How was your week?

I've had a fantastic inspiring week,

and also got lots of painting time.
I'm still, after several years of painting, always surprised on how much a small collection of colors can do. It's a true joy to sit down each morning with fresh, clean water and my watercolors, and just create whatever I want to. I know for sure that my lifestyle is just a dream to many people, but real for me and I truly appreciate it.

SOC 5 week 2 is pink + pink + orange. Lovely combo and some of my favorites. It was very tempting to make another flower, but I chose to experiment a bit instead. In fact, this is an idea I've had for some time and now got to test it a bit. My colors this time is: Twinks, Jasmin and pink garnet the orange one is "flat" watercolor. Black and white in addition this week.

In class I had a go on an old can I have, and I have to say I'm very pleased with the result. Someone asked me if I were going to frame some of my work, and I said no because I have so many from earlier that should have been framed, but this one does need a frame.

I have chosen to make a booklet containing some of my paintings in class, together with poems/ verses. I made the front cover the other day, and am happy with that. It has a good feel to it and as it's growing, it becomes more and more a part of me.

First spread in my booklet looks like this. An English verse I stumbled upon some years ago, and that flew right into my heart. I so much admire people that live their lifes in a practical manner. Lol.

Right side contains a Norwegian poem about the wasp.
Now, it seems I have gotten into some computer trouble, and can't access the classroom. So I'm not sure I'll be back in there, but the problem is worked on. In the meantime I'm painting on my own, and today it's time to paint a red pepper.

Beautiful people, thanks alot for all your lovely and inspiring comments, I really appreciate you for taking the time.

Linking to Paint Party Friday and SOC 5.

Yet another busy week

I've been working hard in class

and now I feel I'm slowly taking on board all  the new stuff. I really enjoy to test all the new in private also, so my entry for the first week in SOC 5 is a tiny piece done in Neocolors 2. Colors used are: phthalocyanine blue, dark ultramarine and light olive. Beside that I've also used black and white ink.

At a certain stage I thought I'd have to throw it in the bin, but I've learnt to follow my instincts and at the end I really love how it came out.

Otherwise in class I've made veggies, some flowers and other things as well. It really takes some time to clean the "top drawer" to make room for new learning.

I absolutely feel more confident now, and starting to get the grip of my pen and ink. The corn cobs below were fun doing, but the first one (right side) ended up not being as good as planned and I made the other one as well. They both have character and when I see them together, I think of a couple dancing a fiery tango.

 My dragon fruit, pink, pink, pink! Some weeks ago I saw a dragon fruit for the first time in my life, I didn't know what it was other than it was heavenly beautiful to look at. I bought it promptly and photographed it so that I had references to paint from.

Isn't it quite an ironi that I've been trying to paint droplets for ever so long, but never could make them good. In my fruit I tried to paint a dip, suggesting I couldn't wait to eat some, and all I can see is a pile or a droplet.

Thank you for stopping by, and all your lovely comments.

Linking to Paint Party Friday and SOC 5.

Have a good weekend all!

What a week this has been.

You know the feeling

when you're about to learn something new and can't get the grip of it. Frustration. I started my class and did follow the lessons, but I didn't really understand what I was doing. Some exersices was so unfamiliar to me, I nearly went mad trying to do them. I did some of my usual stuff, and they're more than good enough, but hey, that wasn't what I have come to do more of.

So, almost like an accident the one below emerged. I had lost every bit of expectations and just messed up some colors, I didn't even like the colors I used untill I started thinking of sea shells. The result is very good, I think, and has the look I were searching for. But it just happened, I still didn't know how and why.

So, I had to bite the bullet and ask Tracey Fletcher King for advise, and I got the best explanations one could ever dream of. Spot on and clearly delivered. It was all about the line work. With my spirit flying high, I went back to my desk and for the first time, tried out what I now had learnt. And this time I was consious about what I were doing. What a difference it makes to fully understand a technique. 

I did it over and over again, and all I need now is to practice, practice and practice even more. I will be searching for the lines I love the most and also which lines to which subjects.

It's such a relief coming out of the darkness and know excactly what to do to achieve the results I'm looking for. Tracey is a very good teacher, so if you ever get a chance, I highly recommend one of her classes.

Linking to Paint party Friday, happy painting everyone.

Waiting for something good

I've been kind of restless this last week,

in waiting for the class to begin and the summer to arrive. While waiting I have nearly finished my bug, just the background remaining. I'll show it again when completely done.

I did order some new tube watercolors in waiting for class, and yesterday they arrived in the mail. Colors are my main source for inspiration, when I see colors I always want to sit down to create something. BUT, remembering their names is quite another task. When I'm painting, I always know what color to choose by instinct, warm or cold, bright or toned down.
To help learning the names, I've made a "map" of my watercolors. Perhaps I now will learn the name of the red-ish blue and the one which is more green-ish. And which is which of all the reds.

 Our appletrees are in full bloom right now, and since we've only had cold weather the colors are spectacular this year. I picked in some small branches and had to paint them, they are such beautiful flowers.

Have a look at the colors, so intence pink.

Over a long periode of time I have wanted to paint a blue painting, and had a go some days ago. It's not the worst painting I did, but it didn't turn out as I had hoped for. I consider this one as a test for a larger piece in the future.

