Crafty Blogger

I’ve been spending a ton of time in the art studio what with all this heat. I’ve got the garden in, so except for a bit of weeding, watering and picking, I’m leaving it to fend for itself. I’ve posted a few things on facebook, but have been forgetting to update over here. So, I’m going to try to get them up and stop letting them languish in the land of finished until whenever.

Peacock is inspired by a recent zoo trip. Our zoo has a ton of peacocks roaming around strutting their stuff and the baby was blown away the first time he saw one spread his tail. Mouth open, eyes huge…Shock and awe. It made me think about the first time I saw one. Funny the way it turns into old hat until you see someone else being amazed by what you are taking for granted, huh? So, I went home planning to paint a peacock. I thought about my reference photo, taken when the baby was gaping in amazement, and proceeded to paint.

Of course, I can never boss my canvases around, no matter how hard I try. So, I ended up with an abstract peacock. Very abstract. But I think it captures the vibrant boldness of the birds and the excitement the little one felt seeing them. The purple Radient Pearls paint is homage to the way the feathers go iridescent in the sun. I hope you enjoy looking at this piece as much as we enjoyed looking at that bold peacock unfurling his tail and as much as I enjoyed painting it.

I’ve been working on a series of journals lately and have finished the first one – a faith journal. It has quotes from the KJV of the Bible that pertain to faith on some of the pages. I use art journals for my own diary efforts and thought that people who like to write but don’t feel confident about their ability to make an art journal might enjoy being able to write on mixed media pages, too.

I think I will list them on Etsy since the local art studio I was hoping to put them in has closed its shop. I used a mix of watercolor paper and brown wrapping paper for this first journal and used rings to bind it so someone could add a lot more pages if they wanted to. Here’s a peek at it:

The cover of the journal

I have been so obsessed with photography that its been awhile since I’ve done any mixed media stuff. I’ve been thinking about a few pieces, though, and this one wouldn’t wait any longer to hop from my head to the canvas. I think it is because I am surrounded by children making joyful noises! It is sure amazing to see things come together and how different they end up being from what I originally planned. The bird’s head is the protective foil from the container of paint I opened and the stamp insisted on becoming a patch of square flowers instead of a neutral background texture.

If you like this piece, you can find it as a birthday card on Zazzle:

Make a Joyful Noise Birthday Card by craftyblogger
View other Birthday Cards

I stayed up til the wee hours working on this mixed media canvas that should have been finished a few months ago for several days straight to finally get it done. I consider it my mission statement for 2010. A reminder that, when you dream impossible dreams, they can come true. Let’s start dreaming, people!

On to the nitty gritty. I used acrylic paints and a dab of Radiant Pearls on the background. The shimmery stuff is a really cool children’s product from Faber-Castell called metallic gel sticks. I love these things and would advise swiping them from your five year old to give them a try. The flower is a piece of canvas I painted. The bird is tissue paper with Progresso unleaded colored pencils, gel sticks and a few other things layered on top. Oh, and his eye is another piece of canvas. I used several different ink pads on the tag and used a couple of different products to write the saying. My favorite is the Zig chalk pen, which I used to do the top layer on the black words.

Do you make yearly mission statements with your art?