That being said, I want to show what I did and, just maybe, get the ball of creativity rolling again.
I had been fascinated with altered books for quite a while, but needed to just jump in there and TRY it! I found a book - not the best binding for this but, I didn't like the philosophy of the author and wanted to make the volume worthwhile to me, somehow.
I started by removing every other page. Yes, you take a craft knife with a sharp blade and get in there and desecrate a book! This is truly the hardest part for me. I tend to get distracted by most printed material and cutting up a book just seems wrong. However, that is part of the process. I now have a stack of printed pages to used in some other project!
I had no idea of what to do next, so I opened the book, skipping a couple of pages and started pasting in paper. I journaled a bit and decorated it a bit and called it done!
Interesting - maybe, maybe not BUT it was done! I proceeded for several days, hiding out in my studio, pasting and painting and writing whatever connected to to what I had done.
Gesso on the pages, paint and then stenciled... and then I extended the page out and did it some more. I used copy paper for the extension and was surprised to discover that, after an application of gesso to both sides of the page, it is quite substantial. The lightweight paper adds much less bulk to the page than cardstock would.
On another page, I admonished myself to USE IT UP before buying any more supplies...
That didn't last too long.
In my hunt for supplies to use up, I tried absorbent grounds - liked that a lot!
The last page I finished was about what have heard my Amsterdam cousin talk about many times... about awakening in the morning to the sound of the neighborhood lark. She lives on a canal and most birds don't make it their home - but the lark is faithful, even in the midst of water and cement.
A challenge to myself is to re-start this book's alterations. And, to complete at least one watercolor in the next week or so. I have been back working on getting my watercolor brain to wake up again - not as easy as I expected. Since I got sick, carrying a thought long enough to finish it has been even more of a problem for me than it ever has been before. Creativity is something that I never had a real problem with before but this kind of infection leaves you with all kinds of interesting challenges. There seems to be a strange disconnect between my thought process and what my hand does. If I don't really think about it much and just dip my brush in paint, my hand seems to know what to do. The challenge is to actually do it!
ps. If any of you want to see other photos of the book, The flickr page is at https://www.flickr.com/photos/79481680@N00/sets/72157631316606050/
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