Sunday Sketches - Aren't we a Pear?

I'm new to Sunday Sketches, and so excited to put my first post up! I've been checking it out for a while now, but have never actually posted.

I have an affinity for mixed media pieces, but I especially love my water color pencils. They are so forgiving. When I first started with them, I used a brush to blend the colors. I have young children though, and they inevitably knocked the cup of water over, or took it to use with their paints. I couldn't always find a cup to use either. Then I discovered Copic markers makes a clear blender. It has a broad end for larger areas, and a fine tip paint brush end for detail work. A love affair was born!

In the piece below, I used my water color pencils to sketch the pears and fill them in, then blended with a Copic marker. The background, believe it or not, is made from large sheets of watercolored paper that I paint randomly then cut them up to make a "sketch" book. It's more blue in person, but I'm not sophisticated enough to fix it in Photoshop.

I don't always have a full concept in mind when I start a sketch, so I cheat and cut the finished focal piece out and adhere it to my background. I then add collage elements to support it.

I hope you like it! I call it "Aren't We a Pear" - because I'm terrible at naming paintings ;)

And now, for your Sunday dose of funny

Conversations with Mackenzie (age 5)

Her "Mom, can I have a sharpie?"

Appropriate Mom warning bells go off

Me "Whhhyyyy?"

Her "I need to write a note to the birds to tell them (she turns to the birds) to STOP POOPING ON MY SLIDE!"

Me "Sure"

She wrote them a note and made sure to add the consequence "If you poop on my slide again, I'm taking it down and you won't be able to do it anymore!"

Always in My Heart

Happy PPF everyone! I'm late to the party this week and missed last week all together (yikes!).

I have a new vinyl project started. So far it just has black lines (not really post worthy). I'm hoping to have it ready for PPF next week. It's my first large piece ever (read intimidating). Stay tuned...

In the mean time, I decided to post a piece I did last year. It's a deeply personal piece for me, and I've never shared it before. I'm sure we all have someone who lives in our heart. Here is the story of mine.

In between the birth of my oldest, and Mackenzie, we had three miscarriages. The last one was particularly difficult because I had felt her kick. We named her Kayla, and planted pink tulips in our front yard to remember her by. A month later, we were pregnant with Mackenzie (she has her own story, but that's another post).

Everyone handles grief in their own way. I decided to paint. This piece is called Always in My Heart for my baby girl, who lives there.

In other frivolous and completely unrelated news, I bought a new rose for my garden. It was too beautiful to pass up when I saw it at the rose farm . I thought you might enjoy it too!

Last but not least, conversations with Mackenzie, on how she would like her spaghetti.

Me "Do you want sauce or just noodles?"

Her "I want just a bit of sauce on 1/4 of my noodles, a little pinch of salt on 1/4 of the noodles, and some grated cheese on the rest"

Me "So, yes?"

Now I ask you, where does this child think she lives?

Happy PFF everyone!

Happy PPF!

A crazy thing happened in Seattle this week - SUNSHINE and WARM weather. No seriously - the sun shined - for...like...days! It was SO distracting! Incredibly distracting. I got a whole lot of nothing done this week because I was outside as often as possible...just being in the sun. It was glorious I tell you. Fortunately, the rain came back today, so we could all get back to work.

Unfortunately, I didn't get my piece entirely finished in time for PPF. Even worse, I didn't get to visit for PPF last week! I'll be making up for this week! I promise. Double duty for me - last week and this week!

Enough gabbing! I'm posting what I have done so far.

This is a bit (just a bit) of departure from vinyl. The piece has a water color skin (top left corner) which I printed part of the archway/doorway on (technique courtesy of Miss Julie P and Chris C).

Unfortunately, I forgot to seal the picture prior to applying a gel topcoat. The gel separated, and the ink ran causing the image to blur. I really liked the effect though and decided to run with it. There's crackle paste all over, some paint of course, and a bit of cheese cloth to tie the whole thing together. I still need to blend the edges of the water color skin and the transparency so they melt into the painting more. Hopefully we won't have sun next week. WAIT - did I just say that?!

