journaling in a tent..or field..or the beach even!

It was with some trepidation that I only packed paint, baby wipes, stencils, a Pritt stick and the odd stamp, a couple of book pages and a pencil/pen with me to go camping.

I chose a journal to use, just the one, and as it is an old book it's pages required gessoing.

Now I'm not a fan of gesso.  I like my paint to stay put once I put it on the paper. But being forced to stick with it meant I did have fun, and ended up with some interesting effects.

My pages have been feeling a bit 'samey', and everywhere I looked things seemed very similar, so I started by using parts of hymns or bible verses as starting points and using my journaling as part meditation.

I journaled these pages whilst attending a Christian conference so they have lots of meaning for me but I still didn't feel I'd 'cracked it' as it were.  I used to be able to just enjoy my journaling without feeling it had to mean something or say something.

So I've given myself a bit of a talking to, read some stuff, watched a fantastic video by Jane Davies HERE and am back just enjoying being creative, playing with paint and mark making and seeing where it takes me, if anywhere!