Me, me, me, me...

...mine, mine, mine, mine, now, now, now, now! (Points if you know the movie and the character...)

I need to use myself more in my journals than I do. I tend to shy away from pictures of myself because I don't like them. I'm not a very photogenic person - some people are, some aren't. Also, most people are terrible photographers. Sorry, but it's true. So I'm going to take more of myself. Happy, silly, goofball. Just more. And I'm going to journal them.
This one is on a Margarita Monday (you might recognize it, since I blogged it that night) and it surprised me how much I needed this particular Margarita Monday. I don't think our friends came (Tim and I try to have other people join us for MM) so I was just me, Tim, and Mini. But I don't think I'd been out of the house in over a week (I don't have a car) and I was cranky but not in a snappy way - I wasn't cranky with anyone or anything in particular, I wasn't taking it out on anyone - I just had a bit of cabin fever but I didn't realize it. I didn't really want to go out, I just wanted to sit in my art room and putz, but once we were actually out and having food and fun, I realized how much I needed it and it surprised me.

Margarita You Suck Monday!

December Calendar

Still participating in the calendar project! It's just pages in my regular (Moleskine sketch) journal.

Background

Date circles

Completed!

Kelly and I made our pages together, and we were thinking circles could be fun this month. She has the coolest punches! I wonder if we can do something else interesting for January? Anyway, the ages are REALLY shimmery and none of the glues we were trying worked so we used regular old Elmer's. To make my circles lay flat, I closed my journal and sat on it - an advanced technique I often use when I'm making journals. Sure, I could stack heavy things on top of it, but a hundred-fifty pound chick is even better.

Oh, and the circles are randomly applied with no dates on them yet. We're just going to pick a circle we like that day and put the date on it.

Teesha Project

OK, I've been purposely NOT telling you this...I don't know why except I really feel like my ideas are mostly stupid and I don't want like putting myself out there. But I've been working on this for days and now I kinda want to post pictures. So, my thought is this - back in the day artists would study and mimick other artists, trying to capture their style EXACTLY. These days, we're all about "originality" and "doing our own thing". On that note, I had coffee, mini oreos, and mint M&M's for breakfast.

So, there are TONS of artists out there whose style I admire from afar, maybe attempt to make something kind of similar and fail and then tell myself they're more "talented" than I am and that I just can't do something like they can and blah, blah, blah. But really, they have just developed into their style. They practiced at it and worked at it and perfected it. There's no reason I can't do the same thing. I convinced Kelly to do it with me. The idea is to spend a month working in the style of each artist that we like (I have a list) and we're starting with Teesha Moore. I have tried several times to make journals in Teesha's style, but sort of making it my own and I've hated every single one. So instead I'm going to work like she says to. I'm using magazines (not scrapbook paper), I'm cutting up faces (not drawing them). I have Sharpie poster paints and PanPastels and Copic Markers. I didn't make my journal with Fabriano Artistico paper like she does, and I used the paints she hates because I like matte finish better than gloss or satin. Other than those small changes, I'm going to channel my inner Teesha.

This is the front:I've since added a bit of shading with PanPastel and plan to add the title "A Month Of Odd"

I really like this one

Using bottles as bodies seems fun to me, and she needed something else so I gave her wings.
This one's head is on backward - I love it!
Yes, that does say "goddess" - aren't we all?

I'm not sure if I'm having fun. It doesn't really seem like it. I don't get the satisfaction out of this kind of work that I do when I've drawn something, but it might be just that I'm not used to collage. (Kelly says I'm "collage retarded".) I wonder if this experiment is going to teach me that it can be more fun to admire someone's work from afar than to try and create it myself, no matter how much I love it? I mean, if these pages were straight out of Teesha's journals, would I like them because I'm not the one who created them? I'm not sure. The next step for these pages is pen work, and then lettering. I re-watched all of Teesha's YouTube videos and that's what she says to do - and she's the boss.

Layouts

These should have been posted sooner, but I'm a slacker!

For this one I used Ahhh Scrap's November Collab kit.

For this one, "Unique" by Kiki Designs

For this one "Bits and Pieces" by Piccolina

And last, "C-Stars" by Stanger Girls

All of these kits are available for purchase at Ahhh Scrap.

What is important?

I think it's so easy for people to get a little bit preachy about this subject. Everyone wants to think they're so enlightened and un-materialistic, but I find this to rarely be true. A lot of people want designer bags/jeans/shoes just because there's a name on it. If you research, you'll find out there's no difference between the way a pair of jeans is made whether you paid $100 or $10 for them. Personally, I'm a $10 pair of jeans kind of chick. I don't wear makeup, I don't own a hairbrush, I usually make my purses. I have a cousin whose dog has a Coach raincoat.

The thing is - I adore this cousin. We're great friends. She doesn't care that I made my purse out of thrift store ties and I don't care that she paid $300 (on clearance) for hers. She is a loving wife and mother and an amazing friend. She teaches children with emotional and behavior disorders and she loves it. Is she a bad person because she likes Coach? Am I because yesterday I spent all day in gym pants and a hoodie? No and no. We just think different things are WORTH our money. I don't think ANY purse is worth $300 but I don't think LESS of you if you do. People will talk on and on about how other people look down on them for being thrift store shoppers and wearing old clothes and blah, blah, blah - but they do the same thing, judge people who like expensive things. I like video games and I have lots of them (more than you would think possible, trust me). I pay $17 for my Moleskine journals and $2/pencil for my Prismacolors. Two dollars is not a lot of money - but for ONE pencil? It's absurdly expensive. Ridiculous. But I've had the pants I'm wearing for at least five years, probably longer.

Stanley

OMG, people, tell me you've missed me because I have MISSED YOU! OK, what I've really missed is wifi. My parents HAVE wifi - they're pretty technologically competent people. But something is wrong with it. Getting a computer to be able to use it is almost impossible. Their computers work just fine, and my old laptop did as well...it's adding a new one to the mix that doesn't work. Even with the correct WEP key, and sitting less than a foot away from the access point my computer could barely get "little or no connectivity". I did a couple of mobile updates, which makes me happy, but I hate that I can't put a title in on a mobile post and then I have to try and use Safari on my iPhone and blah, blah, blah, pain in the ass. Anyway, I have TONS to tell you and a million pictures, but let's start with Flat Stanley. My friend Kelly was JUST talking about Stanley and then I get to my mom's and what do I see?This Stanley belongs to my first cousin once removed, Albert. (That's the child of your first cousin, if you're wondering - no they're not your second cousins.) He sent his Stanley to my mom, who was supposed to take Stanley on an adventure of some kind and then return him, along with the story of what they did. Instead, I stole Stanley for the weekend.

First, we helped make Thanksgiving dinner.

Then we went Black Friday shopping.
No, it is NOT 3am - it's about 9pm and we're on a movie hunt. We didn't find what we were looking for, but Stanley's first Black Friday experience was a pleasant one.Saturday we went to the beach.And Stanley met some friends.On Sunday, he watched some football.And what did Stanley do on Sunday? Well, he went
to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, of course! He met Mr. Olllivander,drank some butterbeer,met some visiting witches and wizards who came for the Triwizard Tournament,and went shopping at Zonko's joke shop.
(OK, is it ME or does this dude look like Mr. Weasley from the movies? I know the picture is bad, but he had the nose and everything.)Monday Stanley had dinner with some friends.

I took about 70 pictures with Stanley for my cousin's project and I'm hoping my sister in law will help my mom scrapbook them - I bought some supplies before I left, but I didn't have time to put the book together. I hope Liam has to do projects like this for school, Stanley will go visit Aunt Tami in London!