Need a creative kick in the pants?

If so what is the one thing you can do for yourself today to gift yourself that lift/inspiration/revitalization? 

If you read my latest blogpost where I share the struggle I've had with my creativity you may know I’ve had a punishing year, but through all this I’ve learnt all we need to do to give ourselves this boost back on our creative path is one simple *small* thing. 

When we are in this space we can think that we are soooooo stuck that we need to make huge shifts in order to get ourselves moving again. This is FALSE. Every journey begins with a single step...and besides big shifts are too difficult (if not impossible) to do from this space anyway. How can you travel all the way to the moon if you cannot journey to a nearby sea? 

The art table can seem like a looming stranger that only gets more and more distant and difficult to approach the longer we dwell in a place where fear has set in, or the inspiration has dried up, or burnout has taken over. But…it’s still just our art space. It is the same as it was when we were thriving in our creativity, it does not have the ability to have its own thoughts, therefore it simply cannot loom. IT IS NEUTRAL, as is our creativity and both are ready to welcome us back into the fold with open arms. But it does take that one step to turn that intimidating stranger back into an old friend.

For my one step I am currently using the workbook out of my 'How to Ride Your Creative Camels' ekit for the starting of a new project, as it contains sections for helping along every step of the journey. Notice I say ‘starting’, I am not trying to attempt the whole project, I am just starting and using the kit as my one small step for doing this. This kit is the first product I have created for agggggeees and I made it because, well, I need it. As I said this year has been a difficult one but even in the best of times taking the creative path can be hard, it requires courage and it requires conviction, so sometimes we need such things to support us in travelling our paths. 

Your one step could be engaging in something new that you know will be of support to you, or it could be the easiest creative thing that you already know how to do, like cutting out images or organising your supplies. Your creative intuition will always know what the thing is that you could do that would put you on your path again. If you cannot hear it you are not listening hard enough. Take a moment, get quiet and when you feel connected just ask internationally ‘what smallest simplest thing I could do right now?’…then do it.

My newest ekit is all about riding your creative camels, traveling your path and dealing with any roadblocks that come up & available from my Etsy shop here:

http://tinyurl.com/creativecamels

Good luck (& love)

Jennibellie

Tough Times, Choose Art

I’m going through a tough time (peeps that have seen the Monthly Challenge video will already know this) so I’m consciously making an effort to keep up creating art consistently, especially in those times when I feel upset/bad/confused and so find it difficult to reach for art despite knowing I will feel better for it. 

It can be easy to slip during such times, to make up (extremely plausible sounding) excuses and let your art go. 

I’m having to fight all that daily and choose art anyway because if you are a creative person it is SO IMPORTANT to give yourself this comfort/release/support/exploration/self care so that you can face the world and be the wholest version of yourself that you can possibly be in that moment in time, for yourself and others (not just for others!)…even if that means having to force yourself into it.

Art Journal Summer School started a few days ago, I’m so grateful for this because classes and groups are great guideline, a great place for this conscious effort to go. I’m going to be joining the other 500+ peeps in this class and go through the first weeks lessons tomorrow evening, if you want to join us the link is below or if you want a free ‘guideline’ then the link to my art communitys Monthly Challenge is also below. 

I’m hoping you’re living better times than I am right now but if not I know through this experience to urge you to pleeeease ensure you keep up your art…when no amount of love nor money might be able to help what is happening to you A*R*T STILL CAN. 

Choose Art

Art Journal Summer School -

http://tinyurl.com/ArtJournalSummerSchool2016

July Monthly Challenge -

http://tinyurl.com/JulyArt2016

Love, always

Jennibellie

xoxo

Sending You the Habitual State of Love

I’m not a selfie girl (in fact I’m the one who suddenly disappears when you whip the camera out) but tonight the desire was overwhelming. Ever felt so lucky that you just had to capture the moment? Nothing particular occurred, nothing out of the ordinary, just an inner knowledge of peace…and appreciation. Appreciation of having this body. Of being human. Of being alive. Of being alive in this time right here, right now. Of having such options, amenities and possibilities. Of understanding how lucky we are, even in the worst of times, to have all that we have – and even in dire times to have the potential and capacity to find our way through it to the other side and know we will be stronger for it. It is a full feeling, yet a natural one. It is the feeling that is supposed to be our habitual state, and we remember that when we sense it. It is the feeling of trusting everything will always be okay, for all of us. 

