It’s been a long while since I’ve had the urge to blog. Once I did have the urge to blog, I found my media reader was broken! I got a new media reader yesterday only to find it’s not exactly compatible with my computer. I have to do some gymnastics to get it to work. I’ll have to get another one so I’m not sure when I’ll be able to post again after this.

I’ve been painting. Not as much as I normally do, but I’ve been painting!

Ma Cherie

Another encaustic painting. I’ve really fallen in love with this technique.

I’ve started another blog. A book review blog! That’s why I haven’t been painting as much. I’ve been reading like a madwoman. I thought I’d put it to good use and write up some reviews. One thing led to another and I started a blog.

I hope you visit!

My first encaustic painting! Courtesy of Willowing!

I sealed the background in beeswax with a quilting iron and beeswax pellets. I didn’t seal the girl though. I wanted to leave her unsullied.

This is a true mixed media piece. I used colored pencil, tissue paper, bubble wrap, rubber stamps, and paints to create the background. As you can see, I also used a button to embellish her dress!

My first truly 3-D effect! Whoopie!

You can really see the Beeswax in this photo.

I had a blast with the beeswax. I plan to do it again. And again. And again. And again. And again….

:D

Here are my two boys, Quincy and Sammy. They’re sleeping ass to ass. Ain’t it cute?

Happy Monday! I hope you had a great weekend!

Backtracking before my previous painting, I had been on an angel kick. I had basically painted four angel paintings. I showed you two of them. Here are two more, the Angel of Joy and the Angel of Hope.

The Angel of Hope is my favorite of the two.

She has a star to keep her company.

I still like the Angel of Joy.

She has a butterfly on her dress that’s a rub-on.

I like the way the background came out in this one, but I couldn’t get a good picture of it. It’s hard to capture sparkle with a camera.

Both are listed in my Etsy shop.

I’m not sure if I’m going to do more angels. I feel like I’ve done them to do death, but they’re so fun to do! I love them! I do! I do! I love the angels!

Ah well.

There are other things I love to do as well. I just don’t want to end up with a stack of angels a mile high.

We’ll see. Maybe I’ll do one more. As a gift.

Happy Thursday, folks!

.. I finished four paintings. I won’t show them all today, but I thought I’d let you that I’ve been keeping busy.

It’s just that I caught this cold and my sinuses have been bothering the hell out of me so blogging hasn’t really appealed to me. Thus, I’ve let it fall to the wayside.

I do have one painting to show you today and some news to share. First, the painting.

I’ve been very entranced with the whimsical technique of painting. It’s fun! It’s .. It’s… whimsical! It brings out the little girl in me. Who doesn’t want the little girl in you to come out and play once in awhile?

Especially with a cat.

A rose-cheeked cat! Who’s smiling away because his girl is home. Home with him. Big smiles all around. :-)

As for the news? I opened my Etsy shop Opalescent Artworks last week. I don’t expect my paintings to fly out the door, but it’s nice to know I have it open and that I’m putting myself out there.

I’m proud that I got my stuff out there in time for the buying season.  Usually, I’m way off with my timing.  Hopefully I’ll snag one buyer.

If not, that’s okay! Rome wasn’t built in a day! It takes time to get exposure. To get recognized. Art is hard to sell! I understand that. I’m okay with that. I’ll keep persevering.

In the meantime, I’ll keep doing what I love and follow my bliss. I’m not going to try and paint what I think will sell. That just isn’t my thing. I’m going to do what I love.

Now I hope to show the paintings I have finished this week, if not there’s next week. I hope to do two tomorrow. Kind of wrap it all up in one go. I might not show one painting at all. It all depends on my mood. I actually have another painting that I completely forgot about. So that’s 5 paintings that’s finished and a 6th that’s waiting some beeswax as a varnish.

I actually don’t like that painting. I don’t know what I’m going to do about it.

O.o

I did finish off Art Every Day Month. I just didn’t blog about it. Damned sinuses! They’re killing me as I type.

Babble babble! That’s me! :D

Happy Wednesday folks!

I took a new class from Willowing! It’s called Ultimate World of Whimsy and in it I learned how to create lovely whimsical girls and creatures.

My first creations are angels!

My first painting came out a bit of  a mess. I tried to use Golden Fluid Acrylics for her hair. It leaked onto her face! Maybe that’s why she looks so sad!

It’s too early to take detail shots. It’s still dark here. I’m not sure if you can see the splotch on her face, but it’s there! I also had to put a red heart on her face to cover a dark spot of black paint. No! That wasn’t intentional! :D

My second angel went much better.

I used a heavy-bodied acrylic for her hair this time. Much better!

I’m so enjoying these light and cute whimsical girls.  They’re so different then my portraits. I’m not sure why I’m doing angels right now either. I’m just diggin’ the angels. Maybe it’s the season!

The wings aren’t easy to do either. You have to trace a pattern of them onto clear paper then cut them out onto whatever paper you’re going to use to collage. Very tricksy and tedious if you have tiny bits.

The main thing is I’m having fun with this and I have many idea for future whimsical paintings!

I have one more angel in the works, then I think I’ll move on to ordinary whimsical girls. I might go back to an angel or two later on. They’re so much fun. We’ll see!

Happy Saturday! I hope you’re Thanksgiving was great for those of you in the States! For everyone, happy weekend!

I tend to be the type of person who dwells on the past or worries on the future. I also tend to criticize myself to an extent that would extend beyond self-flagellation. This type of unproductive thinking always leads me on an unhappy road of self-destruction. This issue is so important to me, I chose it as my healing topic for my next collage painting.

