Eccentric Spirit

Ok, you know you’re a bit obsessed when you make a journal page about a journaling supply. But I couldn’t help myself. I got a nice juicy order from the oh-so-amazing Angoo-Mart today, and I simply couldn’t contain my excitement. If you aren’t familiar with deco tape (aka “decorative tape” or “kawaii tape” among many other names) then I suggest you start with Kelly Kilmer’s post about deco tape. You’ve probably heard me talk about deco tape before – I’ve certainly talked about Kelly before, and she is very much the source of this new infatuation. I’d been wanting to try it out for a while and when she was at Ink About It in December one of her classes was focusing specifically on deco tapes, so I jumped at the chance to try it out and play with Kelly’s massive collection of tapes. Let me tell you, I was SOLD. This stuff is enormous fun! Let me explain by quoting my own journal page: “DECO TAPE! How do I love thee? Let me count the ways! (Ok, the reasons WHY!) ~~~ You can cover a mistake. ~~~ You are oh-so-easy to use. ~~~ Your transparent qualities are marvelous for layering with. ~~~ You take paint but only kinda. Which is just even more awesome for layering! ~~~ You are oh-so-affordable, especially now that I found Angoo. I ♥ Angoo. ~~~ Just a tiny snippet can say so much, even literally! ~~~ You are sticky and awesome! wait that came out wrong…” Okay, rereading this I realize that my journal page reads like a gushy teenage love letter, only written to an inanimate object. What can I say? I’m an artist, I’m SUPPOSED to be a bit crazy. :)

In case you’re wondering, Angoo-Mart is a China-based supplier that added me as a contact on Flickr a few weeks ago when I tagged some pages with “deco tape”. Clever social media marketing, eh? Since it was actually on target, I clicked over to their page, and oh man… I lost HOURS drooling over their selection. I kid you not! Hours! After much deliberation, I settled on the 40-ish rolls I couldn’t live without. (Yes, I AM a shopaholic.) Shipping came to about as much as the cost of the items themselves, but it was still a bargain compared to what I’ve seen on Etsy, and some of my favorites were ones I’d never even seen on Etsy. With shipping it came to something like $2.25 (American) each. I’ve rarely seen that kind of price BEFORE shipping. Seriously, I don’t mean to gush so much, but I’m totally knocked out by their prices. (No, I’m not being paid to say this – though they DO have a referral system of sorts, email me at bgoutal AT gmail DOT com if you’re interested in listing me as your referrer on a purchase, and I’ll look into the details.)

All in all, I am amazed by Angoo. They win big points for finding me in the first place, for their awesome prices and shipping speed, for their staggering selection of tapes, and for the free adorable plush monkey they included in my order. :) My only complaints would be that their site is fairly difficult to navigate, and they only have the shiny “packing tape” sort of deco tapes, not the “masking tape” kind. And if I were to really quibble, the tapes were a tiny bit dusty (presumably from warehouse storage) – but they were all individually wrapped so it’s really only a TINY quibble.

Feeling blocked, grumpy, frustrated, jaded, or generally “not into it”? Me too! I can get that way pretty often, so I’ve learned some good strategies for beating it. Some are artistically-oriented, good for loosening you up and getting you creating, others have nothing to do with making art. (Well, not directly; I think most artists will agree that almost everything has something to do with creating, any little thing can spark an idea, a possibility.) Any of these unsticking tricks can be employed to get you out of your funk and moving again; and not just on your creative projects. I find they often help to lift a bad or stuck mood no matter what it is I’m trying to accomplish.