It is the feeling of love, not the kind which we label and attach to a person or thing, just pure love and I wanted to send it onto (and hopefully into) you too.

Peace and Love

Jennibellie x

Where YOU Meets YOU: Making Meaningful Creations from Your Journaling

Hello

Today I want to share how wonderful it feels to create art pieces that feel incredibly meaningful to you before you've even begun creating them. 

But how can to you get a significant connection to something before it's brought into being? Before you've seen it, touched it or even thought of it? 

By pulling meaning directly out of your mirror, your reflection, your giant holder of all things meaningful to you - your journal, and smushing it together with your brilliant creative ideas of course. 

I'm working on a new class (well actually I'm working on several, and several other projects of all kinds, all at once - not very clever of me as it then takes aaaaeeeooonnns to get anything ready but my excuse must be that I have to go wherever the creative energy does, as you probably know by now if you've followed me for any length of time) and one thing that came up is how much I create from what appears in my journals - and how much those things mean to me as they hold SO much significance before my hands have even created them.

For instance I shared this dragon I created this week on social media:

and when I think about it creative dragons have come up a lot in my journaling lately (and blogposts too - click here to read 'What a visit with a Fake Famous Artist Taught Me About My Creative Dragons'):

When you create this way there is a connection already present between you and the creation and it is so POWERFUL it's palpable. So in the hopes of inspiring you to take up making some really unique and personal items to you, I thought I'd share some of the things I have made from my journals. 

So first up here's something I made a couple of days ago that is really easy to emulate...

as it is simply an atc I created (with scrap card I keep cut and collaged ready for when I want them) with a message on it that comes directly out of my written journaling (see my written journal right there underneath?)

These are great to keep around your journaling space as reminders of whatever is important to you at the present moment; right now I'm owning my power! We are insanely powerful beings, and through my journaling I've learnt to forego any thoughts of unworthiness that hinder that tremendous and beautiful brilliance from coming through. It's satisfying to say 'no' to all those pesky, niggly (and boring) useless thoughts & feels so good to whip out an atc, black pen and crayons as soon as those gems come up in your journal. 

Within couple mins BOOM: you have a lovely meaningful reminder of something profoundly important to you.

FYI: this journal space above is a big part of one of those new classes that'll be on Journal Workshops soon enough. Shhh! Don't tell!

Another creation was this doll I shared when I got a 'Creative Download' (aka My Raw Intuitive Journaling Class):

here's the journaling counterpart:

I actually covered this whole 'Creative Download' process/story/development in a couple of other Weekly Ramble blogposts with videos which you can find here:

How to Receive a Creative Cosmic Download

& Cosmic Download Chronicles Part 2 (aka I'm flyinnng!)

And finally I also realised one of the projects we did on Journal Workshops for my Birthday Bash (the 'Community Flag' project to be precise), also came about from the journaling I was doing back at that time about creative living (hence 'Creative Life' being on the flag):

If you want to see a video of the flag being created (and some other art technique vids thrown in too) then you can still check them out in the Birthday Bash Group [here] for free. There are many more creations I could share but hey, gotta hold something back for the class! lol.

So I hope sharing these projects has given you some inspiration. I really cannot stress enough how wonderful it feels to create art that feels significant to you before you even start. I realised writing the 'pull meaning directly out of your journal and smush it together with your creative ideas' sentence at the beginning why it feels so meaningful...

because it's where the unique meets the unique:

Important things in your journal = unique to you. 

Your brilliant creative ideas = unique to you. 

It's such a meaningful process because it's where YOU meets YOU!

Let me know if you give it a go, or if you already do this what have you created? Fill me in the comments below.

Have a wonderfully arty weekend

Much love

PS Did you see my latest video?? 

If not click the image below to watch:

Join Journal Workshops Art Community

The Power of a Question

{Warning: This is quite a long post but contains the best journaling tool I have discovered recently, and how you can use it too}

Well lately I've had a real case of the fuzzy-woolly head! I'm finding it difficult to focus, yet my head seems to be full of loads of stuff, but when I try to focus on any of it....poof! It's like a rabbit that's spotted an oblivious fox. Apparently it's been Mercury Retrograde, and while I would find it comforting to be able to blame it all on astrology I just cannot see a 'physical' reason for any of it which is making me even more frustrated. So I've been journaling A LOT to try and counteract....whatever it is that is going on with me. 