The woman’s face was too big for my art journal and I didn’t think to use my bigger art journal, so I chose to glue two pages of 90lb watercolor papers together.

I chose three quotes to go with this painting:

“Our life is what our thoughts make it.” – Marcus Aurelius

and

“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.” -Marcus Aurelius

finally,

“With our thoughts we make the world.” – Buddha

It’s important to me to work at keeping a positive attitude and I wanted this page to remind me of how much a positive frame of mind can change your life. Keeping this in mind, I kept her face peaceful and joyful.

Those are the rewards of a positive outlook, in my opinion.  Peace within yourself and inner joy. Once you have inner joy, other things begin to fall in place around you. For instance, the people around you are happier to be around you and make your life easier.

These are the things I’ve found to be true. I can only speak from personal truth. Not from world experience.

Surely though, if we all were to find that inner joy and peace the world would be a better place? A naive thought, but isn’t it true?

For now, I’m thankful for the fact that I have the insight to be aware of my dark moments and the will to turn them around to positive moments as much as I can. I’m not always successful. Sometimes it’s chemical! I’m bipolar! It’s not always a matter of positive thinking. For the most part though? I can steer my mind away from self-destruction.

Of course if you take me shopping… that’s another matter.

I did say “for the most part.”

O.o

I’m also thankful for the friends who remind me when I backslide. Without them, where would I be?

Happy Wednesday everyone! And Happy Thanksgiving to those of you who are in the United States! I might post about something new tomorrow or I might not. It depends on how football goes. ;-)

I didn’t like the way the background looked, so I changed it.

I changed the name too. “Freedom and Peace” is the new name.

I also added some faint stamping to the background with my new favorite handwriting stamp.

Artistic license.

To change and reform what was previously set in stone.

I haz it.

Over on willowing.ning.com there’s a Wacky Hair Challenge! I took up the call and I hope I answered it. :)

I call this piece “Wild and Free” because of how wild and free her hair is. I’m sure there’s a more suitable name for this piece but I can’t seem to find it. I might change it a little later on. Freedom of the artist, no?

I used my brand spankin’ new lotus flower stamps in her hair and layered two coats of color.

I also dabbed some Staz-On ink on with a spouncer over some punchanella or sequin waste.

I used the same spouncer to dab some silvery ink over sequin waste over the background. Some of it came out with a slight silvery green tinge which I thought was kinda cool.

I “leaked” some of the background into her hair as well.

This was a fun piece. Not too much symbolism going on here, just a lot of fun and play. I think she came out looking a little sad. That’s unfortunate. That wasn’t the look I was going for. I might have to tweak her a bit.  Then again, maybe not. What do you think?

I know her shirt needs some work.

I’ll work on her some more today.

There’s another painting I finished on Wednesday, but I don’t have time to share that with you right now. If you want a sneak peek you can hop on over to my Flickr Photostream for a look.

Happy Friday! The weekend is here!

I have always struggled with knowing my limits.  Having Fibromyalgia this is not something that can easily escape my notice. Overdoing things leads to grave consequences and I’d inevitably beat myself down for not knowing the ends of my endurance, which leads me to my latest collage painting.

Even though I’ve been diagnosed with Fibromyalgia since my 20′s I’m still in a constant battle to find that balance of what I can do and what I can’t do. Maybe it’s because some days I can do a lot more then others.  Maybe it’s because I’m still in denial about the fact that I have such severe limitations on my health after so many years.

Inevitably when I do fall short of the mark, I beat myself up needlessly. Unproductively. It doesn’t do me any good to take me to task for something that’s in the past. I can learn from my mistakes, but self-flagellation is never productive.

This is why it’s so important for me to know myself. To truly know myself, without any rose-colored glasses or harsh incriminations.

It’s also a never-ending journey. There’s always something else to discover within myself. A new hidden facet that I never knew existed as I peel back the layers.

Each metamorphosis I undergo brings me back deeper to who I truly am though. I may change, but I also become more emphatically me. Each characteristic I seem to either like or dislike heightens with each transfiguration.

It’s important that I’m aware of these changes. For good or bad, I’m stuck with who I am. I like to think that it’s a good thing.  :)

Happy Wednesday, everyone. I hope you’re happy in your own skin.

I think I may have missed the mark with this painting. I’m not sure I care, but I may have missed it anyway.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the bold colors I used. I just don’t think this painting speaks of “tranquility”, but I wracked my brain trying to think of what word or words to accompany this painting.

At first I wanted to put “live art”, but that wasn’t right. Then I thought of “love art”. That wasn’t right either. Up next was “live, love, laugh”. No. Not right either.

I slept on it.

“Tranquility” was the best I could come up with.

Bugger.

What do you think? Was that the right way to go?

I do love the color wash I used with the stencil and the faint rubber stamped images in the background though. I guess I’m going back to my roots of my original paintings when I used really bold colors and all sorts of things to make up the background.

Whatever.

I like it.

I also added a tiny gold earring. There’s no ear, but this is a whimsical painting! Imagine an ear! There’s a hint of an ear with the earring in place!

So no, this painting isn’t perfect, but all in all? I like it. I think the girl herself bespeaks tranquility. She’s laid back. She’s cool. She’s tranquil!

I can get down with that.

Sometimes you have to be flexible with these things. :-P

In keeping with the tranquil mood. I give you Quincy. Languid in his repose.

Happy Tuesday! I’m just about finished with another collage painting! I’m on a roll people!