Nature Journaling | Stay Motivated
‘How do I stay motivated in my Nature Journaling journey?’, is a question that a follower asked recently. What a great question, and an issue that I’m sure we all struggle with from time to time. I know I certainly do. Let’s jump right into the why’s and how’s of staying motivated.
Finding Your ‘Why’ Is Key to Staying Motivated in your Nature Journal
Finding your why — terminology coined by Simon Sinek, a motivational speaker/entrepreneur. Catch his TED talk on the topic at or read his book ‘Start With Why’. In a nutshell, dig deep and figure out why you want to keep a nature journal in the first place. Make sure it’s not just another thing to tic off of your, ‘I should do this’ list.
There are many ways to connect with nature besides Nature Journaling. Our brains balk at the ‘shoulds’ in our life. Your own personal ‘why’ will help keep you motivated naturally.
How A Growth Mindset Keeps You Motivated to Nature Journal
A fixed mindset is another way we ‘should’ ourselves.
I believe that we often underestimate the power of the words we speak to ourselves. Think about it for a minute. Words can be used to sell, to motivate, to inspire, to belittle, to degrade, to uplift, . . . and the list goes on.
How we speak to ourselves matters!
A ‘fixed mindset’ might say, ‘I should get out my Nature Journal and create a page. It’s been so long since I’ve done one.’ Notice the ‘should’? See the way that those words conjure up shame and guilt? That’s not motivating, and yet most of us speak to ourselves this way all the time. Shame and guilt are never going to motivate us to create that nature connection that we’re looking for.
A ‘growth mindset’, however, might say, ‘I get to go Nature Journal for a while’, or ‘Woohoo, I have time to work in my Nature Journal today!’ Just a few tiny little words, but what a difference in perspective and staying motivated in your Nature Journal!
Learn to use the power of words to your advantage to build yourself up rather than tear yourself down.
How Time of Day May Affect Motivation
Are you a morning person? Do you have a day job and come home too exhausted to do anything else, much less get out your Nature Journal? Have you really drained all your energy, or are you, perhaps, a morning person?
No matter what time of day you feel most energetic, that’s the time of day you can try to carve out a bit of time for Nature Journaling. That’s when you will find it much easier to get out and explore! Find times that work for you.
- Get up just a bit earlier in the morning.
- Carve out morning time on your days off.
- Are you a night owl? You can Nature Journal at night too! Sketch a star map or work on cut flowers and fruit at your kitchen table.
- Take your journal with you to work and slip in some sketching time during your lunch hour.
Baby Steps to Staying Motivated
‘An object in motion tends to stay in motion, while an object at rest tends to stay at rest.’ Newton’s first law of motion.
Most of us are probably familiar with that part of the law of motion. But do you know the rest of that statement? The rest of that law states: unless acted upon by an outside (unbalanced) force.
So what does this have to do with staying motivated with your Nature Journal?
It only takes a teeny, tiny change in motion to get you re-motivated. Start with a tiny commitment. Just 5 minutes. You can do anything for 5 minutes, right? Get out your journal and sketch something simple — an apple, for example. Set a timer. If, after that 5 minutes is up, you don’t feel like continuing, give yourself permission to put it away.
Keep those 5 minute appointments with yourself. You’ll be surprised at how often that 5 minutes turns into 10, 15, or 30 minutes.
Set out on a stroll. Take your Nature Journal along, but don’t plan to get it out. Just enjoy your stroll. Often for me, I’ll head out in a bad mood and as I stroll along, I find myself noticing the bird sounds. Pretty soon, my mood has lifted and I get my sketchbook out. I allow myself to just stroll and enjoy, however, without any expectation of Nature Journaling that day.
So much of the time, the goals we set are unrealistic. We are ambitious, which is a good thing; but when we fall short of our goals, we end up feeling like failures. We beat ourselves up. (Think New Year’s resolutions — and ‘the shoulds’.)
Expectations Can Block Your Nature Journaling Motivation
Do you expect a perfectly executed sketch or painting in your Nature Journal when you head out for the day? Does your finished page live up to your expectations — whether it’s the artwork, the lettering, how well you identified species?
Nature is unpredictable! So, it follows that predicting an outcome in your journal may also be unpredictable.
Go back to your why. Why do you want to keep a Nature Journal? If your why is to create beautiful works of art on your pages, then you need to adjust your journaling to accommodate that goal. That kind of page takes much more time, more tools, and more practice than say, a journal page that is more of a diary of your encounters along the way.