Someday, I hope my photography skills catch up, so I can take a decent shot of my art work.

It cracks me up that I can take shots like this



and this

but still struggle with getting a straight on shot of a piece of art. Someone feel free to lie to me and tell me it's my lens or something!

ONE LAST BUT VERY IMPORTANT THING! And the winner is.....Heather Foust!!! Congratulations Heather! I used www.random.org's sequence generator to randomly generate the winning number because you're all too fabulous for me to pick just one!!!

Oh my GOSH! I almost forgot my conversation with Mackenzie. I'm telling you, the sun has made me lose my mind! Here it is!

Convo's w/Mackenzie (age 5) who needed me to get a bowl down for her cottage cheese
Her "Bowl!"
Me "Manners!"
Her "Please" she didn't actually roll her eyes, but her tone said she was thinking about it.

I have a feeling our conversations when she is a teenager will look like this
Her "Car keys"
Me "No"

One more funny - if you want to read on. In my house, if you use potty words, you get to go to the bathroom and think about it. And since my son is 8, and my daughter is 5, there are more potty words in a day than I care to acknowledge. Usually it's the little one, but on this occasion, it was my son.

15 minutes later, I found him squatting on top of the toilet lid reading a book, and the following conversation took place.
Me "Whyyyyyyy are you reading a book on top of the toilet"
Him "You told me to come in here, and I got bored."
Me (crap, I can't believe I forgot he was in there on time out) "You can come out now"
Him "Nah. I'm good"

That whole staying in the bathroom for a half hour thing that men do starts early, huh?

Vinyl Fever and Blog Give Away!

Happy PPF and Sneak Peek Friday!!

I decided to take vinyl to a new level and combine it with collage! This is my latest piece from my e-course Mixed Media Melange with Julie Prichard and Chris Cozen! (Give Away Below!)

She's not quite finished yet. Unfortunately, I messed up one of the flowers and couldn't repair it. As I was working on the back of the vinyl, I forgot to flip it over prior to stamping the notes. SO, the musical notes are on the wrong side - oops! I think it's still a good second piece though.

What do you think? She's also unnamed. Leave a comment and give me some suggestions please!

Alright - drum roll please! Time for my first BLOG GIVEAWAY! That's right - free stuff!! Woo Hoo!!!

The fabulous Julie Prichard and Chris Cozen are graciously offering all of my blog readers a chance to win one of their online workshops for FREE! We're talking FREE people! Leave a comment here on this post and one winner will be drawn on next Friday. The winner gets to choose ANY class that is currently being offered in the network! Suh-weet!!

Click here to see the class options.

http://www.julieprichard.com/mixed-media-workshops/

AND - if you visit Julie Prichard's blog this week, SHE is giving away a $25 gift certificate to Dick Blick - and who can't use that? I'm entering too!

And now, for your Friday dose of funny. Since there are two give away's - you get two stories!

Conversations with Mackenzie (age 5) whose favorite food group is meat - no seriously, meat. We can't take her past the meat counter in groceries stores b/c they draw her in like tractor beams and she starts giggling deliriously while saying "Meeeeat! Meeeeat!"

She asked to make blue jello, and while stirring her blue jello, she sniffed and said "Mmmmmm...it almost smells as good as meat!"

Me (thinking) "WHAT?!"

AND........

It's time for another episode of "Nice Mouth Mackenzie!"

Upon completing a piece of art work she was particularly proud of (I call it Paint Blobs on Paper) she fist pumped her little 5 year old hand and said "DAMN! That's goooooood!" Did I mention that we recently purchased extra bars of soap for her?

Leonardo da Vinyl

Hi and welcome if this is your first time to my blog! This is my first time participating in both Sneak Peek Friday and Paint Party Friday. I'm so excited to be a part of these events! Feel free to leave a comment - I promise I'll respond! Funny story is at the end, as usual! Enjoy!

