Flip Through My Journal: Pages From This Week
Can I show you something?
I spent some time this morning flipping through my journal from the past week. Not to "assess" my work or see if I was being "productive enough" — honestly, I just wanted to remember what I was feeling on Wednesday. What color Tuesday was. What words I needed on Friday.
That's one of my favorite things about keeping an art journal. It's a record not just of what I made, but of who I was when I made it. The anxious version of me. The hopeful version. The tired version who just needed to put paint on paper at 11pm.
Let me show you a few pages from this week. No tutorial today — just... sitting with you on the studio floor, showing you what I made.
The Page from Monday
This one started with a bad mood. You know the kind — where everything feels slightly off and you can't name why?
I grabbed two colors that felt like irritation to me: a weird reddish-brown (almost rust colored) and a murky green-gray. I didn't try to make them pretty together. I just let them fight on the page a little. They bled into each other and made this unexpected neutral color in the middle — not quite brown, not quite gray.
I wrote "okay" in the center with a black pen. Not "everything is okay" — just the word "okay," like a placeholder. A temporary state.
The page is kind of ugly. I love it.
The Page from Wednesday
Wednesday was a good day. I found a pressed flower in an old book — a pansy I'd forgotten about, saved from who-knows-when. It was brittle and perfect.
I made a simple wash of pale yellow behind it, glued the flower down, and wrote "small things" in tiny letters underneath. That was the whole page. Five minutes, maybe. But looking at it now, I remember exactly how it felt to find that flower. Like a gift from a past version of myself.
This is why I don't throw away "failed" pages or ugly spreads. Sometimes they're holding time for me. Keeping it safe until I'm ready to remember.
The Page from Friday Night
Friday was... a lot. Work stuff. Life stuff. The kind of day where you're running on adrenaline and don't realize how wound up you are until you finally sit down.
I journaled at midnight. I'd had some tea and couldn't sleep anyway. I didn't use any color — just a regular ballpoint pen and a lot of scribbling. Words overlapping. Some of them legible, most of them not. The page looks chaotic. It WAS chaotic. That's what was true.
Halfway through, I started drawing these little circles. Just round and round. Meditative. My breathing slowed down while my hand kept moving. I didn't solve anything. The work stress was still there. But my body had somewhere to put the buzzing.
I fell asleep at 1am with the journal open on my desk. The circles are the last thing I see every time I flip through now. A reminder that I can make a container for the chaos.
What I Notice Looking Back
When I flip through these pages together — the irritated one, the gentle one, the chaotic one — I see something I couldn't see while I was in it.
I see that all of it was okay. The bad mood passed. The good moment was real. The chaos found a container. Nothing lasted forever, but everything was allowed to exist for as long as it needed to.
That's what I want to say to you today, friend: whatever you're feeling right now, it's allowed to exist. It doesn't need to be fixed or solved or transformed into something pretty. You can just make a page for it. Give it somewhere to land.
If You Want to Try This
Maybe today, instead of a specific prompt, you could try flipping through your own journal if you have one. Look at the pages without judgment. Just... witness them. See what you notice.
If a page feels finished, great. If it feels like it wants more, add something. If you want to paint over the whole thing and start fresh, that's allowed too. Your journal belongs to you. Past, present, and future you all get a say.
If you don't keep a journal yet — or if you haven't made a page in a while — today could be a gentle starting point. Not because you "should" or because it's "productive." Just because it might feel good. Because your hands might want something to do. Because there's a page waiting for whatever you need to put on it.
Supplies I Used This Week
Since I know you'll ask, here's what I reached for most often:
Strathmore Visual Journal 5.5x8" (
$12-15): My current favorite for mixed media. Budget alternative: Canson XL Mixed Media ($8) or literally any notebook you have already.
Koi Water Color Pocket Field Sketch Box ($12-15): Still using this after three years. Budget alternative: Prang watercolors ($5) — the colors are actually really vibrant.
White gel pen (Sakura Gelly Roll): $3. Worth it for writing over dark paint. Budget alternative: Uni-ball Signo ($2) or just use what you have.
Regular ballpoint pen: Seriously. The one from your junk drawer works great.
Glue stick: Any kind. ~$1-2.
Total if you're starting from nothing: Under $15 with budget options.
Before You Go
I hope you give yourself permission to make something imperfect today. Or to rest. Or to flip through old pages and just remember.
There's no right way to do this. There's no quota. There's no "falling behind."
If you made one page this week, that's enough. If you made none, that's okay too — the journal will be there when you're ready.
Your messy pages are beautiful. Your simple pages are beautiful. Your empty pages waiting for next week are beautiful.
There's no wrong way to fill a page.
Take care of yourself, friend.
— Renna
This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase through these links, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. I only recommend supplies I genuinely use in my own journals.
Art journaling is a wonderful self-care practice, but it is not a substitute for professional mental health care. If you're struggling, please reach out to a therapist or counselor. You can call 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) anytime.