1. Doodle. Doodling is a fantastic way to “warm up” creatively, a time-honored artistic version of jogging in place. Do it over a page in progress, do it on a blank page, do it on a piece of scratch paper and recycle it when you’re done. You can even use it as a way to test a pile of pens and markers to see if they still write, or how they will write on an unfamiliar type of paper. Don’t know what to doodle? Flip through an old clothing catalog or fashion magazine; look at textures and lines, look for patterns to repeat. Try making those patterns large and then small, orderly and then organic and messy. Fill a page!
2. Do some contour drawings. Another classic, contour drawing is a great way to improve your drawing skills AND to get out of your own way. Contour drawing is essentially exactly what it sounds like, drawing just the contours (or the lines) of an object, no worrying about colors, shading, etc. If you’re unfamiliar with this exercise, YouTube has some great videos tutorials on contour drawing. (I’m especially fond of blind contour drawings, where you keep your eye on the subject and off the page while you draw – the results are very interesting and often rather hilarious!)
3. Splash on some color. Sometimes it’s just the “blank page” effect that can get you stuck. That vast expanse of white can be intimidating. Pick a color, ANY color, and start laying it down. Quickly, don’t think about it too much; use the biggest brush you have – or try a brayer, a large sponge, or just a clean rag. Just bathe that scary page in something – anything. If you decide you don’t like it, you can just paint over it again!
4. Fingerpaint. On that note, I find a really good way to relax and stop worrying about Making Art is to go back to childhood roots and just dive in – literally. Just feel the paint, let the colors go where they want and let them speak to you – let your Muse speak to the paint. I find that getting visceral and tactile with art helps to open up some great lines of inner communication. (If you usually work with artist quality paints, you may want to spend a couple bucks on cheap non-toxic temperas.)
5. Consult an expert. Having trouble getting in touch with your inner kid for some fearless creating? Learn from the masters – actual kids! Go color or paint with your kids. If you’re childless, offer to babysit for some one, or volunteer at an after school program. Watch how they just instinctively grab a crayon and GO, not worrying if purple is the “right” color for a tree. They know.
6. Empty your head. Call it automatic writing or call it a brain-dump, a great cure for a head full of too many thoughts, ideas, and emotions is to just write it all out. Grab a pen, marker, pencil – whatever – and start writing. Whatever is in your head, pour it onto the paper, stream-of-consciousness. Fill an entire page with words; big and swooping, or tight and crammed together – whatever comes naturally. If you run out of space, rotate 90 degrees and write the other way. Keep going til your head feels nice and empty! The art will then flow into your head and onto the page. You can throw away your writing (or burn or shred it as a nice healing ritual) or use it as an element in your page.
7. Artistic crosstraining. If your usual medium is watercolors, try ripping up an old magazine and making a collage. If you normally do collages, grab a pencil and do some sketching. Like sports crosstraining helps build your muscles by working them in new and different ways, trying new media can help you to grow as an artist. And when you are feeling stuck it can be a great way to build some momentum, since you’re out of your element and more likely to cut yourself slack if it doesn’t some out that well.
8. Go for a walk. Another tried and true approach, this one is another “oldie but a goodie”. If you’re getting stuck on something, get up. Walk around, stretch your legs. If the weather is good, go for a quick trip around the block for a little fresh air and sunshine. Our bodies are made to move, they crave it, and your brain will thank you. (Personally, I’m a huge fan of Leslie Sansone’s Walk At Home workout videos – not just for weightloss, as they are intended, but for a pick-me-up. She has “one mile” walks you can do in 20 minutes in front of your TV or computer.)
9. Hydrate. Along with light or moderate exercise, drinking plenty of water is critical for getting plenty of oxygen circulating throughout your body – including the brain. Maybe it’s a bit of a placebo effect, but I always feel better after a nice cold glass of water. If you find the recommended 64 oz a day tough to manage, try getting a filter system like a Brita pitcher. I’ve found that filtered, chilled water makes all the difference in my ability to get plenty of good ole H2O.
10. Blast some tunes. Get some auditory funk-breaking stimulus. Tunes to your favorites radio station, pop in your favorite CD, or pick your favorite mood-boosting tune and have iTunes create a Genius Playlist. (Don’t have iTunes? Pandora.com will do something similar and create a radio station based on songs you tell it to use.) I like to keep a specific playlist in iTunes just for this purpose. I look for empowering lyrics and upbeat tempos, but you might prefer something more melodic and soothing, depending on what mood you’re trying to create.

