Here's another 8.5 by 11" painting that I finished today. Yes, there's a theme going on. There will be more. I tried out the Krylon Webbing Spray on this one. Love!

Also love this girl. Is she cute or what?

It's the paint silly!

I painted this little 8.5 x 11 piece this weekend. Just moving around the gesso and the molding paste and the colors I don't normally use. Micaceous iron oxide. Payne's grey, anthraquinone blue. Painting for the sake of painting, not as a means to some other end, not simply to add color to some other project. Exploring my beloved color and texture. Soaking in the joy of pushing paint around with my fingers.

It seems I am a painter. Artfest has been trying to tell me this for a couple of years now. Not that I have some kind of talent or skill for painting, but that I have a passion for it. It is always in the painting classes, the classes where I am plunked down and expected to paint for several hours, it's in those classes that I lose myself. I get so absorbed in what I'm doing that I lose track, even of the passing of time. I'm completely in the zone. It's a glorious and joyful place. A place where I work spontaneously and confidently, just laying down color and texture and then responding to it with more color and texture. Expressing myself.

My heart is firmly and happily placed in the mixed media world and this little painting is no exception, incorporating rubber stamps and graphite pencil. There are more bits and pieces in the studio waiting for more layers, some of which will undoubtedly include collage and stencils and even stitching, but I am ready to focus on the paint and see where it takes me.

lots of making over here

Dirty Martini, 24" by 29"
Here's a quilt I whipped up with some fabric I hand-dyed and surface designed with stamps and Shiva Paintsticks. If you're in the area, you can see this quilt April 10-11 at the Imagination Unleashed 2010 show at the Jacklin Arts and Cultural Center, 405 William Street, Post Falls, ID. There's always interesting contemporary work at this show.

ArtFest!! Just got home from ArtFest and it was AMAZING as usual. Below is one of the pieces I made in Creative Doodling with Traci Bautista. I LOVED this class! I'm not a natural doodler, but I really fell into the zone with this - that completely awesome place where everything else falls away and I am totally focused on what I'm doing. Love, love, love!

This is the piece I made in Lynne Perrella's Going for Baroque class. This piece is actually pretty big - 18" by 35". This class was really fun too, although I worked like a demon to cover that huge canvas with layers and layers of pattern and texture in a short 6 hours.

Just hangin' out

I used to loathe this time of year. Cold and dark and dreary. But then I figured out it was the perfect time to hang out, be lazy, read books, make stuff. Between that resolve and the strangely warm, sunny winter we're having (and a trip to SF and nonstop watching of the Olympics), well, time flies when you're having fun.








I got a new camera. I loved my old Cybershot, but wow, my new Cybershot takes crisp photos effortlessly. Plus, it's tiny.

I'm not doing this on purpose...

bag full o' pretty

Here's what I came home from Joann Fabric with yesterday. Well, not the cat, he just has to help with everything these days. I'm really feeling drawn to soft pretty colors lately: creams and whites and champagne, pinks and blues, and my current favorite, the Pantone color of the year, turquoise. I'm loving the work of Natalya Aikens and Ruth Rae and the yummy hand stitchiness of Jude Hill. Also definitely feeling the influence of my Artfest sister Jill. That girl makes everything pretty.



So yeah, we're enjoying a long, lazy New Year's weekend, thinking about how we want to live this next year. Pistol wants to make sure there are lots of naps.


We've been making soft pretty little collages. Pulling together little bits that speak to me and resolving them into something finished. Here's to more of that in 2010!

artfest circle journal

I joined a circle journal project with a bunch of amazing art sisters from Artfest.
This is my little garden journal that I sent out into the world. I chose a garden theme because, well, I love gardens. This is the first book I've ever made. I really didn't know what I was doing, but I love how it turned out. I made the covers from chipboard, tore up some watercolor paper for the pages and bound it all together with ribbon. Yes, of course I blanket-stitched around the edges of the covers.

This is my sign-in page. The tags are shaped like garden stakes.

And these are the pages I did in lovely Michelle's beautiful birds/nature's findings book.

Sheesh...

Life has been a whirlwind. My mom and my hair stylist had to collaborate yesterday to remind me that I had an appointment. In the midst of all the busyness I've fallen in love with art journaling. I carry my journal with me everywhere. And now I've signed up for the Sketchbook Project so I carry two journals with me everywhere. Plus a ziplock bag full of my favorite pens.

Today I'm enjoying a rare fall day where I don't have to leave my house. Today I am reveling in a rare fall day when I don't have to leave my house.