I've been writing more than arting because...well I'm finding that a struggle to, just like any of my bigger art projects, my classes, my shop, social media, this blog (I'd forgotten AGAIN that it was friday and so time to do my Weekly Ramble post and even as I'm doing it arrrghhh, it seems SO difficult to get my words out on the keyboard. Almost like there is a humongous block between my thoughts and me being able to acknowledge them). But thankfully I am having a wee mini break next week & plan on taking a big pile of art supplies and a picnic blanket with me to go find a park and unwind. I think a change of pace & scenery is definitely what the doctor ordered (if there were such a thing as a doctor for the fuzzy-woolly head syndrome).

Through all of my journaling though I have discovered something this week that has worked WONDERS for me, and I think it is most powerful tool when you are struggling with the fuzzy-woolly head. It is the Power of a Question. Not just any question, and unfortunately finding the question that you need to ask through a fuzzy-woolly head can be e-x-t-r-e-m-e-l-y exasperating, but if you persist something happens where you get over a hump and realisations you need suddenly start occurring to you, often in an avalanche.

I think this happens because a) to ask the question you have to take yourself out of your head, which is SUPER important for finding your revelations. As Albert Einstein said:

'We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them' 

b) When you give your mind a question it cannot HELP but try to find the answer for it. 

Here's a test, read these and try NOT to think of the answer: 

what's your name?

what colour is the sea?

what do you sit on?

Did you manage it? I'm guessing not, because our brains are answer seekers so if you turn your problem into a question it becomes something UBER POWERFUL!

So below is some tips on HOW to find a question from your problem/confusion/frustration/etc:

see, these hot tips are direct my journal!

1) Write at least two pages focusing on your 'issue', or if you don't want to do that just generally write about anything for 2 pages; you may find the issue naturally comes out. 

2) If you don't already use your journal like you were talking to a friend. Now imagine what a friend might say back to you after every paragraph or page - whatever feels right. This is to do that thing above and take yourself out of your head - try looking at what you have written from someone else's perspective.

3) Begin identifying your 'sore' spots, the parts of your writing that hits most to the heart of your issue & ponder what question or questions would a friend ask about this to a) make you open up more about it or b) to help soothe you about it. If you didn't write about your issue for example you could ask 'why did you avoid it?'

4) Remember the how, why and what's! I know it sounds silly but finding the question that will give you an answer, that will cause you to have your revelations can be really hard to come up with, as stated above it can be frustrating. So remember your 'how's, 'why's or 'what's, because as they are the beginning of a question, it can help prompt the rest of it while you are contemplating your page. Even try saying each out-loud - it can help.

5) Imagine you are a gold prospector and what you are doing is the digging part until you get to those big, fat, juicy nuggets! - it can help with the frustrating part mentioned in the last point. You are a prospector, and you are on a discovery!

6) If still stuck try on one of these how, why or what's as a pen-starter:

'How is this issue helping me right now?'

'Why am I reacting in this way & how can I react differently?'

'What use can I turn this problem into?'

and 7) OBVIOUSLY YOU NOW NEED TO ANSWER THE QUESTION. A question has zero power if it is not answered. Write another two pages answering your question, OR a page per question if you have more than one. You really do need to actually answer them babe, and usually the revelations happen right at the bottom of the writing so don't cop out and stop after one paragraph, you are only cheating yourself by doing so.

This is seriously the stuff that has helped me recently come up with the most shockingly beautiful realisations that I would never have identified had I not asked myself a question. Please try it, it's something that's magnitude of power can only be understood when experienced first hand. 

Warning: Expect flabbergasting eye-opening discoveries to occur!

Good Luck!

Love you lots!

Seeing Through Mud via Inner Critic Work

Arrrh weekly ramble post, I have been dreading you so much, not because I don't want to write about what I have been doing, it's just that every time I try to pinpoint what that actually is I lose the words.

And that kind of sums up my week...except it is not just words I've lost. I feel I have been confused and conflicted over a lot of things (...or perhaps everything...I am even confused on that!), but if I try and put any of that into words right now, again I lose them. 

But among these trying to see through mud feelings I have gained a lot too. I think it would be impossible not to, because they became work, and all work brings results of some kind...

The work was surprising, and it brought surprising results. Because I could not see through the mud on things I wanted to look at (or perhaps they were just things I am normally used to looking at), I ended up looking elsewhere and as a result found clarity on things I often do not see at all.