I hope some of these suggestions help you out, artistic blocks are so frustrating – and always come at the most inopportune times! Do you have any other ways you break out of a blocked state, awaken your muse, or get the creative juices flowing? Please leave a comment – I’d love for this to turn into a big collection of block-busting ideas! :)

…try saying THAT three times fast! :) Today I want to share with you an interesting art journaling experience I had on Saturday. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m in Kelly Kilmer’s online journal class, A Life Made by Hand. I’ve been using a lot of painted backgrounds, but have noticed a lot of folks in the group are limiting themselves more than that. When the subject came up on the discussion board Kelly pointed out “If ya’ll want to paint, stamp, -WHATEVER on the pages, PLEASE do it!!!! These are only techniques meant to GUIDE you. Nothing NOTHING is ever set in stone for an artist and for an artist’s creativity. If something tells you to smear paint on it, do it. If something says add a sticker or tape or whatever, do it!!” so I’m not fussing too much about marching (or painting) to the beat of my own drummer, but the other night I decided I wanted to give it a try, working “without wetworks,” as it were. So I set myself a guideline of only paper, stickers, tape, and pens (well, and gluestick of course!) and set to work. I had hoped to crank out tons of pages, as I set aside the whole day for this project, but found the limitation challenging enough that I only ended up doing four pages. It was surprisingly challenging, I had no idea how attached to my paints  – and to a lesser extent, my rubberstamps – I’ve become.

Today, I encourage you to set yourself a challenge, even a seemingly small one. Pick one color, and work only in shades of it. Journal only using cursive (or pint, if you usually write in cursive). Pick a magazine or catalog and make a journal page using only elements from that – including words. Raid your kids stuff and make a page using only their art supplies, nothing fancy. Have fun with it, and see how fun it can be to stretch your creativity in ways you’re unaccustomed to!

Just a quick and happy post to announce the winner of my giveaway! Using random.org, the winner is determined to be…. Barbara aka @penguintrax. Congrats, Barbara! Please contact me at b-goutal @ gmail . com (NO SPACES) with your contact info and I’ll get a Serendipity Pack out to you ASAP! (Sorry, I didn’t think through ending a giveaway the Saturday before a postal holiday, whoops!)

Click the image to view the full spread on Flickr. WARNING: Mom, Sis, and other close friends – please read this post before clicking through to the full journal page, so you’re aware of the content.

It’s been an interesting day. Last night, I only got about five or six hours of sleep, thanks to the wonders of modern technology (mainly in the form of  Twitter and Peggle on my iPhone). The day has largely flown past me in a sleep dep’ed timewarp of poking the internet and groggily eating my cereal. I did find a little time to do some art; finishing a journal spread I painted last week and added backgroundy bits to last night. It was hands-down the strangest journaling experience I’ve had to date.

You see, last night I dreamed about my father. He passed away on 11/25/09, after a couple of very unexpected weeks in the hospital. Two months later, and I am still in shock. I haven’t been able to journal about it until now, but I’ve known it was coming. Today, with shreds of my dream clinging to my psyche like cobwebs, the need to journal about it hit me like a ton of bricks. I’d read about healing through art journals before, and have certainly been doing so on subtler levels for months now, but never before have I experienced the radical and raw feeling of switching back and forth from grief-stricken tears to the joy of an “Aha Moment”. Over and over, I sobbed, wiped my tears away, added a bit more, and then knew the additions I’d made were perfect because they set me to crying again. Agonizing and joyous at the same time.

