Creative Alchemy

LOTS going on around these parts, Hence why I haven’t been around. This girl is flying the coup and moving across the country in 11 days.

In the next couple months I’ll be

1) Moving to California’s Central Valley

2) Starting a whole new life

3) Starting a New job

4) House shopping with my BFF so were not homeless!

5) Trying frantically to pack everything I own by the 26th. It’s a tornado of packing tape, bubble wrap, garbage bags and boxes.

6) Frantically trying to save enough cash to make all this possible

7) Journaling with no supplies save for a few pens for doodeling/writing.

Goodbye dinners and outings with all the awesome people I’m going to miss terribly

9) Buying Emergency dress pants since my new office has a no jeans business casual attire code.

10) Moving my blog to a new location (same address!) because Wordpress has become uber suckish lately and not liking my coding/formatting of stuff that should be relatively simple. Thus making it so I really don’t want to blog much out of sheer frustration.

11) Trying not to loose my sanity.

Oh! and textures to make above hiatus notice from the awesome Colorfilter. Go visit her, she’s an amazing talent and rocks like no other with graphic resource making! <3

The lovely Kira just did a what’s in my bag type post that was great. Go check out the post if your a journaler, she’s got some GREAT tips for journaling on the go.

Yes, I carry around a lot between work and every day stuff!

Bag that I just got and ADORE from here, pricey but the quality is amazing.

My new Dell Inspirion laptop. My baby.

Bag of journaling pens, because I’m a WICKED pen addict. Especially Farber Castell artist pens and Sakura Gelly Rolls.

Current novel, Arron Conners “The Pandora Directive” based on the old Tex Murphy FMV games I’m completely addicted to.

Lemonheads. Favorite candy hands down.

Ciggs and I heart NY lighter. Hey, I’m trying to quit!

Two journals, one writing only, one art.

Laptop wireless mouse.

Hairbrush, because a girl’s gotta primp.

Work keys

Hand lotion from Trump Plaza :p

Cd’s of programs I occasionally I occasionally use at work.

Misc, Jewlery

Frank Zappa zig case that doubles as a tampon holder.

Frida Business card holder

Wallet. Fake coach thing since I’m cheap

Cell – Pink Motorola rzr.

Digital voice recorder

Tardis pouch thing I keep my *counts* 6 flash drives in, scored here.

Day of the dead change purse, scored here.

Mini Edgar Allen Poe notebook I use for phone numbers and addresses, scored here.

Deodorant. Hate sweating. And smelling.

Ibuprofen. Drug of choice.

Best earbuds ever.

120 gb black Ipod Classic, chock full of tunes, podcasts, vids, and favorite fanfic. I think it only has 10 gb on it now… Pink case from here.

Yes, I’m a bit addicted to pink!

Oh, and a small Abe Lincoln pendant I just got, because I’m also addicted to history like that. ‘Specially him!

When I first started in visual journaling I spent HOURS browsing the internet for resources and links. Techniques, Inspiration, Image resources, Books, Workshops, anything that I could get my greedy little hands on.

I had this brilliant idea to share the link love. I’m starting up a MASSIVE resource list at this blog for everything worth while that could even relate to visual journaling, so it’s all in one spot.

This includes everthing involved, plus stuff like photoshop brushes, textures and the like since I know a lot of people do their journaling digitally too.

If there’s a resource you think I should include, send it my way by comment or e-mail. I really want this to be a huge, ever growing resource for journalers, weather in txt form or visual.

It should be fun to compile! Plus, I love discovering new sites to browse!

Thanks!

<3

So I haven’t blogged in quite some time. There are some reasons for it that I’m about to get into here. Stuff I really need to get off my chest. Be warned, this is a rant. A long one at that. Two things first though. 1) This is in NO way targeting any specific person. I won’t divulge names, so don’t even ask. 2) I’m taking a stance that may be rather unpopular in blog land. It’s all good, I expect it. Crap, I even put on my special flame retardant knickers for this post. 3) Oh yes, I curse quite a bit here. YAY potty mouth!

I’ve become rather distant and annoyed with the art blogging community lately. The amounts of absolute stupid assed drama I’ve seen have pissed me off to the point of not wanting to post for a while. I’ve written and re written this post in my head far too many times, so this is the easiest way I thought of getting it down.

1)High horses. My god, there are people in this community that need to be pushed off some majorly high pedestals. There is absolutely NO reason for any one human to be considered god like, but it seems to be happening a LOT. I’m not one for hero worship of anyone, and it REALLY ticks me off when your considered a bitch and hater for making one tiny, well thought out, not rude at all comment about a post, piece of work, workshop, ect. It’s bloody STUPID and needs to stop. Be your OWN god/goddess. Think for yourself, do your own thing. Loving someone’s work is one thing, worshipping their almighty greatness is another. One is great, one is annoying as hell. Which leads me to…

2) The almighty land of love and light where unicorns roam free and happy rainbows are everywhere. Constantly. Oh boy, this is a big one for me. I’ve seen so any people get slammed for posting anything negative IN THEIR OWN BLOGS. Ranting, venting, whatever. Isn’t that what a blog or journal is FOR? To get out your emotions, whatever they are? Life isn’t rainbows and puppies 24/7 for craps sake. Shit happens to all of us. Why hide the ugly parts? It’s what makes us all HUMAN. If I want to swear, bitch, rant, post a million of those stupid meme’s everyone seems to hate, I’m gonna. It’s MY place. If I just want to yell FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK on a post and be done with it? Yup, I’m gonna. Deal with it!

