A few things to share

First gemstone painting

Gemstones in your Zentangle anyone?  Okay, it's all the rage now on the Facebook groups.  Come on, you HAVE to keep up here.  So this is just my first ever try at it.

I see it can be kind of addicting. I need to give my watercolor students their grade after the 3 workshops.  Everyone got an A.  Thought I'd make it a cool one.

Mike (9)

Okay so this is my grandson, Mike, sending me a Happy Thanksgiving card. On the front is his cat.  Very nice cat.

But inside is this.  Okay help me on this.  My first though it is Mayflower with sails bringing over the hapless Pilgrims. 

 But it looks for all the world like they have a trolling motor on board.  (Mike is an avid fisherman…his dad does have one of these).  It must be early in the morning or late in the evening as the sun and stars are out at the same time.  Always an amazing event when that happens.  

I adore kids' drawings.  They are so wonderful.  Mike has not yet been told he can't draw so he does and he can.  In a few years he'll stop.  Somewhere in there we lose that fresh joyous spirit that says "just do it" and we forget how.  

And then someone will have to re-teach him again when he is 40.  

Planning for the last wc workshop for beginners

My watercolor class will conclude it's 3-part series on Monday with making some Christmas cards based on  things we have learned (color mixing and control of water) and combining them with some techniques for texture.  

Using Brenda Swenson's beginner wc book for our text…we are exploring her preferred textures: Saran plastic wrap (see background on top card), masking fluid (see snow flakes on bottom card), lifting (see moon and snow drifts in second card.  

I am using really inexpensive card stock as it actually works better for wet techniques.  Because it doesn't like to be taped down, however…we are using stic-tak on the corners of the cards to hold them to our support boards. 

I am limiting everyone to one #10 round and one 3/4" flat brush for the cards.  

If you look very closely you will see there are Christmas lights in the palm trees (moon glow gel pens).  This IS Florida after all. 

Happy Holidays.

Journal Prompt 46: Font Fun

Journal Prompt 46: Fonts

One thing I am learning is that "font making" is like illustration…it takes practice and it takes TIME.  Unless you plan to just "trace" fonts, you have to take time to learn some new ideas about printing and writing.  Not interested in calligraphy…just interesting font-making.  

I was in charge of the journal prompt on Nov 11 and so I challenged members to work with fonts.  Since then there have been two challenges and I'm not on top of them. One is about birthdays and one is about special celebrations in your life.  I should be able to put those together, don't you think???  

The journal prompt is now coming to the close of their first year together.  Some folks have dropped out, others plan to drop out but there is a core group still left for next year.  

My goal is to post twice a month…combining prompts together if I can and if not, then picking my favorite.  I also plan to use a larger journal at least 9 x 12.  Doing it weekly was just too much pressure.  But I learned a lot.  I also learned at 5 x 7 journals do not give me enough wiggle room!  

Am going to try to find a little more studio time in the holiday rush of things.  We are in the middle of a kitchen remodel too…but no excuses.  This evening my goal is to write my Christmas letter (long over due) and decide what art work will go with it.

I am also trying to search out a mechanical pencil that holds a .3 mm lead (normal is .7).  I am thinking I need to visit Office Depot first.  Been enjoying Danielle Donaldson's book Creative Girl Mixed Media techniques for an Artful Life.  Her graphite work is gorgeous.  

Hope you all had a lovely lovely Thanksgiving and next Sunday is the first Sunday in Advent.  My tree is up.  I am keeping decorations VERY simple this year with the kitchen construction happening.  Decorating with a lot of nice pungent piney candles and a live poinsettia and just some favorite little Christmas table cloths and runners.  Just enough.  Now to find the Christmas CDs.

Week 3 of Jane Davies online class

So in Jane's online class we are cutting "stencils" with a craft knife…just simple shapes.  I am using old magazine pages for this.  Every place you see "blue" that is where I cut out a shape.  Then you roll out paint on your gelli plate and lay the stencil on it and then place your 8 x 8 paper wherever you want.

So for instance on this one (actually white paper, sorry about the pink tint) the aqua blue and the orange are actually paint.  The others are collaged hand painted papers.  

