True Colors, OPB and Band Aids

All this, everything that I do and think about doing and am not doing right now because I am writing this, really started in 2002. It started then, but it exploded in 2003 when I had that big fat Lilly grant to study book arts. In early fall of that year, I bought a book called True Colors. Are you familiar with it? It was and remains the definitive book on mixed media art journaling. True Colors introduced me to the work of Teesha Moore, Lynne Perella, Michelle Ward and a small army of other artists. I have continued to follow these ladies over the last 5 years by reading their blogs (OPB - Other People's Blogs)

I was reading Teesha's blog the other day and saw these cool little journals:

http://teeshascircus.blogspot.com/2009/01/having-fun.html

Teesha is the Queen of art journaling. I cannot art journal AT ALL. I try. I determine to do it. I might do a few pages, but then I get caught up in that dreaded J word - JOURNAL - private thoughts and prying eyes - and then I quit. The

little journals on Teesha's blog were too tempting. I made one:

I used an assortment of old boxes, machine stitched together for the cover and a brown paper sack for the pages. I gessoed them before binding to speed up the process. I bound the journal with a simple pamphlet stitch. I started by painting the pages with a coat of acrylic.

It only has 16 pages and it's made out of trash. No pressure. I WILL fill this book.

Maybe.

While I was making the book, I sliced my left index finger with my xacto. My finger slid off the ruler while I was cutting down the pages. I bled on my book.

Ick.