Insight after insight came to me. 

I have not had a week like this week in a long time. I feel like I am always growing, and learning, and developing, but even then with all of that routines occur, and major new insights can be few and far between.

The insights that occurred I can share I suppose, because they are the clear things I have right now, but it took me the mud of the rest of this writing to once again be brought to them, remember them. I could not have just started from this point at the beginning of this blogpost, there was too much cloudy confusion, so once again work had to be done to bring me here. But that is just another lesson I have learnt while actually writing this blogpost - even when you think you have lost the words just some talking (or in this case writing) from that very place, however muddy, will always bring you some clarity (even if that clarity is the acknowledgement that you are confused!... At least you will know it and have somewhere to start)

So my first main insight was about my daily journaling practice, which I have previously mentioned in this ramble HERE. Things have been happening in that practice that man, has opened up worlds for me. But until this week my inner critic would have a bit of a field day, telling me that this practice was: 

'a waste of time!'

'How many other useful things could you be doing instead? 

'And DAILY, wow you really are indulgent of a whim aren't you?'

I can't always understand or hear what my inner critic is saying, I again find I cannot locate the words of it, often it's just the feeling, but this is something my daily journaling practice has helped me pinpoint and understand.

So I've had huuuuuuuuge glorious insights on the side of my inner critic, which is useful, as that is what a large part of my 21 Secrets Lesson is going to be based on. 

I've also learnt that any work I do on anything is important for my artwork, or developing myself as an artist - which is another stumbling block my inner critic would try and sneak in my path, telling me that again I 'wasn't doing anything important' - but as the above point (of work on my inner critic being useful for my lesson) proves, it is all-all-always important. Every clump of mud you have to look around, disintegrate, wash away etc is useful. Obstacles and interests are in our paths for the very reason to work with them, and enjoy the results.

This week I have really enjoyed my results....and my confusion.

Thank you for reading my ramble, and I am sorry that it really is living up to the title of 'ramble' more than ever before, but this is where my head is at, and that is exactly what the weekly ramble blogposts are supposed to be about, me mid-flow of projects, figuring things out and posting myself and my work, unpolished.

PS if you could help me out by letting me know what your inner critic says to you I would be hugely grateful, I have posted a discussion on Journal Workshops that can be found here & I would love it if you can participate =) mwah 

What the Seagulls Taught Me

Hello beautifuls!

OMG, what a month I have had! As some peeps have noticed I haven't been around online the last couple of weeks. Thank you to those of you who have even slightly wondered where I've gone or asked if I'm okay, I've had what you may call a hum-dinger of a month! I won't make this an incredibly long (well long-er) post by going into details but an example would be the tummy bug I caught earlier this week, not nice, not pretty and how crappy I felt kinda summed up the whole of my beginning to December but guess what?? Last night this happened:

First colour of the month!!!!!!!!!!!

I must have my mojo back!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I kid you not!

I have discovered that when I'm good my nails are good, when I'm bad my nails are bad. And it's true, after this colour was on I got back to creating a project that has had to be left on hold the past couple of weeks, which I'm neeeeearly ready to let loose and am so excited about!! Squeak **while bouncing**!!

Since I am not yet ready to reveal the project itself I'm being called to tell you a story about it, as it taught me a very crucial lesson, and today some seagulls brought home the teachings even more. Yeah, seagulls.

....no not these kind, the real kind

So start of this month I was planning on having this project wrapped up and posted in no time. Actually I wanted it done yesterday, as it had had so much work already (and I had loved every moment) but I kept getting distracted my shiny new projects, like the 7 Day Art Journaling Challenge for example. Now I know shiny object syndrome is made out to be a bad thing, and in many cases it can be, but listening my gut on any creative project (I think) is never among them. Not for me anyway. I firmly believe in following your own 'creative instinct' as I often refer to it, as it leads to the best places. 

It allows you to create with ease

in a total state of flow and exhilaration

...and what is the point of creating if not to do it when feeling this drive, this eagerness, this fun? 

So yes I often drop projects in favour of other projects that are calling me, but obviously in doing so it puts my other project/s behind, so I became de.ter.min.ed! It should have been beyond finished probably earlier in the year but certainly by November, with all the time that had been dedicated to it. So I set myself a deadline and was super focused on achieving it while I was feeling the creative instinct, the flow, to get it done and move onto other things. The time was right, nothing would stand in my way...and then...

and then...

everything stood in my way!

