Week 15: Favorite Things
Welcome to Week 15. This week we’re art-journaling FAVORITES. What are some of your favorite things?
If you’re new here, check out Week 1, to make your journal, and this journey your own.
If you’d like to watch this week’s video prompt first, scroll on down…
Small Art & Journaling
This week we’re combining our arting and writing to cover two pages with some of our favorite things.
You can doodle, draw, color, paint, collage, whatever works to make a record of some of your favorite things.
My plan was to do little doodles, with some added colored-pencil color. But I also wanted to start with COLORS. I love color.
I figured I’d use some acrylic paint in my first little favorite entry… because… color… And I’m still a little obsessed with my Liquitex Basics dioxazine purple acrylic. Not only do I like the color, I like the texture compared to my cheaper, thinner, craftier bottles of acrylics I use most.
And then I was looking at some of the tape I peeled from last week’s painting… hmmm… COLOR… Fun color… And I love those colorful pieces of tape… And I want to use them for more fun art… PERFECT! And definitely FUN…
What’s your favorite…
To be honest, I don’t actually have a favorite color. It varies with my mood. And why have just one? Which is why the first of my favorite things that came to mind—surrounded by art supplies and ready to art-journal some of my favorite things—was COLOR. If you have a favorite color, feel free to start with that. Or whatever else popped to mind when I asked about your favorite things.
How would you like to represent your favorites? I didn’t use one method. I did try the sketchy thing I had in mind, but it just wasn’t working for me. I ended up playing with paint and collaging with my painted paper. That’s what was working. And, hey, another favorite thing to do: play with color, and then see what I can do with pieces.
Write as you go
Write about your favorites as you art them… Maybe you can art-journal some favorite memories. Or refer to them to explain why something is your favorite. There’s also no need to explain everything. Sometimes there isn’t an explanation to give for things that are our favorites, at least not an easily articulated one. Sometimes we just like what we like. They spark something in us.
Journal some things that spark your soul.
Lake Ontario was the second of my favorites I put on my page. I decided to experiment with the fun simple print-making from Week 13, with acrylic colors like those I’ve seen at various beaches in various weather. For the base I used some interesting surface-protecting paper I’d kept. And I used some brown packaging paper as the funky printing plate. Then I used that on my page, too. As a background for the printed paper cut in wave-like shapes.
My simple little journaling… Lake Ontario… the sight and sound of the waves… led me to BEACHCOMBING… Which brought me to cool rocks… Which is where my tiny sketches, and their inadequate colored-pencil colors, just didn’t capture what I wanted to portray. And that’s okay… Really, it’s okay… even if you’re filming it, and people are going to see it… It’s okay, Melinda… People won’t judge the little rocks… and if they do, well… that’s their problem…
Don’t worry if what you end up with on your page doesn’t look like what’s in your head. We’re more interested in the process than perfection of outcome.
If you missed the video about letting go of perfection, you really should try out that week’s blind contour drawing small art. Or revisit it for some fun. As much as I struggled with the imperfection when forced to do this for art class in the past, it’s one of my FAVORITES now.
Always remember your art journal is yours. You never need show anyone anything in it. Let yourself make the art, and let the art take care of itself.
I next tried to doodle hot showers. And my buttery yellow comforter. Which also means SLEEP. Three of my life’s pleasures.
But I was getting really tired of how it just wasn’t a moment that doodling specific things was working for me.
So back to collaging… a favorite thing.
Looked through some scraps. Collaged walking in the woods. At least that’s what it means to me. And used a fun scrap that reminded me of a birch or aspen trunk. More favorites. Favorite types of trees… then TREES in general!
Next I’ll finish FLOWERS… I ran out of time, Friends.
Let’s fill our pages.
All those things
Our favorite things are part of our identity. We love them because of who we are, and they inform who we are.
What do your favorite things say about you? In what ways have they become part of who you are? What effect do they have on you?
All of our favorite things are reasons to be grateful. And maybe today’s small art and journaling will be an act of gratitude. We all need to remember how much there is to be grateful for.
Sometimes that’s hard.
When we experience the anhedonia of depression, the dampening or deadening of our ability to feel pleasure, it’s difficult to remember we have favorite things, that life can be enjoyable. It’s important to remind ourselves that those feelings pass, that lack of feeling passes. We won’t always feel numb. The world won’t always be gray.
However you’re feeling, take some time to record and express some of your favorites, some things that bring you joy, that give you pleasure, that brighten your life.
And thank you again for the opportunity to encourage you to reclaim your creativity and establish a healthy habit of creative self-care. It’s one of my favorite things.
