going retro

RetroArtJournaling promo2

Anyone that has been in my studio or my classes, knows that I have been practicing art journaling for several years now.  It has gotten me through times when I just didn’t have any fresh new paintings in me.  Since I was in elementary school, I have loved collage.  I used to make calendars for my mom for Christmas, creating a different theme for each month and hand-drawing the calendar (this was way before Microsoft Word.  No PCs in my house).    I loved collecting images and then putting them together thematically, and the cutting and pasting is still as thrilling to me as it was in my childhood.

I have a growing collection of vintage magazines, including McCall’s, Good Housekeeping Life, Newsweek and National Geographic.  I am interested in the stories as well as the advertising.  I honestly don’t know how women made it in the 40’s – 70’s  (although many of those same ideals and expectations are still around for us today).  But I find the glamour mesmerizing, as well as the rationale that the softness of your hands after washing dishes will positively affect your husband’s desire for you.

In my new Retro Art Journaling class, I’m sharing my vintage magazines with you as we create some fun journals.  The base of these journals will be booklet cookbooks, so many of your backgrounds will already be in place.  We’ll use collage, paint, markers, gel pens and more to create one-of-a-kind art books. I personally have created a couple of these retro-themed books and have loved it.  I know you will, too.

Find out more about this new class by clicking HERE.

thinky things

Thinky Things

For a while now, I’ve been feeling the need to write. I used to love journaling. I’ve got volumes of poems, prose, stories of my life from when I was a teenager (Oh, the drama!). I used my journal — a very large three-ring binder — to let out my frustrations, my longings, my ideas, my passions, and all the things that I knew no one else would understand. These writings began as an assignment from my favorite English teacher. Most of my classmates would moan in disdain each time she announced a new set of writing tasks and due dates. But I relished every moment of it, and couldn’t wait to live life so I would have something to write about.

And so here I am, twenty years later. Haven’t “had” the time to slow down and write much. It has seemed like a luxury that I can’t afford. House. Kids. Job. Husband. Volunteering. Just too much to do. And then there’s this art thing. You know, I could be painting right now.

But I’m at the point right now that I don’t think I can afford not to write. As my youngest daughter, Sophie, said a while back, “I’ve got all these thinky-things floating around in my head.” As she said this, she moved her hands in a swirling motion on either side of her head. My husband and I laughed and he said, “Yes, I’m sure you do!”

I totally get that! She put into words how I feel about 95% of the time. These Thinky Things are so noisy that they pretty much drown out everything else, and keep me from being focused on anything. Even this morning as we were driving, we passed the art center where I’m having a show this month, and a million “to do’s” popped up into my head like spam in a trash folder. My husband, who knows me so well, heard my sigh, and said, “I can see the wheels turning. Are you thinking about all the things you need to do?”

Yep. And starting a blog was very high on my priority list. (check!) Sure, I think it’s a good way to communicate with my friends and “fans.” But more than anything, it’s going to be a way for me to put all of those Thinky Things in their place!

Julia Cameron would be so proud.