enJOY it by Elise Blaha Cripe

GOventure : treading water.

Treading water.

It's like staying afloat. I think of treading water as what you do to keep going. Like drinking coffee. Or praying. Or making friends. Or working at a job. It seems like you tread water temporarily, but really, it's ongoing. You are always treading water. Moving and working. Fighting and keeping your head up.

I tread water by making stuff. And I kept afloat for this prompt by making a journal out of everything I could find that was blue. With a little bit of khaki and white thrown in. Why a journal? Why not? For writing. For treading. For thinking and growing.

At first it was going to be for me, but then I realized I have 700 projects and another journal is not necessary. So now it can be yours. It's thicker and larger than most of my paper books and the $25 price tag reflects that.

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Thank you, Kal for this challenge. This was a good first GOventure for us, no? I have to say, I have a lot more time and a lot less little ones that need to be cared for so triple arm pump to YOU for making it through. Let's do it again.

And thank you, Blogland for reading and playing along. Such cool stuff. It helps to have a little challenge and project to get you going.

My GOventure art pieces from Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday are available for purchase. ($40). Please email me if you are interested. And thanks for the suggestion of letterpressing the song + dance print. I LOVE THAT IDEA.

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And more thanks for your support in my UPdate on Wednesday. My next shop update is tentatively scheduled for July 22. There will be many more mixed paper books as those are quite the hot sellers. Also maybe more big handbound journals. [there is another one still available.] And all the rest. I would love to have 1000 sales on etsy by November. That means I have 374 to go. I better start thinking.

Look for another post later today for how I used my art journal kit.

GOventure : song + dance.

This one. Oh this one. It was a challenge. But yesterday morning, I started thinking of song lyrics about dancing. Or singing worked too. And I typed them up. The result is a random mash-up that reads a bit like a strange poem. And that works for me. And I threw some of the Journey song they sing in Glee up there. Because nothing says song + dance like glee.

Go see what Kal made. And thank you for playing along this week. Tomorrow, Friday, it's all about treading water.

GOventure : pocket.

Pocket. Pocket. When we were tossing phrases and challenges around it was like a quest to see who could be more random. Pockets are random. They are not really something you think about, but something you are happy to have. They are a feat of engineering really. They are the only thing that would make my wedding dress even more perfect.
As I turned this one over and over, I thought a lot about making pockets on a piece of paper. Each one would hold something different. I have a bunch of small glassine envelopes that seemed perfect for the task. The pockets on the paper remind me a bit of a quilt. All unique, but coming together to form something cohesive.

The pocket art needed a word. I thought about the expression "in my back pocket." What does that mean? The thing in your back pocket is your go to. Something to rely on. Something you can keep hidden from view until the right moment. It is your secret weapon. What's in my back pocket? Love? Faith? Art? Glee? Chance? I couldn't settle on a term that seemed right until : GO. I have GO in my pocket. It's my make it work, my get it done. My drive. My GO. Kal also has a lot of GO. That might be why we get along and it is certainly why she is so inspiring.

Tomorrow we are going to get rolling on song + dance. I have to spin in circles and come up with an idea for this one. Please continue to join in if you would like!

GOventure : not my type.

Type is my favorite part of design. I love fonts. I love combining text. I love using typefaces to tell stories and make art. So for me, this prompt was all about actual type.
My favorite key on the keyboard is the ampersand. It's simple, yet sophisticated. It is the glue that holds words & thoughts together. I love how with each typeface, the shape of the ampersand changes.

So I knew my piece for this challenge would revolve around the "&". Then I just needed something to go with it. Forever & Ever made sense. Especially because the opposite of someone who is not your type is someone who is yours forever and ever.

To make this piece, I printed an ampersand (the font is Century) and then used it as a template to cut out pieces of text from magazines. I trimmed the magazine sections to fit around the shape of the ampersand and mounted them down on gray cardstock so the ampersand would appear in the negative space.
The "forever" and "ever" are the font Minstral and I used detail scissors to trim them out of black cardstock.

Be sure to go see what sort of wonder Kal cooked up today! And if you are playing along, our prompt for tomorrow is pocket.

GOventure : green + dizzy.

When Kal tossed up green + dizzy all I could think of is my favorite word. Twirl. When I was a senior in college, struggling to find a job, my mom sent me a card that had a little girl spinning on the front and the inside read : "sometimes you just gotta twirl."

I believe this. My life, especially right now, is about twirling. Twirling from one project to the next. Twirling in circles until I find a new idea. I love it. If I am able to keep twirling forever and ever and this can be my job, well, SIGN ME UP.

So my piece of art for today became a girl in a green dress. A twirler. I should say that I am not a painter. I do not like how little control my hands have over the brush. I find painting non-abstract things difficult and awkward. But I didn't know how else to make a girl in a green dress. So I sketched her in colored pencil on cardstock that I letterpressed three times with "she believed in a good twirl." I added water to the paper and the colored pencil became water color. I then added the text with a black pen. And stamped over the top with a watermark stamp.

(After I was done I realized that green + dizzy could also mean nauseous. I am glad this was not the first thing that popped into my head.)

I will not be painting for the rest of the prompts. But this was a good challenge. Thank you, Kal for adventure number one. See you tomorrow with the next prompt : not my type. Game on. GO.