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!

Illustration Friday Swarm

Phew! Two posts in 24 hours! Feels good to be super creative again.

Here is my entry for Illustration Friday's 'Swarm'.

For some reason this is the image that came into my head, I wouldn't mind being surrounded by a swarm of butterflies! :0)

Hope you're all having a great weekend! :0)


I'd just like to add that I'm having a giveaway on my facebook page, so just click on the facebook link on the side of my blog to enter! :0)

My first oil painting finished Sunday sketch

Hi guys thought I'd post pics of my finished piece. Because it has been a work in progress from a sketch that I submitted to Sunday Sketches last week I thought I'd submit the finished piece to Sunday Sketches this week :0) As you can tell from my the photos in my last post, I did another layer of colours over my entire painting. After I let the painting dry enough I was able to paint more on top and I love how the oils pop! I think this piece turned out better than I expected and I really enjoyed doing it! Using oils made me slow down alot and think more about what I wanted to do as I couldn't be in a hurry with the drying time.

It's funny I realised this week that I really like the smell of the oil paints and that it brought back a few memories for me. My Bampi (granddad) used to paint in his spare time he was actually very talented but it was something that he used to do now and again when he retired. I think he could have done alot with his talent in another place and time. But I think back when he was growing up being artistic and creative wasn't as encouraged as it is today. Painting with oils reminde me of him :0)



I'm looking forward to doing more of these, I guess my only real problem with oils is the drying time, it's not very convenient to leave paintings out on your desk to dry for days on end. What do you guys who use oils do with your paintings  when you're finished? And how long do they tend to take to dry? My other thought was do I need to varnish it? I find with acrylic paint that varnishing helps make the colours pop alot more but I wasn't sure if I needed to do that with oils. Can you tell that I'm fumbling my way through this one? ;0) Hope you're all having a great weekend :0)

Some work in progress!

I had a very productive day today and finally after about 18months of procrastination, opened my oil paints. I've been wanting to try them for a while but really didn't know where to start. But I have been inspired by my gorgeous blog friend Kelly Berkey's work as she recently started using oils so I thought I would give my second canvas a go. We both seem to be experimenting with flowers at the moment :0) This is from the sketch I did for Sunday Sketches a few days ago.

 I painted my canvas with black acrylic paint and sketched the outline of the painting on top

 I didn't really have a plan or know how different the oils would feel to the acrylics.

 This is as far as I got with the painting today. I felt I had to stop and wait for the paint to dry a bit. I'm not sure what else I'm going to do with this but I know it needs something more. I want to outline the leaves a bit and include more detail. I really love acrylics and find them so user friendly but I have to say the oils are so bright and vibrant. The only thing that bothers me is the drying time, but it might not be such a bad thing as I think I tend to rush my paintings and it might do me good to work on this over a longer period of time.

I'd love to know what everyone else's thoughts on oils are and if you might have any tips for me. I shall post up more pics as I work on it :0)



Lastly I managed to bake these pendants up while I was painting today, I have since varnished them which makes the colour really pop. I drew a couple of designs on some of them too :0)

Hope you're all having a great week :0)

New flower painting!

I managed to work on this one and finish it today! Well I think it's finished. I'm so picky with my work lately I want everything I do to be a 'masterpiece' and stress about it when it doesn't turn out the way I had it in my head. I know I should just stress less and just learn from each piece but it's hard not to spot things  don't like in my work. Having said that I'm pleasantly surprised at how this one turned out. I've not painted many flowers on canvas and I'm glad I perservered with this one. I initially wanted a black background like my rose painting but I thought it looked a bit boring so I went over the black with a light layer of light blue and I quite like the texture it gave it.

I'm going to sign and varnish it! :0)

Now for the next one .......

Sunday sketches

Hi everyone hope you all had a great weekend. I've been so busy doing a massive stock take of all my pendants for my upcoming market. I've been pricing them and practicing my set up. My lovely hubby made me some boards to hang them on which has really made a difference to how it all looks.

This weeks Sunday sketch is just a quickie from my sketch book, i've been wanting to do another flower painting but I've been really struggling, I've painted over one canvas 3 times now as I'm not happy with how it turned out. So I sat down and sketched up some different flower ideas. I'm hoping to work on the paintings in the next few days.

I should have at least 100 pieces by the time I finish my stock take and I plan on making as many as I can before the big day as I bought some really cool clay the the other day.

Here are some shots of my set up with my clay pieces! :0)

I'm off to check out all the other Sunday Sketches :0)

And the winners are.........

Hi everyone well the One World One Heart event is over and I have managed to randomly pick the 3 winners. 132 lovely people entered.

The first one out of the hat was Doreen who just so happens to be from the same city as me! Congratulations Doreen you are the winner of the Japanese paper glass pendant

The winner of the next prize is Saskia. Congratulations Saskia you are the winner of my two glass bobby pins!

And last but not least the third winner is Regina. Congratulations Regina you have won my laminated print fridge magnet 'I curse my sweet tooth'.

Thank you everyone who entered. I enjoyed this give away sooooo much that I am already planning another so stay tuned :0)

I'm off to notify the winners :0)

Illustration Friday 'Sweater' and Sunday Sketch

'May-belle, just LOVED to knit, she didn't really know why she loved it so much because she wasn't particularly good at it, but she enjoyed the challenge of wearing those baggy sweaters!!!' :0)

'May-belle' is a character that I sketched up a few weeks ago for Sunday sketches and I decided to give her a bit more of a personality, perhaps I should take her different places each Illustration Friday and see where it takes me. I like working on this character as it is completely different to the other things I've been working on lately so it's a nice change!

Busy week!

Hi guys!

I realised today that it's been over a week since my last post which is unusual for me. I have to say though that with the OWOH blog hop going on and preparing my next big market in less than a month, as well as both the boys going back to school it's been a bit of a crazy week. Once I get into a routine (my youngest has finally started preschool) I shall be able to post more frequently again and I also plan to paint and draw alot more.

I wanted to show you guys some of the pieces that I have been working on in preparation for this new market I'm trying out. It's a real big country market and very popular in our city so I'm hoping that I'll do well there so that I can keep making these fun pieces.

These are also listed in my shop too :0)

 My current favourite, Japanese paper in a vintage setting!

 Hand drawn design on fimo clay.

 Love these settings, marbel swirls in fimo clay.

 I called this piece 'Jupiter' as it really reminded me of the planet! Love the antique bronze!

This is Japanese paper inside a black gunmetal pendant tray!

So as you can see I have been very busy. I'm currently working on another flower painting. I started painting it yesterday but I just wasn't happy with it at all so I ended up painting over it in black and starting again. Does that ever happen to you?

Hope you're all having a great week!!! :0)

Illustration Friday Surrender

Hi guys this week has been rather busy as I'm one of many people taking part in OWOH which is a massive blog event. Be sure to scroll down to that post as I'm having a giveaway and anyone with an active blog worldwide is able to enter.

So I have had this piece sitting on my desk for a couple of days and thought I'd better show you before I missed this weeks prompt. 'Surrender' for me this week was all about letting my paint brush decide what I wanted to paint and push myself a little and step outside the box. I tend to do alot of figurative paintings and pretty ladies etc and this time I wanted to do something that I wasn't so confident with which is flowers. I took a photo of a beautiful rose in my back yard and used that for reference. And the funny thing is the painting turned out completely different!! I'm now thinking of painting a series of flower paintings!