Some new pieces!

This week is a very exciting week for me as we have some relatives arriving from Wales. I'm so excited to be catching up with them and to do lots of much needed socialising :0). We are going away for a trip to the coast at some point so I plan to take a sketch book and my Sistahood sketch book with me and see if I can get some inspiration at the beach :0) fingers crossed, in the mean time I made a start on my last butterfly and have had some new deliveries of supplies so I tried out a few new pieces.

 First of all I received these cute earring trays with dome glass inserts. I had the perfect silver pendant tray so made this matching set with Japanese paper.

 Then the same day I received my order with this chain and findings. I ordered 16ft of this chain so I will be able to make many little beauties, this is my first every bracelet. It is made from polymer clay which was been varnished.

 Then I used the brass vintage style findings to make the bracelet. I love how the warm colours of the clay go with the vintage style findings. I attached a cute little bronze dragonfly charm with come lovely little red beads at the clasp.

 This is my current favourite pendant. Just love these colours and it sits on my new chain.

 Next up I made a cute matching set with my new vintage style setting. And a pair of vintage copper earring trays.

 Then yesterday my new antique brass lobster swivel clasps arrived and I made some key rings out of some clay.

The heart and flower designs are hand drawn on.

 I also received these cute little chair charms!

I think this is my favourite key ring.

So much to do so little time ;0) I've got lots more ideas for new pretties but wanted to share what I have been working on this week with you. 

My sketch book cover for 'The Sisterhood of the travelling sketchbook' Sunday Sketches

Finally had time to work on the cover of my sketch book for 'The sisterhood of the travelling sketchbook' that I'm taking part in this year. Read all about it at this post on Jaime's blog from Artsy Fartsy me :0).

I'm now thinking about my entry into this book before passing it on to the next person :0)

Paint Party Friday

Hi Guys this is my first piece for Paint Party Fridays. It's a new weekly challenge site hosted by Kristin and Eva. Each week people will be posting a painting and sharing it with everyone else!

If you would like to find out more about this fun activity you can click on the 'Paint Party Friday' button on my side bar, and check out everyone elses beautiful work.

This week I'm showing my fun painting 'Day Dream Fairy' which I painted in mostly oils and some acrylics. I really enjoyed painting this one inbetween my butterfly commission that I have been working on. Check out my previous post if you haven't seen butterfly number two!

Hope you're all having a great weekend, I'm off to check out everyone elses beautiful work :0)

(Update: I just wanted to share how my little fairy dreamer turned out as a pendant too! :0)

She has just been added to my shop!

Butterfly number 2 purple! :0)

Hi everyone, hope you are all having a good week so far, I thought I'd share with you my second butterfly in oils in the series of 3 that I am working on for a customer :0).

I'm really loving the vibrant colours of the oils and with each piece I'm feeling more and more confident with using them. I think I'm starting to get the hang of it.

The next butterfly I've been requested to do is green, I've been thinking about this one alot as green wouldn't have been my pick. I think on a blue background green will have trouble standing out like the rest but I do have a few ideas bouncing round my head about perhaps using a sunset and having the green one in the middle and just changing the background colour slightly in the other two (thanks to hubby for that cool suggestion). The other idea I have is to sit the butterfly on flowers showing no sky background so watch this space as I have no idea how it's going to turn out yet.

Any way here are some progress shots of the purple one :0)

 I started by painting the background in arylic paint and letting it dry. I love the texture that this creates.

 Then it was just a matter of layering the paint, letting things dry in between  etc.

 I'm really happy with the end result and can't wait to see all 3 together :0)

This last painting is just something fun that I was working on in between drying times. I'm going to have another go at this one before starting the final butterfly, I find it helps to take a break when you are doing a bigger project just to keep things interesting :0)

Sunday sketch and my first butterfly finished!

Hi guys! Hope you all had a great weekend.

We are all back to our healthy old selves now after a very sick last week. I'm even feeling up to a run this afternoon so it'll be good  to blow off those cobwebs.

