last 30 minutes of my day with my art.  

So what about you?  Do you struggle with balancing passion and practicality?  What’s your passion and how do you find time for it?  I’d love to hear what you all do.

BTW  one of you had a question on how I managed to keep the rings of my book so pristine. The answer is I didn’t LOL. By the time I finished my art journal they were so gobbed up with paint, that I couldn’t turn the pages of my art journal properly.  Not to mention the fact that I love adding dimensional items to my work, so the book didn’t sit flat either.  My solution was to re-bind my book using my Zutter Bind-it-all using the Zutter O-Rings.

The art journal page itself was created using all Stampin’ Up! products (other than the words which came from a recycled magazine page).