This rings a little true to me… Aj Ning, the zine, the blog… Love not profit. (Yeah the zine barely makes a profit even though we charge for it, review products are $$$)

Some of you asked about my summer reading list. The majority of these books have nothing to do with art journaling per se, but they do have a lot ot do with the process vs product nature of the practice.

Introduction to Art Therapy: Sources & Resources
(read)
Art Therapy Sourcebook (Sourcebooks)
(reading)
Art Heals: How Creativity Cures the Soul
(purchased)
Introduction to Counseling: Voices from the Field (purchased)
Art As Therapy: Collected Papers
(not yet purchased)

Also included in the list:

DSM-IV-TR (not yet purchased)

APA Manual (purchased)

Of course, I probably won't read the DSM or the APA manual, they are reference books, not really things you sit down and read. But I have to have them on hand for classes and writing. Saying I have 7 books to read over the summer is a tad bit of hyperbole, I amend that to 4 with several chapters out of another.

Reading Introduction to AT was interesting as it reaffirmed some of the beliefs I hold about art therapy. The book is an overview of the history of art therapy and as such was rather boring, but it's a great reference for grasping what art therapy is all about.

Continue reading →

A
few months back I reviewed the Pilot Prera pen, an all around favorite
in the fountain pen world. My review was less than joyous. I felt it was
too much money for too little pen, while that sentiment still stands
I’ve grown fond of this lightweight little pen. The ink flow is just
juicy enough that the inks look great on just about any paper and the
nib is smooth without any work on it. I find the pen a perfect one to
clip to the side of my Davis Leather simple notebook cover for quick
notes on the fly.

It
can languish nib up in my bag for a couple of days and when I uncap it,
nothing but ink, it just writes. I can't say that for every pen that
sit in my bag over a weekend.

After
I wrote my review I passed the pen off to my partner who then passed it
back to me. She’d beaten it up a little bit, taking it to and from
court. Initially I started to use it to use up the last of the ink in
it’s cartridge, then I refilled it and just kept using it. Then I made one of these for it.

Honestly,
I’ve grown to love this pen. If you can find a decent deal on this pen,
maybe in the fountain pen network classifieds section or eBay, in the
$30 range, spring for it, it’s worth every penny at $30- $35. Paying $50
for it willleave you with buyer’s remorse.

You’ll
notice a new addition to the right hand sidebar here at CSS, just below the Put it on Paper link, the
European Paper Company logo. I’m now an affiliate advertiser. What does
that mean? If you follow the link to their site and purchase anything I
get a small portion of the purchase price. It works the same was as the
Amazon affiliate program, but for a great small company.

Over time you’ll notice links in my posts to related items on their pages or
items I’ve reviewed. Basically, the same thing I’ve always done with my reviews
and how-to posts. This will not change my review policy, I’ll still be
doing open honest reviews. If I don’t like something, I’m not going to
pretend I do.* Same as usual.

Help a girl pay for grad school, check out the European Paper Company's great products.

Continue reading →

Of
the many things I’m considering for school this fall are 2 questions,
first: Is it feasible for me to make all my notebooks, or will I even
need notebooks or are things all digital since I was in school so many
years ago? Second: Is notetaking with a fountain pen a realistic option?
It seems kinda crazy when I think about all the changes that have
occurred in note taking technology since I was in school.

One
of the major projects I had to complete in my 3rd year of school was to
create a binder/archive of projects to do with  my art students. This
involved heading to the library stacks with a card loaded up with money
or a pocket full of nickels and dimes, finding an interesting article,
photocopying it, and then making note on the first page margins what
magazine it was in as well as the publication date. I then had to place
this into one of 3 giant 3 ring binders I had for the project and decide
what tab it belonged under and which age it was appropriate. After I
did that I had to create an index. It was labor intensive and not an
easy task. In the end I had a milk crate full of photocopies in binders
and lots of ideas for last minute classes. I haven’t cracked those
binders open in 10+ years. I still have them, I spent hundreds of
dollars on photocopies.

I
have to think about how much easier this project would be today with
either a smartphone or tablet and a scanbox or DIY version of the scan
box coupled with something like Evernote or Google’s knockoff, Keep.
There are a number of apps that will let you shoot a series of pictures
and create a searchable PDF. It would be crazy easy to create a pdf
database on the computer that is fully searchable either through the
search function of the computer or by creating a spreadsheet.

Maybe
the reason non-traditional students do so well is because they are all, “Holy crap this is soo much easier
than when I was 18!”