First up is my Sunday sketch. I just doodled this in front of the tele, I don't particularly like it but it was good to just sketch something quite random heheheh I need to do more of this as it's a good way to think of ideas for future projects.

I'm also taking part in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Sketch Books which is something special that is being organised by Jamie from Artsy Fartsy Me check out her lovely fun blog to read more about it. Basically a group of us 'creative sistahs' have joined together and we will each be buying a sketch/art book we'll each do a page and pass it on to the next one each month. The idea is that at the end of 12 months we should get our book back packed full of wonderful creative pieces from each artist! I'm very excited about this project as I've never taken part in anything like this before and I've already met some lovely new blog friends through it. I shall post my piece each month to show you guys! :0)

Phew! Lastly here is my finished butterfly in oils. I'm really happy with it, and will be starting the 2nd piece in the set of 3!!! I LOVE oils and can't believe I was nervous about using them for so long! :0) I have a question for all you oil users out there. Do you varnish a painting when it's dry? I have gloss varnish for my acrylic paintings but wasn't sure if there was something I should use for oils?

Bye for now :0)

When you least expect it! :0)

Hi guys,

This last week has been a bit of a nightmare one. After the exhausting weekend with the market we got home to a very sick little man. Since then a horrible stomach bug swept through our family resulting in a trip to the hospital with my oldest little man as he was suffering awful stomach pains. Thankfully after catching it myself as well we're all back on the mend now and both boys are back to their usual noisy mischevious ways! :0) Phew!

So yesterday I finally started work on my newest oil painting.

I started by painting the back ground with acylic paints and just played around with lots of different colours. I didn't like the colour of the background but got some great texture when it dried. Then I painted this butterfly.

Then I decided that a blue back ground would work much better with the colour of the butterfly.

This is where I left it yesterday I needed to let it dry a bit so that I could work on the background a bit more.

I decided to post it up on my facebook fan page as a work in progress and someone has already snapped it up. I also told them that I was planning on doing a set of three butterflies in different colours and she wants them all and has requested the other two colours, it is very exciting for me and I'm looking forward to starting the other two today!! This lady is a collector of my work and has one of my most favourite paintings that I did a couple of years ago, my Geisha!

 It's so nice to know that someone really loves what you do :0)

My first serious market! :0)

Hi guys,

I'm sooooooo tired today. We were up very very early  for our first 'real' market. This one is very popular in our home town and it's got a real country feel.

I think I learnt a lot from this market. I sold a painting and lots of bookmarks! They were my most popular item. As well as some hair clips made with the Japanese paper and some pendants (clay, Japanese paper and some of my own prints). I was hoping to sell more and felt a little down but after speaking to some of the other stall holders was told that it was a bit quieter than usual and that I shouldn't be disheartened as this wasn't a good example of what this market is usually like. So we are going to go back for the mother's day market in May (these ones only run once a month) which they said is very very busy. I'm happy with how it went today and enjoyed the experience. I've got some new ideas on what to make next from lots of positive feed back. And look forward to building more stock up for the next one with lots of variety :0)

My very talented cousin Clarey, lent us these 'walls' that her very handy hubby made for her. (she is a handbag designer and has done her fair share of markets.) They came in so handy and were great for displaying my paintings. I felt much more professional with my paintings hanging in the background and they showed up really nicely and would catch peoples eye.

I'm really happy with how they looked on the boards, my bookmarks were so popular I shall make sure that I have lots ready for my next market.

Hubby has been sooooooo supportive of my passion and is very passionate about my work too which makes things so much easier :0)

Thanks hubby :0).

I've got lots of ideas for my next market and how to make it bigger and better :0)

Bookmarks!

This week I'm busy making some new last minute pieces for my market on Sunday and getting organised. I shall be taking a camera with me on the day so I can share some photos of the market with you all! I'm getting excited!

I made these bookmarks this week out of some prints of my paintings.  I laminated then beaded them!