It’s always good to mix things up and try something new, so, in the middle of finishing up the travel journal from my recent trip to France, I decided to take a detour and play around with a concertina sketchbook I’ve had in my stash for awhile. While working on the travel journal, I’d been […]
Category: Sketchbook Journaling
Sketching in Giverny – The Old Mill at Vernon
During my workshop in Giverny, France, a few months ago, we visited Monet’s garden one morning, and then, after lunch, took a side trip to the nearby village of Vernon, famous for a beautiful old mill that sits on the River Seine. (I shared the journaling from that day in an earlier post.) The Old […]
Sketching in Giverny – Monet’s Famous Lily Pond
Years ago, long before I dared to dream of the life I’m now living, I looked at pictures of Claude Monet’s garden in Giverny with a sense of wonder and admiration. The iconic view of the lily pond with its arched Japanese bridge was so perfect it almost seemed unreal. But one day last September, […]
Sketching in Giverny – Monet’s Garden!
This flowery two-page spread chronicles the day our group of sketchers visited Monet’s garden in Giverny. I had so much I wanted to write that day that I had to glue an extra page (the one on the left) into my sketchbook to make room for more journaling. That’s always one of the trickiest parts […]
Sketching in Giverny – Days 1 & 2
This is one of my favorite pages from my France 2025 journal. It was the first project I did with my class at the start of my Giverny workshop, and it brings back memories of sitting in the courtyard of our hotel, taking in the shuttered windows and geranium-filled window boxes, spindly metal cafe table, […]
France 2025: Giverny
After two fun-filled days in Paris, it was time to pack my bags and go to work, teaching a week-long workshop with French Escapade in Giverny. I had been looking forward to this trip for a long time and was so excited to finally see Monet’s garden and walk in the footsteps of Van Gogh. […]
France 2025: Paris Sketches
My 2025 France trip extended from late August to early October, and, because this was such a long trip for me, I decided to write in my journal every day and record the highlights of what I experienced. Of course, I couldn’t include everything, and it was often really challenging to pare down what I […]
France 2025: Paris Map
The first stop on my 2025 France trip was Paris. I only had a day and a half there before the start of my workshop in Giverny, but it felt like longer. You can cram a lot of fun into a day in Paris! For the title page of this chapter of my journal, I […]
France 2025 Sketchbook: Pre-Trip Pages
Last month I returned from a six-week trip to France. It’s the longest I’ve ever been away from home, and the travel journal I kept during the trip chronicles every one of the forty-four days I spent there. During my time away, I taught two workshops, vacationed for two weeks with friends, and enjoyed my […]
Stitch a Slip-on Cover for Your Sketchbook
I always agonize over which sketchbook to take when I go on an important trip, don’t you? For my recent trip to France, I went through my stash of blank sketchbooks, waffling between this one and that, and ultimately decided to use a beautiful hardcover journal that I made several years ago. It’s been “resting” […]
