A New Doodly Friend! Traci Bautista!
i am such a lucky girl!
i got an email a few weeks back from an accomplished author, teacher, artist, doodler named Traci Bautista. You may know Traci from her book, Collage Unleashed or her line of Collage Pauge products by Aleene’s. She also travels a lot, speaks to groups, teaches her craft, offers tons of online workshops, and generally rocks it in the creative community. And she’s just adorable too, isn’t she!?
Anyway, Traci’s new book, Doodles Unleashed just released and she’s touring the blogosphere sharing the love and doing lots of giveaways with artist friends and colleagues. i get to be one of them! Traci thought my book, Creative Doodling and Beyond would be fast BFFs with her book if they met each other on the street. i’d have to agree….don’t they look cozy together? They’re on the way to the craft store for some new micron pens. Good times. : )
So follow the book tour! She’s got a slew of stops already posted on her blog here. Tons of fun. I highly recommend.
Aaaaanyway……for our post, Traci asked me to create a Tag-Team art piece with her! A cross-country collaboration of doodly goodness. i was given the task of beginning our project by laying down a whole lotta my signature color and texture. Here’s a little peek….
i used textile dyes to paint on watercolor paper. The intense colors just make me sooooo happy! i snapped photos and sent her my part. Then SHE worked her magic to make a completed artwork. When you are done reading here, you should pop over to her blog and see a whole bunch of juicy, vibrant still photos she has of just HER part! They are super cool. But here’s a little hint at how she approached the collaboration to pique your curiosity!
Are you intrigued!?
We also videotaped our process. And Traci edited it into a fun time lapse movie because she is WAY better at that than me so far! Wanna watch?
To finish off this little stop on the “tour,” we’re also both offering signed copies of our books to some lucky commenters. We each came up with a burning-hot doodle question for ya to answer. Here on my blog, i want to know your fondest doodling memory. Did you have the best Trapper Keeper in the 8th grade? Did you doodle your high school sweetie’s name all over your composition notebook and then go on to marry that sweetheart? Did your kiddo give you a doodle-rific birthday card last year? i want to hear! Comment below to enter and i’ll use a random number generator to choose a winner. Then hop on over to Traci’s blog for another chance to comment, win, AND see more of those photos i told you about taken during HER part of the artwork collaboration! The giveaway closes on Saturday, March 10 at 12:00am. Good luck!
This has been a serious amount of fun, people. Thanks so much, Traci!
….and Happy Doodling!
65 comments
My favorite doodle memory was taking paint markers and doodling my name on my metal trunk that we would pack our clothes in for summer camp.
Such a fun post today!
OMG .. when you said Trapper Keeper I flashed back to middle/high school … it was covered with doodles of flowers and hearts and of course some with names! This collaboration is incredible … I love both of your work! I can’t wait to see what is next! Thanks for the continued inspiration.
I’m exploring techniques for doodling! I was never a doodler
. (such a rule follower) it was not fun, but I couldn’t bring my self to doodle. I want to and I’m learning. I have tried zentangles – a lot of fun, i have followed Traci and I have her book. I would love to explore some more.
Oooh, I love doodling, but my favorite thing is a collaborative doodle from kids 1 and 2. Kid 2 doodled a snail, super cute and girly. She left the snail pic on the kitchen table. Kid 1, a teenage boy, found the snail pic and started adding to the doodle. The result? A monster thingy with horns and a huge mouth with fang-like teeth, his mouth open and hovering over the top of the little unknowing snail. It cracks me up every time I look at it
Thanks, great question, and great inspiration!
xoxo MotherDana
My favorite doodles are those done by my sweet little granddaughter.
Fondest memories of doodling has to be in middle school when we would take just bid pens and draw all over the white rubber soles of our Converse tennis shoes. Hearts, stars, peace signs, happy faces, words, anything went!
Really enjoyed watching the video and your process! Two creative and very talented artists teaming up together is such an inspiration.
I received the best doodled puzzle from my daughter for my birthday last year.
My foundest dooding memory is back in high school when my class notes were looking more like art projects than actual notes.
