last journal pages

last journal pages, a photo by vickylw on Flickr.

Lots of people know I begin each of my artist's journals with some kind of illustration of my palette. Lately, I have used the last page as a place to collect memorable quotes or thoughts. These are usually gathered over a period of time, so they are generally scattered in a hap-hazard fashion.

I've also seen a journal artist using the last page or two as a calendar, drawing in the calendar themselves with a splash of color or tiny motifs. Maybe I might try that in the future, if the journal has lots of pages.

Referencing all those journals - the lazy way

An 8 1/2 x 11 page of thumbnails from one of my journals

I recently had reason to refer to something in an old journal, and it took me only 3 minutes to find it.  Knowing you journallers as I do, you, too have many, many volumes to keep track of.  I know there are people who have the discipline to number pages and create indexes but that's not me, and that's not how I recall information.....I recall events by the pictures I drew of them.  So, upon completing each journal, I photograph the cover and all the pages and print a contact sheet with thumbnails of every page.  I label the pages and pop them into a binder, divided by category (regular journal, garden journal, travel, etc.)  I can flip through those pages and find what I want very quickly!

Developing a journal page...

We went to Powell Gardens in Lee's Summit yesterday for our anniversary...what a wonderful idea THAT was.  The trolleys only run on weekends, so we had to stick to distances I could actually walk to...this sculpture by Dan Ostermiller caught my eye on the way to the water garden.  J. went to check it out...

Oh, wow.  Look at how the light and reflected like work on the bronze forms of the rabbits.  I liked this view--AND there was a bench to sit on to draw!

Here's partway through...I knew I'd want to add a lot more to the page, and the spread...

And so I did....more definition on the sculpture, the little ink drawing at upper left for scale, and more foliage--plus some text.

I had just gotten started on the new visitors' center, an elegant building with lots of glass, stone, and wood, when someone turned the sprinklers on--I had to finish from memory!  My dress was wet, my camera was wet, but I saved the sketch.  I've got my priorities straight...

That's the Marjorie Powell Allen chapel viewed from the water garden at lower center on that spread...its spiritual, silent, soaring space (pardon the alliteration!) with views of water garden, prairie and forest makes you whisper in spite of yourself.

I connected some of the vignettes with foliage, added a sketch of the water garden on the right, and the sticker they give to visitors adds a touch of collage, repeats some of the colors, and echos the round sketch at upper left.  A bit of text finished the spread!