Jourdling?

Last night was our monthly art journal club meeting at Bizzy B, our third one since the group began in June.  The theme for last night was Zentangle and someone on the store's website used the term "jourdling" to describe a combination of journalling and doodling - very clever. 

First Joanne gave us a demonstration of pop-ups and showed us her royalty themed journal page, which she described as featuring a king (Elvis), a princess (Diana) and a "queen" (Elton John).  I must point out that Joanne is actually ahead of schedule, as royalty is the theme for next month's meeting but she is going to miss that session so she jumped ahead.  With amazing results, as far as I am concerned!

The page flipped up to demonstrate three different styles of pop up techniques.

Here's a close up of one of the pop up demos she brought along to share with us:

She also brought along a very cool Spiderman pop up book that we all found very entertaining!

Then Suzan gave us a demonstration of how to use a Cuttlebug tool to emboss patterns on paper.

After that, we went around the table and everyone who wanted to, showed their pages.  I didn't get everyone's name or specific permission to post their pages here on my blog, but I have to tell you, some of the pages were absolutely stunning.

Bizzy B's owner Barb finally bought herself a journal book and proudly showed us her page, while dressed in an appropriate outfit:

My friend Marilyn did this colourful page (one of several she completed for this month's challenge):

Here's a picture of some of the gang checking out one of the group's pages:

As you may know from a blog post from last year, I doodled my first Zentangle back in Nov 2010. Since then, I haven't done much and I'm still a bit intimidated by the whole process but I did start a journal page on the weekend, using watercolour paper and a Sharpie poster paint pen (black, extra fine point).  I didn't have a chance to finish it but here's what it looks like right now:

It's a bit of a sampler.  I tried a number of different patterns, using a Zentangle Basics book I bought at Art & Soul earlier this year, and wrote the name of the pattern on the edge of the border for future reference.

I find the big spaces a bit daunting, it seems like a lot to fill in with just one repetitive pattern.  But it is enjoyable, very relaxing and meditative as you're doing it.

Once again, it was amazing to see the quality of artwork created by my fellow artists and the variety of styles on display.  Thanks for sharing, everyone!