On this one the yellow/burnt sienna and the light blue are all painted.  The others are collaged hand painted papers.

Mostly we are just "playing" a little with the ideas.  We are not working out a lot of details on the collages yet.  

Preparing for tomorrow's WC lesson

Goals for Beginner class II:

drawing negative space (around the outside of the leaf).

mixing color on the paper.

leaving white spaces.

remembering where the light source is.

shadows.

using water droplets for texture.

scraping for lines (veins)

You can get a lot of information from a small painting.

Artsy Fartsy on the portable sewing machine cover.

Before

After

Ever since I discovered that my portable sewing machine case had begun to deteriorate…I've been planning on making it look a tad better.  First I thought I'd just paint it.  But soon I began thinking of something a little "wonkier".  You know me.

All those scraps of gelli-print paper…I know just the place for them.  These are collaged on with heavy gel medium.  I chose the heavier medium as I didn't want it running all over and the heavy medium stays put when you put it down and the papers also wrinkle a little less.  

Now that it is bone dry,  I'll coat the whole thing with Modge Podge clear coating to seal it well and give it some resilience.  Now where I store it in the studio will at least make it "fit in" as a piece of art work!!!

In my small space, there is no where to "put it out of sight" and I so I just needed it to "fit in".  Voila.  

There's Something in the Air

One of the many things we did at Legacy Park at the Zentangle class yesterday.  The Christmas card folds at the middle.  

The snowman is done on a classic 3.5 tile and then I cut slits in the card to insert the tile so it can be removed later if the recipient wishes to do so.  Above are a sample of some other possible borders (there are tons and tons of them, of course.)  But these are ones I like especially.  

Leesburg Art Association Fall Show

You Are Not in Kansas Anymore

Last Saturday evening's art reception for the fall gallery show at the Center for the Arts in Leesburg, FL.  No prizes this show…but it was fun.  

Zentangle Demo ready...

Bookmarks

For the demo in Mt. Dora, FL I decided that for those people who bring a fine line black pen and a pencil, I would demo a book mark. Totally optional.  I wanted one that would be simple and not take too much time or have too much explanation.  This is not a "class"…just a demo.  Here are a few I played with the then decided on the third tangle.  "Ing" is the tangle that was introduced at CZT 15 which was my session.  So you sort of "bond" with your tangle, ya know?

It is very simple and yet has a very nice look to it.  I added a little tipple to balance it with a little organic lines and then did an aura around the whole thing. The wc is just to show people how things change if you add color.  

So I cut 50 book marks this weekend and on the back of each I have the information about my DK class in January.  Susan thinks we could have as many as 45 people at the demo.  So that would be good marketing for the class.  

Pretty warm (86) in central FL…overcast this afternoon.  After church and lunch, we are now watching the Packer's game.  They are down 14 to 27 at the point in the game.  Go Pack!  

Fun With Gelli Print class

Using Dimensional Paint

Using Acrylic Glazing medium

Okay so I am in this online class with Jane Davies.

This is a first for me.  Never done anything like this before.

I am not sure how many folks are in the class but I know it filled last April in 48 hours.  

She establishes a private blog to which we all post our lessons each week.  I think it's 6 weeks but right now I can't remember.

Folks in it are from all over the country and other countries too…I remember seeing The Netherlands and Canada and Great Britain..I forget where else.  Very fun.  

At this point Jane is having us begin to learn how to create different textures on the Gelli plate for collages.  I won't bore you with all the things but here were two I especially liked.  

Have been a busy bee in the studio lately…also getting ready to post my first prompt to the journal group on Facebook.  Makes me nervous to think I am in charge of it next week!  Yikes.

Thanks to Cynthia, who gave me inspiration, I think I have it written the way I want it now.  Hope I remember to post it!  

Life is crazy here.  After 3 weeks of not feeling well…I am almost back to normal (if ever I am normal).  We are busy remodeling our kitchen, and I have several classes I am teaching…watercolor next Monday and then Zentangle Tuesday the 17th.  So prep work ongoing there.  Everything slightly behind!