I went to private school and in Jr High when we were on our way to High School we signed each others shirts and got creative with decorating it, kind of a good bye to Jr High memory
I used to doodle lots when I was about 16 and experiencing first love. It involved a lot of fancy hearts and flowers and somehow blood (don’t ask me why
It was a troubled relationship, star crossed lovers kind of situation. Now I am in my 50′s and sometimes I doodle things in 3×5′s I keep to write grocery lists. My favorite is a liquid gel black pen 
and btw….I am in love with both of your books (colors, techniques all t I have seen here in the blogs. Congrats to both!!! xoxo
This has got to be the best stop of Traci’s tour yet – I just loooove your collaborative art! My partner got up from bed to sneak a peek at what I was oooh-ing and ahhh-ing about.
Fondest doodling memory: It was through doodling that I ended up with my “legal signature”; people have commented again and again how unique it is, and quite whimsical for something so “official”
iris!! you can’t leave us hanging now! we need to see your cool signature!….i do love when folks post on my facebook page…..(hint, hint) : )
My earliest memory of doodling was using a pen to doodle stars and flowers.
Oh yes, there was a lot doodling on my trapper keeper, but I also doodled on my folded paper bag book covers and, to my parents’ horror, my shoes!
I love your work, and I have just recently started to embrace my doodling now that I am a parent. Looking forward to my daughter’s first doodles! Yay!
Wow trapper keeper—I loved mine! I doodled on everything all thru high school and still today. If I’m on the phone and there’s paper I’m doodling.
Lots and lots of doodles all through law school — mostly eyes and doodling around letters and words.
Love the video’s girls….. I would save my lunch bag and doodle all over it the rest of the day then throw it away before I got home so that my parents did not see it. They would have thought I was playing all day and not paying attention to the teacher. When in fact I learned more while my fingers were moving then just sitting still. I guess that is why I still doodle with pen.
Wow that brings back memories! I used to doodle all over my 3 ring denim covered notebooks since grammar school. I would doodle with whatever I. Old get my hands on. I r,ember making a giant mess with pastel sticks. I learned in a hurry that they needed sealer after doodling with them!
Love your work and cannot wait to explore your blog! TFS
The best doodling that I did in high school was while I was talking on the phone. I would write certain words from the conversation and then start doodling all around them to connect them into a mini artwork.
i have always doodled in some way or another for as long as i can remember, i doodle on the bus, on the phone, at art school [i am a mature age art student and try as they might they cant get doodling out of me] i am a doodle freak. love the books.
Ha!! I remember all that middle school doodling too…we had brown craft paper covers for our text books… I loved how they looked all crisp and new, but the urge to doodle on blank surfaces is irresistable!
Hi Stephanie, I’m so happy to have found you and you’re fantastic work through Traci. Love the video duo. I used to do very detailed doodles in studyhall, but my favorite memory is when my parents let me move into the attic (third floor) of our very old house and I doodled all over the walls and when friends came by they added their doodles. I live in that house now and the doodles are still there. Such fun. Would truly love to win your book and I’m going to try the textile dyes.
I still have my trapper keeper. My fondest memory of doodling was in my junior high notebook. Colored on every single page and around every blank space. I think I still have it around somewhere.
I have to admit, the best doodling I did was in my Impressionism class in college. The professor was always a couple of minutes late, and I’m incredibly shy, so I would sort of “will” away the terror of sitting alone in a class full of other people by drawing very intricate doodles on the margins of my notebook. By the end of the course, I had a book full of this amazing art that was created out of a need for comfort. It helped me survive that course (and I loved the content, when the professor DID arrive and begin to lecture!). Since then doodling is what I do when I need a little comfort, a little place to escape to without going anywhere.
Even though I love doodling, especially when on the phone to friends
I must say the best doodles ever are those my 9 yo daughter gives me nearly daily saying I love you, just so sweet 
I never get tired of it.
I had 3 boys and we all happily doodled away on any stray paper. Then when my oldest son was in 4th grade, I got a call from his teacher who said he had to STOP doodling on his class notebooks. Shame on her! He grew up to be creative writer – movies, tv shows, and commercials.
My best doodling memory is a collaborative doodling with my son when he was a child. We had lots of fun adding to each other’s doodle. Love your collaboration with traci; so pleased she introduced you.
