Collage & Art Journaling for Fun

I am a planner and love decorating pages in my calendar. I have never had any desire to utilize an electronic calendar, because it would never work with my creative mind. Every month I create a collage in my weekly planner according to a color pallet or theme.  I also collage randomly in an art journal when I'm feeling inspired by something I have seen or heard. There is so much inspiration around us everywhere and it can all be translated into something creative using almost any medium of choice. Today, I'm focusing on paper collaging, using magazines, scrapbook paper, notecards, stickers, washi tape, tags, etc.

This first collage was created just last week. I had gotten in some new pads of paper and couldn't wait to cut pieces of them out and create my own layout. The window, chair and wheel caught my attention right away and from there it all came together beautifully. I actually created this on a blank piece of cardstock, then glued it into my art journal.

The collection of photos below includes items from my planner, and the cover of my art journal (top left). The bottom left t was created in January to highlight my word for the year and what I wanted to CREATE as the year progressed. In February, I took on the challenge of weaving together four separate magazine photos, look closely and see if you can determine what's there.

In this collection of photos, I have included my manifesto for the year as well as a few other collages and a couple art journal pages. I think my favorite is the feather, which was created with small bits of magazine scraps. The center right was just created a few days ago. It was a start and restart process till I was satisfied with the outcome.  Something I think we all need to be reminded of, is it's always okay to start over or walk away and come back when inspiration is fresh and renewed.

Lately, I've been working on not giving up on something just because it doesn't seem to be working out the way I envisioned Sometimes it's just a matter of reevaluating how I'm going about the process and the steps I'm taking. Have you ever caught yourself doing something one way, then realized you could accomplish what you want if you changed the steps or medium being used?