faith-based art journals

Recently, I received three beautiful art journals from Ellie Claire: Faith and Lettering, The Illustrated Word and Illuminate Your Story. All of these journals are beautiful and well crafted. The paper is thick so most pens and paints will not bleed through. These journals also lay flat which I consider a necessary feature.

Illuminate Your Story

I loved the cover of this journal! Since my last name is Story I couldn’t help but love it immediately! This journal has a ribbon bookmark and elastic band closure. An elastic pen loop is located on the spine and it has a pocket inside the back cover. The beginning of the journal has a short history of illuminated letters and their various styles. The journal has dot gridded pages for practicing the letters and lined pages with inspirational and encouraging quotes for journaling.

The journal has step by step instructions on creating illuminated letters, doodles, animals, flowers and leaves. The instructions were step-by-step and very easy to follow. There are more pages dedicated to instruction and practice than journaling pages. For that reason I plan to use the journal as a place to keep quotes that I would like to remember. It makes a very pretty and practical commonplace book.

I used a pencil to draw the letter and designs at first. I then used watercolors to add color and followed up with a black drawing pen. I used a metallic paint marker to add the illuminated touches. Nothing bled through to the other side of the paper.

Amazon: http://amzn.to/FaithAndLettering-Amazon
Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/FaithAndLettering-BN

my first two illuminated letters
letter instruction and practice page
other instruction and practice page
journal page opposite of illuminated page showing no shadowing to other side

Faith and Lettering

My thirteen year old daughter chose to review this journal. The Faith and Lettering journal has beautiful full color illustrations and also teaches you how to make the lettering designs with step by step instructions. The are also plenty of lined pages for journaling and a pen loop. The design of the lettering is intended to be used in the large margin of journaling Bibles.

Here’s Sparkles: This journal is difficult at first but it gets easier as you use it. It helps with handwriting of all different types lettering. I think it looks cool and is fun to use. There are quotes from the Bible for practice. The book lays open while you write, which is super important to me, because the pages dont’ turn constantly and get in the way. The designs of the quotes are really fun to copy, and try on your own. It really tapped into my creative side, and I’m really glad about that, seeing as I really like to draw.

Amazon: http://amzn.to/FaithAndLettering-Amazon
Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/FaithAndLettering-BN

journaling page
practice page

The Illustrated Word

This is a lined journal with full-sized pages to color. There are lined pages with plenty of space for coloring, quotes and color illustrations throughout. It has the same high quality thick paper as the two previous journals. This would make a nice Bible study journal or even a nice place to jot down sermon notes. It would especially be lovely to use for a sermon series, Advent or Lent.

Amazon: http://bit.ly/Illustrated-Amazon
Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/Illustrated-BN

Products used in the journals: Sharpie pens, felt tip pens, ink rolling ball pens, pencil, colored pencils, micro pigment waterproof ink, metallic markers, Koi and Kuretake watercolors and watercolor pencils.