I’m thrilled to visit your website. Loved the video! My favorite doodling was one day sitting in the emergency room of a hospital with DH … waiting can be so tedious … I kept my sanity and remained calm with doodling. It also peeked the interest of those who were looking after him. He was fine and I ended up with a very cool doodle that I made into an anniversary card the next month.
I found your work through Ashley and just love, love, love it!
Doodled Alice in Wonderland throughout 5 and 6th grade in Amsterdam, got into so much trouble with my teacher. She had no sense of humor! I don’t know how many different ways I did each character. lol
Also peace symbols and flowers, it was the hippy days and my folks had a popular cafe in downtown Amsterdam. OMG I remember doodling them in bellbottoms and putting flowers on my mom’s. Flowers, flowers and more flowers.
I better get going, I feel flower power coming on.
I took Traci’s class with Strathmore Paper and got so excited, then following her book release now and learning so much more from her and other doodlers. My fun memory is after Traci’s class several of my friends and I got together for 2 days of doodling! We laughed, doodled, ate lunch, snacks, and doodled some more for 2 days. We turned out some pretty incredible work and new ways to do things too! Great ideas, great friends, and good healthy pasttime! Thanks.
I doodled on fabric and cut it up to use in mixed media projects. Really loved it and it is so addictive. Started with help from Alisa Burke and realized how much fun it was.
What an awesome collaboration, LOVE the video! I just added your book to my birthday wish list :p My favorite doodling memory is once my niece asked me if I could decorate her binder, so I doodled all over it with some paint markers. She came home the next day with 2 of her friends’ binders because they asked whether I could doodle on it for them as well!
I think doodling is something I’ve done ever since I was a kid. Even back then I made my own small journals I kept with me doodling annoying that came to mind. Remember specially summer days spent out on the lawn with pen and markers and time just flew by. Same feeling these days when ever I take out my journal I feel calm, happy and content.
Love your doodles Stephanie and would love to have your book. A few years ago, my autistic son brought home a doodled picture using watersoluble crayons. I loved it! I copied it and now use it in my work.
Mu favorite doodles are the ones I have done “on the sly” in work meetings. LOL! Thanks for the great giveaway!
OMG!!! I doodled so much in high school. Had a boyfriend I was sooooo in love with. I doodled his name all over my notebooks, all over my jeans, (which in the 70′s was all we wore), on the girlsroom walls, with hearts, robin + george (yes, i still remember his name in over 30 years.. yes I’m getting older but am young as heart anyway, I doodled and doodled till my hands hurt. the bad thing was, when we finally broke up after 2 years in my senior year, I had to get new notebooks etc etc. I bet the doodles are still on the girls room walls. you would have thought they would have painted them in 2 years but i suffered every time I went in the girls room. LOL… (that’s what I get for writing on the walls per se) anyway, I’m doodling again. after I became disabled, didn’t think I could do much of anything but lie in bed, but since I met Traci (on the internet), I have been going doodle crazy. Now that I just met you….(you are awesome by the way) I will definitely get your book too and let traci’s book and your book become friends at my house… we will all have fun. Nice watching the video. good luck with your book. you are great. Traci is adorable.
Robin
I have both books on my wish list! So fantastic. IN jr. high and high school people would pay me to write their boyfriends names or I love so and so on their book covers and trapper keepers. I wrote in big bold colorful calligraphy I created…it was cool. Thanks for the chance to win.
Hi Stephanie! My favorite doodling memory would be this: when my parents first divorced, finances were extremely tight. My mom couldn’t even afford coloring books for us, but she’d draw loops and swirls on paper and let us use our imaginations to color them in, add our own designs and doodle to our hearts content. It’s something I’ve started doing with my grandson now
Aw, the good ol’ Trapper Keeper- such fond memories! My favorite doodling memory is very recent. I recently took Joanne Sharpe’s Letter Love 101 class and had SO MUCH FUN just being free and doodling. It is amazing how much time goes by when you are doodling and how amazing you feel afterwards looking at what you’ve done! Love your blog and will be coming back. Thanks for the chance to win!
Hi, i came over here from Traci’s blog–love your art, and the watching the video to see how you make your art is inspiring! Can’t wait to doodle, now! My fondest memory was before the ‘Trapper-Keeper’–the old denim blue notebooks! In grade school we doodled all over them–boys names, favorite bands, etc. Favorite Quote? “Send a Girl To Boy’s Town!”