My latest venture is painting on Vinyl - yep vinyl! It's a pretty fun technique, and I'm hopelessly addicted to it! If you are interested in learning the technique, you can investigate it in Julie Prichard's workshop Mixed Media Melange here. I've said it before, and I will say it again - I love, love, LOVE her workshops!

My first vinyl piece is cherry blossoms. I don't have a name for it yet - feel free to leave suggestions! The background is painted in multiple colors which were blended as I applied them - but it gives the piece a few highs and lows. Now I will admit, I was intimidated by this technique, so I kept my first piece simple. As I gain confidence with this technique (reverse collage painting on the vinyl), I will make more complicated back grounds.

So here she is

What do you think? The finished piece of vinyl is gallery wrapped around a piece of precut wood.

I have a second piece I've started on which has a bird image and flowers. Stay tuned next week, and I will post a picture of the finished piece!

And now for your daily dose of funny...

Convo's w/Mackenzie (age 5) on her new bathing suit: "MOM! GUESS WHAT? I got a new bathing suit. It's blue with yellow flowers, and I have my own BOOB COVER and SKIRT! Isn't that great?" She starts skipping around and singing "I've got a new boob cover! I've got a new boob cover!". Thankfully, she hasn't announced this in public...yet!

You can get the full story here.

If you're interested in more Convo's w/Mackenzie, you can find them on my other blog here

Have fun!

Day 2 - The Red Sharpie Incident

Motherhood has given me many gifts over the years. Stretch marks, C-section scars, extra fat "storage" in places I've never stored it before, the Rota Virus (but that's another post) and gray hairs. Most of all, motherhood has given me laughter. I am blessed with two funny and curious kids whose antics remind me of young kittens finding trouble. They're mostly innocent (although the conspiring whispers I sometimes hear give them away), and then I hear panicked cries for help. And like most curious kittens, it happens quickly, and without warning.

For example, two weeks ago, hubs and I visited Home Depot to look at plants, and lumber for building a raised bed for gardening. We were momentarily distracted by shiny objects in the gardening department - namely new cushions for our patio chairs. The chairs are in good shape, but after 7 years, the cushions not to much. We found one we thought we would like and brought it home for trial. It was raining that day, so we left it in the house. It rained the next day too, so we still left it in the house...where my kids found it...and decided to use it as a primary mode of transportation DOWN the steps! They were pretty sneaky about it, and amazingly quiet, until they decided to give each other pushes to make the ride faster. Only my oldest is not so good with directional pushing and the youngest is, well, young, and she collided with something (I never got a straight answer as to what it was) resulting in a mild head bump (not to worry - no bleeding, bruising or swelling). A good lecture on safety, "what if we had to take that back?" mom speech and a healthy dose of guilt, and they sat quietly, no doubt dreaming up new ways to get into trouble.

This past weekend, my son was off his ADHD medication. He is silly even when he is on meds, but he can't not be silly, deliriously silly, when he is off meds. He gets distracted every two seconds even when he tries to focus. The good news is that he is the ultimate playmate for my 5 year old daughter when he is off meds. The bad news is that he tends to get into more mischief than usual. While we were all sitting together watching TV, he left to go to the bathroom - not an event which would signal the mom alarm bells - but it should have.

He came back a few minutes later, and proudly announced that he "look(ed) just like Daddy!" and was giggling hysterically. Daddy has a full beard and a mustache at the moment. SO, my son took a red pen and drew in a nice handle bar mustache and a "beard" multiple lines running down his chin...allllll over his chin. I almost giggled until I remembered that the only red pen in the house is a Sharpie. I inquired as to what he chose to use to "look just like Daddy". He proudly held up a Sharpie, a sudden look of kitten panic crossed his face. "IS IT PERMANENT?" I confirmed it was, and he said "Will it be on there for SCHOOL TOMORROW?". I confirmed it would be. "What do I DO???". Now I admit, I was tempted to say "Stay right there while I get my camera", but knowing how embarrassed he would be the next day, and only imagining the phone call home from school, I opted to be a responsible mother and told him to go wash his face while I contemplated whether or not a Mr. Clean eraser was safe for faces. Thankfully, 10 minutes of scrubbing later, he was able to get it off of his face.

