Art Journal in Person

I did my very first in-person art journal class for adults last night — I was nervous! Sure, I’ve been doing online art journal classes for over a year now, but I can (and do!) edit my videos before I share them with the world. Plus, I’d only done art journal classes for teens and I didn’t want my information to be too basic — I figured the adults were paying for the class, so I wanted them to feel like the class had value. (Not that the teen classes don’t have value — it’s just that the teens aren’t the ones who pay me for those!) It was also my first class with that location, so I wanted to do a good job so that they would ask me back in the future.

For my teen classes, the program is pretty freeform — we spend the first half of the class working at the “wet” table — using spray paint, watercolor paint, stencils, watercolor crayons, etc, to create pretty backgrounds. Then we spend 5 minutes or so blasting the pages with the heat guns and move over to the “dry” table — where I have collage materials, glue sticks, and markers/pens spread all over. I’ve found that middle school kids need little to no prodding to come up with ideas — as soon as I show them a few pages of “frankenpeople” their minds start whirling with ideas that never cease to amaze me.

I thought adults might need (and want) a little more guidance.  Plus, adults tend to be way less messy than kids, so I figured I could up the quality of the available supplies without worrying about things getting ruined. And I wanted the pages we created to reflect my style now — frankenpeople are perfect for kids, but I haven’t made a frankenperson page for ages.

So instead, I came up with a basic “formula” for an art journal page, bearing in mind that in art journaling, all rules are made to be broken.  I figured I’d share that formula with you here:

Step One: Get rid of the white page — Nothing holds people back like the fear of the white page, so we get rid of it immediately by gluing down scraps of vintage book paper and tissue paper.

Step Two: Add color — we used cheap-o craft paints and Liquitex acrylic paints (love that company!) to add splashes of color over the page. We also use some of my favorite Crafter’s Workshop stencils to add more pops of color.

Step Three: Add collage — we cut out words and images from magazines to glue down on the page.

Step Four: Doodle and write — I had a variety of markers and pens around on the table so that everyone could experiment with some different supplies. Most people had reached the doodling stage on their first spread by the end of the class.

It was AWESOME seeing the work that everyone created — just like in teen classes, everyone has their own style and ideas from the get-go — it’s so fun as a teacher watching the ideas evolve throughout the class; that’s something I don’t get to see with online classes. Plus, I got to talk about art — which is by far my favorite conversation topic. I know I had a blast and it sure seemed like my students did, too. I can’t wait for my next class!

[Do you live locally to Providence, Rhode Island? I’d LOVE to host an art journaling class at your location. Feel free to email me to learn more!

Free Digital Download: 100 Year Old Postcard

Over at Crafty Moira, I have a free digital download of this image:

The date on the hand-written part of the postcard is May 15, 1912! Exactly 100 years ago today! Wow!

You’ll get a full resolution PDF of the full postcard, front and back. Visit Crafty Moira to sign up for my new mailing list and get your free download.

30 Days of Me Giveaway + 2 Winners

Hello all! Long time, no post here on the Weekly Art Date blog! Don’t worry, I have posts in the work, just way behind schedule.  As you might have seen, I have a new class coming soon: 30 Days of Me.

30 Days of Me was originally supposed to start on May 15th, but this morning I made the decision to bump the start date back to June 15th — All of the content is filmed, I have the prompts planned out, and all of the content will be available on day one. I still need to get the video edited and the PDFs formatted, but I don’t want to rush the process, which is why I’m giving myself the extra month to get it done! This is a little different from how I’ve done other classes where I’m filming new content week by week. I wanted all of the content to be finished so that students could work as fast or as slow as they like through the course materials. I also want people to be able to jump around to do whatever assignment inspires them at any given moment!

I’m SUPER excited about this class, because I think the pages and videos I’ve created for the class are some of my best and I can’t wait to see other people’s takes on the projects! It’s certainly been a learning experience creating all of the content up-front, instead of my usual flying-by-the-seat-of-my-pants experimental style, but I can tell that this is most likely how I’ll be offering classes in the future.

As you probably know, members of the Weekly Art Date class at artjournaling.ning.com have access to all of the great weekly content that Weekly Art Date (the class) has to offer. I post some of the free content here on the blog, but the good stuff is all inside the classroom. (It’s not too late to sign up!) One of the perks of being a member of the class is access to giveaways of art journal supplies, one-of-a-kind art creations by me, and, as with the current giveaway, spots in other classes that I offer.

For our current giveaway, we have two winners (drum roll please):

Congratulations to Phyllis & Teddi, who have both won spots in 30 Days of Me!

Feeling sad that you didn’t win? Don’t worry! I’ve decided to giveaway a spot here on the blog!  This contest will run until June 4th, so you have lots of time to get lots of entries!

So how do you enter to win your own spot in 30 Days of Me?

For 1 entry, leave a comment here on the blog telling me why you’d like to win.

For 1 extra entry, like Weekly Art Date on Facebook.*

For 1 extra entry, share this giveaway with your Facebook friends.*

For 2 extra entries, blog about this giveaway.*

For 3 extra entries, tweet about this giveaway with the tag #artdate somewhere in your message.*

So you could conceivably get 8 entries in this giveaway! * To get your extra entries, just leave an extra comment (or 7 letting me know which extra entries you won. If you already like Weekly Art Date on facebook, just let me know!)

You do NOT have to be a current member of any of my classes or of the artjournaling.ning.com network in order to win. (Though you should check out the artjournaling site for loads of awesome free and paid art journaling content!). Please feel free to share this giveaway with anyone and everyone!

This giveaway is open to anyone in the world!

If you win and decide you can’t take the class, you are welcome to gift your spot to a friend or family member.

Good luck!

[P.S. I have a free class coming this summer: Tiny Travels — transform an empty mint tin into a tiny art journal travel kit w/ a pint-sized journal to match.[

New Class: 30 Days of Me

Coming May 15th —

30 Days of Me

Have you ever made a self-portrait? I know, I know, scary thought, that. I felt the same way when I challenged myself to make 30 self-portraits in 30 days! And I didn’t actually meet the goal: I made 15 portraits instead; 15 very cool self-portraits that I’d love to share with you. Plus, I came up with 15 journaling prompts to encourage you to get to know yourself better and put more of you into your journal pages. And that’s not all! I also have an easy DIY journal tutorial to share with you so that you can keep all of your lovely self-portraits in one place.

When you sign up for 30 Days of Me, you’ll get:

15 High-Definition Journaling Videos — these show the making of each self-portrait from start to finish.

15 PDF Supply Lists – these include suggested replacement supplies plus tips and tricks for each portrait.

15 Journal Writing Prompts – these are designed to help you get to know yourself better and to put more of YOU into each journal page.

PLUS: An easy DIY journal tutorial

Click here to sign up.