It Worked!

I was doing further cleaning in the workroom and found my watercolors.  I had a sudden brainstorm...

OK.  So I didn't get as much done in the workroom as I should have, but I did have some fun!

I thought.  Why couldn't you do a whole line of landscape painting across the page of watercolor paper and then decide which part you liked best?

So I tried it. 

I am not crazy about the bottom one and not even sure if I will use the top one, but it does work!

After I let them dry, I cut up a couple of scraps of the watercolor paper and made two L shapes.

That way I could make the template larger or smaller. 

Then I started sliding them around on the painting. 

This part isn't too bad, but I did all of these in about 15 minutes. 

If I do it again and take my time, I may get a few paintings to frame. 

But it did get me out of room cleaning!

Back to the serious stuff now.

See you tomorrow.

The Budding Artist!

First of all... I did more on the rug, but I'll bet you couldn't tell me where... Some of it is in the border and you really won't be able to see it until I have the whole border finished...

Now about the budding artist... I took a photo of the painting that Amare did, rather than scanning it.  It was easier that way.

 I put it in my greeting card program and repeated it in three different sizes.

Then I printed it out on cardstock...

I had enough picture frame molding to frame the center one. 

The other two, I had to wing it.

The smallest one is done with half scale crown molding.

The larger one is done with guitar strips of inlay that I bought in 1982 when I was working in a mini store off and on...  I wish I had bought more of that.

Anyway, if you don't have picture frame molding, with the little ledge to fit over the painting... You cut the cardstock with a border outside of the picture, large enough to lay the strips of molding flat on it. Then simply miter the corners of the molding and glue the strips to the cardstock on the outer edge of the picture...  It works just as well as the fancy stuff if you do it right.

Now all I have to decide is which size I am going to use in the library.

Please excuse me now.  I have to go see which one looks best...

See you tomorrow.

Garbage Day...

Have I mentioned that we have an almost two year old that is mad about garbage trucks?  A lot of times we get a visit on Tuesday because he will get to see a double dose of garbage trucks for the week.  His garbage day is Monday.  Now all we have to do is introduce him to others with different garbage days to keep him amused all week.

He has the garbage truck drivers wrapped around his little finger.  They even honk the horn just for him.

In reality, April came over to have me help her frame this painting.  I did it when I was in college and she grabbed it when she left home.

It was just a corner of the oil painting classroom at ASU....Many years ago. 

She has had it hanging in her home ever since she thieved it.

This one is my favorite.  It hangs in our living room.

I did this in the same era.  It is of an abandoned house in Jerome, AZ.   The building was supposedly a house of ill repute, back in the mining era.

It's kind of a sad painting, but I like it.  

This is it for minis today. 

Tessie came in the kitchen when I was baking homemade cinnamon rolls this morning. 

She started drooling and quickly came up with a proposal.  "OK.  I will trade you the monkey for three cinnamon rolls."

I am no fool.  I can make more cinnamon rolls.  I can't make another monkey.  That's the only one.

Here you see how quickly a witch, a Steampunk inventor and a pit bull can devour three cinnamon rolls.  It didn't take long, but the story has a happy ending.  They are full and I have my monkey back.  Everybody's happy.

See you tomorrow.

Framed!

I have said it before....The gluing jig is my best tool, after my exacto.

I was not getting any happier with the macramé. I kept going and I kept saying to myself, "I don't care if it was a 70s thing...It doesn't work here.  Then I finally threw it across the room and started framing.

I got two framed and in the jig.

Then I went to work painting the chimney and putting the first coat of spackle on the inner walls of the fireplace.

So much for that.

 By the time I got back to the bedroom, the pictures were out of the jig and being tried out in the room.

The Terrible Two can sometimes be the Terrific Two.  Then found the right places for both of the ones that I framed...And tried them out.

Tessie insisted that this lighting was just right for atmosphere....I told her it was just right for "dark".  I think that this one should go a little to the right, but other than that, since I cut it down in size, it looks pretty good there.  So much for macramé...

Meanwhile, Zar got out the razor saw and Tessie held down the miter box and they framed this one as an extra.  I am going to have to find a place for it...

Zar hinted that it would look good in the Clockwork Cottage, if I ever get back to finishing it....Hint.  Hint.

Anyway, I got an E mail from Walter saying he will be back around five this afternoon... So much for minis...I think that I should make at least a path from the back door to his recliner before he gets here...