Make sure that you’re enjoying the journey of creating your pages — not just looking for that perfect end product. Don’t let BIG expectations steal your ability to stay motivated!
Partner Up
Accountability. It’s not the perfect word here, but stay with me for a second. Having Nature Journaling partners, keeps us motivated to get out there if for no other reason than we don’t want to disappoint or let others down.
There are times when I’ve committed to a Nature Journal outing with other people. Like most introverts, the day comes and I think to myself, ‘I really don’t feel like doing this today.’ Because I’ve let others know I’ll be there, I force myself to get it together and go. I am never sorry that I followed through! But left to my own devices, on those days, I guarantee I would not have gone by myself.
There are Nature Journal groups and clubs all over. Jack Laws has graciously created a page on his website where you can search for one near you. If there isn’t one, he also teaches you how to start one where you are.
Be Kind to Yourself
Be kind to yourself! We are literally living in unprecedented times — our brains are filled with the chaos and fear of what’s happening around us. It drains us of energy and focus. Although spending a bit of time connecting with nature through our NJ can help with that, ‘shoulding’ all over yourself will only add to your chaos!
Nature Journaling, done right, should be a relaxing, engaging hobby — don’t make it your job!
So there you have my take — 6 ways to increase your motivation to keep Nature Journaling; or doing almost anything else for that matter!
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Barefoot Shoes: My First Year
Wow, it’s been a year already since I bought my first pair of Xero Barefoot Shoes! And what a year it’s been. I’ve:
- assisted my Dad in his recovery from a broken hip (he’s fully recovered now!) — actually, he broke his hip the day after I got my first pair and I wore them for 48 hours straight in the hospital with him. I was hooked on the shoes from there!
- spent hours outdoors in the gardens sprucing up the yard at the home we were selling.
- spent more hours repainting, cleaning, and purging inside the house.
- helped move 6 people from 2 houses into 1.
as well as, of course, a bit of hiking squeezed in along with my day job that continued during the Pandemic.
Read the full Disclaimer HERE.
This post contains affiliate links. I may get a small commission. This does not in any way affect the price of the product for you. Affiliate links are one way that I make money to keep this blog and my YouTube channel going. Thank you!
The Results of My Year With Xero Barefoot Shoes
After that first encounter with barefoot shoes , my feet felt so much better that I ordered my second pair of Xeros; the TerraFlex.
- Before barefoot shoes, I had on and off issues with plantar fasciitis. I wear the Xeros almost exclusively now and have had no more fasciitis issues.
- I’ve also struggled with bad knees since I was a kid. Walking/hiking downhill can be punishing to my knees! While I still have bad knees, I have noticed that the pain with downhill hiking is much less than it used to be. I have to wonder if that is due not only to the ‘barefoot’ styling which has made my gait more normal, but also the fact that the shoes weigh so little compared to my former clunky hiking boots.
- After working for several years at a garden center, wearing those clunky boots, I developed problems with ingrown toenails. The hiking boots never fit tight enough in the heel, so as I walked miles and miles through the day, my feet were forever sliding forward and jamming my toes into the toe box. After a year with my Xero barefoot Shoes, ingrown toenails are a thing of the past.
These are just a few pairs of my and my family’s Xero barefoot shoes collection. We all agree these are the most comfortable shoes we’ve ever worn! We all wear them for active adventures as well as at work and in our everyday life. Unexpected Benefit As a Nature Journaler
As a Nature Journaler, I have come to appreciate the super thin Vibram sole on my Xero barefoot Shoes. They allow my feet to feel the terrain almost as well as if I was actually barefoot. So what, you’re thinking?
In my old hiking boots, I was forever tripping over roots, rocks, and other trail trippers. Is there anything more annoying when you’re trying to get a good look at a skittish bird or other animal to sketch them? The sound and sudden movement when you’re tripping is not conducive to stealthy stalking!
Now I can feel what’s under my feet without having to look down all the time. Less tripping — hey, I’m still a bit clumsy!
Xero Shoes: The Company
At the time I’m writing this, Xero barefoot Shoes have more than 26,000 5-star reviews over 97 countries. That speaks volumes.
And, did I mention — they guarantee their Vibram soles for 5000 miles of use!
Head on over to the Xero Shoes website and check them out for yourself.
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Portable, Disposable Watercolor Palette
Need a smaller, portable, even disposable watercolor palette for sketching in your Nature Journal? Here’s an easy way to create a custom one of your own.