(at that point, we didn’t even know what Boy’s Town was!).
Good Times!
Those mail in doodles in magazines in the ’70s.
My best doodling days had to be in Jr. High cause I doodled on everything I put my hands on I think! LOL What a wonderful collaboration you’ve got going on with Traci!
I had a trapper keeper and I really loved to doodle as a child. It was one of my favorite things to do. I remember spending most of my extra time just doodling on notebook paper.
Your work is beautiful and your book is on my wishlist ! I just recently started to do some serious doodling (LOL does that even exist, serious doodling??) after taking Traci’s class … Now I have both her books and can’t stop anymore
But I guess in a way everyone doodles every now and than, right?
I use to always doodle all through school! Doodling names and hearts. writing my name with the boy I liked over and over again! I love to watch my children doodle now!
Sitting in a class about vanity publishing and doodling a flyng man in a field of talking flowers , I photcopied it the next day, turned it into a card and gave it to the tutor. He loved it and framed it. A doodle well worth doing. Cheers janet keen from new Zealand
I’ve doodled my entire life! It kept me awake in college and now I’m incorporating it in my artwork. I found you through LBB and have a board on pinterest for art journal/doodle inspiration. I love your style. I’ll pick a recent favorite doodle…one with my 6 year old daughter. We doodled for over an hour on one page and she thought it was so great to make a ‘real’ artwork with me. Those are the greatest moments. I hope I win a signed copy, but if not I look forward to getting your book! Thanks for the chance to win!
I always doodled in my weekly planner especially in high school – it was what got me through class!!
Love it!
My favourite doodling memory wasn’t even my own! My friend Jocelyne, who used to take my phone messages for me at work, covered the little pink notes with doodles and I loved them.
Doodling in history class in high school. For some reason it always helped me remember the dull facts!
Fav doodling memory: survival of an incredibly intense series of meetings by doodling surreptiously as a means of staying grounded/present rather than leaving my body.
When I was younger, I used to doodle around my initials. I would do elegant letters and funny little drawings around them. I enjoyed very much watching your video. Love the final result. Thanks for the chance,
Thanks Stephanie for sharing your talent with us. Going through my mother’s papers and books after she died, I discovered she was a bigtime doodler. Amazing thing was my doodles looked just like hers, same
I like to doodle mandalas, I try to do a doodle mandala a week, so love to get more ideas with your book!
My favorite doodling memory . . . I used to doodle in class – all over my textbooks in high school. I remember being stuck on how to do something in math, when a friend came to help me. She pulled my book out for reference and then stood there speechless for a second. She probably thought that was the reason I didn’t get it. hehe.
I have just begun doodling. I found zentangle and the have expanded my search and I love the process. My first piece is my favorite so far. I made a 9″ x 12″ piece with my husbands name on it for him.
I was never a doodler until recently … but my fav is my first ‘zentangle’-ish doodle of my hand!
Hearts, always hearts………..all shapes, all colours, scrolls and stripes and dots. They just ALWAYS appear
I don’t really have a good memory and I wasn’t much of a doodler but if I doodle its usually hearts or stars ty
What a great giveaway. Would LOVE to win your book.
I loved my Trapper Keeper and anything to do with “office supplies” — pens, paper, tape, glue, pencils, notebooks etc. I loved to doodle too. I especially remember creating those “bubble letters” that connected together to write names and other words. Now I love to create zentangles and still doodle while I am in meetings and use doodles in my art journal.
I used to doodle on my notebooks in school, but I still doodle especially when talking on the phone or watching TV. Sometimes it’s fancy ways of writing my name or sometimes the doodles turn into little ideas for art or crafting.
when i was a little girl i remember watching my mom doodle flowers while she talked on the phone. they were always the same kind of flowers. i pointed this out to her. then i studied her doodles, so i could copy them.
I love yours and Traci’s art. I love to doodle with sharpie paint pens. Thank you!
OOPS forgot my favorite memory of doodling …
always doodling in the margin of notetaking … mostly circles and circles and circles.
My fondest doodling memories are when I doodle late at night and no one is around and I’m playing when I need a creative outlet.
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