What makes you feel better?

 I am in a bit of creative slump... I'm sure you know the feeling - you want to create, but don't know what... 

When I feel like that I usually start writing, or sketching silly things and often it leads to brushes and paint. This time, I cut up some of my collage sheets, plopped them on journal pages and started from there.

I was listening to a very long and repetitive book, and mindlessly scribbling, gluing, painting....

I love spending time like that. It helps me relax and rest and at the end I have several colorful additions in my journal. I am also left with a HUGE mess on my table, floor and everywhere around :)

Do you ever reuse some of your images or do you always start with a white page?

Cyber Monday Inspiration

This is the first day in two weeks that I have as much time as I want to create, and - would you believe it - I spent the good part of the morning not knowing what to do. I pulled out a big canvas, decided I don't have the energy for it, then I cut up some ATC sized cards and opened my watercolors... but it didn't really feel right, so I opened my collage drawer and smiled at the the images that I saw in.

Playing with collage sheets in journals is easy and fun. I looked at all the faces and they seemed to be waiting to be placed on colorful backgrounds.

Birds brighten any page and always make me happy, so I knew it will be fun to use them.

I thought that someone else might be inspired to play with collage sheets, so I'm joining Cyber Monday and putting them on SALE.

If you are a reader of my blog, you will get a collage sheet of your choice free for every $10 spent in my Etsy store. That means that for every two purchased collage sheets you get additional free one.

Even better - for a purchased digital kit I will send two collage sheets for free (not to mention the workshop - 5 free sheets!!!). I never had a sale like this, so if you ever wanted to play with my images - this is the perfect time to stock up.

My Cyber Monday will extend to Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Just let me know that you are my blog reader in the etsy convo and pick your free collage sheets.

Happy Creating!

My garden

I have a very little garden and only green plants survive in it. 

I tried growing carrots, peppers, beets and other veggies with no success.

But kale, parsley, chard and stinging nettle thrive.

I stepped out to pick some nettles for dinner and was surprised to see how much they grew.

We had rain and it is obvious that they love it! 

Before I carefully picked the very prickly nettles I had to get my camera and capture the wonderous greens combined with rain drops.

Happy weekend! xo

At home

Always at home

in his heart.

Thank you for the love, understanding and gentleness.
It poured trough email and comments directly to my heart.
xoxoxoxo

Sad

Yesterday a squirrel committed suicide and I can't shake off the sad feeling. She didn't run in front of my car. I would have slammed the brakes and stopped for her. She ran from behind and in between my front and back wheels and just hit herself on the wheel... There was nothing I could have done to prevent it. And as much as I am aware that it happens every day and that it's minor compared to many other horrible things, I still feel miserable... therefore the sad face painting.

ATC Giveaway Winner

 Mr. Random.org chose number 23. For some reason I cannot open Darlene's website, so I can't reach her. I hope that you are going to read this and contact me Darlene. Thank you all for entering my giveaway! I hope to have another one soon :)

A girl with roses

 Sometimes I manage to paint eyes the way I want them. 

Not too much detail, not very precise, but somehow they express what I wanted. I wish it happened more often :)

If you didn't enter my giveaway - there is still time. I will pick a number tomorrow (Monday) at noon Pacific Time.

Daily thoughts

Breaking the rules

We all know the rule not to paint with water-soluble paint over oil based paint...
but it is so nice to break the rules sometimes.

 About a year ago the magical Lynne Hoppe wrote a tutorial about the way she paints faces using oil pastels, watercolor, gouache... and I had to try.

 I found a book that felt nice, and started painting quirky characters mixing anything and everything... except acrylics. The paints I use the most are banned from this book. I've been working in it for a year now, it is my go-to place when I feel more introverted than normal :)

Since I said that I will be posting every day in November, and I had nothing to show today, I decided to pull out my book and introduce you to these two guys.   I wish that my characters would whisper their names to me, but they don't, so they remain nameless...

Happy weekend!

101 BIRDS - Painting #23

Moving on with the the 101 Birds series.... Today - layers of strong colors; almost the whole color wheel in this painting :-)

Thank you for the lovely comments on the previous post! I'm glad that so many want to try the technique. I'm sure that you will enjoy it as much as I did. Welcome to all the new readers! I hope to have time to visit your blogs and meet you soon :-)

ATC technique and a giveaway

I stumbled yesterday onto THIS site and found a link to a tutorial for Intuitive Watercolor Wash Faces. It seemed like a lot of fun, and I could hardly wait to try it. 

The basic idea is to quickly add washes of color to watercolor paper, somewhat face shaped but very loose and free. You can see what my "faces" looked like after that first stage.

Then I spent some time playing with black and white inks and got this result.

This was really fun! More and more I love the feeling I get when creating without expectations.

I am going to sign up for the ATC swap at Art Colony, and three of my ATCs will go there.

Since I made more than three, I thought I might offer the forth one to one of you.

If you would like to win one of these four ATC cards, leave a comment with the card number you like the most and I will randomly pick a number on Monday morning.

Raining Happiness

I am not sure that these colors represent "happiness", but they did to me while I was dripping, splattering and layering them.

Day 5

It's only day five and I almost didn't make it... but it wouldn't be a challenge if I gave up so quickly, so I made myself pick up some colored pencils and scribble something quickly. As always - even scribbling lifts my mood and makes the day better. Where did that rabbit-creature come from and why, I don't know... but I allowed him to stay :-)

Forever Spring

I am so frustrated right now that even layers of soothing green/blue can't calm me.

I know I have several packages of little eye screws but I can't find them... I need them NOW to prepare canvases for hanging and it is so frustrating that they are not where I thought they were. Can you please use your magic powers and tell me where I left them? I would be so grateful...

101 BIRDS - Painting #22

It has been a while since I worked on my bird series. I planned to paint 101 bird paintings this year. As you can see - I didn't come far. It doesn't matter, I'll just continue until I have 101 paintings that are all the same size and subject. And then I'll do something with them... don't know what yet.