Create colorful journal pages

If you want to create your own colorful notebook this is a tutorial for you. Or it’s more of an inspirational thing than a tutorial, but if you haven’t made colorful journal pages before you’re in for a treat I think. Today you will learn how to create your own very personal and brightly colored pages via two videos. I will give suggestions and then let you loose on this messy process.

You can create directly into a bought notebook or use loose papers (that you can bind together later), what ever you prefer. If neon pink is not your thing, use your own favorite color(s). Paint with coffee brown, sea foam green or use all beige, grays and mauve… Make it your own and have fun.

I love working inside beautiful notebooks and journals, both store bought and the ones I bind myself. I use all kinds of different books all the time, for different purposes. For a while for example, I was obsessed with a kind of colorful documenting my days in a Fauxbonichi notebook. The first one I used was in a found, ruled notebook (like the ones you use in school for writing) but then I decided to make my own to have it be more colorful from the beginning. I wanted to use my own painted papers to make these bright, colorful pages inside. I love this kind of notebook as it inspires me to open it up to any page, and then simply play on that page. That is such a joy to me because I love colors.

I hope these videos will encourage you to play too. Let me know how it goes!

What you will need to follow along:

• for the pages use some thin writing paper, blank or lined – I am using lined paper because I have been given a couple of A4 writing notepads that I wouldn’t otherwise utilize and I like using things that I already have at home.
• any paint you have – I am using acrylic paints but this will work with watercolors as well
• any runny white glue that works on thin paper – I’m using something called matte medium which is perfect for decoupage and tissue papers
• patterned or plain tissue paper (more examples of fun materials like the tissue paper confetti shapes below)

I love collecting tissue papers but now they have outgrown the little box where I used to keep them. They are overflowing everywhere and it’s a bit sad that I have been collecting more than using, storing more than utilizing my stash. So let’s us change that. Let’s just see how we can use thin patterned or plain tissue paper in a mixed media context.

Create colorful journaling pages with tissue paper

I’ll give you some fun ideas in this first video:

Colorful journaling pages with acrylic paint

Then let’s bring out some more paint. It’s a messy process, but I like that. I enjoy doing this in one sitting, so a hair dryer to quickly dry the pages helps speed it along.

Here’s video 2 on how to create even more colorful journaling pages.

I love creating colorful pages for journaling, much like the pages of a previous Fauxbonichi Journal. In that one I used all those printable illustrations I got via Patreon. It’s now full of journaling, images and memories. That’s why I wanted to create another similar one.

What I like about colorful notebooks

What I like about this journal is

• that it is SO very colorful, because I have added something to all the pages. Most of them have a wash of acrylic paint and some of them are decorated with a bit of patterned paper (polka dots) or tissue paper
• the weight of the paper, which is just about 80 gram. It’s from a regular lined, A4 paper pad paper. It is really thin and I enjoy that for this type of journal
• how each spread is a surprise because the papers are painted before I bound the book together, which randomly creates pairings of the two sides of each spread. Or maybe not so random, because I sort through them and move them around to my liking before I bind the book of course, but still more random than if I would have painted them facing each other in a already bound notebook.
• the tissue bits that I used in this one, which you will see if you watch video two of the process. I love the look of the tissue confetti so much! I like that the colored tissue bits are transparent and also recognizable shapes like heart and stars, which makes them even more decorative and fun to use as borders.
• and as always, I love the anticipation of filling its pages. I love that feeling when it comes to any notebook.

I enjoyed using these quite a bit:

I couldn’t find that the pouch of Jane Davenport tissue confetti is still available, but there are plenty of options to make your own or shop for confetti bags of tissue paper shapes if you feel inspired to try this. Here are some ideas to check out (with amazon affiliate links if you want to have a closer look). You could try playing around with these confetti hearts or a pack of rainbow stars (or why not these yummy multicolor hearts). I think they’d also look great on a page, any page.

I also don’t know where you can get a roll of patterned paper like mine (with the little bouquets on white) but that kind of really thin paper is called decoupage paper. I am sure that if you ask for decoupage papers a lot of options will come up.

If you have any questions or suggestions you are welcome to add them in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.

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❤ You might also enjoy previous blog post about using tissue paper by iHanna

This post is part of NaBloPoMo where I write 30 blog posts in November. Thanks for reading and leaving me a comment, it encourages me to keep going. To follow along subscribe to blog posts via email or RSS. I also have a sweet Substack Newsletter about art, craft and creativity that you might want to sign up for so that we can keep in touch in the future. I’d love that. On instagram I’m @ihannas and on YouTube Studio iHanna. Take care and stay creative friends.

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