Feedback Friday: altered books, collage sheets & art journals

A couple of posts lately have generated a few questions, so here are the answers!

Many of you commented on my heritage photos and use of photos in my art in general. I do not use original photos in any of my collages. I do use original photography in my other types of art work, which I posted about here, and in photo greeting cards, which I posted about here. Instead, I have created a whole bunch of collage sheets using original photos.  I make them in a very old fashioned way.  I arrange them onto a 8.5x11 sheet of paper, adhere with repositionable adhesive, and then take them to a copy store and have them color copied using a toner process to make multiple copies.  I know I should just learn how to scan and print at home, or at least scan and manipulate at home, but I don't know how and it's just not a big priority for me right now. So, I go old school.  I have three types of collage sheets:  those created with heritage photos (the two in the upper left of the photo above); those created with current photos (see the travel ones in the bottom row); and those created with ephemera (the two sheets on the right).  I sell the sheets at craft fairs and would sell them online, if I ever got my act together to open an etsy store. I love using my own images in my art because it makes it feel like the art is more of my own total creation. Although I use rubber stamps and other clip art/collage sheets sometimes, those pieces don't feel as totally my own as when I use my own collage/photography.  Using my own collage sheets also makes  my art more original because these images aren't generally available.  Finally, by repeatedly using certain images, I continue to create my own style and look. 


Deb asked about my art journal pages and where I store them.  Basically, I create them in bound journals and they just stay there.  My every-day art diary pages are done in these small (6x9) journals:

The page on the left is about how dd Clara leaves all her hair supplies, make up and clothes all over the house  (LOL!).  The page on the right is a completed background.  I usually have a bunch of completed backgrounds in my art journals, to jump start a journaling session. I also find creating backgrounds to be a relaxing and satisfying bit of creative time.
When I feel like using a big format, I used these spiral bound watercolor paper pads:

Finally, many of you asked about the girls altering book groups, which I posted about here.  The group is a local group - most of us met through our membership in Club Scrap.  As we completed our pages, we sent them to our Queen Bee.  Once we are done with all our pages (next month), we will all get together and people will get to choose one page from each theme.  You can then bind them yourself.  Each page has been punched with three aligned holes, so I'm just going to create a cover and bind them with a big d-ring.
Coming tomorrow - more feedback; this time on storage!