The Journey

Discussion of the spiritual message related to this illustration in my Bible can be found in the following blog posts: Teach Me and He Means It.  As usual, on this blog, I discuss the creative process itself.

This page was created without gesso or other page prep.  The illustration was hand drawn.  Since hand drawing is not my strength, I practiced on scraps of paper that were the same size as the margin.  When I had the path the way I wanted it, I slipped the scrap under the page and traced it onto the Bible page - easy to do since Bible pages are so thin.  I then drew in the lettering.  Both path and letters were drawn with my Zig Millennium Pen.  I colored in the letters with my Zig Scroll & Brush Markers.  

Next, I colored the grass, path, and sky with pastel chalks - applying them with a small stiff brush.  Using several colors helped give depth.  I was careful to leave the main portion of the sun blank (fortunately stray chalk marks erase pretty easily if done right away).  I colored in the sun with watercolor pencils & blended a bit with Wink of Stella. 

I wanted flowers, so added some Flower Jewel Dazzles (HOTP) and drew in stems for them with a Scroll and Brush marker.   I also added a few small flowers on the main words I wanted to highlight.  Note that the word "WAY" is drawn with arrows to emphasize the word's meaning.

I found there was more I wanted to journal about than easily fit on the margin, so I added a "tip-in":

As you can probably tell, I stamped an image on patterned paper and added words with my Millennium pen.  The ink bled through pretty badly (I had used a new ink pad - Celebrations hybrid ink), so I used a rectangle of Elizabeth Crafts double-sided adhesive to adhere it to another piece of the same patterned paper.  Then I added it to my Bible using coordinating washi tape.  Here you see it open with the start of some journaling:

As you can see, I used the washi tape on both the outside and the inside to make the hinge more sturdy.