Mid Week 17

It's Thursday morning. So far everything is quiet. I've been low key this week and a bit sad. Not to mention, a little lost as to what to do or not do. I think mom has had another little stroke. She had a headache on Monday and willingly went to lay down for a while. When she got up a few hours latter, it was like she was jut a bit more lost and definitely she has been a bit cranky. When I try to determine what is going on, she pushes me away and sluffs it off, so I can't get a true handle on things. She has a doctor's appointment next week, so I guess we will see what he thinks.

As to painting, I have been working a bit. Here is a sketch I did a couple of days ago when it was actually nice enough to sit outside for an hour or so. It is not quite right as far as the shadows are concerned. I may try it again sometime.

I've also been experimenting some more with monoprinting to get ready. Nothing spectacular so far.

Wet and dry stuff!

Some week. Between almost letting mom's bath overflow because I was distracted by a phone call, getting the carpets cleaned and throwing mom and cats into chaos because life is not "all systems normal" and getting soaked by Hydro, its been some week!

All in all, its left me pretty dry. Tried a few things but other than this mono-print, none of it worked. I've been distracted with stuff that needs to be done, stuff I'd like to be doing and stuff that is landing on my plate unexpectedly. None of it is what I want to be doing. Griping is so over rated. Changes nothing..

Here is my mono-print for this week .I was experimenting to get ready for the next Art Group meeting when I'm supposed to be demonstrating this technique. I tried a couple. This one I liked, especially after I'd gone back in with gold ink

Carnelians Garnets & Pastels

I ended up being able to get the jewelry case moved on Thursday night and set up my display on Friday morning. Light was missing the transformer. Looked everywhere logical that I could think up till finally on Saturday (after I went back to Ikea to see if I could get just a transformer --- no such luck. Had to buy a new one) I remembered to check the hall bench. Yep, there it was somewhat the worse for wear. So its just as weel I got a new one. The cord and transformer fit the existing light in the case. It looks great.

As it turned out on Friday one of Sue's customer's was interested in a bracelet with garnets and goldstone (she used my list of Gemstone Properties to figure out stones that would support anemia and poor circlution. Not an aethetically good combination. I went through my resources  by ailment and determined that I did have some garnets, plus carnelian and hematite that would support those conditions. I met with her on Saturday and she choose garnets and carnelian. I made up the bracelet on Sunday and also made up a necklace and earrings set while I was at it. Here they are

In addition, this first request for custom design spurred me to take out ALL of my stones and sort through them and bag them by type and colour. Good to see what I do in fact have in stock and what I might want to get when I go on another buying spree. I definitely have too mcuh turquoise in every shape and shade possible. Its gotten me planning new creations.

The only other thing I got done yesterday was this pastell. I worked off the same photo from the workshop It was so nice that Mom and I were able to sit outside for a while out front during the afternoon. Its supposed to get up to 26 by Tuesday!

Mid Week 15 Report

Yesterday our Probus Art Group went for a workshop with a local artist, Tony Johnson who demonstrated his approach to painting a landscape scene using acrylics. He uses a bright (red) undercoat and then blocks in all the darks before applying lighter details. We all did the same using a photo as a basis while we followed his step by step approach. Here is my results.

I'm pleased with it.

I've started another painting and am going to try to use the same methods in another landscape. See how that  works out.

Other than that, I've gotten quite interested again in exploring the power of using crystals and rocks for energy and healing. Been reading my books again, and have moved a large piece of Rose Quartz into our bedroom and  have place a piece of Citrine in the south-east corner of our house.

No joy this week!

End of week 14 and I've not got much of anything to show for it. It's been too cold and rainy to sit outside and work, and I've not been inspired to pick up much in the way of a paintbrush.

What I have been doing though is creating in my kitchen. Went to the Farmers' Market  and bought a basket of tomatoes from a very old farmer with a beat up truck and not too much on display on his table. The tomatoes looked great though! I made a big batch of spaghetti sauce using basil and other herbs from my garden, Then I tried t recipe for slow roasted tomatoes. Made a batch of tomato soup out of them mixed half with frshe tomatoes. Quite a lovely flavour. Today I made a batch of cookies.

