Bright and Bold

Sorry not my best, but I am in a hurry, have to finish this and post it quickly onto the Andy Skinner DecoArt website in order to be in time for their competition called 'Bold and Bright'. 

 Using scraps of card paper and string left over from other projects and left on my table, (I am terrible at tidying up) then stuck down on a canvas.

Lots of DecoArt fluid acrylics, interference turquoise and the  Lovely Metallic Lustre turquoise.

So there you have it, wonky fish and bad lighting!

Must do better next time.

Finger painting Monet style

Hi there you wait for one post to come along and today you are stuck with two from me!

A few weeks ago I was looking at this Monet painting, The Lily pond, at an art class I go too.

I liked it so much we all in the class had a go of doing our own lily pond. Well me, being me, ended up painting with my finger! I find it so freeing using my fingers to paint with, I just tense up when I have a brush in my hand.

Hope you like it xx

Inspired by Paul Kleen

Hi there thanks for calling by.

I am still looking at artists that inspire me and lately I have been looking at Paul Klee.

If you don't know his work, this is the picture I got inspiration from yesterday:-

Mmm I thought, I could do that, but my way. Thinking of all the shapes that are important in my life, I set too work.

I started with a sheet of acrylic cheap paper and basically just stuck odd bits on it, like my empty B.P tablet packets, netting from satsumas, bits of packaging, just everything that would normally be thrown away in other households. Then I covered everything in  Gesso, crackle paste, texture sand paste, Glass bead texture gel. So I had loads of texture on it. Texture makes me very Happy.

Sorry I should of taken a better picture, but You get the idea!

Next I painted in all in acyclic black paint, let it dry. Drew on my shapes in chalk and painted those shapes white, as I wasn't sure what I was going to do with it yet! 

Then with lots of layers of colour, I filled in those shapes. (you might want to get a cup of tea at this point as there are lots of pictures to come)

So here you have all the things that are important to me in my life. My children in the shape of a figure, my husband is the Treble clef with the heart in it, the sun, nature in the shape of a flower, my cats, my ducks, a paint brush, as art is my life line and bits of heart (love) are included too.

Hope you can see all the texture and cracks.  Husband doesn't like it (always hurtful, but hey ho, we are all different) but hope someone out there does like it! xxx
x

A bit Monet

Hi folks

I want to enter the DecoArt competition to win some of their lovely goodies. (because you can never have too much paint, can you?)
They asked for paintings that we had done inspired by a famous artist. So here is a painting I did inspired by Monet a short time ago. It is of a local lily pond.

  Hope you like it x

Been Recycling with the help of Hessian and great paints.

Hi there,
Been busy today playing with my paints. I while ago I bought to large canvas's from the charity shop, two for £3.  Both 70mm x 40mm. They were a horrible plasticy surface. So today was the day to get cracking on one of them!

                                                                   Plastic picture.

I started with a large piece of Hessian, which I cut some holes in and pulled some of threads out. (which of course I forgot to take a picture of)
I slopped large amounts of  emulsion paint (bought very cheaply at DIY shop as someone had ordered the colour and then didn't want it) Stapled the Hessian on and slopped more emulsion on top adding a few off cuts of Hessian on top.(This was an idea by the way from my teacher Peta Stockton, who is a very talented artist) 

                                             
                                                                 (Hessian stapled on)

                                                       Then left it to dry and stiffen up.

Picked up my trusted Decoart paints, covering the dried Hessian with white paint. I covered it with white as I had a mental block as to what to do next and was panicking about such a large empty space. Brayered some colour that pleased me on, Stencilled a bit, stamped a bit. (not easy on such a ruff surface)  

Finished abstract piece, MAYBE!

mmm said husband, nice colours!

Close up shows the extra bits of Hessian I added in the beginning.

So if you only like the colours like my husband, it still made me happy doing it. No thinking and worrying about drawing, I just went with the flow. 
So finished or not, that is the question?
Thanks for calling by, comments are very welcome, so I can tell I am not on my own!

Yesterday I felt a bit rusty.

Hi there thanks for stopping by.

I found a Huge (well 21") black plastic Buddha in a garden centre the other day.  I love Buddha's, ever since I was lucky enough to visit Bangkok in my twenties for three days. All those lovely temples, Buddha's and sunshine I just adored and of course, the smell of Jasmine in the air. Anyway I wanted my Buddha to look like rusty metal. So yesterday I set too it!


This is the black plastic I started with.

See he is a big boy!

This is how he looks now after a splish, splash, splosh of paint. (be prepared for lots of boring pictures, you might need a cup of coffee before you start)

Oh I did do a bit of dry brushing too, just to make the features pop out a bit.

On this shot you can see that the plastic was a bit damaged but, I rather liked that.

So now all I need to do is vanish him and find somewhere to put him in the garden, because there sure isn't anywhere to put him indoors!

That is all folks!

Take one Ali Reeve Egg Cupbaord

Hi  there nice people, (well hopefully you are nice) thanks for stopping by. Hope you have nice November sunshine too.

I have finally finished a project I started a while ago, so thought I would show you.

Take one Ali Reeve, Stamp away Egg Cupboard kit. One mallet, glue and fit it together!  

Add some yummy DecoArt paint called New Life (which sadly the photo's don't do the lovely colour justice) It is a really beautiful green. I so loved it I nearly stopped there!

I decided I wanted it to look a bit worn inside, so I sanded the inside a little bit. On the outside I didn't sand it but, instead I added some DecoArt  Americana Decor crackle Medium. Left it to dry, then put my back out for a couple of weeks (queue violins) two expensive visits to the Osteopath and I was ready to carry on.

I mixed some Timeless and Everlasting paint together as, I didn't want the colour to be too beige and the Everlasting lightened up the colour.  I then dry brushed a little extra New Life on the edges of the box.

On the top I then added  a stencil by Dylusions.

I made a little duck and painted it before sticking it on the front. As our eggs are ducks eggs in this household.

At the moment the back and sides are just painted, still thinking about whether or not to add some egg stenciling on them, but at the moment it is staying as it is!

Close up of some of the crackle.

Inside of the door.

I have covered the whole thing with Soft touch varnish.

So all I need now girls is some eggs. But I might have to wait now until Easter to get some!
All for now
Love 
Kathy x

Rescued by glue and DecoArt paint

Been missing ages sorry, no mojo, he is off having fun in the sun without me as usual. He isn't back  yet but I thought I would share with you something I am really pleased about.
Having two kittens means things (lots of things) are getting broken and some times that has made me rather sad, in particular a pot that belong to my mother which I was rather fond of.

So what the heck I wasn't going to loose anything by trying to fix it was I?  So I thought I would have a go. No more nails and DecoArt paints and a touch of glossy Accents to fill in the gaps and give it a bit of a shine.

Far from perfect, but I am happy, thanks DecoArt you have made me happy.

Short and sweet, OK short and wonky!

Just made a card for my daughters birthday!

Wonky I know, but Hey it is hand made and I didn't have any dies big enough!
Bye bye! 
I said it was short and I wasn't just talking about me!

Glue
paint
DecoArt Silver Spark Metallic Lustre

Self belief is hard!

Why is it that when people look at your work and say  'That is good'  you don't believe them, just thinking they are being kind, and then one person is negative about something you have done and you completely believe them and end up feeling rubbish about your work!  Ho hum, I thought when you got older you didn't care what people thought! Well not in my case I guess.

Anyway, what brought this all on is I have been painting! 

Lots of beautiful things to look at in nature at the moment and little art work being done as I am trying to fight my way through the weeds in the garden while the sun shines.
Hope the sun is shining on you and thanks for calling by. 

Kathy xxx