Getting back to what I consider "normal" blogging, I thought I'd share a bit about the travel journal experiment we did for our trip to Hawaii. I got one of those new Japan accordion book style Moleskine journals, the smaller size. I brought a little map of the island and collected bits of text and images as we traveled. I also brought a date stamp, ink pad and a few rolls of printed tape just for fun. So glad I put the ink pad in a ziploc bag since it leaked. For this trip, I wanted to try and make a journal while on the trip using only dry media (pen, pencil, colored pencil, scissors and a glue stick).

The title page spread is on the left. The photo in the center I took from our balcony. It was so beautiful! 

HAIKU

I thought it would be fun to make up Haiku poetry each day about our vacation. Keith was a really good sport about it, although there was some "making fun", which only encouraged me more. When we saw Haiku Rd, I knew it was a "sign". It had to be included, with a Haiku of course, 5-7-5 syllables.

"A wandering day

side roads & following signs

with no agenda."

- Valerie Sjodin

USING PHOTOS

Because Kauai is so beautiful, I couldn't imagine it without some actual photos, so I packed my camera, took photos, used them as photo reference to draw from as well as to print on nice photo paper, when I got back home. I mixed it up though, using a few images from brochures we found on the trip.

FREE TO INCLUDE WHATEVER I WANTED

There was hardly any criteria of what to include, except I wanted it to be chronological. The accordion style reminds me of the timelines I used to put up in my classroom. There is a bit of text in this journal. I did a lot of writing in another and we read a bunch of books. There were so many people reading books by the pool. I haven't even seen that much literacy, even in a library. We fit right in.