Wednesday, February 18, 2009

What Starbucks Has To Do With Journaling

Okay so this coffee wasn't from Starbucks but you get the idea. I actually took this photo in Iowa City at a little cool coffee bar/bookstore.


This is my little travel journal that actually matches two other journals out there in journal land. All three were made ahead of time before attending a journal marathon with two other friends that lasted for several days and nights in Chicago. The best way to journal is to set aside uninterrupted time with friends and stay up all night feeding off of each others ideas. Bring lots of junk food, a sewing machine and little journal type goodies to share with each.
I decided to combine this Chicago book with my trip to Portland since they were within weeks of each other. I knew I would never get two books made so combining them seemed to be the next best thing. Making your travel journals smaller gives you more of a chance to finish them before your next trip. I don't just talk about my trips in these journals. Whatever is going on in my life while I am working on them goes in there too. Otherwise it gets very boring and I loose interest.
My stuffed full book is a representation of my life, it includes, trips, writing, photos, thoughts, dreams and sketches. It is combined because our lives are combined. Get it? and yes I just realized I did use the word combine 5 times in this paragraph. ( I highlighted them so you don't have to go back and search. )

Now here is the deal-e-o about Starbucks. When I travel I always look for two places to shoot pictures. Anthropologie and Starbucks. From their displays to color choices to the style of graphics used I glean off of this for my pages. And since I live in a cow town these two places have become something I miss. I took this photo of the coffee cup on a wall in Starbucks. Look very carefully at all the little details around the cup. The dots, triangles, lines, how the cup is drawn, ect. It is very simple but there is a lot of bits and pieces you can take home to your pages.

This is a clip from a insert for my pages that I attached with masking tape. Using masking tape I made a primitive tab on the end and simply wrote Bits and Pieces, which is really what the coffee image is all about.
Another clip off of a larger page shows charcoal scribbling a rough sketch of a coffee cup. I mooshed it around with my fingers to make it look blurry and messy. Then I copied those original Starbucks circles and lines with quick strokes using colored pencil and ink. Don't think about it, just scribble quickly.

Now this is the best part. The green dots where done with my fingerprints. Quick uneven prints randomly placed taken from the original circles on the Starbucks ad. Quick lines on the right side with colored pencil. Keeping the background simple leaves more room to write. Then write in and out of your composition. Using various fonts and pens. And there you have it.

8 comments:

Gwen said...

Great to see this glimpse of your journal, I love your ideas and the process you describe.

I'm also glad you are blogging more!

Dreamcicle Journeys said...

Randi, It's fun to see you blogging again and sharing your journals. Paula

DJ said...

I'm swooning.... and your lime coffee sketch almost makes me want to try and start liking coffee. OK almost...

LOVE your journals!!

Anonymous said...

Well Missy...since you love green so much you could always get a Irish Cream coffee for starters.

Anonymous said...

Hey girl! I'm so glad to see you blogging again! I was wondering...did you still want to trade mail art -- we were supposed to last summer, but you disapeared!

HEEE. I do a LOT of journaling at Starbucks. Probably because I'm doing it during my breaks...there's tons of inspiration around there, and working there just helps you to discover more...

randi said...

Sure lets do the mail art thing.

Francie Horton said...

yum! the journal pics are even more delicious than the coffee pic.

thank you for the tips.

Tanya said...

so cool!!