Getting Started

There are many different processes of how one starts their journal.  I searched online and found a few. I’ve never been one who wanted to reinvent the wheel when there’s perfectly great information out there. My personal favorite instructional is Teesha Moore’s, How I Journal. She lists 4 different layers that she works on to acheive her pages. I’m going to follow her concept but personalize it for me and my availability.

First layer. Now I don’t want my pages to be extremely thick with paint, so I’m going to water down my acrylics to give a similar watercolor wash. Teesha’s technique, she uses watercolor.

I don’t have much time to spend a whole day working on my pages, so I’m going to paint up to 5 pages. You would think this easy to do. But, in the last group I was in, they suggested to do the same. And I just couldn’t. In my mind I wanted to have all the elements in my page ready. I wanted to complete a page or two even if it didn’t include journaling I wanted the page as complete as it could be. But, again my time is limited so I need to break out of this inhibiting need. I was looking at the Color Combo Galore challenge and I like the last challenge of colors they had. I’m going to use #110 challenge.  The colors are: soft teal, mandarine orange, vanilla pudding and sundance. 

A little bit about Color Combo Galore Challenge. I think it’s a great challenge blog/group. I love that they give you a color scheme. I think it helps you step out of your boundaries and lets you create with colors you might not necessarily use all the time.

As for the journal. If you want to join me, take sometime to paint on 5 pages. Don’t think about images, or what you want the page to eventually turn into. Let this be the start of the creative flow and just put colors on the page.  What colors to use? Pick a few colors maybe 1 -4 colors and just start painting. You can use one color for one page,  you can combine 2, you can combine 3, or use all 4.  Take a look at the archived Color Combo Challenges to get inspiration. Look at a favorite scrapbook page you like and pull the main colors from there. Maybe a favorite photograph and pull the colors from there. But, find yourself some colors and start painting.