When I’m out and about creating Nature Journal pages, I use a small half-pan watercolor palette that holds 12 colors. It’s portable enough for most field sketches, but sometimes I want something even smaller and easier to balance. So I created this little system for those times.
Creating a Watercolor Pencil Palette: Gather Supplies
Say hello to my easy, peasy and disposable watercolor palette. It’s flat, weighs almost nothing, and clips right to your sketchbook.
Supplies needed to create your own:
- Index cards
- Watercolor pencils
- Binder clip or paper clip
- Access to a laminator (many libraries and copy shops have one)
Watercolor pencils are so versatile! Did you know that you can color with them dry, then use a watercolor brush to pick up paint just like it was a pan watercolor set? That’s how this system works. Choosing artist grade pencils can make a big difference in the intensity of the colors. For that reason, I use Prismacolor Watercolor Pencils.
Premier Watercolor Pencils (Set of 24)Create Your Personal Palette
Just like working with fill-able half-pans, you get to create your own custom palette of colors. Because this is temporary and disposable, you can make as many different palettes as you need!
- Choose the colors you want to take along on your sketching adventure. This might vary from trip to trip depending on season and ecosystem. For instance, if you’re traveling to the beach, you’ll probably want a selection of blues; greens if you’re headed to the mountains.
- When choosing your colors, remember that you can mix them just like pan colors. You don’t need every color that you own! The more colors you choose, the more index cards you’ll need to get enough pigment to be usable.
- Don’t have all the pencil colors you’d like? You can certainly mix the dry colors right on your index card — nothing says that you have to use only pure, 1-pencil color to create your palette! (create an index card with mixed pencil colors)
- Color large swatches of your chosen colors onto your index card. Make sure to really saturate the card with plenty of pigment. I usually keep it to 6 colors plus a strip of black on one index card.
- Leave space between your swatches, otherwise you’ll end up with mud when you begin grabbing your color.
- Take 2 blank index cards, place them back to back and have them laminated. I use 2 back to back to make the mixing palette sturdier. You’ll use this over and over. This becomes your mixing palette. Pro tip: you can usually get more than one card on a sheet of lamination — use all of that space! You can give extras to friends or carry them in more than one sketchbook.
Using Your Portable Palette in the Field
When I use this system, it’s generally because I’m hiking and don’t have a lot of time to sit and paint. This is a great system for standing and sketching. I tend to use this more for creating color swatches on my page and not so much for coloring a whole image, although with a tiny sketch you could certainly use this palette for the entire image!
On the far left is the laminated card-mixing palette. The watercolor cards and mixing palette are clipped to my 4″ X 5″ mixed media sketchbook. Using your binder clip, or even a paperclip, attach your palette and mixing palette to your sketchbook (they might blow away otherwise!). Take your water-brush and grab a bit of your chosen color from the corner of a swatch. Just like in a regular pan palette, your colors will muddy over time — if you use the corners first, there’s less accidental mixing. You can now go straight to your sketch or over to the laminated card to do some mixing — it works just like your half-pan palette!
This disposable watercolor palette system works great for me because I can carry just a tiny sketchbook with everything I need all in my jacket pocket. I also keep one in my glovebox for those unexpected adventures as I go about my day. I hope you’ll give this a try! Let me know what you think in the comments.
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Page Layout: Make It Engaging
How do I create a pleasing page layout?
This is a question that I see often from beginners who are tentative about getting out there with their nature journal. They do a few pages and they’re really unhappy with the way it comes out.
There’s no pre-planning involved.
Are you ready to start creating Nature Journal pages with a little forethought? Here are a few basic rules that you can follow to help you create pages you’ll love.
Page Layout Using The Golden Ratio
The first rule that we should pay attention to is Fibonacci sequence. The Fibonacci sequence is a mathematical formula that defines the shape and the pattern of everything that we see in nature, including people. Since we see these patterns in our everyday existence, it’s very pleasing to our eye.
Almost everything in nature follows the mathematical formula of the Fibonacci sequence The Fibonacci sequence is a complex mathematical formula but artists, photographers, and graphic designers use what’s called the ‘Golden Ratio’.
‘The Golden Ratio’ is a simplified version of the Fibonacci sequence that we can use as Nature Journalers to get that ‘pleasing to the eye’ effect. Simply divide your rectangular page into nine equal sections; three by three.
Any place where those lines intersect is a great place to put a focal point. You should, in general, avoid putting anything smack dab in the center of a page. That center positioning tends to create kind of a dead spot in your page.