3)Visual journaling. Yes, I do it a lot. It keeps me sane. What I don’t do? Care what other people think about my journals. Try to make my journal pages look like the latest and greatest. Get upset to the point of not journaling because I’m not making beautiful pieces of artwork on every single damned page. Why? BECAUSE IT’S JUST A FREAKING JOURNAL. You may notice I don’t post pages too often and when I do, its pre journaling or just bits and pieces of pages. Because my journals are personal, and I don’t feel the need to show the entire interwebs every part of the twisted workings of my noggin. If that’s something you wanna do? Great! Go do it. But that’s my point. Journals are not about pissing contests of who has the latest cool technique, most gorgeous pages, most heartfelt journaling. It’s plain and simple about getting your emotions out of your head and on to some sort of surface. Whatever you wanna journal about? GO DO IT!! Stop worrying and pick up a pen.. it’s supposed to be fun and cathartic. Not fucking rocket science. Which brings me to…

4)Eye candy. We all love it. I sure do. I’ve met some absolutely amazing artists on the web and love seeing what they produce. But is there a point where we get so caught up in eye candy that it hinders our own creative process? Is there a point where everyone sees that new technique that turns into total overkill? Is there a point where we get so influenced by everyone else’s work weather we realize it or not that our work becomes less and less about who we are? Absolutely. There are literally days now where I don’t visit any art related website or blog, especially when I’m in a creative zone and itching to get some work/pages done. I really think eye candy is both something amazing and inspiring, and dangerous and hindering. Love the eye candy, don’t let it overtake your own voice!

And now, a little list of things I absolutely hate with a violent passion, for your amusement. Or not. It’s all good.

~ running with the heard

~ not thinking for yourself

~ pissing contests

~ loving just what’s popular at the moment

~ not exploring every bit of what life has to offer, good and bad

~ pedestals

~ feet

~ clowns

~ running out of peanut butter

~ missing a marathon of your favorite show

~ hindering of personal freedoms

~ fluffy bunnies (for those new to the land of the interwebs, this doesn’t refer to the animal. Because I love animals. Trust me!)

~ stupidity

~ taking yourself WAY too seriously

~ not realizing/accepting life is a balance of dark and light

~ not being true to self

~ the fact that my mouse isn’t quite working right now.

~ people who are far too damn judgmental for their own good.

~ having to wait two weeks to get my hair cut!

Now that all that’s off my chest, I bring you to our regularly scheduled blogging.

<3

Gifted by much in the way of journaling/art books today as an early birthday present. It’s not ‘til May peoples! It’s all good, my friends are awesome and know how to make my day happier.

1) “Alphabetica” By Lynne Perella
2) “Collage Techniques” by Gerald Brommer
3) “True Vision” By L.K. Ludwig
4) “Exhibition 36” By Susan Tuttle
5) “1000 Artist Journal Pages” By Dawn DeVries Sokol
6) “The Colorful Apocalypse, Journeys in Outsider Art” by Greg Bottoms

Lavender chamomile tea will be made tonight as I relax and pour through the pages while curled up on my not so comfortable bed.

Because it collapsed this weekend, with me in it. Headboard legs split down to the floor, causing the mattress to make contact with said floor. At 2:30 in the morning, resulting in the rudest awakening ever.

Excuses to go shopping for a new one. Plans are being made to acquire my dream sleigh bed. More of a reason to stay curled up in bed until the afternoon sunlight pours through my blacked out windows.

Have I mentioned I’m not a morning person?

At all?

Not having a comfortable bed and sleeping with the mattress on the floor is making me grumpier than normal in the mornings. Because wow, my back can’t take it!

I miss having a headboard to lean against for propped up night time reading and journal scribbling.

Soon! Just have to pick it out…

I was going to try to re post this, but since I didn’t save copies of my last few posts before they got deleted, I’m just going to wing it. It’s more fun that way!

Some point in everyone’s life, I think there’s a time where we just have to step back and re-evaluate everything. I hit that point over the holidays, and it was slow going for a while. Between family health issues, work, school, personal studies and a ton of other projects I had going on I just got overwhelmed. FAST.

To the point where I put EVERYTHING I was doing (aside from my day job, of course!) aside. No art, no studies, no reading, nothing. I basically vegged out in front of the tube watching movies, or listening to tunes on my ipod for about two weeks. And I did a LOT of soul searching and thinking.

I needed a time management plan, and fast! I’m still working on such, but it’s going a LOT better now. I’m focusing my efforts on what really matters to me so I can actually live life instead of being freaked out by never having enough time to get it all done and still maintain some sort of presence of who I was, something very important to me. 

Seems simple, right? If I focus my free time ONLY on stuff I absolutely adore, it becomes less overwhelming and far more enjoyable and fun. So far, it’s working too! I’ve also taken up yoga, and omg I love it, but I’m getting more in touch with muscles I didn’t even know I had! Gone back to meditation as well, which is REALLY helping my foul moods and general state of mind. Much happier, much more observant to everything around me, more in tune and generally calm.

So things are definitely looking up and coming together! And thank the gods too, I really hate when I get in those miserable downer moods.

Love to you all, and I hope all is awesome on your end!