Smile and relax - Creative endeavors in 2016

Hopefully everyone has had a great start of the new year. 2016 for me began a bit rough, as the coffee machine decided to break down on january 1st (and oh boy, how I do need coffee in the mornings to be coherent) but things can get only better wish a fresh new coffee machine (which is exactly like the old one, why change a winning formula?) to start off the new year, right? My mantra for the new year will be Smile and Relax. And so far I have been telling that to myself quite often in the start of the new year because things do not always go as planned...

First entry of the year in my midori pocket notebook... Also week 53? Did we somehow end up getting an extra week last year? No complaints, it was a relaxed one for sure!

I also was pondering on my creative endeavors for 2016 and I decided to start up an Art Journal, which I have never done before. I was given a sized leather bound blank book by friends for my birthday last year and I decided it would be perfect to use it for this purpose. So in the weekend I crafted about a bit and done a few pages.

The journal is a bit bigger than A5 size and has 100 double spread pages. So I'm not doing a 365 challenge, but more a "when inspiration hits me" kind of thing and I want to do something else than mail art.The field notes booklet is there to 'catch' excessive ink off the rubber stamps.

The first page is a collage piece from my 'junk box' where I keep all excess random papers. It has a few inspiring quotes as you can see. I especially like "the time to be happy is now" - and am trying to be mindful of the fact, that all we have is NOW.

A while back I made these marbles pages and have a ton of them. I finally have a place to put in the pages which I made and want to keep, like this one.Decorated the edges with masking tape. Great excuse to use more of what I have. Also something I am trying to implement this year.

When I make mail art sometimes I have a 'high production' as I make random envelopes and pages to set aside and work on them later. A few of those envelopes I found hard to mail away and the ones I have gathered in my to keep folder I will be incorporating in my art journal like I have above. The stag is a stencil I have used before, but the colors on the envelope just came out so nicely I wanted to keep it. Also I added a bit of humor to it :) The mustache is also from a masking tape I have.

The plan is to work on my art journal when I feel inspired to do so and hopefully it will be full with creative pages by the end of the year. But I want to go about it organically and not fret about it. Found a great quote by Salvador Dali to inspire me, which I have put in my daily writing journal (also something I have started recently)...

To an ex-perfectionist, this is very comforting and instead of creating something that will be 'perfect' (which it never is) I want to focus on the process of creating itself more. The Dali stamp is from Carmen's Veranda and I have a post coming up on using this stamp and quote for a 'tip in' in my Art Journal.

So there you have it, my creative endeavors for this year. Am curious to know what yours are! Leave a comment if you are going to try something new as well (or continuing something old ;) 

Thanks for stopping by!

namaste