I'm still just a little sorry that I didn't capture that moment for posterity though.

Reconnecting - I'm BACK baby!

Wow - I can't believe it's been a year since I got serious about my blog. I can't believe it's been 4 months since my last post (4 months ago I had my second shoulder surgery). What I really can't believe is my bad luck in falling down and breaking my arm (the very same arm that was operated on) on my first day back at work. Now that I can wiggle my fingers and turn my arm over to type, the writing begins.

First up - I meant to post this a looooong time ago, but it was during the dark months after my last surgery when in a narcotic/muscle relaxer haze. Anyway, my very good friend Jessica is an amazing photographer. She did her first bog giveaway for a free photo shoot if you were in the Seattle area. Stop by her blog to see her beautiful photographs, and stay tuned, in case she gives another shoot away! You can find her blog here
http://jldimagery.com/

Second up - I've decided to work on my networking with other artists more. I first started blogging to document not only the crazy life I lead, but also to connect with other artists. My dear friend Elizabeth Gonzales is having her second blog giveaway. I was fortunate to have won a print in her very first blog giveaway one year ago! I still treasure it to this day, and it sits prominently in my art studio. You can visit Elizabeth's blog here
http://elizabethglz.com/blog/2011/04/unexpected-gifts-and-a-celebration-giveaway/

I apologize - I'm still not savvy enough to know how to do the short link. I'm adding it to my things to learn to do this summer list!

Third up - I'm taking two art classes online at the moment with Julie Prichard - Mixed Media Melange and Pixels and Paint. Side Note - Thankfully I'm left handed (and I only seem to injure my right arm), so I can continue to draw and paint from time to time!
The class promo videos are here
http://www.julieprichard.com/mixed-media-workshops/

I really love her online workshops for several reasons. First, I love the ideas and inspiration I get from taking her work shops. Her videos have so much information (and you get so many during the class) that I often go back and watch them a couple of times to get all the info down. The techniques are always new, and she is not afraid to show her mistakes on camera - which I greatly admire. SO, if you are in need of inspiration and new techniques, stop by and look! You won't be disappointed!

I promise to post pics of work I've done soon - when they are finished this week!

Last but not least, I started a separate Conversations with Mackenzie blog which you can view here
www.conversationswithmackenzie.blogspot.com

She's turned the big 05 now, and has the att-ti-tude to match. While I'm catching up on that blog too, I'll be dual posting. So here's her latest convo in a string of posts I like to call "Nice Mouth Mackenzie!". At the rate she is developing her more "colorful" vocabulary, I'm going to have to rename the string "You kiss your mother with that mouth?" or "Conversation's that embarrassed a sailor".

Last weekend my in-laws came up to our house for dinner. The boys (Papa (Grandpa), Hubs, and my son) went out to the driving range for golf while we girls worked on a Mother's Day photo collage. When the boys returned home from their outing, we girls (I was in a sling so really it was my M.O.M doing the work while we watched) were out trimming the cherry tree.

Papa climbed out of the car, and spotting Mackenzie asked "Whatcha doing Bits?"
Mackenzie "Oh nuthin'. Just screwing around"
Me (mouthing to my Father In Law with my eyes wide open in shock) Oh my gosh! I cannot believe she SAID THAT!

Then I remembered, that in a moment of frustration a few days before, when both kids were deliriously tired and over the top silly, not listening to my gentle "please get into bed" requests, I said "You two need to stop screwing around and get into bed!". Yep, that's right - it was ME - AGAIN - teaching her new colorful words. Geez!!!!