Pretending that it's cold

Thinking about winter and un-made Christmas cards... Maybe I should just accept the fact that I'll never be organized enough to mail cards and hope... Birds around here don't need caps and scarfs, but I thought it would be fun to paint them like that anyway.

xo

Brown-blue

As much as I love color, sometimes I think it's fun to challenge myself with a very limited palette. Today I wanted to see if I can paint a face with only blue and brown (+white). What do you think? Does she need brighter colors in her life?

Mixed Media PLAYGROUND

I did it!!!! I wrote the workshop description! That was harder than creating the full workshop... I hope I wrote all the necessary information. Will you be kind to find the new tab under the banner - it has a very original name - WORKSHOP. When you click on it you should be transported to my Mixed Media Playground page. 

Registration is NOW open!

Workshop starts on Saturday 11th.

There is still enough time to make some Christmas presents...

Let me know what you think :-)

xo

If (workshop preview)

If creativity makes you happy,

If you are

If you like color

If you want to make gifts for family and friends

or sell them on eBay or etsy (not sell friends and family, sell stuff you make)

If you like making things just because you want to

If texture makes you smile

If you like and are all of above, then I will be

and ask you to join me in my first online workshop, where we can
 paint, cut, fold, make, collage etc. etc. together.

By the way, it helps if you are also:

More information tomorrow :-)

xo

Oil pastels

Day before Thanksgiving, I woke up with a need to paint with oil pastels. It's funny how that happens... I think about something maybe for years, and then suddenly I just have to try it. It helped that I had a 40% coupon for Dick Blick. So I went... and almost found what I wanted. They didn't have a portrait set, so I purchased a still-life set. Why not, right? Colors are colors.

And these colors are pretty...

 They are thick, rich, smooshable, yummy...

I used my fingers and it almost felt like sculpting, not painting. This is my favorite detail:

Everything about these oil pastels is fine, except that colors are not colors.... this set doesn't have the colors I need for faces (or I don't know how to use them correctly). The closest thing to yellow is a light green pastel.... therefore - another green lady.

So, obviously there are many things I need to learn. This is my first try and for a first try I really love it. I'm looking forward to many more. And to January, when a new dickblick coupon arrives so that I can get the proper portrait painting set. What was the last thing you had to have?

Five things I did today

I watched my husband frame and hang two of my paintings.
Made me smile really big to see that he likes my paintings that much... 

Took pictures of pretty things in our backyard.

Processed 16 pounds of cabbage into future sauerkraut.
Enrolled help of the above mentioned husband when strength was needed.

Created four new digital collage sheets. They are listed in my etsy shop, of course.

My roses as inchies:

Turned journal pages into stamps: 

Had so much fun with it and loved the look, so I made another one: 

More roses. This time as ATCs.

I worked on a new project.

 My first online workshop.

Here is a little preview.

I thought that now would be a good time to have a glass of wine with dh, but Hana is inspired to paint and is in my studio right now. Last time that happened was at least two years ago... Wine will wait, I won't miss the rare opportunity to be with my favorite teenager in the same room.

I hope you're enjoying the weekend!

xo

Happy December!

Can you believe that it's December, meaning - the end of the year?

This month our son turns 24, our daughter 16, my dad has his birthday too... lots of things to celebrate and many cakes to make. 

This whole day I've been doing something that is completely out of my comfort zone...  I've been fighting all the negative voices that show up when we are insecure and kept pushing through. To reward myself, I pulled out my rosin paper journal and created this page. How very relaxing to do something that I've did so many times before...

Happy December!