Inspired By Autumn Colors

We had a sunny, blue-sky Autumn day in the Pacific Northwest yesterday.  It inspired me to take these photos of trees in my yard and then splash some watercolor paint around!

Nature is full of colorful inspiration! The name of each tree is under the photo.

River Birch Tree – has interesting bark texture and greenish-gold leaves.

Sunset Maple – Fall colors of a sunset!

Crabapple Tree – the birds love to feed on the tiny crabapples in the winter. This tree is color-filled all 4 seasons.

Larch Tree – needles turn gold in Autumn and fall off.

And my watercolor experiments:

How does nature’s colors inspire you?

Cheers! 🙂

A Strange Case…

Today’s weird bird is a strange case…

Could it be Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?

A before and after photo:

Perhaps it is just an ordinary “Two-Headed Hat bird,” not to be confused with this one: The Cat Bird

If you’d like to inspect it further, here is a close-up photo:

Hope your day is clearly fabulous…

Happy Weird Bird Wednesday!

Cheers! 🙂

A Different Perspective

I don’t know about you but sometimes I get stuck in a creative rut…

When creating becomes less fun and spontaneous, I realize I need a break.

I need a different perspective.

Taking a blogging break has helped me realize that creating art doesn’t have to be about knowing the direction I am going in life or art.

It can be about the JOY in discovery.

It can be experimenting with different art mediums such as watercolor paints…

And being inspired by aerial photography at National Geographic to create abstracts by dipping my paintbrush in paint.

I don’t have to create a masterpiece, I just need a new perspective and keep experimenting with JOY! 🙂

I hope you find JOY in what you create today.

Cheers! 🙂

What The?!

Bleep!!

A short blip to wish you…

Happy Weird Bird Wednesday!!

Cheers! 🙂

H, I And Pattern Play

I realized that I hadn’t shared my letters, “H” and “I” from my watercolor Alphabet Journal that I did in July on my blog.

I added the collage portion to these letters last weekend.  I think this page is extra happy:

And you all know how much “I” love flowers!

Last night, I had only a few minutes to paint before dinner so I created this experiment in watercolor:

Watercolor pattern play is relaxing and fun!  I encourage you to give it a try!

Cheers! 🙂

 

The Feckenham Family…

The Feckenham family had similar features…

And could easily be found in a crowd!

Hope these funny faces give you a smile today!

Cheers! 🙂

Drawing Quirky Characters…

I discovered this online class over the weekend at JeanneOliver.com – Quirky Characters with Lucy Cooke…

And I haven’t been able to stop drawing… a very good thing! 🙂

Here are my beginning drawings in my sketchbook on Friday:

I wanted to loosen up and create more quirkiness in my drawings…

So I decided to start my faces with something familiar…a little paper collage:

Experimenting with different drawing materials helped me relax too.  I also like how Lucy gives different ways to start a drawing of a face:

I started the ones above with watercolor hair and then used water soluble Faber Castell graphite pencils to add the details.

It was super fun to give little “stories” to my characters as I did with my collage ones.

I did the sketches below with a .7mm pencil, blending stump and a little color pencil where mentioned:

I think I have come a long way in my pencil sketches in just 3 days!  I think that Lucy Cooke is such a good teacher.

This class is teaching me so much and I’d highly recommend it if you’d always dreamed of drawing faces that are playful and fun!  It is one of the more reasonable online classes I’ve taken in price yet it doesn’t disappoint in content either.

Cheers to quirky drawing! 🙂

The Power Of Touch

I do not believe we can ever understand the depth of love…

And the power of touch!

I started my two hands in watercolor last week, if you recall:

And added the finishing “touches” in ink over the weekend.

Two people who “touched” my life with love recently passed.  One a family member and the other the mother of a friend.  Both ladies were 95 years old.

It has made me think more about how others touch my life and how I have the power to touch others with love.

Cheers! 🙂

E, F and G

I have been adding collage to finish some of my watercolor alphabet journal pages from the month of July.

I thought you might enjoy seeing them – before and after collage photos:

Letter “E” is for eyes:

For the collaged “hair,” I colored Swedish tracing paper with Derwent Ink Tense Blocks, added water to blend the colors and let dry.  I then sewed them to my paper with a light gray thread.  Her eyes were a little more sultry than I intended!  😉

Letter “F” is for Fridays, frogs, flowers and ferns:

I stapled my handpainted collage papers to my watercolor paper.  I then covered the staples by gluing a circle over them.  The black letter “f” is a sticker.

Letter “G” is for mixing greens:

I attached the collage paper with a flower brad, glued a paper scrap with a square on top and added the “good” fortune:  You will hear good news today!

I hope to finish letters, “H” and “I” next week!

Happy Friday! Cheers! 🙂

A Hand-Drawn Mandala

I recently purchased this book on Mandala Art from Amazon:

Since I am exploring art with my hand this week, I decided to try a hand-drawn mandala:

First, I drew my hand and then reduced its size on a copier.  Next, I started with my flower pattern in the center, moving outwards, something I learned from the book.

Note:  It helped to copy my reduced image of my hand on card stock for a stencil.

I used my stenciled hand to create a pattern on the rough grain, 140 lb cold press watercolor paper.  I used a purchased stencil for the heart and tulip.  I drew the diamonds and swirls free-hand as you can see above.

Experimenting with Ecoline liquid watercolors, I used yellow, red and green directly from the bottle without diluting it.

WOWZA!  That red is so vibrant!! ❤️

I used Winsor & Newton Watercolor in Pernament Magenta for the flower petals in the center and Colbalt Turquoise Light for the tulip shapes – that I diluted with water.   Interestingly, the yellow Ecoline color bled when I applied the turquoise color on top but not when I applied the Ecoline red undiluted on top of the yellow.)

After the paint dried, I outlined my pencil lines with a .05 Micron black pen for definition:

I’m not sure that I am done so I will let it rest a few days…

Have you ever created a Mandala?

Cheers! 🙂