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.

Little by little.

It doesn't take much to make me happy,

and right now a few things makes me very happy. Little by little my mother is recovering from her brain stroke, I've started to paint again and each day now the birds are throwing the most beautiful concerts. Sparrows, tits, blue tits, trushes, sparrows, magpies and crows just to mention some. As if that wasn't enough, my garden is slowely awakening. Today I photographed the very first flowers, or more correctly, the first flower buds. The bright yellow Eranthis is the first flower to bloom, and it's very welcome. I won't mention the hail that came later on, I'll just see past that.

I found an unfinished mandala, and sat down to finish it. It's such a joy to get back to painting again. First of all I had to clean out and tidy my studio. It has been locked up for winter and has served more or less as a storage room. But, today I dug my way in there and now I'm enjoying all my colors and some time to paint.

This mandala were done using Neocolor 2 crayons, Twinks and I also did paint with some spray inks. I'm not over the top happy with this one, but as the first one in a very long time, it's ok.

The next painting is Twinks only, on top of  black paper. To paint on a dark substrate gives some interesting results. The colors behave differently, and the depth is much more visible.

I call this one done, even that I feel something is missing. I would love to add some white to it.

It feels good to be back, and now I have to pop in and say hello to all my blog friends.

Something sad, something good and a bit fun.

I have not been making any art lately,

other than knitting some dishclothes. Wednesday November 26.th my mother had a brain stroke and she didn't understand what had happened to her. She was so looking forward to see my brother and his wife coming to visit her Friday 28.th. I'm very happy they they were there to look after her, and not least for bringing her back home. I'm glad to report that she is much better now, she can talk, walk and do many different things. The right side of her body is affected, so she has some trouble with balance when walking, and of cause, her strength isn't the same. But, I'm sure she will be able to regain her strength as soon as she starts rehabilitation. I'm working on establishing a good quality rehab for her.

Late yesterday evening, I were out to pick up some more firewood, I heard this terrible noise. It sounded like 50 grizzly bears. It was, to my surprise, an American 911 police car and during it's last turn before parking outside my sons house, the engine delivered an extra sound like a gun shot. Instantly, I were ready to let go of all the firewood, freeze and hands up. My goodness!

Our son has a friend that is over the normal level interested in old and special cars. He buys and sells them all the time, mostly buys them, I think.

Well, handyman and I had a good laugh, and I'm still chuckling. Who could ever imagine to have such a car at ones doorstep.

I'm not sure to be back before Christmas, so I wish you all a good one, right now. I hope to find time to be creative after Christmas.