I've also been occupied doing up tags for my jewelry that included brief descriptions of the properties of the various gemstones I've used in a given piece. Quite time consuming.  That's in prep for setting up my dispaly case in the store.

Mid week 14!!

Tuesday it was 30 degrees and steamy! Today, Thursday, its about 14 degrees with a cold wind. Fall is here with a vengeance after this oh so hot summer. Its been a week for chores and fixing things, so I got less time to paint than I might have liked. I'm also in the process of re-organizing my jewelry pieces for sale, since I have a place that will take my case and fill it with my jewelry! Should give me the incentive to create some new pieces!

This is only painting I've finished so far this week. I was in a stylized mood and wanted to try to work with my Trius Professional 3 tipped markers on bleedproof paper. The 'bleedproof' part is not quite true. So here is my fish with waterlily.

13 weeks! One quarter of a year!

Its already 13 weeks since I started this blog. I'm thrilled that I've managed to stick to both the creative process and the journalling!! Its not unusual for me to shift focus to other projects, interests or fascinations to the detriment of what I've started.. So kudos to me for still going strong.

I had bought, with the help of my cousin Annemarie in Holland, some DVD on Holland history and geography for my mom's birthday. We thought watching stuff that she was familiar with would keep her interest a little longer. Unfortunately, DVDs are not universal, so when we got them they would not play through our equipment. Thank god for Mark, our computer guru who was able, with some challenges, to transfer them to a format that will play. Got them yesterday. It was hard to find out what was on the DVD's when I bought them through a Dutch site, BOL.com, (somewhat like Amazon), so the first one we sat down to view was all of 12 minutes with English voice over. Another one seems to have no voice over at all, just a camera going through various canals!! Not too thrilling. The 3rd one is about Historic Leiden, the city mom grew up in and lived until she married my dad. Completely old black and white films and stills from the 1930 to 1970. Some voice over that was in Dutch that was clear; other stuff from what looked like newsreels from the 40's was very rapid fire announcer type voice over that was hard to follow. Mom was quite intrigued and it did hold her attention, though she did not seem to recognize anything from the streets, canals and events shown.

I recognized places from when I was about 3 or 4 and was staying at my grandma's place above the Jamin candy store 2 of my aunts ran. I think this was one of the many times my mom was anemic and was in a sanitorium and I was left in Leiden. I caught whooping cough so I was laid up for sometime, and my uncle and aunts (un-married at the time) were living at home and taking turns entertaining the first grandchild!! I remembered being  taught how to tell time, and played at being princess Mariska! I also remember on Friday mornings the famers would drive their sheep, pigs and cattle to the market past grandma's house. I can still recall the smell. I slept in the front room upstairs. I always remembered the room being huge, until I went back to Holland when I was 11, going on 12. The room, in fact the whole 2 story apartment, seemed to be a whole lot smaller than I remembered.

Well on to the creative stuff! This week, I worked a a couple more small acrylic paintings using hand carved stamps and finished with gloss gel . The stamp is carved out of an eraser in the shape of a stylized leaf.

As well I did a larger abstract that seems to have sea horses in the patterns that evolved from the tissue paper surface when I added layers of very diluted acrylic paint.

Oasis HD!

Since we have gotten our new plasma TV with the HD package, we've become mezmorized by the picture quality, especially with some of the coral sea and South Paciifc programs on Oasis and National Geograhic  channels. So needless to say, I've been drawn to (pun intended) sketch birds and fish. Been very hot, hot, hot this week. Very abnormal for this time of year. Harder to get things done. Mom has slowed down even more this week. Hard to see.

At any rate this is what I've gotten done so far this week. This is a drawing of a wrase, a coral reef inhabitant. My source photos are nowhere near as spectacular as the HD programs. This was done in watercolour, but I may try the next one in pastels.

I'm also working on a couple of abstract paintings. Should be done by the end of the week. Today (Wednesday) lots of running around for me doing chores in 38 degrees real feel!! By the time I got home I'm wilting.