Country Garden Stitchery

I finally am caught up with Christmas things so I decided to catch up on IF topics too. I knew what I wanted to draw and paint, but had a hard time getting a few minutes. These were fun topics and I loved to play with the color on them. With "horizon" I wanted the feeling to be that you never know what is coming next, especially since the new year is upon us! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Tis the season so I decided to draw a little Christmas elf for the holidays. I wanted to do different colors than the traditional red and green which was fun. There were so many "little things" I wanted to draw for this. Will still draw them I think... Happy Friday to all. Snow and rain here in northern Nevada, yay!

I have always been intrigued by superstition and supersticious people, though not suspicious myself. I wanted to paint some flowers since they are my favorite thing. Most flowers have meanings and I figured that there might be some superstitions that go along with the meanings. I found some fun ones but my favorite was "Don't pick the foxgloves or you'll offend the fairies." This was my first time painting and drawing faires and I can say I love them too and hope I've not offended them in the past with picking foxgloves!

I would love to have an antique scale and a little room in a potting shed for making potpourri with dried flower petals from my garden each year. Tried to depict this in my illustration this week. Can't wait to see all the other scale illustrations... Happy Weekend!

Just doodling and draw a cityscape in lots of different colors. Lots of shapes, like the circles - balls. Interested in how the different colors work togtheter, some don't like each other at all. An old train in the desert with small trees and clear mountains in the background. Have to sketch quick as we go by on our way to somewhere else.

I loved this topic and thought immediately of fancy hats worn to a tea party. Our family has tea parties now and then and it is fun to dress up and have tea. I also thought of the RED hats that are so popular now, but decided to stick with pinks and purples - my favorite colors. Enjoy the autumn weekend.

Here are all of my new creations. Technical difficulties on my post before. I think I really like these colors.

I've been adding new watercolor paintings to my card shop. I let myself just play with color and shape and found it very relaxing. Nice to loosen up and not worry about what it may look like. Play like kids do. Have had to think of my own flowers now that it is too cold for them to grow here. Have had some rain, but it has been freezing at night and all my flowers are now gone. Until next year... Oh and Happy Halloween!

These two little kids remind me of my own when they were young and loved to trick or treat. However, we never did see any really scary houses that we had to think twice about approaching so I thought I would draw some. Happy Halloween~

Taking my moleskine out and about to record the changing leaves and such. Exploring ideas and nature helps to get things flowing. Contemplation at the end of the day with a walk is always good. Love the colors of hot air balloons and the feeling of freedom watching them float through the sky.

Thinking of how kids like to measure how much they've grown. A tall sunflower would be great to measure up against, especially if there is a sunflower house close by. I've always wanted to grow a sunflower house. Sounds like a great place to escape to.

I had to think all day about this illustration, didn't come easy to me. Until...I was working on another project and the concept of light and dark extremes came to me. And since I love to draw and paint flowers, this is what I came up with.

I wanted to depict the study of the rose from the closed bud to its fullest "open" point with this week's topic. I think it is fun to do studies of flowers in their different stages. The rose is one of the flowers that has quite a long growing phase from the time the bud appears to the time the rose is at its fullest. Have fun with the contest for this week's entry, I did.

I immediately thought of clusters of blue flowers in many different shades of blue. Mixing the different shades in watercolor, however, presented another challenge. I found myself coming up with lots of teal shades. I'll have to work on mixing the blues. Happy weekend all.

I wanted to draw something to correlate with the season and I thought about a lady trying to juggle all of her equipment back so she doesn't have to make another trip, ever feel that way? I felt like using red too, such a strong color and not in my usual palette, so apples came to mind. Have a good weekend. Nice and cool here in Nevada.

i decided to play along and get myself a moleskin sketchbook to see what they are all about. i find myself sitting and waiting more. waiting for kids - need to do something so i have my moleskin companion now. i find myself just putting it with my keys ready to go. i need to practice drawing people - out of my comfort zone. i draw flowers and nature a lot probably because it is easy for me and i've done it for many years. i do a structure now and then, but people are fascinating and i would love to depict them better in my work. don't really know if my efforts are going anywhere, or if they are supposed to. have tried many venues in the past and none of them really lead anywhere, but they do make me happy. i guess that is what counts. sometimes it is hard to accept just that though. this is something i can do when i get old though. travel around and draw what i see. need something to do when i get old.

