The story behind it is this: As I've mentioned many, many times, at the beginning of July I moved from DC to LA. In the months leading up to this big change I was leaving my job, packing up my apartment, and trying to figure out how to move to the opposite coast (where I'd lived for my entire life and where the vast, vast majority of my family and friends were) and I was having a lot of feelings about it. I wanted a place to work out those feelings, and, of course, making things always helps me with that, so I started a daily art journaling project for myself.
The idea was to make at least one page for the book each day. Not to just decorate a page, but to completely create it - background, writing, etc, all on that day. I then punched holes in each page, and bound them together with book rings, adding a new page or two each day. I'm not exactly sure why I decided to do it this way, I think I thought it would make a cool project and a nice creative challenge. And this way, I could end the book whenever I felt like it. With a pre-bound book I could end up with several blank pages that I didn't feel like filling, or I could fill all of the pages and still want to add more.
Emotionally, my goal with this book was to get really honest about what I was feeling and thinking. I think a lot of the time I'm not really honest with what I write in journals and sketchbooks. I gloss over or downplay or write something vague. I don't think this is because I'm afraid of someone else reading what I've written (let's be real, no one cares what I write about in the many many journals I keep), but more that I'm afraid that writing something down makes it real, or I'm afraid to admit something. But I feel like it is also important for me to get that stuff out. This project also makes a good time capsule of my last days in DC and of my state of mind at a very specific and important time, so hopefully I will like looking back on it one day.
Phew, sorry that was such a long introduction. This project is unique so it needed some explanation. Now, onto some of the pages.