Instead, what you want is to create little pockets of interest in multiple different spaces on your page. Placing your sketches and text blocks on the line intersections or even stretching them along the lines will give you the kind of interesting Nature Journal page you’re trying to create.
Little pockets of interest sit on the lines — nothing sits exactly in the center of the page Face the Center
Here’s another compositional thing that you should think about. Say you’re drawing a bird and you’ve decided to put him on the left hand side of your page. He should be facing forward or to the right — the center. Why? When you have faces, whether it’s a person, a bird, or even a flower facing into the center of your page, they’re seen as part of that page.
To our brains, it appears as though they’re looking at the rest of the page — and enticing the viewer to do the same. They lead your eye to bounce around between different elements, back and forth and stay on the page. If, however, you have them facing outwards away from the page, it leads the viewer’s eye off of the page — following their gaze to see what they’re looking at! (We are curious by nature!) You want to avoid that most of the time unless you are trying to create a specific look for that page.
‘Faces’ face the center of the page! See how your eye bounces back and forth between the birds? Odd Numbers
An oddity about the way our brain perceives things: we are especially pleased with things that are arranged in odd numbers! We are particularly fond of things that come in threes.
Use this to your advantage when planning your page layout! Arrange the sketches on your page in groups of 3 or 5.
Our brains are really pleased with elements in groups of 3 Using the Triangle in Your Page Layout
Another compositional trick to keep your eye bouncing around the page: triangular placement. In other words, put your main page components in a triangular arrangement around your page. If you’re using the magic of 3 elements on a page, you’ve automatically got a triangle!
The sketches should all face the center of the page. Bonus points if your sketches kind of face each other in a diagonal arrangement. This causes your eye to bounce around the page, taking in every detail.
The Importance of Negative Space
Last but not least, let’s take a quick look at negative space. Negative space is a place or places on your page where there are no words, and no pictures. It’s a resting place; a spot for your eyes to take a break for just a second. It should be carefully placed so that it doesn’t cause your eye to bounce right off the page! Without negative space, your eyes and brain quickly become overwhelmed. The viewer isn’t sure where to look! Negative space can be a very powerful element on your page — make sure to include some.
Don’t crowd your images too closely — a bit of negative space creates a resting spot for they eye. Phew! That’s quite a bit of information to absorb! Don’t let the overwhelm get the better of you. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel yourself. Inspiration for page layouts is everywhere!
Finding Inspiration for Page Layouts
Look to the graphic designers and artists who’ve already done the heavy lifting for you! In other words, pick up some magazines, copy the way they have words and pictures laid out on their pages. They know what they’re doing. They know how to make your eyes bounce around the page. Check out a few graphic novels (modern-day comic books) from your local library to see how they pair pictures and words together.
Creating dynamic, engaging Nature Journal pages is within your reach! Choose to incorporate one or two of these compositional rules on your pages and make them pop!
New to Nature Journaling? Grab your Free copy of my Quick-Start Guide to Nature Journaling from the Freebies Library!
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Hand Lettering in Your Nature Journal
Creating fun hand lettering on your Nature Journal pages can really take your pages to the next level! Take a quick look at this video to see how easy it can be.
To pick up the free tutorial on the lettering styles shown in the video click here to sign up for the Freebies Library.
My favorite pens when I’m Hand-Lettering on my journal pages. The ink is archival, meaning it won’t degrade the paper over time. These are my go-to when I want to outline letters — when they’re dry you can watercolor over them with no bleeding or smearing. That’s the reason I use them for any notes or observations also. The non-smearing effect means I can highlight text with watercolors!
I want to give you a super-quick overview of how and why you should create ‘just word’ pages in your Nature Journals.
Sit-Spots and Nature Journal Pages
I have been practicing ‘sit-spot’ for a while now. A sit-spot is a place that you can go, preferably at home or at least very close to home. You visit your sit-spot on a regular basis. Visiting your sit-spot without an agenda, without your phone, without your sketchbook will allow you to just get quiet and make a real connection with nature.
Over time, you will find that you are becoming familiar with the wildlife at your spot. You recognize the calls of the local birds and notice how their calls and songs change when they are looking for a mate or are warning each other of a potential threat. You’ll follow the progress of the seasons in the trees, perennials, and annuals that live near your sit-spot.
