Celebrating New Beginnings

This is the last page in my first art journal.  That is cool in itself but for me it's much more. I began this Art Journal in Oct. 2012. That's five years to the month the my life as I had known it changed.  

I didn't create art for those five years. I was learning how to take care of myself by myself.  I was learning who I am and seeing how very capable I am.  

Farmers let some fields rest before planting a new crop.  They need to build back their nutrients. That is what I did during those five years.  I was building my strength, my confidence, my ability to love me and be happy in my own company.

I was a little scared the day I started this journal.  I didn't know if I still had the ability to create.  What if there was nothing left inside me to be expressed with ink and paint?  One of the things I learned in those five years is how to ask for help. 

I went looking on line and I found Daisy Yellow  when I googled art journaling.  Tammy at Daisy Yellow has prompts for art journalers.  I did those for a while.  It got the juices flowing.  I joined her Facebook Group and met many other art journalers.   

The rest as they say is history..... I started posting my work on DY and on my blog.  I meet some great people and I began a FB group called Mixed Media Madness (M3).  We share ideas about all kinds of Mixed Media projects: ATC, Altered Books, Book Making, Mail Art, Art Journals... pretty much anything that you can make with paper.  I also joined The Mail Artist Corner.  It's fun to receive beautiful art in the mail from time to time.

I also found other online art groups that have been very helpful and encouraging to me.  Artist Play Room, The Sketchbook Challenge, A Year in the Life of an Art Journal and Creative Every Day are the ones I participate in regularly.  They are all groups where artist share their work and encourage each other.  

During the past seven months I also began working in an Altered Book, a handmade messy book, a things that fly book and a handmade inclusion book.  That Art Journal really got my muse in gear. Finishing this Art Journal is new beginning for me.  I'll continue to work in those other books and I'll begin another art journal but this one is special because it represents the rebirth of my muse and the rebirth of my confidence of my ability to be an artist.  Today, I am celebrating my New Beginnings.

Linked to Artist Play Room,  A Year in the Life of an Art Journal and Creative Every Day