This circumstance happened, then that circumstance , and all the time I'm pushing against saying 'no I will get this done', next circumstance 'no I will, I will, I will', and then the next...you see the pattern. 

I was feeling disheartened, 

I was feeling out of control, 

and then, I got sick.

And then...I gave it all up.

I let go.

Or I was forced to.

It was not going to happen if I accepted it or not.

I had no choice but to let it go.

And it was the most freeing thing ever.

Eventually I reset my deadline, taking into account things like recovery time, and shopping time, and family time etc etc and without worry about it changing, without the need to feel I had to push it into place. This was the lesson I learnt;

That, no matter what, we cannot control. 

We can plan, yes. We can expect, yes. We can try, yes. We can move the earth to try to make something happen, yes.

But we cannot control. 

Perhaps it's a lesson many learn before the age of 30, but we are all on our different paths and we learnt different things from those paths at different points in our lives. My path showed me this right now. Previously I've had the mindset that if you just work hard enough, if you just push yourself that little bit more, if you just...if you just... But it showed me that really, you can't even control yourself - for example my body getting sick and doing things I didn't want it to. The only thing you can ever really control is your reactions, how you cope with things, and even then at the core of the entire human race we are emotional beings [enter crimes of passion over other crime stats here], and so cannot even have control there in certain situations. 

We certainly do not have control over any external circumstances, at all. And really why do we ever think it is our business to? All we can really do is accept what is, and ingratiate it into any planning, but with understanding that the playing field may change on you again. I've often heard it said that near enough all we worry about, all of us as a collective, are things that actually never happen. We worry about things that never come to be. Well now I understand that a whole lot better. I think we probably worry like this because we can feel that, at the root of it, we don't have control. But after this month's experience I find that so freeing. Isn't it nice to know that it isn't in our control? That it isn't our job to control that event, or that person, or that timeline?

As I've said above we have enough of a battle if we just try and control ourselves, our bodies will let us down on that point - it has it's own stuff to deal with and do. Our brains often let us down, not being able to remember that famous persons name on the telly 'ooooh what have they been in? what have they been in? I know the face....I just can't place it...', or coming up with a great point an hour after an argument has ended, when you can't implement it. Our emotions often let us down, how many apologies have each of us made in our lifetimes for saying something we didn't mean in the heat of the moment or 'god damnit why am I crying right now? That's the last thing I want to do. Grrrr'. And of course by 'let down' I don't mean that it's a let down at all, I just mean that I've learned disappointment can only follow if you choose to control anything rather than just ALLOW!

That's the point of this whole post I suppose, to ALLOW, 

and then go from there.

You wondering about the seagulls yet?

Well as I've only just got back to working on my project, or doing any creative work, I decided to open the outdoor studio tonight. 

I got in there just before it turned dark.

And all the sky was grey. Gloomy, but in it's own way beautiful.

The sun was low as it was beginning to set, giving the place that 'winter sunlight' that reflects so brightly off of the snow (when it's around)

And then suddenly there was a hundred seagulls

At least

Bouncing around like floating lightbulbs

Their white bellies being lit up by the low sun, against the cloudy grey backdrop

Making them look like fairy lights in the dark.

And every one,

Every single one

Was just riding the wind

Bobbing

Flowing

Drifting

Twisting and turning at the current's will.

They were all allowing.

Every one

Every single one

Riding the wind

Not flapping, not flying, not caring if they were separated from the flock, not controling.

The sky was FULL of seagulls. In every direction.

Little bright lights filling the sky through their roaming

I wish I had caught it on camera

But I was too busy watching and understanding what it was meaning to me:

It meant a sharp contrast between animal, and human, behaviour. It meant a lesson in remembering to live from instinct and intuition, rather than restriction and control.

It meant I forevermore have a visual in my mind to remind me just to let go

(you can't control it anyway), 

and allow.

U r an *ARTIST* Video & My 'Regular' Journal Vlog

Hi guys

so some of you may have already seen this video I posted yesterday sneakily here, on the issue so many of us have on claiming the word 'artist' as a description of ourselves:

But I also filmed this vlog while at the Chamber. It is about what could be considered my 'regular' form of journaling. I thought it was about time I shared it, though as I say in the vlog 'seeing as I share all my others', but then I realised I actually have TONS of written style journals that I don't share - goal setting, gratitude journals and many more besides. But then they really are mostly writing so probably v.boring to look at...hope this one isn't though. I also lay down a challenge if you would like to discover the joys of regular journaling for yourself:

Much love & Sweepiebum kisses

Hello...remember me???

