Art Journaling made easy

I'm a fan of art journaling and I know a lot of people would like to get into it but lack the time or feel they lack the creativity.  Some times the idea of taking on a new project with new materials (that have to be purchased!) is just too much!

I got ya.

So here's a primer on simple art journaling for the time crunched, materials lacking, and creatively brain frozen.

1. Decide what you are actually journaling about.
Very few people journal, let alone art journal, everyday.  Instead, we journal about an interesting thing that happened or we saw that day.  A journal is a record of important, if simple, memories.  So decide what you want your journal to be about.  Picking a single topic will help you gather materials and focus the art you will work on.  Also, pick something you are already interested in.  If you love ghosts and want to journal about them, chances are you already have stamps, stickers, and all sorts of ghostly paraphernalia.

2. Pick a journal.
There's a lot to be said for moleskin with watercolor paper, but some of us are budget crunched.  And some of us are lucky enough to find a journal that has a picture of an owl right on the front when we want to do a journal about birds we see.  But the rest of us aren't that lucky.  So go for a spiral bound, plain cover journal with acid free pages.  You can find them in art stores like Michaels, book stores like Barnes & Noble, and Wally-World.  Whether or not it's lined doesn't really matter unless you really want one or the other.

3. Gather items related to your topic.
Remember the topic you picked?  Let's say you love flowers and picked flowers for your theme.  Go get all the flower stickers, stamps, magazine cuttings, pictures, findings you have related to flowers.

4. Pre-embellish your journal.
Take those awesome stickers and stamps and magazine cuttings, and decorate your journal.  Every few pages, use the stamp randomly.  Put some stickers here and there.  Glue in a few magazine cuttings.  Don't think to hard about it.  Have fun with it.  And fill most, if not all of the book.

5. You're ready to art journal!
You're new journal is ready for some instant art journaling.  Carry your journal on you with a pen, a few colored pencils (I like Crayola True to Life), and some glue or tape.  When every you see something to do with your theme or find something awesome about your theme.  Whip that journal out and play with it.  With your pages pre-fab, you only have to do half the work.

After doing this little experiment, you'll know whether or not art journaling is for you.  If it is, well, I'm not responsible for the amount of money you will spend it.  If it isn't, you still have something cool as a keepsake.