Playing With Watercolors

You all know how much I enjoy watercolors... well, recently I made my own using dry pigments, water and gum arabic. I like the richness of color you get from watercolors that you make yourself.The tube colors don't hold as much pigment, so they're generally more transparent. You just need to be careful not to inhale any of the dry powders as you work them into pastes.

Creating the colors

After I made the colors, I wanted to try some color studies with this limited palette.You can see that by mixing, I got a wide enough range of colors... but I couldn't create a real bright green without a bright yellow. All I had was the ochre. (Cadmium Yellow is REALLY expensive to purchase as a dry pigment.)

All my greens were sort of khaki, and my yellows were dark, but the variations I got when colors were overlaid were quite nice. I made lots of dots, letting some dry and leaving some wet as I overlaid other dots, just to see how the colors reacted and changed. It was fun!

I also played with lines, using the same color palette I had created. I found new colors while I was doing this study. Corals and pale pinks came out, though I have no idea from where! Well, that's not exactly true, but it was nice to see them unmuddled by other colors on my palette. 


Here's the final products from my three pieces created for this study...

I had a really fun afternoon/evening making dots and lines out of colors. I essentially had five original colors that I created from dry pigments: Cadmium Red Medium, Ultramarine Blue, English Red Dark, Yellow Ochre, and Genuine Green Earth. Pretty crazy, huh? I encourage playing with colors, especially if mixing isn't your thing. You learn a lot from playing with things! That's how we start out as kids, after all... learning from playing! It's the best way!


xox

Putting Together a Travel Journal Kit

My kit, journal & some of the things inside my kit.

Whenever I go on a road trip, even if it's just for the day to somewhere interesting... like a beach, or a hiking trip, or to a public or private garden, maybe, I like to bring along my travel journal, and my journaling kit.


I've put together a list here for you, in case you should want to be prepared on your next trip to somewhere interesting! You'll be ready to create some lovely journal pages to go along with your memories...

• You'll need a container of some sort to hold everything. Make sure it's sturdy and won't accidentally open up on its own.
• A journal, some loose sheets of watercolor or sketch paper, maybe some thinner papers for rubbings, or some sun print paper
• A ruler, alphabet stencils, paint brushes, scissors, pencil sharpener, erasers
• pens, pencils (I like watercolor pencils, as they do double duty), watercolors, cake temperas in some basic colors, a bottle of ink, small closable plastic container for rinse water
• A watercolor pen (you fill them with water, and it has a brush on the end) can take the place of a brush and bottle of water
• Small glue stick, a bottle of PVA glue, craft tapes
• Stamps, stamp pad
• Paper towels & wet wipes

Some optional items that I like to keep, but depends on how much room you have:

• Wood carving tools and extra corks for stamp making
• Linen thread, an awl, or paper punch
• Binder clips and paper clips, brads
• Some glassine envelopes for stashing found bits into your journal

Obviously, what you decide to put into your kit will depend on the media that you like working with. I like to have a lot of options, as I never know what I'll feel like using when I'm out and about. It's nice to have a smaller kit for traveling abroad, and a larger kit for road trips. Maybe tomorrow I'll show you a few pages out of one of my travel journals. I start a new book for larger trips, like when I was in Europe for three weeks last year. Then I added to that when I went to Mexico and then my road trip across the states, and lastly, my trip to Hawaii in December. So one travel journal held about a year's worth of travel. You could do a few loose pages for each trip and then bind them together, if you liked. There are lots of ways to chronicle a journey... it's all up to you! 

Colored Tapes

I have always loved using these tapes in my travel journals, and also for putting up inspiration pictures on my board. I realized today that I haven't shared them with anyone, really. The big rolls I got at a Japanese dollar store in Fremont, CA. The smaller rolls my sister got me from Japan-town in Los Angeles, CA.

Aren't they cool?

The Joy of Art Supplies

Irish waxed linen threads

One of the staples of book-making is waxed thread, for stitching books together. I probably have more than I'll ever use, but I really enjoy having the availability of almost any color I could want, for my artistic expression. Choice is an important thing. So, like Brandi and Vicki's gem stones, and Terri's fabric, I have my binding threads, leathers and papers. It's wonderful and fun being an artist!