I do this on an almost daily basis. I’ve watched sparrows nest, lay eggs, feed the nestlings, and then finally watched the nestlings fledge and fly off on their own. These are the things that I write about in my Nature Journal pages after the fact. Since I’m not drawing as I’m watching, I use only the words. I do, however, help to tell these stories with creative Hand-Lettering on those Nature Journal pages that are words only pages! For me, it makes those pages so much more interesting and more like a story.
If you haven’t tried just sitting still in nature without any agenda, I urge you to give it a shot and see how it can change you!
DANIEL SMITH 285610005 Extra Fine Essentials Introductory Watercolor, 6 Tubes, 5mlPlease follow and like us:
Create Shading With Watercolor
How do you create highlights and shading with watercolor? We’ve looked at shading before when we talked about turning simple shapes into forms. Today we’re going to do it with watercolor rather than graphite.
With watercolor you need to know a few different techniques and some new terminology.
Let’s Watercolor Stacked Rocks
Let’s do a hands-on project and do a simple painting of some stacked river rocks.
Reference photo: Natural shadows have soft edges — cast shadows have hard edges The first thing we’re going to do is make a very light pencil sketch of the rocks; sort of a map of where we’re headed. The next step is to do a very light, simple, wash on all of the rocks. There’s our first new term — wash. A watercolor wash is a very light overall color that is our background color.
DANIEL SMITH 285610005 Extra Fine Essentials Introductory Watercolor, 6 Tubes, 5ml
Watercolor Shading: Washes and Glazing
A wash can be either wet or dry. A dry wash which means your brush is not super wet and it’ll give kind of a stuttered feeling across the paper, leaving a little texture behind. A wet wash means there’s a little bit more water involved, and it gives a more even coating across the paper. With our rocks, we’re going to begin with a wet wash as our stacked rocks are smooth river rocks. Consider using a dry wash if you’re painting something with a rough texture: a rocky mountainside or the skin on an elephant maybe.
Pentel Arts Aquash Water Brush Assorted Tips, 4 Pack Carded (FRHBP4M)Let that first wash dry completely.
Now we’re going to go back in and begin to darken our rocks. Adding wet watercolor over dry is called glazing. And when you put wet over dry what we’re doing is called glazing. Watercolors are great at this because they’re naturally transparent — the under color will show through. Work slowly until you have the color built up where you want it.
Be careful not to overwork an area. If your glazing layer is too wet, it will re-wet the under layers and lighten rather than darken!
My favorite watercolor set is this Daniel Smith set below. The colors are highly pigmented and smooth. This particular set is great to get you started as it has both warm and cool primaries — you can mix almost any color using just these 6!
Shading: Natural and Cast Shadows
With the natural shadows, begin at the darkest spot and work your way up. Blend as you go. The edge closest to the light source should just blend with the rest of the rock — no hard edge! If your shadow isn’t dark enough yet, add glazing layers until it is. Make sure to continue blending out those hard edges!
Now let’s turn our attention to the cast shadow areas — where the object (in this case a rock) is casting a shadow on the surface where it sits. Take a minute or two to study the reference. Notice that the cast shadows are much darker and they have very sharp, defined edges.
A couple of special things to notice about cast shadows; shadows are not black! Often our eye reads them as black. Most of the time shadows are a dark purple/gray. If you remember this little tidbit of information, you’ll always get a much more realistic result! And pay attention to the depth of color in the cast shadow — the darkest area is always where the shadow touches the object.
With those 2 things in mind, let’s paint our cast shadow areas. You can add the color all at once, or build up a few layers using the glazing technique. Just remember to go slowly and don’t use too much water!
Add in any small details. I used a Gelly Roll pen to add the white lines in the large rock on the bottom. If you haven’t already painted a surface for your rocks to sit on, add that in now as well.
And voila! You’re finished.
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New Sketchbook Anxiety
New sketchbook anxiety is real for most of us! It used to be a real stumbling block for me. Purchasing a new sketchbook is always a rush — thinking about all the potential in those blank pages was thrilling! But all of that imagining always gave way to crippling anxiety when actually facing that first blank page.
It’s an all or nothing mentality really. It goes something like this: ‘If I mess up this first page, the whole sketchbook is ruined. Why do I even bother?’ We make those tentative first marks, and our prediction has come true! We failed to create a masterpiece!
Remembering What a Sketchbook Is
For me, the first step in overcoming that anxiety is remembering why I keep a sketchbook in the first place. My sketchbook is for exploration and experimentation. It’s for taking notes and for planning out the occasional larger finished artwork.
Remembering the purpose of my sketchbook takes lots of pressure off of that first mark on that first page.