Back
to the question at hand, notebooks, should I make them? Things to
consider- I can only make them unlined and 5.25×8 inches or so in size.
This is a size I like but will I miss lines? What paper should I use, if
I do make them? It will need to be economical yet, if I decide to use
fountain pens, decent for fountain pens. Is it cheaper for me to invest
time and energy into making my own notebooks, or should I simply buy
some?

As
for the fountain pen questions, I’m going to see if it will work or
not. If it doesn’t I’ll grab some back up pens, probably something from
Uniball. They are great for doodling.

I've mentioned that I love my Kaweco Sport medium nibbed fountain pen. It's a decent looking workhorse pen. one I'm not afraid to take anywhere and draw anything with. It's moderate price (in fountain pen terms) means I'll be upset but not too heartbroken if I lose it. Who am I kidding, I'll be a wreck if I ever lose it. I love this damn pen.
I read this page on the fountain pen network about making a bulb filler for the pen. And I thought huh, I can do that. So I did.

I had to order "sacs" for my pen, which I did through this guy. Minimum order is $15, so I had to spend $20. I've kep a few aside for further hacking and tinkering and the rest are for sale in the classifieds section of the FPN.

Anyway, here is the video.

This hack will work with any pen. I also made a filler for my old Rotring Esprit.

Just a heads up, I'm moving my site to a new domain and making a few changes to the site. It might go down for a bit but know that it'll be back up shortly.

The
next part of self doubt, or the recurring refrain I hear in my head is,
“How will I screw this up? How will I subvert this from reaching
success?” You see, I believe I have a history of screwing up the things
that should work, or so I tell myself. I tell myself that I find these
ways of hijacking myself so even if I finish a piece or find my way to
success I won’t actually achieve success, instead, I’ll be left
disappointed looking at success, so close yet outside of my grasp,
achievable but not.

These
are incredibly destructive thoughts, especially when kept in the dark. I
know my initial reaction when thinking and feeling like this is to not
share that I feel, well, vulnerable. When I boil it down and really look
at these destructive thoughts I realize that when I’m working on a
successful piece, getting good news, or anything else good those good
feelings are delicate and unstable. Especially when I’m first getting
them established. In a way I think self doubt comes from a protective
instinct, a place where we want to protect those oh so delicate feelings
of success from the possibility of failure. At some point something
happens and makes those protective feelings turn inward and they become
destructive.

At
that point I shut down, declare that I’m in a rut and feel as if I’ll
never get out. Why work on fresh art when I’ll just screw it up anyway?

It’s up to me to break that cycle, no one can do it for me. I have to decide, “Hey, I can do this.” Then I have to do it. (Some external positivity helps, so give someone props on stuff you see online, comment on a blog post, or flickr upload. Spread love.)

This is the 4th art journal page I've created exploring self doubt.

I forgot to shoot pictures of it as I was working and I feel it isn't finished. It needs something undefinably "more." I'm not sure exactly what it needs but I'll figure it out eventually.

This is the 3rd page in a series where I explore self doubt.

In
keeping with the goal and theme of these pieces I started by writing a
journal page. This time I used a vermillion watercolor pencil. I pressed
into the paper harder in some areas and lighter in others. Overall I
tried to keep a stream of consciousness method of writing as I
considered the various issues connected with self doubt.

Heart
and mind continued to be a theme with this writing but this writing
focused more on the heart aspect. To blur and blend the color I added
water to the page with a large wet brush. As the color moved around the
page I saw 3 darker areas. I created 3 darker circles of darker red in
these areas. I then allowed the page to dry naturally. I chose a
photocopy of my heart image and used a Chartpak blender marker to
transfer the image to the dried watercolored page. I then layered
various shades of blue colored pencils around the heart, as if radiating
out. The radiating lines stopped and I used watercolors to highlight
and illuminate one of the remaining red circles. the writing is still
visible in the illuminated area.



I
wanted the area around the blue to be darker so I layered some liquid
watercolor over the top of the colored pencil. I used a paper towel to
remove the excess. An interesting thing happened, in the areas where the
writing hadn’t dissolved fully the colored pencil lifted off. Leave me
with the texture of the writing being visible through the radiating
lines. It’s an interesting happy accident, I’ve often said that writing
will illuminate and lift up the darker parts of our mind and heart, and
here by accident that occurred.

The image measures 5×7 inches and is available on my etsy shop here.