Art Journaling

I don't know about you but I have been keeping myself so busy and trying so hard to be ok about Corona for my kids that I have not been dealing with my feelings about it at all. I have been cleaning, cooking, researching (getting ready to teach preschool online), looking after kids and just generally sticking my head in the sand.  Then last week a friend of mine posted a video on art journaling and I was inspired by it. So I tried it and I tried it with my kids. It gave us something fun to do together and I thought that that was enough.

Then I went shopping out in the big bad Corona world and I came home feeling totally overwhelmed. I barked at my kids and my husband and then switched on the TV to house shows to calm down. But it didn't work the feelings were still there. Then I remembered the art journal that I have started that afternoon. So I grabbed it and some pastels and just started drawing. When I felt that was done I still had feelings left over so I wrote a poem.

This process really helped me get my feelings out and calm down. I have noticed how the art journal is helping me to release my feelings that I had been storing up behind a dam wall in my mind and heart. That dam wall would definitely have broken at some point if I hadn't found the art journaling.

I'm sure like me lots of you moms (and dads) are holding onto your feelings so that your kids won't be more scared, worried and frightened that they are already. So why not try art journaling as an outlet or infact a journal of any kind. Not only will it release those pent up feelings but it will be a great part of your remembering of this time.

You don't need a lot of things to begin this just a blank book and some things to draw with but here is what I am using:

Acrylic paints (left over from art class)
Fine liners
Old magazines
Scissors
Modge podge (not the real thing its actullay just watered down wood glue and it works like a charm)
A hair dryer (because who can wait for paint to dry)

Here are a few examples from my journal for inspiration.