The first two days were fun. The third is for cleanup.

See you tomorrow.

Knotting Is Going to Happen....

I did a couple more paintings after I left you yesterday.

I am leaning towards the first one.  Good color and kind of primitive looking.

Zar liked that one.

With that, Tessie started edging Zar out of the picture...Literally.

We tried this one, but it is too cute and feminine.  I didn't tell Tessie that, because she would have voted for that  one immediately.

When I said I didn't like that one, Tessie disappeared in a flash and so I waited, knowing that she had something up her sleeve.

She made it clear, in no uncertain terms, that Zar couldn't have this.  She said, "This is from my personal, private collection.  It belongs in the living room of the town house.  And besides, Zar wouldn't want a macramé owl in his living quarters.  You will have to make something in his colors and then we will see if we like it.".

That just means another day deciding on art...

No.  I am not going to make anything resembling an owl for the wall.

Just to humor Tessie, I will do a hanging....No. Not her with a noose around her neck. What she doesn't know is, I need something for the wall at the other end of the room, so that will keep me busy today. 

Walter has gone to Prescott to play golf for the next three days, so I am going to put my feet up, watch Korean Dramas and play... First with string and beads for macramé.

See you tomorrow.

Working Outside the Box....

Outside the box and in the workroom...For a while... Straightening can be fun...When it leads to finding other things to do.

Then I found wood to do the shelves at the back of the Bloomie's box.  I cut the wood for those and the desk.

That only took about ten minutes and then I went back to cleaning...

Then I found my tubes of watercolors and a 140 weight pad of watercolor paper....So much for cleaning. 

I worked hard yesterday and Walter is out golfing, so I am rewarding myself.

I need some art for the walls of the new box.  I sat down and fiddled with watercolors.

It has been a  long time since I last worked with those.

The above photo was the first try.  It's about three inches square.  Not that good.  I want abstract, but not boulders...The colors will go in the room, but the overall design is a bit heavy.

This was the second try.  The color is right and I like the design, but it just doesn't scream 70s to me.  It looks a bit too modern.  It's more like a colored tangle.  Back to the watercolor drawing board.

It will take me a few more tries to find a happy medium.  Maybe I should do some sketches first.

I need to do another and another, until I find one that I like.

Zar and Tessie are still in the room box...They both refuse to leave.  It's like one of those contests where the person that holds on to the new car the longest gets it... It's going to be a long day...They both keep asking for food and water.  I don't want to think about when one of them has to go to the bathroom....If it's Tessie, I may find Zar out cold on the bedroom floor....

See you tomorrow.

Channeling Bob Ross....

First of all, I have two legs carved.  I can only do that kind of work for just so long and then my eyes start to cross and I start to see stars.  That was yesterday.

This morning I decided that I had to do something on one of the other boxes.  I went for the Mystery Box.

Oh!  I forgot to tell you about solving my worktable problems.   I wanted something a bit taller than the one that I have been working on.  Walter and I discussed putting it up on bricks or some other kind of risers.

Then I solved the problem by wandering around Walmart!  I love this table!  It is just right for the space I have.  The top is very durable and washable.  Best of all, it is adjustable to three different heights.  Even better than best of all, it was priced at 15.00!

Now, about the boxes.  I decided that there should be some "Outside" in the Mystery Box. 

I took a piece of graph paper, folded it in half and cut out an arch shape...

I drew around it on the inside lid of the box.

Then I started channeling Bob Ross...Yup.  He's the guy that did an oil painting class on PBS for many years. 

Being an artist myself, I was a big fan....I loved the fact that he could turn out a pretty good oil painting in 30 minutes....Well, 30 minutes not counting the stop time between camera takes....

Anyway, once in a while, I take advantage of the techniques that I learned by watching that show. 

I sat down.  I squeezed out white, browns, greens and blue.

In about 30 minutes, I had this...

Thank you, Bob.

The mystery is, where will this go next?  You will have to wait and see...

See you tomorrow.

"Torn Between Two Worlds..."

That was Tessie, being her usual melodramatic self this morning.  Oh, woe is me!

The reason is, I was spending some of the time outside.  The weather is perfect right now.  72 degrees and clear skies. 

I found some plants for the back yard yesterday, so I have been alternating between the yard and the house.  It is hard to stay inside in weather like this.  In a few weeks it will be in the 90s.