My favorite ‘go-to’ sketchbook is Canson’s Mixed Media. The paper is just heavy enough to take watercolor in the field. I also find that it has just enough tooth that I don’t have a bunch of trouble with graphite smearing. I also love that it’s wire-bound so it lays flat when I’m working. Plus it comes in several sizes!
New Sketchbook Anxiety Busters
Here are a few more tricks I’ve learned along the way:
Muddy boot on page became my title page after outlining and a bit of lettering! - Don’t buy expensive sketchbooks! I am much less ‘precious’ about a sketchbook that hasn’t cost me an arm and a leg. On the occasion that I want a more expensive one, I try to buy in advance and on sale!
- Create a title page on the first page. Do some nice hand-lettering. It’s all about creating those first marks.
- Drop your book on the ground – yes, you heard me correctly! Drop it on the ground, step on it. Create a doodle from the marks.
- Make pre-set layouts for the first couple of pages. Draw smallish rectangles or squares — they’re much less daunting than an entire blank page.
- Tuck a couple of scrap papers between the pages. Do your warm-up sketches (ie: the uglies) on the scraps before you work in your new journal.
- Create reference materials on the first few pages.
- Value studies
- Color wheels
- Write or paste a copy of a favorite inspriational poem or quote on the first page.
- Choose a theme you’d like to explore. Write that theme at the top of a couple of pages.
- Who says you have to start on page 1? Flip your sketchbook to a page in the middle and get started!
- Take a cue from bullet journalers and create:
- A moon chart
- An index
- A sketching habit-tracker
Color-Mixing Practice & Value Study/Color Wheels These are but a few ideas to get you started. Try one or two or come up with a list of your own ideas! Most importantly, don’t let new sketchbook anxiety win — get started on that new journal!
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Nature Journaling in Public: Yikes!
Nature Journaling in public can be a daunting prospect for most of us. Planning a nature journaling trip to a museum, zoo, or aquarium sounds like a great idea! That is, until you get there — it’s crowded, and you’re now too nervous to get out your sketchbook. Today I’m sharing tips to help you get over your fear of nature journaling in public.
‘Fear is not a rational response to whatever challenges stare at us in life. And it is all in our mind, within us, and not anything external to us.‘
from Think Simple NowPrepare Your Mind Before You Go
Before you head out remember, everyone else is usually busy doing THEIR thing as well. Look at how many people are texting or talking on their cell phones, chatting, talking with a friend, having lunch or tea or a drink in the pub, shopping, sightseeing, taking photos, or reading… most often they’re going on about their own business and won’t even notice that you’re nature journaling!
There are basically two strategies that we’re going to discuss: avoiding interactions with other people and how to handle situations when people approach you anyway.
Tips for Avoiding Interactions When Nature Journaling in Public
- Wear headphones or earbuds and make sure they can be seen from a distance! Most people are reluctant to approach someone who is listening to music. Of course, you don’t actually have to be plugged into anything! Just tuck the end of the cord into your pocket — they’ll never notice!
- Use a smallish hardbound sketchbook. It looks more like a written journal or diary and people won’t be as inclined to look over your shoulder.
- Don’t bring every art supply you own! That will definitely call attention to what you’re doing! Choose your favorite sketching tool: a pencil, pen, or brush marker should do.
- Look busy — concentrate. This may be the appropriate time to bring out your resting bitch face if you have it! People don’t often interrupt someone who looks totally engrossed in what they’re doing.
- Use the buddy system. Bring a friend, or join a group. You won’t be as nervous if you aren’t alone! Also people are less likely to approach a group of people involved in an activity.
Tips for Times When Someone Approaches You
In spite of your best efforst, there will ocassionally be someone who breaks through your defenses. Although these encounters will be few, it always helps to dispell that fear if you have a plan in place in advance.
- Relax and breathe! You are allowed to be a beginner — give yourself that permission. You can be an expert artist and an old hand at nature journaling, but new to dealing with people looking over your shoulder as you work. That is a learning process as well!
- Do your warm-up sketches in the car so you aren’t worried about doing those first few wonky sketches with an audience.
- In my experience, most encounters are positive. Remember that most people think that drawing is magic! If someone does approach you with a comment, say thank you for the feedback (whether positive or negative), then put your head down and get back to work. You will have acknowledged them politely and shown them clearly that the interaction is over and you’re getting back to work.
- Look at an encounter as an opportunity to be an ambassador for nature journaling! You are in love with nature or you wouldn’t be out here trying to capture it in your journal. Don’t be shy about sharing your passion!
