Silent Sunday- The 2012 Decatur Garden Tour

SO many inspiring gardens on this year's tour!  Enjoy my little recap of some of my favorite things I saw....see if you can spy some of my inspirations for future paintings.....

why anyone would need massage oil in a hot house is beyond me, but I liked the comp, so I'm sharing it.....

amazing pond

 

I loved this little planting beneath the windows....

I WANT a bench just like this!

PRETTY

 

I could totally paint this....

or THIS......

another cool bench

AMAZING fountain made from wine bottles and Chilhuly inspired sculptures

Another wonderful fountain made with reclaimed pots

garden sanctuary.....so wonderful!

Double Dipping Again.....

I PROMISE I'll do better next week, but this week I am once again double dipping with Paint Party Friday and Palette & Paint Thursday...yes, yes, I know it's no longer Thursday, but after painting most of yesterday, then teaching my class then falling into my family/mommy duties plus editing a bunch of Etsy stuff, there just wasn't any time left!
This is a WIP for a commission I'm working on, and to be truthful I almost didn't share it at all!  It's at that uncomfortable stage where probably only I can see where it's going and what it will be when complete!  But I need to get back on track with my blog stuff so here ya go...

 this is just the under painting and the colors will be quite different when I'm done, 

but it will give you an idea anyway.......

That's all for now- I have to get back to painting- this is due next Wednesday!  I'll be around to visit at PPF and P&PT- you should go too; there's always so much beauty to see there!

 And a little more- it's funny looking at it on the screen; to me, it doesn't look like I just put 3 more hours into it- but I did!  Now I'm off to enjoy everyone else's art!
Have a great day!
Stephanie

"Counting the Blessings"

So here I am finally posting an update on the pages I did in Tammy's Round Robin book for our Inspiration Avenue art exchange.  I finished these on Friday but never got around to posting until now....

So, I added a little more flesh-i-ness to her skin tone and made the moon more orange-y

 ......and added the quote.

To finish it up, I folded my painting and glued it in to be a pop up.  I know I hinted that I'd do a tut for this, but my way is so fly by night, I think it would be impossible to follow!  Basically I get a "dummy sheet" of paper and practice laying it out until the measurements fit appropriately...very scientific, huh?  However, Robert Sabuda's website has a TON of great ideas that you can use or just take inspiration from and make your own!

Have a great day!

Stephanie

P&P Thursday- NOT an Octopus!

Happy Palette & Paint Thursday (a wee bit early;))  I'm way behind this week, in terms of making art, but here I am at last with a WIP for Tammy's wonderful book!  Because these books are open to interpretation and have no theme it can be a little challenging to come up with an idea for them!  I originally wanted to do something featuring an octopus, but it just didn't work out this week.  Never fear, there will probably be an octopus in one of the upcoming books, because I did a LOT of research and came up with a LOT of ideas...Just nothing that felt right for this book.

BUT, what to do with this book?  

I felt like I was out of ideas and really, have I ever HAD a good idea and for that matter; why the HELL did I ever decide to be an artist......was getting ready to really wallow in self pity and then, BAM, it came to me!  Because I had been thinking of octopi and them having 8 legs and that led me to thinking of numbers and them my weirdo little brain started thinking about how much I like stars.......well, what if I did a night sky with numbers instead of stars and so I started sketching and here's what I came up with.

Have you ever heard Einstein on the Beach- very cool modern opera...

anyway, that was playing in my head while painting this.....

 

 My plan is to make it a little less monochromatic and then I have to paint the background pages with a quote- something about counting blessings....it will be attached in pop up format and I might, might do a tutorial since every time I do pop ups, people ask!

 And here is my extremely monochromatic palette- I assure you it will have more color tomorrow!

 

For now, try to stop by Tracey Potter's blog to see last week's P&P entries!

Have a great day!

Stephanie

Semi-Silent-Sunday.....Redusing, Reusing and Recycling....In the GARDEN!

Happy Earth Day!  I wanted to share some more pictures of my garden 

showcasing some of my up cycled garden art.....ENJOY!

found this cool little bottle in my attic....as the six children of the original owners lived in the attic, I'm sure this has stories to tell!  But for now, it has been re purposed as a vase.  I HATE Bourbon!

Fallen branches?  My favorite FREE garden borders enrich the soil as they decompose!

Old birdbath now won't hold water....but it WILL hold a flower pot and very prettily too!

My arbor I designed around these beautiful windows....I have more windows waiting in the shed to become a pergola

overview of the arbor

bottle tree fashioned form an antique coat rack and assorted wine bottles- I DO love that shade of blue!

found Adirondack chair housing my favorite rose; Jude the Obscure, Anemones and Irises

Jude the Obscure- I LOVE this rose as much for it's name as for it's beauty!

I LOVE finding broken pots on the side of the road and burying them to disguise their flaws......FREE and beautiful!

one of my favorite flower pots that didn't survive the freezes we had a couple years ago- now on active duty as a border

HAPPY EARTH DAY!!!

Killing Two Birds with One Stone.....

Happy Friday!  It has been one crazy hectic week around here with the end result being that i just didn't get much done painting wise.  SO, I'm double dipping this week with a combo post for Palette & Paint Thursday AND Paint Party Friday....I did take these pictures yesterday but spent half the day at vet with an injured Peri and the other half prepping for my art class!
Anyway, I almost finished my garden angel...

I want to do a little more distressing on the face and maybe a bit more with the pansies....

but for the most part, it is finis!

Here's my palette too- I love mixing the pansy colors!  Like Easter Eggs in acrylic :)

That's all for now, I'm off to visit the other artists at both parties- click the links above and join me!

x

Stephanie

Art Class- Enter the SQUIDS!

A few years ago, my son, Garrett won a series of squid hats at Six Flags and they are now mounted on each of his headboard posts- FUN!  Anyway, he loves peeking in art class and visiting from time to time.  Last week, he surprised them with his squids, which of course they had to try on and KEEP on for the remainder of of our class.  So the end result was some pretty fun and funny snaps from class...while they were drawing a foxglove from the garden.

To begin our Mother's Day project; we started with blind contour sketches in their art journals, 

then regular contour drawings- 

And then once they were confident that they had mastered 

this incredibly difficult subject; it was time to draw it again- large!

 Once they finished their drawings, we cut tracing paper for them to make a copy.  

We'll end up with two very beautiful finished pieces- one with my color specifications 

and one with their own!

Tomorrow when it's time for class, we'll transfer the tracings and then begin adding color...can't wait!

Have a wonderful day! 

Stephanie