I was hesitant to even share all of this, as it is so raw and personal. But art is meant to be shared, especially when it teaches. And I wanted – no, needed – to share with the world my experience of how ART HEALS. It’s a truth many artists have found, but it’s one that finds us over and over again. In the past few weeks, I’ve been reading Elkemay’s blog with interest and admiration. She recently lost her own father, and her bravery to create art about her loss and share it with the world has been an inspiration and a comfort to me. More so than I can truly express. It is my sincere hope that I can share a fraction of that with others by sharing my own experience and artwork.

Peace be with you today. ♥

I’m in such a fabulous mood today! I actually got everything on my to do list done, including getting my new Serendipity Packs listed on Etsy, and uploading a huge backlog of art journal pictures to Flickr.  I’m feeling celebratory, so first of all I am sharing my journal pics with you! Enjoy all the gorgeous eye candy! Ok, some less gorgeous than others, some of these are older entries and I’ve come a long way in the past few months. :) Click on the mosaic to be taken to my Art Journal Pictures set.

Secondly, I am having a giveaway! Seems like there have been loads of giveaways posted to Twitter in the past few days, and I wanted to jump on the bandwagon – giving stuff away is fun! So, the prize is one of my new Serendipity Packs – 25 assorted game cards, playing cards, and flashcards great for your collage and mixed media art. These are the cards I blogged about last week and I am just tickled pink with how they came out – so juicy and full of inspiring randomosity! Hence the name Serendipity Packs. To enter the giveaway, leave a comment here. You can also get yourself a bonus entry either by blogging about the giveaway or tweeting/retweeting about it. Be sure to let me know if you blog about in a comment here, and use my Twitter name – @Eccentric_Betsi – in your tweet. (I can’t count your bonus entry if I don’t know about it!) In fact, you can do both if you like! Limit 3 entries per person. I will draw a name at 10:30pm Eastern Saturday night (January 16, 2010).

I’ve really had a blast the past month or so of blogging, and the past week on Twitter – this is just my little way of saying Thank You to everyone for being such a fabulous network of creative, juicy, awesome people! ♥

Been a while! Busy weekend, plus lots of new site-seeing ’round the web has lead to it getting to be nearly a week since my last post. Hmm, let’s see, what have I been up to? I bought a new chair at Staples; normally I wouldn’t bother mentioning such mundanities but OH my heavens does this chair rock. It’s like an armchair mated with an office chair and gave birth to a cloud. Seriously. But let’s see, what else for news from the land of Betsistudio? Still Twittering like mad, though I still feel totally clueless about some aspects. Oh, and a tremendously fun mail day, yay!

I got an order from Dick Blick, an order from PrettyTape on Etsy, and Lynne Perrella’s “Art Making: Collections & Obsessions” from PaperbackSwap. All on Monday. Woot for excellent mail days! Let’s see, what’s the rundown… a BUNCH of loose Caran D’Ache Neocolor watersoluble crayons. I caved to peer pressure – everyone else is using them! They look like so much FUN in the bazillion blog posts and YouTube videos I’ve seen referencing them. I went with picking out my colors individually, as it seems to be cheaper that way than buying the sets! On a similar note, I saw my friend Ricia using watersoluble oil pastels (with gold acrylic paint instead of water, YUMMY!) at our art retreat back in November, and I finally sprang for ‘em. And last but decidedly not least, I picked up Sharpie Poster Paint pens in three fluorescent colors. Frickin’ awesome. These, along with all the yummy tapes from PrettyTape, are Kelly Kilmer’s influence. :)

And speaking of Kelly, this brings me to the title of my post. I am working hard this year (and have been forever, really) on creating my life, by hand, one piece at a time. So it’s only natural that I signed up for Kelly’s six month journaling workshop, A Life Made by Hand. I’ve been a member for less than a week and I’m loving every single minute. It’s only $50 for now til the end of June, I can’t recommend it enough. We are having SO MUCH FUN. Here is a spread I’ve done using Kelly’s marvelous prompts:

(Click the image to see it bigger on Flickr.) This was a tricky prompt, talking about my gifts – I am learning to be better about recognizing my own talents, but writing about it and sharing it is pushing some new boundries for me!

