L&C Get Messy: An Art Journal Challenge
Welcome to the wonderful world of art journaling. Where anything goes and messes are encouraged. Its like elementary school art for grown ups. I seriously don't think anything could be better!So, the ever sweet and talented Caylee and I were chatting about how we are ecourse junkies and we both really wanted to spend more time being intentional with art journaling. Thus was born L&C Get Messy: An Art Journal challenge! We are working through the A Beautiful Mess Art Journal eCourses. These first 2 challenges came from the first course (that is retired now).Art journaling is such an interesting concept. It literally has no rules. But this can be intimidating. I have had a box of random ephemera I have been saving for YEARS, just waiting to be placed in a book. Through my destash I got rid of most of my stuff, which is good and bad. I only have the really meaningful and fun pieces left but got rid of some stuff that would have made great accents. Oh well, there will always be random bits of pretty trash floating around for me to recycle. All this to say, I was very keen to actually sit down and put my precious stash to good use by going through the challenges. I love the outcome. And even more, I love the stark differences in Caylee and I's take on each prompt.
First, I'm using an old recipe binder to hold my pages. I wanted the flexibility to add pages in as I went and work on them without being attached to another. My pages are roughly 9x7 in. I may recover the book, but for now I really love the vintage Italian look and it makes my journal look more conspicuous for people passing by and wont get picked up as often as it may have more personal thoughts than just a normal scrapbook would.
This is my intro page. I have an embarrassing amount of paint chip strips, so I created my entire page out of them! I simply stapled them to a piece of cardstock and trimmed the edges. I added my title, a favorite photo that I had in my pile of leftovers, an old blackout poem I made (and loved so I hoarded it) and my handwritten journaling explaining my plans for the book. I really want it to be a place where I can try new techniques and not be afraid of messing up or it not meshing with my traditional scrapbooks. I also have a pile of saved bits and pieces that didn't make the cut for my project life or I had duplicates of that I just couldn't part with and maybe want to write a bit more personal thoughts, This is where I want to put these pieces to good use.
The next challenge was all about layering. One of the words she uses to describe your thought process is 'weaving'. I took this literally. Remember in elementary school when you had to weave paper?! Well I did it again! I actually did 2 of them but didn't like how the first one turned out. This was time-consuming, but totally worth the redo. I love the mix of patterns and the pops of yellow. Oh and notice...another paint strip. There is something so uniform yet creative about writing on paintstrips. The perfect lines + the great color just tickles my creative soul. I wrote about all the thoughts that are taking up too much space in my head these days. For the photo I photocopied a random photo on plain copy paper to use.
Fun tip: The more times you make a copy of a copy of a copy, etc the more washed out and 'scratchy' a photo will look, giving it a more vintage vibe. Very cool. 
Are you new to art journaling? Do you have any great courses that you bought and haven't even touched yet? Well get to it! Join us on a challenge to get messy and create without rules. Share a link to your posts in the comments, Id love to see your take on these challenges or any pages you've made for inspiration! And make sure to check out Caylee's take on these same challenges!Make sure you sign up to follow along via email, reader or Bloglovin for more prompts and challenges!