Three more sleeps and the class is on, as Tracey Fletcher King would say. Yay, bring it on!

Thanks alot for all your lovely comments last week, I loved reading them, all of them. Linking to Paint Party Friday again this week, have a good week everyone"

Lots of painting this week

In between very hard work on my bug,

I've done some more warmups for my class in June, and it's really fun to try new things to paint. I'm absolutely out of my comfortsone by doing this, and the results are showing that. The bug is very time consuming and I need breaks from it. Both for the intencity while working and also to keep a fresh eye on it.

The paint bottle below is one sitting in my studio and have some text as well. The letters are very hard to get right, but it isn't too bad. My whole painting is a bit wonky.......... oh well.........

At this stage my painting looks a bit disastrous, but I know it will come together nicely if I'm capable of doing the right things. That's why I need fresh eyes from time to time.

Next one is an old sketch I did for a larger project, and this one had never been painted. It was my very first try on stacked cups. As you'll see my sketch was done in a hurry, but it learnt me what I needed to know for my project. Now, it came in handy for my warmups.

At least it starts to come together, but the big shell needs more work. In person it is a bit darker but still needs to be darkened some more. I so much enjoy working on this one. When the bug is done, I''ll make the background as well.

I also want to give credit to Jaroslav Maly, the photographer. Most kindly he gave me permission to use his photos as inspiration for painting, and as painter one is always in need of new subjects to paint. The photo I work from can be seen here.

Still my text isn't good, but better than the first one. It was tricky to paint the walnuts, I've done much better walnuts than this. The black text says walnut kernels. I would never have thought it was so fun to paint this kind of stuff, but it actualy is. Worth trying. And now, I'm shopping food for the looks of it, just mentioning..............

Let me end by saying thank you all for your lovely comments last week, it really made me happy.
I'll link this post to Paint Party Friday, and I look forward to visit all the creative people out there.

Enjoy the weekend!

So much fun ahead.

I'm finally painting again.

It's been so long wothout any painting, that I had to make some small easy ones to start with. The first one isn't anything but a try of layering. I always think it's so pretty when I see paintings with lots of layerings in them, so this was my first try in a long time. It's done on a textured paper meant for acrylics, I used Twinks and watercolor pencils to make mine.

Next one is done in my Zeta A4 sketchbook. I've made this rose once before, but in a much larger scale. Twinks once again and the purpose was to get the paint flow and me to relax. I think I did both things well. I hope you'll get the feeling of depth in this one, that's why I share the angled photos.

One more to go before I got to a bit more serious stuff. This one is a prismatic painting, but all of a sudden I were carried away and added shading and.......... well, I'm pleased after all. This one is also in my Zeta sketchbook and Twinks.

Below is the reason I sat down with my colors again. I so much wanted to paint a giant bug. This is a work in progress, and it will take me quite some time to finish, but I love doing it and will enjoy every minute of it. I've just started his head, so it's the initial layers only, visible here. Paper in use is Fabriano Artistico extra white hot pressed 140 lbs. Very nice to work on, and for this one I use my watercolor pencils.

As I wrote in my last post, June is almost here and along with that Summer of Colors 5 start again. I'm so looking forward to that, and now I've bought me a class over at Community Trive, thought by Tracey Fletcher King, called Deliscious Painting. I so much want to be able to loosen up a bit, and I think Tracey is the best one to learn me that.
Just as a warm up, I sat down and made this last piece. I had to see if I could do something similar to her videos on the topic. I'm pleased with it and am so excited.

It seems June will be packed with fun for me, and I can hardly wait.

I'll link this post to PPF for a change. Happy PPF everyone.

What I've been doing the last months.

I'm sorry for being absent for so long,

 but so much has happened that I couldn't find time to blog.
I have been driving my mother to and from doctors, hospital and fysio ever since she came home in December. She is doing good but still have some issues to work out. Lately she felt weaker again, and I saw it when she were walking. New workouts have been started and I hope that helps.

In February my sons girlfriend moved in next door (my sons house) and brought her two lovely sons with her. They are aged 5 and 2 and are such charming boys. So when I'm not driving my mother, I spend alot of time with the new family, showing them our neighbourhood and try to get to know them properly. Due to all this, I haven't been able to find enough peace to start any painting or art making at all. To compensate, I have been knitting and " hooking" so a bit creativeness has been going on in between it all. The cardigan below were made for Lucas, the two year old, and it fits perfectly. He is so cute wearing it.

The green sweather is for Tobias, the oldest one. I have not seen it on him, but he said it suited well.

The blue one is for handyman, and I still need to finish the neck. I have never been knitting with several colors before, so it was kind of slow going. But, I'm very happy I finally managed to do it. I can't count all the times I've tried without success.

My latest painting is from the start of February, and some of you might have seen it published on my Facebook page. I were trying to paint the depht in a bunch of flowers (tulips) just like we see it in real time. I'm happy with my result.

Right now I'm working to finish a plaid I'm hooking, and then it's time for painting again.


June 1st The Summer of Color-5 (SOC) starts again, and I can't wait for it to start. It was so much fun last year, and it's kind of slow. One week to create a piece of art due to the given colors. It's free and open for all who wants to participate. Come on, join in you too! You'll find a link in the button to the left, click it and read what it's all about.

These were my creations last year.

Thats all for now, and I love being a bonus grandma.