Catching up

Instead of doing art or my household chores, last weekend was spent getting a new laptop configured and loaded with software. Some of it was easier than expected - Google Chrome brought across all my internet bookmarks and folders, and I successfully copied my Outlook folders and transferred all my archived mails.

It's a long weekend in Australia - today is ANZAC Day where we remember fallen servicemen & women, as well as those currently serving with our armed forces. The day always begins with dawn services all over the country and later in the day, a televised service from Gallipoli in Turkey as well as from France - usually Villers-Brettoneux. There are lots of special events due to the centenary of WW1.

Anyway, a long weekend means more time for everything including art.

Colour Me Positive Week 15 - HAPPY

This prompt was about how we approach life with a quote from the Buddha:"There is no path to happiness ... Happiness is the path", and with the option to use some drips or splatters on the page.

I went for a fairly literal rendition of the quote with a pathway through a garden, and used paint drips for the stems of plants and trunks of abstract trees. I kept the paint fairly liquid so the flowers look like splatters of paint.

The background was stencilled in pale pink before being washed over with blue and yellow. I used coloured pencils for the steps and pathway, and finished off with some small pops of bright yellow & orange in amongst the flowers.

Colour Me Positive Week 16 - ART

The challenge talked about art feeding the soul, teaching us to think & improvise, and how we can often use it as a sort of therapy. The quote came from Thomas Merton: "Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time", with the option of putting a bird on the page.

I immediately thought of using some of my previous art on the page. I looked at the background in various pieces and homed in on some to print. I used the background from Week 12 of Journal 52 for the letter A, and from Week 13 for R. The background from CMP Week 15 is the T, and the bird is from Week 12.

I used a very simple background for the page, just two colours and a stencil - I wanted my bird to have somewhere to perch, so the lattice was perfect.

Journal 52 Week 15 - Humble / Noble

I had a few ideas for this challenge where Sarah wanted us to use the quote: " Be humble for you are made of Earth. Be noble for you are made of Stars". I decided to go with the gothic ruin as I had a suitable stencil. I painted a rough shape along the bottom of the page, then stencilled the windows in white. The sky was painted using paynes grey.

Then it was a matter of painting a lightening sky, but still with some stars showing. The picture doesn't quite show the little touches of yellow and pink and the light at the side of the building looks a bit more like fire than light. Most of the sky was finger-painted and I found some paints did not blend as well as others.

Journal 52 Week 16 - Impossible Dream / Goals List

Effy asked us to create a page that looks at our "impossible" dreams, while Sarah wanted us to look at what our goals are this week, this month or this year.

I went with the impossible dream because that is easy and I did a goals page last year for DLP and they have not changed very much. My impossibly held dream is to design a house and have it built somewhere with a sea view. Why is it impossible? Well - first money - land is very expensive by the seaside; second money - it's very expensive to build a house; third time - I've left everything a bit late.

But I can still dream and I can still keep drawing up plans incorporating all the things I see that I think are really good ideas - one day it will be perfect!

Collages - O

Well this was a no-brainer as soon as I got hold of the Daphne magazine with lovely oriental prints to cut out and turn into umbrellas. Except, I cut them out and stuck them on my collage page together with some bits cut from an old calendar.

Now I just need to decide which P word I will use.

Thanks for visiting. I hope you liked what you saw

Week 14 and cooler weather

Well daylight saving has finished and we are back to light early mornings which makes it easier to get up in the morning - although the cooler weather makes you wish you could stay under the covers a bit longer! I love autumn with the crisp mornings and sunny days. I sleep better that's for sure.

Colour Me Positive Week 14 - HOPE

This week's prompt talked about hope being an optimistic frame of mind and how dreams/hopes can help us move forward. The quote is: "Once you choose hope, anything can happen", and we were encouraged to use some glitter on the page.

As on most weeks, I have chosen to use a different quote: "Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul" - Emily Dickinson, and I had a vision of a bird flying out of the soul - hope taking wing. My page started with pastel colours squirted on the page and moved around with a credit card. The pink was a bit pale so I used a hot pink over it to brighten up the page.

Next, I used a grey paint with two new stencils from Lulu Art and the lovely Lapis blue from Dina Wakley to add some accents to the page. The soul shape and the words were done using black watercolour pencil, and I added some glitter to the word "Hope". My bird was composed of various feather shapes from a TCW stencil.

Journal 52 Week 14 - Seed / Root

So this week Effy wanted us to include a quote about seeds or spring and to paint something with seeds in it. Sarah, of course, wanted a root related quote and for us to explore metaphorical or literal roots on our page.

I found my quote first, from Khalil Gibran: " And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair". So my picture is literal for seeds and roots, but my quote is more metaphorical.

The background is my wonderful Distress Spray Stains which I enhanced by rubbing over some gold paint and pearlizing medium to give a bit of sheen. I stenciled the tree using white paint so that I would have a suitable background to colour the tree trunk, leaves and fruit. I painted the roots freehand. The seeds are just little commas of red paint with a white pen over the top.

I also stamped a little around the background but I find the black ink too dark when used over the background colour, so I will need to get a lighter colour,  possibly a grey.

Collage - N

I think the word chosen is a no-brainer as there are plenty of examples to find in the various magazines that I have, and "Needlework" is something I used to do - in fact many women in the family have been needlewomen both professionally and as hobbyists,

Unlike last week, this week ended in celebration with my niece's 30th birthday. It was lovely to get together as a family, catch up with various people and enjoy delicious food.

Thanks for stopping by - I hope you enjoyed your visit.

Stop and Start

It has been a week of mixed blessings - one page completed quickly and easily, the other started off well and went quickly downhill, so was abandoned, and then to top it off a funeral on Friday for a cousin on my mother's side of the family. And the really bad thing is that we (the cousins) only ever see one another at funerals and now that all of the older generation has gone, we are slowly going to disappear - with George being first.

It was a very nice send-off for him with several former colleagues talking about his work and telling me things I never knew about him - like what a great art director he was, a mentor to others, a prize winner and a bit grumpy. Grumpy is something most of the family does well!

Colour Me Positive Week 13 - Eyes

This week was all about seeing with new eyes and a quote from Marcel Proust: "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes". I drew and carefully coloured in an eye, and proceeded to do my page with an image in mind. EXCEPT it didn't turn out as planned, looked awful, so I tore out the page so that I could reuse the eye - which I was pleased with!.

I was at a bit of a loss and thought I would just make a simple background for the eye and write the quotation around the edge. I looked though the journal where I use up excess paint and found a page that I liked, trimmed it, distressed the edges and stuck on my page. The quote and the eye were added and I was quite pleased with the finished page - better than my original vision.

Journal 52 Week 13 - Lyrics/Misheard lyrics

Effy suggested we use lyrics from a song we are loving at the moment, and Sarah thought we should use "mondegreens" or misheard lyrics for our page. This is the second challenge here involving lyrics and again I used Carole King for inspiration.

This page is a variation on one I did for Documented Life last year, using similar colours, the same stencil and words from the song "Tapestry". The background is antique gold and I have used both aqua glitter paint and turquoise matte acrylic for the stencil. I also used some cream around the edges to give a shabby look. The page is completed with the words of the first verse of "Tapestry".

You can see my piece from last year in my DLP 2015 tag here

Collage - M

I had a few possibles for M, but went with "Maquillage" as it is an unusual word and that is the purpose of this self-imposed challenge. As I don't have many fashion magazines, I have also included cosmetic type items as well as maquillage/makeup - just to fill the page.

Well that's been my week - hope yours has been better. Thanks for stopping to look and cheers.