Hello, hello!! I'm back, did you miss me?? I missed you. Thank you to everyone that's left such warming comments for me in my absence...and while I said I was going to stay off of the computer (which I did do very well I think) I did check sites & messages on my phone still - you can take the internet away from the girl (...but only if she doesn't sneak a smart phone up her sleeve or under her pillow lol) still it did mean that if you sent me a message I did read it, so thank you to everybody for being so supportive (right down from the tips of my toes!)

So what's been happening in Jennibellie-land? Well creatively not much. I was actually away longer than I had intended; first I was very unwell and wanted to do nothing but watch tv shows on the sofa (I even brought all the twilight movies to watch consecutively in bed like a teenager lol). Then when I started to feel better physically I still just felt so drained in everything else; I was creatively burned out. This page below was the only art journal page I did during the whole of my absence, done after Margaret Thatcher died:

As you can tell not very 'arty', it is just a sketch on an already-painted background and A LOT of writing. And writing is what I mainly did as a creative release, because while I felt emotionally drained my mind was just going crazy - it did not seem to recognise that my hands were not willing to comply so gave me about 50 ideas for new projects a day (or may be it did realise & tried to overcompensate!), either way it was driving me nuts. So I wrote everything down in the hopes these ideas would leave me alone (yeah right!). But writing still proved useful, and through recognising this, and the fact that I just did not feel like physically creating anything I started to write other things. It worked at calming down my whirling brain by giving it a singular creative focus, and within a week or so, I had completed my first brand new zine in years:

jennibellie's journals - my new zine

It is my first perzine (personal zine) and was one of the most cathartic experiences I've ever been through; I think not only because of the emotional toils I was revisiting on the page, but also because of my current emotionally low plateau. Either way it helped, like extracting something poisonous you didn't even know was stinging you. This zine is about the secrets behind the journal page (or more specifically behind my journal pages) - the life, the experiences, the heartaches, the fears etc. There's more info on why I wrote it from this 'who, what, why' page from the actual zine:

if you want to read it click on it I'm sure it'll become bigger

So I'm pretty pleased I managed to 'create' something while still listening to myself and not actually creating anything lol. The zine isn't available yet, but I have sent it off to be professionally printed so I'll let you know when it's available if you're interested in reading it. Speaking of, I said I would say when the hard copies of my Prompted Art Journals are ready for sale, and finally as of today are they in:

click the pic

So other than hand-making the matching envelopes to go with journals I've not done much arty hands-on stuff more recently either. The most I have done is over a pre-arranged art weekend with a friend (this last weekend just gone) and in showing her how to make things I did feel a bit of my spark did come back. I made my studio a bit prettier and recorded some footage for a new video to do with art spaces - not nearly with the same amount of gusto or huge creative dose as I might have usually though. The thing about creativity is I know myself the times when I just have to park my butt and force it through, and I know the other times when I just have to wait for it to come back to me as it pleases - and this has been one of those latter times. And the constant flow of ideas shows me that if you are a creative, then that never totally leaves you, even when you have to take a break.

Uh! So long blog-post...but I'm back. Gimme a little time to settle back in (yes it's weirdly disorientating coming back after going 'offline' for a while - like taking a long holiday somewhere then having to get used to your regular home routine again lol) but I'll see you soon =)

much love

ps Sweepie missed you too

'where'd you go???'

Series of Simple Wordy Journal Pages

Hi guys, I've not had much time to journal over the last couple of days, but really felt like I have needed to. Whatever is on my chest needs to come off so I've been doing it through these fast-forming journal pages.

They have come together without much thought, and this one above without much process either: just some black ink and watercolour.

I like simple journaling, especially if I need to figure out feelings rather than arty techniques: it helps keep the focus on thoughts and develops an emotional journey through journaling, similar to the process you go through with a written diary. This last one is this evenings:

not sure if it's finished yet but under the butterfly is a little booklet that flips out, like a written diary and through which I shed a tear as I wrote ~ which I have not done in years...so clearly I need this little stint of focus on words rather than art. Then I can be cleansed enough to want to insert the art back in again...as I always do =)

Have a nice weekend, Jennibellie xx