The Documented Life Project Planner

As I told you in a previous post I have joined The Documented Life Project (on Facebook and Flickr). This is a completely free project and you can work in any planner you like. However I choose to buy the exact same planner as most people use, a large, soft cover (5 x 8.1/4") Moleskine one. The outside of this is plain black and thus a bit boring. Fortunately the organisers of the Project have the solution and for the very reasonable prize of $12 there is a class telling you how to alter it. You can find it here.

I started with the intention of following it to the letter but it seems I'm simply incapable of following simple instructions and find it necessary to go off on a sort of tangent while keeping to the idea of the class. I was further hampered by the fact that in warmer climes things dry so quickly that you can do most of this in one session while the Scottish weather dictates that you do it in stages in order for stuff to dry properly, and even then airing cupboards have to be involved.

So I only barely had my planner painted by the time the Project started on the 1st. Now I just need to do the first assignment (and would you believe it, I again diverted from the brief!) which you will get to see in the coming days. I'm very pleased I have this Project to photograph as the world outside is as far from photogenic as it is possible to be. It's wet and extremely windy! So indoor photography projects are very welcome.

I've shown you some close-up details so you can see the underlying texture which was applied into the original gesso, that formed the base layer for all the other painting and stencilling. I sealed my planner with clear gesso as I had used a lot of watercolour oil pastels which smear rather badly if left to their own devices. 

You will see a lot more of this project over the course of this year and there is still plenty of time to sign up and come along for the ride.