Thumbs up Thursday

 As you are aware from my previous posts this week, I have been at Castle Mall in Antrim facilitating Art for Schools. While I was setting up for the first school this morning, a lady stopped by and asked to shake my hand. She said, "I just think it's a wonderful thing you are doing here and I wanted to say thank you for giving all these children such a lovely opportunity to make art." It was a lovely and thoughtful sentiment to hear! I would love to have taken the credit, but it's actually Castle Mall that very kindly invites me to come and have loads of fun teaching art all week and provides so many children the opportunity to come and create.

Castle Mall really supports families by understanding the value of providing creative opportunities for kids, so they deserve a big thumbs up! The kids have been working hard all week and have done such a great job, so I think they deserve a big thumbs up too!

Work in Progress Wednesday

This week's work in progress shots are more Art for Schools student works, rather than my own. This particular group was quite large...30 children in all, but they were so focused that they were easy to teach. I think they have done a brilliant job with their project and have done themselves proud!

Talk Art Tuesday

It's Art for Schools Week at Castle Mall in Antrim and I have been invited to facilitate an art project for about 250 children (approximately 50 kids per day). Given the time of year, it's not surprising that I was asked to come up with an Autmn based theme, so we're making stuffed tree sculptures! We begin by painting card with red and yellow, allowing some of it to blend to orange and setting those pieces aside to dry.

Students then attach a long piece of folded card to a square piece of folded card to create the basic sculpture form. The sides of the card are taped shut, leaving one side at the top open and the bottom of the trunk open for stuffing with crumpled newspaper later. A string is attached to the back and rolled up, then taped lightly against the card to keep it out of the way. This will be for hanging the scuplture later. If we had more time, we might round off the edges at the top, but the project takes many steps, and it's not strictly necessary.

The 'trunk' is painted brown and scratched into with the back of the paintbrush to create the bark texture. It's been fun watching students modify my demonstrated technique with their own ideas, scratching in initials, hearts lines and whatever takes their fancy.

At this stage, we ripped the card they painted earlier into leaf shapes and attached them to the top of the tree forms with glue, allowing the shapes to overlap and come over the edges, disguising the square of the support.


This particular group got a late start and didn't have time to stuff them, so they will be finishing that part up at school. They seemed to have fun and I think their results are fab!

Art Market Monday

I am facilitating an art project with 250 school children this week and am on a tight deadline with 2 commissions, so I will not listing any new work and the special offer for gift vouchers is still available in my Etsy shop. During this offer, I will give you a voucher worth an extra 20% with every voucher you purchase! IE: Purchase a $50 gift voucher, get an extra $10 voucher for FREE. That means you can buy one for a gift and get a little something for yourself too. Check my SPECIAL OFFER section for vouchers starting at only $25. I have also added gift vouchers for custom original paintings at 20% OFF of their normal price (no additional voucher applies to these, as a discount is already reflected in the price).

If you are in Northern Ireland, a selection of my work is now available at Dream Jewels, 84 Main Street in Moira. Dream Jewels is the sort of shop that any 'girlie' girl will adore, so be sure to go and have a look. You can also still see my work at The Yard Gallery in Holywood and Montmarte Gallery, Lisburn.

I will not be at The Artisan Market at The OUTLET in Banbridge on Sunday this week, however, fellow artists that I exhibit with will be there representing my work from 1-6PM.

Solve it Sunday

Today was a good day. I sold 5 paintings and a few prints at the Artisan Market, so naturally I'm thrilled! I'm not any less tired though and I have a busy week ahead of me with several deadlines looming, so today's puzzle is an older piece. Francesca is one of my favourite nudes and looking at her makes me want to get back into painting them, so I just might have to do a few!

Simply Saturday and October Giveaway

I am bone tired today! The hubby and I have both been fighting off colds all week and I think it's really taking it's toll on us. Neither of us has had the energy to do much tidying and the kitchen looks as if a tornado hit it. On top of that, I was painting in my jammies the other day and ran downstairs to grab some supplies out of a bag I had left sitting in the front hall. Of course, the postman picked that moment to arrive...as I was bent over in my paint spattered jammies with the hole in the tush. Yeah, I'm that classy. I was horrified and hope that he just put the post through the door without peeking in! LOL Oh well, I was overdue for an embarrassing moment.

Just a reminder, my giveaway for an original painting is still open for entries for a few morew weeks. Visit the original post to find out how to enter the prize draw for a chance to win the 5 x 7 inch painting on canvas shown below.

Fresh off the Easel Friday

Instead of new paintings on canvas to show, I have a few new bangles again this week. The process and materials are very similar to how I create my backgrounds and I'm really enjoying making these little pieces of wearable art!

Thumbs Up Thursday

A friend posted this video on Facebook recently and I was blown away! It's hard to explain the sense of patriotism that is ingrained into we Americans, and this video has brought me to tears each time I've watched it. However, you don't have to be American to be moved. I think anyone of any nationality would be moved simply by the talent of these little girls! The Cactus Cuties, as they are known, were ages 6 through 8 at the time this video was recorded. They absolutely deserve a thumbs up!

Work in Progress Wednesday

I did a semi-abstract nude series and was quite happy with most of the pieces. However, this particular painting troubled me right from the get go, so it was left untouched from its early stages and has been buried in my studio for at least 4 or 5 years! For some reason, I recently decided it was finally time to go back and work on her again.


