A few days ago I showed you this.

and this

I continued playing with more paper and more color so it now looks like this.

and this

These colors are something I would not have expected myself to use. I rather like them. I feel as if the piece is speaking to me........... like I'm not doing it..I'm not planning.... it's intuitive. I'll let you know how it ends up. And remember that piece of foam board on my work table to catch all the stuff? I like the way it's looking as well.

Thanks for visiting and thanks always for all your comments. I love getting feedback....................jo

About six months or so ago, I was able to treat myself to some new art supplies because of a gift from my fairy godmother. I purchased some items I might not necessarily have chosen merely because of the cost, but a set of india inks were one of them. I hadn't done too much with them until today while playing in the studio. I wanted to see if I could use the ink as paint instead of paint. I also wanted to play with adding fabric and paint on fabric. This is what I came up with so far today.

And some other things I've been slowly gathering over the last several years are stencils. I love stencils. There are a ton of them out there. I bought some stencil sheets and have been making some of my own. I was at Ben Franklin recently and happened on a sale item, a scrapbook for five dollars. And guess what? The plastic sheets on the inside are perfect for holding 6 x 6 stencils. I had fun stenciling the cover of the soon to be stencil holding book.

I don't know about you but I am enjoying the cool weather. Boots and sweaters and golden yellow trees make me feel good. Thanks for stopping here.......Jo.

Ten Eleven Twelve

Here are a few more faces from the morning IN THE VAN faces journal.

I worked the third one from a photograph.

and lastly

Sketching faces is not easy. I refuse to draw the same faces I see so much of on the net. Not that there's anything wrong with them, except they just don't work for me. You know the ones I mean. The perfect, blemish and wrinkle free faces with big, bulging I'm- high- on- the- wonderment- of- life- eyes, the full, voluptuous- don't- hate- me -because- I'm- beautiful- lips- and always, always long, flowing, highlighted locks. The women in my world don't look like that, nor do I. I'm going for the real stuff. The wrinkles, the sag, the sometimes serious ,the wisdom, and the silver. And, I am drawing them on top of everything. Thanks for stopping in.......xoxoxox...... jo

The scrap book covers that for years looked like this

For now, have become this.

I sometimes show you stuff that's in the work and mostly not finished. Often I am interested in seeing the process when I see someone's work. I want to know how they started and got to the that point. It just means I have to remember to come back and show you the finished piece and not get side tracked with something else, which often happens to me. Maybe I have latent ADD. Thanks for your supportive comments on my "faces." More to come. Glad you stopped by........................................Jo

The Smash Book Revisited -Faces

I'm sure these pages are not finished yet but I am liking the entrance of faces. That has been my challenge or goal- to learn to draw faces-in my own style and out of my head.

I want to work on incorporating faces onto larger canvases. That very well may be my challenge on this cold, rainy day. I'm glad you stopped in................................Jo

Unfinished or Forgotten?

Do you have things that you've started and not finished for whatever reason? I seem to have lots of that; some of it has been neatly tucked away in folders, binders, big envelopes, in an old forgotten, put- on- the- back- burner- on -hold- for -years kind of way. When I first started to take my self seriously in that I wanted to actually DO art more than every now and then, I wasn't sure what I wanted to concentrate on. I didn't know whether I wanted to concentrate on sketching, drawing, painting, or art journaling.I didn't know then and I don't know now. I want to play......... with all of it. Maybe eventually, I will find what works for me or what I feel I do best. In the meantime, there still are not hours in the day beyond my work to DO all these things, so I will continue as I have been. Getting back to the original question. Do you have things that you've started and not finished? What do you do with them? I have never been in to scrap booking, but I bought a scrap book about 15 yrs ago just for the sole purpose of painting the front and back covers. I figured I would make my own journal. I got as far as painting them and that was it.

And do you also know the reason you save these things is because you think one day you WILL come back to find these and it will dawn on you that you CAN do something with this stuff now.?! There's a reason I created an "art line" across the room of my studio. So, I could see it and remember that I want to DO something with it even if I don't remember what it was I wanted to do.

These two pages are at least 2- 3 yrs old. I seemed to have been very into collaging and very Teesha Moore inspired. I also must have felt very powerful and at the same time, warrior like. I don't know where I was going, perhaps to war. Maybe I was at war within myself or other people given my life at the time. And maybe I didn't want to be or feel at war, but I had to remind myself that I was the queen of my castle. I find it interesting now to look at these two unfinished pages. I'm thinking these loose pages may find their way in to that broken down scrap book which will be recycled in to an art journal. Thanks for visiting.*****************jo