Creative Prompt - Eye

I loved all the responses to Artquiltmakers creative prompt "Eye". It always takes me a couple of days to be creatively prompted to respond. All the good positive responses had been listed so here is my negative response! Really like the drawing, if not the sentiment.

I used Crayola watercolors, the new metallic watercolors I got last week and a Micron pen I found in my sewing box. One of the neat things about the Micron pen is that it is waterproof and the tip on this one is very small.

Well, Mom's spoiled dog is standing at his dish barking so I have to go and feed him (and Mom, too, I guess).

Keep drawing.

City Rain Goddess

I saw a young woman with wonderful hair and she inspired this ATC. Love pen and ink. The black and white is so dramatic.

This is short and sweet so I can go buy a buttercup jellyroll online before I have to make dinner!

Water soluble oil pastels

I thought this image was really cool when I drew it but seeing it posted here makes it look quite different! And weird.

Once again I used my new water soluble oil pastels but this time I did not wet them. Maybe I should since I don't like the way this image looks. It also might look better if the photo was better. But when I took it the batteries in my camera were dead so I used the webcam on Mini Mommy (my HP notebook) with the ATC taped to my chest so the background has wrinkles and lumps and bumps. And it is green.

There is some ethos in the face of this guy. Hmmmm....

ATC - My pup - Drawing familiar objects

Our dog, Roxy, is a continuing source of joy and inspiration to me. As you can see, she is the most beautiful dog in the world! Also, she is well behaved, friendly and smart.

She enjoys curling up on my lap and the other day I felt like drawing when she was in my lap I drew her.


I started out with pencil, then rubbed some oil pastels in - blue and black - and highlighted it with india ink (great medium, it's waterproof!) and some color pencil for her collar.

The phrase is of course a messed up form of let sleeping dogs lie. Don't know where that came from (the messed up version, I mean).

So, use familiar (pets) objects as your art subjects. It is much easier to draw something familiar than it is new, unfamiliar ones. And the practice with familiar objects will make drawing unfamiliar ones easier.

More playing with new supplies

I've title this ATC "Itinerant Musician" . I got the idea for it from my watercolor a day calendar which Santa gave me for Christmas. My intent was to paint the daily lesson, every day. But the paper is too light to hold much water and I find I really like to do my own thing. So I occasionally pull the calendar out and set it to the correct date. In doing that this time I came across a painting like the one above, I think it was by Matisse, but now I can't find it in the calendar pages so I'm not sure. Anyway, my ATC is a knockoff of somebody elses painting.

But that isn't the point I want to make here! The other day when SBD and I were out and about she bought me a set of gouache paints and this is the first time I've used them. I found a clean palette which closes that is perfect for gouache and I was home alone so had the peace and quiete to work and 'Itinerant" is the result. I love the vibrant colors. I diluted the paint more than I had intended so it is like watercolor, well, it is watercolor - but opaque. Next time I intend to use it thicker so it is more like oil paint. Check back to see what happens!

Playing with new supplies!

I mentioned a couple of days ago that I got some new ink called 'Smooch". I've used it again here. I drew out this ATC in pencil then use India Ink and Smooch over the pencil. It is just freeform dots, arcs and lines. I am happy with the movement in the piece. And I like looking at it trying to pull out meaning from it. What do you think it means?

Milk and cupcakes

I went over to Jazzy Crafts in Castro Valley the other day and looked around. Last time I was there I picked up some metallic rub-on which is lots of fun to use. I used it for the frosting on this cupcake and to enhance the cupcake paper. This time when I was ther I saw a bottle that looked like nail polish but it is metallic ink. The applicator is really neat. It is just like the one for my (seldom used) eyeliner. I got a bottle in an acid green color and I used it for the table top above. The stuff is called "Smooch". Try it, it is a lot of fun!

Rainy Day Coffee

Another rainy day, sitting at the coffee house in Berkeley, waiting for my Santa Barbara daughter to meet me so we can go scrapbook store shopping. Took BART to Berkeley and am really glad that I did. The rain is so bad that traffic looked ghastly from the train.

The scrap booking store is on 4th Street in Berkeley. The area has really undergone a change since I was last there (admittedly several years ago). There are lovely restaurants, great shops and revamped landscaping. The scrap booking store graciously stayed open a few minutes longer than usual (possibly seeing a large purchase looming!) and allowed SBD (Santa Barbara Daughter) to shop for lots of stuff for her paper addiction. After that we walked down the street and wandered into a toy store the likes of which are hardly ever seen any more. All kinds of goodies - marbles, kaleidoscopes, stick horses, block castles, mood rings and on and on and on. It was really fun to browse through both floors.

We toodled back up University in Smartypants (SBDs Smart Car convertible). As we passed Utrecht Art Supplies I mentioned the large rolls of watercolor paper available there. Smartypants pulled a U-turn, we found parking and went on another paper binge! SBD also purchased some gouache for me - which I haven't started using yet.

I plan to use the gouache on some ATCs. It handles similarly to oil paints when used full strength I have read and I am looking forward to that. Can't decide if I am going to use watercolor paper or get canvas paper. Any ideas out there in blogdom?

Khaloesque ATC

Recently I read a book review about a stash of new Freida Khalo art someone had found. After reading the review and comparing the art in that article with another book of Khalo's art I doubt (as did the reviewer) that this is really her art. Regardless, reading the article and thinking about Khalo I was inspired to draw the rather grotesque ATC above! The title is "Frieda as Amputated legs". I used my new prismacolor pens for this drawing and still really enjoy them. Last time I was at Aaron Brothers the pens were on sale so I got two more. Unfortunately, I didn't see that there were different sizes and one of the pens was super ultra fine - I don't like it as much as the medium ones I got. Oh well!

Creative Promt - Pear & quilty comments

I just finished reading artquiltmakers blog posts for March. One of her creative prompts is "Pear". I dug up this ATC (#2 in the series) because it has a pear in it. Should have checked to see if I had posted it already but didn't, oh well. When people look at it they alway ask what the writing says. The reason I write as I did on this is so it can't be read! I don't even remember what it says!

I like the movement and the 'story' in this card. It is a happy little piece.

Have been lax in making ATCs this week. Am working on a quilt project that has my attention. It is a full size double wedding ring! I did 60 of the 98 arcs for the rings in a day and a half. I am foundation peicing it so it is relatively easy. I realized that I am going through a traditional pattern phase of my quilting. The last one I made was a pineapple pattern and the one before a Grandmother's Flower Garden (which was HUGE!). After finishing each one I swore I wasn't going to do another traditional quilt but I keep doing them!? What is that about?

Today I checked Terri Thayer's (she was a guest at artquiltmaker's birthday party) mystery novel out of the library. Before the first chapter is a Flying Geese quilt block. Crazy woman that I am I had a great desire to put them in the quilt I am making for the step-grandchild! That is another traditional block........I guess I'm not done with traditional quilts.

Anyway, the double wedding ring presents a quilting challenge because I am so short of space. My daughter suggested that I try Georgia Bonesteel's "Quilt as You Go" technique. That sounds like just the ticket!

I didn't think much of the arcs as I was making them but now that I am trimming them they look pretty good. I've only found three that I have to fix - was too stingy with the fabric and it doesn't cover the seam lines :( - oh well! Haven't downloaded pictures of the DWR in process yet. Will soon so you can see it.