Happy Valentines Day!!

I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Valentines Day!  Here is  Christa's homework assignment from last month, I thought it was perfect for our blog!

Valentine still life

Learned so much from Desiree today I actually found shadows and I could see them and paint them WOW what an epiphany Thanks Teacher and friends
The first picture is of the still life and an uncompleted picture the second picture is my finished project
Looking for my project the Twinkie anybody have one out there
I am looking forward to next month thanks for all the knowledge everybody

February's Sweets Sketch Class!

Hi everyone, wow, we had a great class today. What can be more fun than painting sweets and food!? Everyone brought some sort of yummy sweets so we had cookies and candy to choose from in wonderful red and pink Valentines colors. We discussed painting textures, colors and what makes a good composition. Everyone set up their own edible still life and did a wonderful job capturing all the wonderful  textures, colors and shadows before eating their setups!  I think Tina had many break throughs in how she was seeing things which is awesome! After we finished up our cookie plates we did some quick loose rose paintings, no sketching ahead of time, just paint to paper and go. These are tons of fun and you can make lots of  them for cards, Valentine Cards, tags or anything else you can think up.

 Next month we will be painting shoes! Bring your favorite shoe, is it a high heel, boot, tennis shoe? What every you love in your closet bring to class so I don't have to make you take one of your shoes off!  This month our homework challenge will be to paint your purse, bring your homework and win a gift. Tina, your homework is different and is what we discussed today regarding your ding dongs! LOL  Happy February and don't forget to paint or sketch. Remember it doesn't matter what we are painting or sketching, everything is a lesson and you can learn something every time you pick up your brush.

Catchup for Christa

Christa asked me to post a few of her last class projects, well I told Christa I was posting her past class projects since she hasn't had time to post them.  This first one is her wonderful bird from last months bird class, great job Christa! I love the textured background and the wonderful bird colors, a great painting using complimentary colors!

Then this month we did Sweets! Everyone brought something sweet to paint and sketch.  Here is Christa's wonderful cookie painting.  I am unable to post her roses since my picture turned out blurry, sorry!

Great job Christa!

Valentine Roses

Had a fun class doing Valentines themes.

A truly sweet class

In todays class we painted sweet treats, it was hard to wait until we were finished before eating the cookies!

Postcard Valentine

Derisee showed us how to make a postcard we did this in a few minutes cool huh

January - a red legged Kitty Wake!

Working on learning to paint birds in our January class, and I am encouraged to do more!  This is from a photo I took while at a nature center on a previous vacation.  This sweet bird sat patiently by my shoulder while I took pictures of several other birds and finally turned and took one of her / him!  They really are this "fluffy"! 

Writing and painting- Be Inspired to Create

Hi everyone, I wanted to share this post with you guys first. I will be posting something similar on my Clothesline blog but it will say something totally different. I want to take this opportunity to share some things with all of you amazing artists, yes artists. You all are amazing and have a voice with something to say so please don't consider yourselves less, we are all students aren't we?!

I have started this new venture this year which is writing daily. It is hard since so much of my time is already so full with painting, sewing, care giving, blah, blah and just creating but I wanted to take some time to work on my writing skills.  I am always spouting in class, you only get better with practice so I decided to do some practicing. One of the many reasons that I want to write more creatively is to take the opportunity to capture moments in my life that are exquisite and meaningful to me personally. I want my new journal entries to also have those special moments that happen and often slip away if we don't record them quickly. We all have them we just let them slip away. Our journals are so perfect for recording those amazing moments in our lives. The thing is that you have to be open and willing to record it. Not every journaling moment will be super special but when they happen we need to grab them. I had such a moment yesterday with my granddaughters and wanted to share it with you. You may not find it as touching as I did but that's okay, all of us are unique and each will cherish different things. In my writing group we follow daily prompts and then write the first thing that comes into our heads. I guess after just a month of doing this when my granddaughter spoke it was as if I had a prompt! So this is what happened and how I wrote about it in Word and then printed it on Vellum for my sketchbook, I guess I could of hand written it but I knew it would fit like this.

I saved some white spots and I added drops of water to my damp paper in the back to create the soft white spots to represent dandelions

Shall we go for a walk before we start our day? Yes, yes scream the girls as they ran out the back door and into the yard. The days had been so cold for so long that it was nice to once again be able to enjoy the sunshine. Megan grabbed my hand as we walked and Rachel ran ahead.  Let's look for something special on our walk, what do you think we will find, I asked? Within minutes Rachel ran back with a hair clip in her hand, probably left from one of her prior visits and almost lost forever.  Oh, good job Rachel, can you find anything else?  Megan stayed behind and held my hand, what are we looking for she questioned?  Whatever you might see or find that is special to you. Rachel was already running back with a pretty flower to show me by this time. It was just about that time when I heard Megan gasp, LOOK Nana, LOOK! I found a WISH!! She dropped my hand and ran over to the white, puffy dandelion weed in the flowerbed and plucked it carefully. Holding her prize possession in her hand she reached up and handed it too me as she told me to make a wish and blow!

In my head I could picture the painting I wanted to do to go along with this scene. I had to paint a field of dandelions on a double page spread so I had room to journal the story. I wanted to freeze time and capture the moment. We all have moments like these in our lives that if we don't stop and capture they will be gone forever. So I found a photo Randy had taken of a field of dandelions in Santa Fe, NM and I was off. Then not wanting to cover the whole painting with words I decided to print on the vellum and cut it out and glue it on top. This would allow the painting to show through but the words to still be read.

I then printed the words on vellum and cut it out and glued onto my painting at the top edge.

I share this with you as a possibility for your sketch book and for being able to journal a bit more about a special event without ruining the painting. Have fun!