Lastly, getting over that fear is just like exercising a muscle. The best way to get over the fear of nature journaling in public is to, . . . nature journal in public! Just get out there and do it!
Make sure to take a look at some of my favorite Nature Journaling tools.
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10 Tips: Your Winter Nature Journal
Keeping your winter nature journal can be tough when you live where winters are long and harsh. We’re talking multiple feet of snow and temperatures below 0 F. Difficult but not impossible! I’m going to get you started with a look at 10 ways you can continue your Nature Journaling even in harsh weather!
Tatuo Women Convertible Glove Cable Knit Glove Half Finger Mitten with Cover for Cold Days (Burgundy)
Tip #1: Work on Improving Skills
- Practice sketching from photos, your own or online. If you use photos that you’ve found online, make sure you understand copyright laws before sharing your sketches!
- Explore.org is a great online resource full of live video camera feeds from around the world. It’s more like sketching in the field with animals moving rather than a stationary subject in a photo. Perfect for practicing your gesture sketching!
- Take a class! Winter is the perfect time to sign up for that drawing or painting class you’ve been wanting to take. Check local art centers or online sources.
- YouTube is a great resource for free tutorials on drawing and painting techniques. Subscribe to my YouTube channel for videos on general Nature Journaling topics as well as drawing and painting tips, with new videos uploaded every Friday.
Tip #2: Bird Feeders are a Natural For Nature Journaling in Winter
Granted, if it’s super cold outside there won’t be lots of birds but there are a few hardy souls that stick around even in the coldest weather.
A bird feeder or two outside your window will be a favorite hang-out for them! Get out your nature journal and sketch away while they have a snack!
Tip #3: Field Trips
Field trips are a go-to for winter journaling! Find a few local indoor spots where you can get out your sketchbooks in a heated environment.
- Aquariums
- Conservatories
- Natural History Museums
- Zoos with indoor exhibits — my local zoo has indoor exhibits for many of the animals, including big cats, reptiles, insects, nocturnal creatures, and an aquarium.
Watercolors are not an option when it’s really cold out! In winter, I travel light and carry only a graphite pencil and a permanent pen.
Tip #4: Local Nature Programs
Check the events calendars of your local public library, parks systems, and rescue organizations. Many offer programming with live animals in indoor settings in the winter! Even better, find a way to volunteer and get up close and personal with them!
Tip #5: Nature Journal in Winter Around the House!
There is truly nature all around us, all the time. We just take some ordinary things for granted!
- Produce from your kitchen — Yep, ALL sketching will improve your skill-set! So, draw that apple or that pepper before you eat it!
- Houseplants — if you don’t have any, get some! Added bonus: besides being great to work on your drawing skills, they help to clean the stale air in your home if you’re stuck inside during a long, cold winter!
- Grab a bouquet of cut-flowers from your local florist. Choose flowers with different shapes to ready your drawing skills for spring and summer!
- Pets — Live models ready and waiting for you! And they stay still enough for you to sketch them in different positions — well, some of them anyway!
Tip # 6: Field Guides
Most nature lovers have at least one field guide on their bookshelf! Practice sketching your favorite bird, plant, mammal, or tree! Learn their common markings and traits, so you’ll be ready to live-sketch them in better weather.
No field guides at home? Check your public library. They usually have several to choose from.
Tip # 7: Anatomy Books
Although most of us don’t have bird and mammal anatomy books hanging out on our bookshelves, you can find plenty of these at your local public library as well. You’ll be surprised at how much better your live sketches become when you understand how to draw the underlying bone and muscle structure of your chosen subject.
Learn to sketch how a bird’s wing folds and where the feathers lie.
Tip # 8: Taking a Trip to a Warmer Climate?
Are you heading out to visit relatives or perhaps you have a business trip scheduled in a warmer climate? (or at least slightly warmer) Don’t forget to pack your nature journaling kit and take advantage of those spare moments!
Tip # 9: Foraged Items in Your Winter Nature Journal
- Shells saved from your beach vacation
- Interesting sticks, rocks, and twigs saved from your last hike
- Found bird feathers
- Fallen leaves, acorns, and pinecones
All of these items can be sketched in the comfort of your warm home — in your pajamas!
Tip # 10: Practice Hand-Lettering Techniques
Learn and practice new hand-lettering techniques to enhance those journal pages. Once again, online resources abound!
