Joy Journal Project - Assignment 3

For the last several months, I have been participating in The Joy Journal Project. August has been a hard month for me -- physically, emotionally, spiritually . . . so I wasn't sure I would get this entry done. However, after a good chat with my husband about why I need to create art (with him giving me the reasons, me questioning the value at this point in my life!), I used a free afternoon to do this spread, which was to include the use of a silhouette. I started the spread without any clear direction because the assignment was to reflect on myself as a child and myself now, and I just didn't know where to go with that. As I was creating random layers (starting with maps of places I have lived over the years), I heard a lyric in a song, "the girl with the dream in her eyes." That reminded me of something one of my teachers had inscribed in a book he'd given me at the end of the school year: "To Paula, with the sunshine of hope in her eyes." (I found the book on my shelf just to make sure I remembered correctly!)  The recollection actually made me cry in light of how desperately I've been hanging onto Hope this past year, and how people have commented on how my hopeful spirit has blessed them. It was humbling and encouraging and altogether uplifting to know that the Sonshine of Hope can still be seen in my eyes. 

So my teacher's words directed the rest of my spread. The profile picture was taken just after my cancer diagnosis last fall, and the picture from which I cropped my eyes was taken the same day. A wee bit of photo editing gave me the variations in the eye images. I think they're kinda cool. The unedited ones in the top left corner remind me of my eyes as a child when I see them without my face. (Funny that ;)

The gold-glittered silhouette, I decided, represents my spirit. I didn't plan it that way -- but that's how it turned out in my mind. (The word in the black box that I squared off from the text papers I used says "resurrection"! ;)

I chose to also include the profile from which the silhouette was made (I just traced around it), but I wanted to use a mix of the plain photograph (back of my head, earring, left shoulder) with a painted picture (below), so I just painted the rest of the photo with acrylics. (Doing that makes me feel like a skilled artist cuz that's pretty much what I looked like when the photo was taken ;) 

Butterflies make me think of new life and hope, so they seemed like appropriate embellishments to finish the spread (along with some black splatter to tie everything together ;)

I think this is one of my favourite journal spreads so far. I was slow getting started with it because I wasn't sure what to do, but once I got started, things began to fall together and I really enjoyed the process, though it really did tucker me out! LOL (I like to work start to finish in one sitting as much as possible.) 

Now for next month's challenge, which will be posted on Sunday. If you think you'd like to join in, don't hesitate to jump in! (At my rate, I likely won't have it done until it's almost October! But it doesn't matter, does it?!)