i have created a few ACEO - ATC for my Esty store and saw the prompt on inspire me thursday to share ATC. i have become quite intriqued with this little painting/drawing format. lots of fun

I had been thinking about weddings last week so I thought it ironic that would be the topic this week. I was thinking about my own wedding and if I knew myself as I do now when I got married I would have had a completely different wedding. I would have wanted a very simple wedding outdoors in nature near an old wise tree dressed in simple clothes with just a few special people attending and hopefully lots of birds and other creatures hiding, but watching.

i have a tiny little area of flowers around a tree in my front yard right now. this is all i've planted since we moved in since it is so close to freezing day around here. i have a blend of yellow and pink snapdragons, some deep purplish-fuschia petunias, and an occasional bright pink petunia peeking up. i try to baby them, keep them trimmed so they will bloom as long as possible and i can have color to draw. buying flowers from the store is second best, there is nothing quite like drawing outdoors for me. total bliss. i trimmed on friday evening and there were a couple flowers still in bloom but most were done and i decided to record them in my book. i thought the textures and shapes were interesting.

The topic momentum challenged me. I thought of the time of year and nature. I have lived in the desert most of my life and spend a lot of time outside exploring. The wind blows regularly and we see many tumbleweeds rolling their way across the desert. They are very light and prickly and tend to float in the wind. Sometimes when there is a strong windstorm at night they will all be piled up next to a fence all stuck together, piled high like a pyramid.

I thought of doing an alphabet garden with a flower for every letter of the alphabet but couldn't think of one for "x" so decided to do it randomly.

I decided to try Illustration Friday, have been wanting to for some time now. Finally got brave enough to do it. We have sunflowers blooming all over our town right now. They are in gardens, along the roads, near canal banks and they were on the front page of the newspaper yesterday along with some bees and dragonflies so I was inspired to make my own interpretation to that.

holidays are getting closer and i find myself wanting to make lots of things, but painting has been my focus. deep rich colors in reds, blues and purples, colors of cooler weather. very excited about the needlework show and etsy at christmas. can't wait to see all the holiday things people make. trying to think of some more smaller cross stitch designs before the needlework show in october. almost finished with "country garden in september" and will need to quickly begin october to have it ready.

madly sewing lately creating some quilted things. found some great autumn and christmas fabrics. don't like "stashes" and things around my house so i make them into something and send them on their way. these will be on my Etsy Store site. have been very busy with painting christmas cards too for my greeting card store. need a break. going to watch my son play football on saturday, that will be a good change.

here is my creative space. i like lots of color and light.

a sneak preview of a ribbon embroidery project that will have at the online needlework show october 17-23.

school started today. kids are starting a brand new school, but handled it very bravely and walked into the noisy crowd without a problem. very proud of them. football season started too and a scrimage on saturday brought back the feeling of exhilaration (maybe its just me being a proud mom) from last year watching our boy play. we've never done anything quite as exciting and fun as watching him play football on saturday afternoons. i find myself cheering as loud as i can watching our team run for the goal line, feels great! busy painting and thinking of new things for my october needlework show and the christmas shopping for my greeting card and etsy stores. i find myself very inspired and wake up at 2am (it is always around that time my muse comes...) ready to work. i am excited to see how the season goes. it will be very exciting when more people discover handcrafts and artwork for gifts. i love receiving handmade things. i still have many handmade things given to m...

i decided to set up a blog to see what online journaling was like. i used to journal in pretty little fabric covered books for years. this feels like i am opening myself wide up for all to see, as a very private person it feels very strange! but i want to try it. i guess i am just wanting to use this as a space to explore ideas in my work, see if i get any constructive feedback from others. hopefully i will connect with others with similar ideas as me. feels fun to just kind of ramble. i have moved recently to a new town in the northern desert of Nevada (haven't moved in 15 years, very long time for me!). i really like it here and it is just now feeling like we are settled here and not on a long vacation. i have had different doors open for me with new areas to explore. i just opened a shop on etsy and greeting card universe. really like these new venues for my work. meeting so many cyberspace people, wish it was that easy for me in person!