Check out Pinterest and YouTube to find tutorials on every type of hand lettering and calligraphy that you can imagine!
Get my Hand-Lettering for Nature Journalers FREE pdf booklet from the Freebie Library to get started.
Bonus Tip #11: Play Around with Layouts in your Winter Journal
If you’re anything like me, you scroll through Instagram, Pinterest , or your favorite Facebook group, and oooh and ahhh over the amazing (and organized!) page layouts that some of your favorite nature journalers come up with. Study them, copy them, and layout a few pages in advance. Find the layout ideas that work for you.
I’m certain that there are many more ways to continue your nature journaling practice even in the harshest of winters, but these 11 tips are a great starting place! Can you think of any others? Share them in the comments!
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Nature Journaling in Winter
Nature Journaling in winter? Absolutely! With just a few minor adjustments to your tools and routine, winter journaling can be tons of fun and a great learning experience. Today we take a look at the things you need to adjust to make your nature journaling excursion a success.
Nature Journaling Field Kit: Winter Style
How does a winter kit differ from a summer kit? In summer, I carry a small watercolor set with a fillable water brush for adding color to my sketches. Where I live, winters have many days that are below freezing — making watercolors difficult or impossible. So in winter, I switch to colored pencils.
But, how do you carry and sift through all the colors you might need, you ask? Most of the time, I carry only 6 colors — 2 sets of the 3 primaries — one warm and one cool. That way I can create almost any color I might need.
Aside from switching to pencils, I tend to carry pretty much the same things. I do eliminate the small junk book I carry for pressing leaves and flowers. Winter cold makes things too brittle to press most of the time. I also leave the insect repellent at home. Yay! I add a tube of lip balm in its place.
A Change of Clothing
There’s no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing.’
~ Sir Ranulph FiennesSo, what to wear out in the field in winter is really the biggest change you’ll probably need to make. Dressing for the weather is really not as difficult as we like to make it!
Keep your core warm, and the rest of your body will be warmer as well. Layers, layers, layers — my mantra for all seasons! No matter what you’re doing, where you’re going, or how long you’re planning to be out, layering is the way to go. As your body temperature and the air temperature fluctuates, it’s easy to add or subtract layers as needed.
Cover your ears! There are not a lot of nerve endings in our ears to register temperature changes; but ears, fingers, and toes are the first body parts to be damaged by prolonged exposure to the cold. Choose thick socks and appropriate footwear. Look for fingerless gloves so that you can sketch, but make sure to cover your fingers when you aren’t sketching.
But Winter is Boring; Just Brown, Gray, and Dead!
Well, . . . OK, I get that. I used to think that too. Used to.
Nature journaling is all about observation and connection, right? For sure, when I’m sitting at home looking out the window, most days are gray, cloudy and lifeless looking. But, trust me, when you get out there and begin to really look, you’ll see a whole different world!
With nature journaling in winter, it’s all about texture. The strong, bright colors of summer might be behind us, but they leave behind the structures of the plants — the parts that were hidden behind all those colors. You get to see the support structures, the seeds and how they were formed. And bonus — all those seeds now become winter food for birds and seed eating mammals. You can get some great sketching time as they come to dine!
Sketching textures can be a challenge, but challenging ourselves is good for the brain! And so what if your attempt at a pinecone is not a work of art! You spent time with that pinecone – observing. Did you hold it in your hand? Turn it over? Did you notice something you hadn’t before? Did you identify the tree it fell from? Congratulations! You’re a winter nature journaler!
Winter Nature Journaling: Yes, Virginia There is Color!
OK, so like we said, at first glance all you see is brown and gray. But, in order to successfully capture that brown seed, you’ll need other colors! Really. Look closely. I’m betting that you’ll see some form of purple in the shadows — not black like you thought. In winter, the light or highlight areas often contain a bit of blue.
Look closely at that mound of snow. Depending upon the time of day, you’ll see blues and purples as well as reflections from sunrises and sunsets.
Look up. There will be breaks in that bleak, winter sky! Sketch the clouds and that beautiful blue surrounding them!
And who doesn’t need practice mixing green colors? The other day, I stood in one spot at a local park and counted at least 5 different species of evergreen trees, all with wildly different coloring! One could spend an entire winter season sketching, studying, and cataloging just those trees and bushes!
So you see, at first glance, nature journaling in winter seems like a boring proposition, but just like nature journaling any other time of the year, it’s all about the closer observation! Are you excited to get out there?
Are you new to nature journaling (in any weather!)? Start HERE.
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