Inside, I started collecting things to go in the cottage...

I had to stand in the bathtub to take this first photo.  This is a Mucha poster that I bought when I was in college...It has followed me from house to house for many years.  It needs re-framing again, but it is one of my favorites.

I decided to go searching on the net for it, so that I could have it in mini in the cottage.  I simply put Mucha in the MSN search box and hit images.

I found it and a couple of other posters that I used to have.  for some reason the other two are nowhere to be found.  I have only postcard sized copies of them .

Whilst searching for things to print, I found a couple of Erte fashion sketches, some newspapers. a Tudor house sketch,  /some labels and some thread holders. This will get me started.

I also went through the boxes, drawers, and bins and gathered a lot of odds and ends that I can use. 

I have been looking for those little glass bottles for a week....I knew that I moved them to a safe place...You know the rest.  They were in with the plastic window sheeting.  Well...That's kind of like glass...

As I unloaded the stuff in the bedroom, Tessie marched in, sat down and grabbed one of the pizzas.  She took a bite out of one side of it and announced, "I want to live here.  You have two kinds of pizza and they are still warm!"

I took the pizza away from her and she flounced off to try out the new desk...To quote her, "It still looks like a dressing table..."  Sour grapes much?

Oh well. Spike likes it.  It is yet another place that he can look out a window.

I did get more done, but I still have a long way to go on that one.  There will be another level at the bottom, where the mark is on the leg.

I am thinking shelf space  and a cutout to put my knees under the desk.  Yes.  I said desk!

I still have this iris and the sweet broom, behind it, to plant.  I had never seen yellow and white iris before...It definitely looks like summer.

I am thinking that this would be a great one to do in miniature.  I see a tutorial coming soon.

By the way, are you remembering to vote every day?  We were ahead for a couple of days, but this morning, I noticed that we were back to second place. Please don't forget to do it each day.  Thanks to all of you that have been supporting Tessie and me.


Here's the last plant I got yesterday.  I is a Madrid Lavender...Until I saw this, I thought that all lavender plants had lavender flowers...Wrong again.

Yes.  This one has tiny lavender flowers, but the main flower is white...I love lavender and so does Tessie.  She tromped into the center of the plant to have the photo shoot and I couldn't get her out.

I have to admit it really does smell good...However, I planted it about two feet from a chocolate mint plant.  It is hard to choose which one to smell first.  Just wait until she discovers that one.

Never mind.  I will let Tessie smell the lavender and mint....I just spotted a few stalks of asparagus coming up at the other end of the planting bed...Strangely, that never gets to the table.  Every morning I go out and snip it off  and eat the two or three stalks that come up this time of year.  After all, it's not enough for a whole serving and besides, I saw it first!  If I don't eat it now, the squirrels might acquire a taste for it...

See you tomorrow.

Painting On Silk.....

Kathi asked to see a close up of the flower paintings from yesterday. I decided to go all out and show you more.

Here you go, Kathi! The little ovals of silk were wrapped around and glued to illustration board ovals. The frames are some of the metal miniatures that you can get and paint yourself.

To do the paintings, I used tube acrylics and thinned them down like watercolors. I started with a light pencil sketch. Then I did the paintings lightest colors first and finishing with darker colors and in this case, I did a few details with Pigma brand Micron Pen .005. They are archival and don't run or fade over time. Very fine.

This next one is the very first one that I did. It is a copy of a Japanese painting. This one is all painting. no pens.

I did notice that it is "foxing" up in the right corner. That's OK. It just makes it look old. If you enlarge this one, you can see the weave in the silk.

The last one is the desert dweller in the Southwestern Room Box. She is done with a little more oil painting technique than the other ones. That is, there is thicker paint on this one and less watering down of the paint in some areas. Some layering of the paint in other areas.

Here's a closer look at the top half of the painting. Her face and cowl are completely covered with paint, as is some of the mountain. The mountain is a kind of stylized version of my favorite Arizona mountain. It is Picacho Peak. It is between Tucson and Phoenix. Picacho means peak in Spanish...So it is a bit redundant....Peak Peak....I always wondered who named it.

I am still working on the real house. For some reason, I get in the mood to clean out cupboards and closets this time of year...Maybe it's because I think that I am going to get a lot of new stuff to fill them when Christmas comes.....If I'm good...No comments please...I really do try...Honest....

Back to work.

See you tomorrow.