Just a quick post today, trying to take a day of less computer time. It’s near impossible to drag myself away from my computer completely, but after a day of being fairly thoroughly absorbed in blogs, Twitter, and shopping on Etsy most of yesterday I’m feeling a need to step back a bit. However, I wanted to pop on briefly to share my latest page. This is the end result of the infamous transfer attempt. If you can find the faintest hint of success with my image transfer, I will be mightily impressed! I did manage to do a fairly good job fixing up the New Year’s page, carefully gluing bits of torn page back in place where possible and coloring in with gray gel pen where it wasn’t. I only lost about 6 words in all, and was able to write them back in. As frustrating as the whole transfer fiasco was, I am quite pleased by the end result, transfers or no. LOADS of stickers on this one, I’m in a very sticker place right now – especially Lisa Frank! I’m a little disappointed with the lettering, especially on the right page… it’s a bit hard to read over the tie-dye background. Oh well, practice makes perfect, live and learn, etc. :)

I’m so glad I photographed my Jaded & Frustrated journal page when I did, because I ended up wreaking some serious havoc on it the other night. I was attempting to do an image transfer, something I know full well I don’t really know how to do, and the solvent did basically nothing to the image I was transferring but loosened up the paint on both the page I was working on and the previous one – the New Year’s page. When I tried burnishing the image in an attempt to get better results with the transfer, I ended up “gluing” the pages together with their own paint. Ugh. This is why I should really have a separate journal for art experiments! And it also highlights for me that I need to make a concerted effort to sit myself down and properly LEARN the stuff I want to use in my art but don’t know how. I can’t remember if I made this page right after The Transfer Incident or not, but this is my To Learn list for the year. Click to go to my Flickr stream to see it larger.

P.S. I’ve finally caved in and joined Twitter like all the cool kids! I am @Eccentric_Betsi on there, and if I know what I’m doing (which is somewhat doubtful) this is a link to my profile. Feel free to follow me! :) I’m still figuring it out, to a certain extent, but it looks like fun.

Do you remember in my last post how I mentioned that the little guy in a truck was from one of hundreds of miscellaneous game and playing cards I have that I’ve been thinking of putting into grab bags for my Etsy shop? Well I seem to have underestimated. I spent a few HOURS of my afternoon today collecting them all up and attempting to shuffle them up so they are as randomized as possible for grab bags. The grand total? 2,040. The picture to the left shows them sorted into stacks of 100. Yeesh… now to figure out how to price them, how to photograph them, what size grab bags to do… I can’t decide if 100 is too many. Maybe more than one size of card grab bag? Like, say… 20, 45, or 100. I’ve been round and round on these subjects for months now, which is why they are still not listed. It’s kind of driving me crazy because I think these are such a cool idea – the fun of looking through a random handful of them, seeing what ideas it sparks, it’s like Muse Wake-Up Juice. Hmm. I suspect this is one of those cases where I’m just being ridiculously indecisive and I should just make a choice and go with it. I’m very open to suggestions though! Feel free to tell me what you think.

While I’m on the subject of studio pictures, I know I’ve been promising to share more of my big nesting project, so while I had the camera out I took a picture of the jungle – er, my workspace that is. The walls look very festive, look at those. Ignore the chaos going on on the tables (and let’s not even TALK about underneath!) while I try to wade though piles of stuff I’ve been meaning to list in my shop for ages. One of my goals for the year is to step things up with my shop, so I am trying to focus a chunk of my energy there. I listed a couple new things this afternoon, watch faces and keys I’d had all

packaged and photographed for a few months now. I wish I’d done it sooner, but thonestly it’s not as if I had the time. And wishing things were different doesn’t change anything, only acting on that desire does! On that note, I think I’ll attempt to make tomorrow even more of an Etsy Day and list the rest of the stuff I have packaged and photographed already. And hopefully sort things out with these darn cards! After that, on to sorting out game piece grab bags!