Right away, I could tell that what bothered me most was her proportions. While the series was about soft curves and textured backgrounds, rather than realistic details, her proportions were just too off for me to be happy. As I built up color, I also adjusted her proportions, giving her a more curvacious figure. She's still not quite there, but I'm happier. I used to juxtapose straight lined hair against the curvy figure, but it doesn't feel right anymore, so I changed her hair to the more flowy, curvy hair that I usually do now.


I'm also not sure I'm happy with the current placement of her arms, though to be fair, it's hard to tell for certain since I haven't started defining them yet. At the moment, they are just roughly sketched in with a large paint brush. Before I go further with her, I decided to play around in Photoshop and try a few other options. My mouse control is terrible, but I am still able to get a general idea of how it would affect the composition if I move her arms to her sides. It's probably a more expected placement, so I'm not sure I'll change it. Many of the other pieces in the series have arms lifted high or swinging around, as if they are dancing, so leaving them in their current position fits in with that concept more.

I'll give it some thought and just see where she takes me. I probably won't have time to work on her until closer to Christmas, but hopefully, it won't take me another 5 years to finish her!

Talk Art Tuesday

I was hoping to share the tutorial that I recorded last week with you, but editing over an hour and a half of video has proved to be more daunting a task than I expected! I'm exhausted and still working on a deadline with commissions, so I have decided to share something else with you instead. Now, some may debate that this doesn't belong on 'Talk Art Tuesday', but I would argue that Jack Vale has definitely turned pranking people into an art (he has over 100 prank videos). I'm not ashamed to admit that I find his 'pooter' hilarious. I don't ever want to be so grown up that I can't laugh at some immature toilet humor. Luckily, I doubt that will ever happen!

Art Market Monday

The introductory offer for gift vouchers is available for another week in my Etsy shop. During this offer, I will give you a voucher worth an extra 20% with every voucher you purchase! IE: Purchase a $50 gift voucher, get an extra $10 voucher for FREE. That means you can buy one for a gift and get a little something for yourself too. Check my SPECIAL OFFER section for vouchers starting at only $25. I have also added gift vouchers for custom original paintings at 20% OFF of their normal price (no additional voucher applies to these, as a discount is already reflected in the price).

If you are in Northern Ireland, a selection of my work is now available at Dream Jewels, 84 Main Street in Moira. Dream Jewels is the sort of shop that any 'girlie' girl will adore, so be sure to go and have a look. You can also still see my work at The Yard Gallery in Holywood and Montmarte Gallery, Lisburn.

As always, you can meet me and see my work in person at the Artisan Market at THE OUTLET in Banbridge on Sunday, from 1-6PM. The special offer applies to purchases at The Artisan Market as well.

Solve it Sunday

It's been a crazy week, so I am spending this evening catching up with old friends in chat, enjoying some time with my hubby and playing with my new mobile phone. Today's puzzle is a charoal and graphite drawing that I sold this afternoon. I'm guessing this one will be a tricky one to solve because it's monochromatic! Muwahahahaha!

Simply Saturday

I've been watching videos on Youtube all week as I paint. You've heard me mention how much I love it before, though I previously tried to deny that I have a Youtube addiction. When I hit 5000 videos and my best friend threatened to stage an intervention, I swore I could stop anytime. When I got to 5500, I said, "Hey, the videos are all less than 10 minutes, so it's really like I have only watched 916 one hour TV shows. That's not so bad, right?"

I have now seen 6,264 videos and the other day I actually watched "The Making of a Male Model", a movie from the early 1980's starring Joan Collins and Jon Erik Hexum. It was unbelievably cheesy and soooooo predictable, but Hexum had his shirt off for the majority of the movie, so I sat through all 9 segments of it. So yeah, I have a Youtube addiction, but I have decided to embrace it...and maybe I'll go watch "The Making of a Male Model" again.

Fresh of the Easel Friday...well, the Art Table Anyway!

This is my 100th post. Woohoo! As a celebration, I'll send one of my bookmarks to the 1st person who comments on it!

As you know, I am quite busy with commissions in the last few weeks, so I don't have any new paintings to show. I don't intend to share the commissioned pieces publicly until after they are with their new owners, however, I won't leave you hanging!

I love doing commissions, but I also often find it necessary to take quick breaks from them to keep my creativity flowing. I think it's because with commissioned pieces, there is pressure to blend someone else's ideas in with your own. If I find my creativity blocked, I simply stop and work on something that it doesn't matter what the final result is. I can experiment, get it out of my system, then get back to the commission with my whole heart.

This week I experimented with these bangle bracelets and am so thrilled with how they turned out! The material I used to create the form of the bangle is recycled. Can you guess what it is? I'll also send a bookmark to the first person who guesses (or the person who gets the closest if nobody gets it exactly), so you could potentially get 2 bookmarks!

Thumbs Up Thursday

You might remember Autumn Rae Art from when I featured her work in August. I am completely smitten with her paintings and have since added one to my ever expanding art collection. The other day I was pleasantly surprised to discover that she is now creating some fabulous fiber art jewelry. I love how Autumn has taken elements, such as butterflies and birds, straight out of her paintings and has interpreted them in a whole new way into wearable art. Afterall, why should just the make believe ladies get to wear such wonderful adornments?

The piece above happens to be my favorite...don't you just love the bird and the feather!? Autumn has listed a few of these wonderful new pieces in her Etsy shop, so be sure to support a fellow artist if you love jewelry. Anything this unique definitely deserves a thumbs up!