ICAD 2 - 2013 - PEONIES

I picked this flower on my walk the other day

 and was looking forward to sketching it.

But for me, peonies are pretty daunting.

They are gorgeous but look at all those petals!

I just love the quote!

 I know nothing about this person Bashō,

so I went to Google to find out. 

Wikepedia says he 'was the most famous poet

of the Edo period in Japan and

that during his lifetime,

Bashō was recognized for his works

in the collaborative

 haikai no renga form; today, after

centuries of commentary, he is

recognized as the greatest

master of haiku (at the time called hokku).'

Great stuff!

 

 

Please take a few moments to check out some

of the other artist's cards and visit:

 

 

Happy Sunday and enjoy your day!
Take care,

Fran T xo

 

 

 

Posting here and there

 hello! Happy Saturday to you. I'm busy with posting things to my shop, then twittering about it and eventually will FB as well. It's a process but a fun one at that. I've been painting. I sneaked this flower in right before it died, that ranunculus was hardy, lasted almost as long as the mum flower did in my bouquet. I took photos and worked off of that to get this:

I love the green in this flower, and I wanted to really emphasize that.
It is such a good color contrast against the pink petals on this flower head.





I added in the name as well,

I probably should include the Latin spelling as well, just thought of that!

 

Today I worked on finishing up some lettering I did with my Copic marker. I have just one, a 02, because I wanted to try it out as I usually use the Microns [which I just love]. I read this in a magazine and thought it would be fun to do:

 

 

Lastly I just wanted to share some more felt fun, last weekend I worked on the felt pieces below, AND my crafty neice worked on one too! Em's is the Dream pillow. She designed that and executed it so well! don't you think?

 

Take care and I will try to post again sooner this time!

Enjoy your weekend and remember to SPRING forward an hour tonight.

Be well,

Still January

Lets try blogging by iPhone shall we? Wheeeee! I just spent a good amount of time scanning and find Blogger won't let me upload photos! So here are images from my phone I'll post. I am sorry that they are such lousy quality ;)

UPDATE: Thank you Mary for showing me the way - the HTML way to get my photos on my post!

I love love love chapter 9 in the Tao Te Ching. I have a copy of it on my wall. Here it is below with some of my favorite bowls.

 I rarely bake cupcakes, this just came out of my head after I spied those pastel-colored paper cupcake sleeves in the back of the cabinet. I thought, hmmm, maybe I should get some cake mix and bake some cupcakes. Hmmm, maybe not. Drawing them is a better idea.

This one started off as ran dom sections of color but after working on it I see it as a landscape:) I'm calling it the River's Wall. 

 

Some doodling on a blank card while on a loooong phone call with my baby sister:

Enjoy your day!

 

Sunday Sketches and AEDMs

 I had such a nice week off. I did zero! It was fantastic..

I spent the whole time drawing, painting and working on Etsy stuff.

Today was spent mostly working on my shop. [ I'll post more about that tomorrow or Tuesday.]

 

Here are some art journal pages I created this week. This one below was my final AEDM for the month. The Gadget page was made on the 29th and my amaryllis page was created on the 30th:

 

 

 

 






I posted this one a while back but got a chance to finish it up with watercolors this week.

 

I also decided today that I'd update my banner on my shop. Here are some sketches I made this afternoon , so it's technically, my Sunday Sketch!

 

Then here is the cleaned up version below:(Blogger gets funny after you put in a couple of photos, it doesn't allow me to up size this art...oh well!)

 

I wanted to have a banner that was made with my own handlettering rather than a computer generated font. Mostly because I do so much of it. I'm happy with how it turned out but I'm sure I'll change it in the future.

 

 

 

I am still learning about working on  and keeping an Etsy shop.  I have to commend each and every person who maintains a presence there. It's such hard work! I knew it would be that is probably why I procrastinated so long... I am really trying to attack this and tried to upload as much as I can. I felt for a long time that I had to wait for the "right" time , blah, blah...but it's never the perfect time to do almost anything so who was I trying to fool? LOL I have alot more to do but I feel like I'm finally getting started. I have to learn how to make a treasury. I also have to remember to get active on that site at least once a day. I am open to any and all suggestions/comments:)

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Speaking of Etsy sites....Please check out Cameron's blog, she is hosting a contest and giving away a  a 50% OFF Coupon Code to use on any ONE item in her shop

All you need to do is leave a comment:) 

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Please remember to stop by Blue Chair Diary's blog and have a look at all those participating in Sunday Sketches, I promise you you'll be glad you did!

 

Have a good week!

Falling Behind

It's been quite a while and I've fallen a bit behind with my posts.

Here are a few images I've worked on these past days.

today's artwork - Sunday 11/18/12 , for AEDM and Sketch Sunday

We finally got power restored in the house on the 11th. Which was just shy of two weeks. This past week we tried to get back into the swing of things.

 

 

 

 I been creating the whole while through but unfortunately  I haven't been blogging
AEDM and PatternADay much since the storm. But I'm here!
 

I've definately been keeping up-to-date on Instagram. Blogging takes a little more time. Instagram is just so, well, instant. LOL!

But you can say more when you blog. I don't have alot to say tonight. So tired and this is going to be a busy week with Thanksgiving on the way. I'll try to do a better job this week:)

Have a great week my friends. Thank you so much for all your visits and comments as it means alot to me.

 

Sunday Sketch 10/7/12

It's Sunday again...

 

I had such a nice weekend with friends and family.  

Saturday we got together with family for birthdays.

Things turned out different than planned but in the end it all worked out fine:))

 

 My nephew, sister and mother are all celebrating

birthdays on the 5th, 6th and 8th of this month. 

[Happy Birthday Mama! XO] 

 

And today I got together with a friend for lunch and some shopping.

The weather was rainy and gray, but what a pleasant afternoon we had.

 

Please stop over to Sunday Sketches and

check out the other participants.

 

 I hope everyone has a super week:)

 Take care! Be good to yourself

and to those around you,

Sunday Sketch 9/16/12

I can't believe we're at Sunday again. These weekends fly right by!

 

I am still working on my 'pickings' from the neighborhood.

This Sunday Sketch is a similar in style to Friday's post.

 

The next one I plan to work on is waiting in the water glass on the kitchen window sill.

 

Quiet and easy-going weekend, thank goodness. Nothing exciting, perfection.

 

Tomorrow and Wednesday the boy is off,

LI public schools are closed for Rosh Hashanah.

 And next week they are off again for Yom Kimpur.

So many days off, he should be glad we didn't enroll him in Catholic school!

 

Hope everyone has a wonderful week!

XO

 

 

Friday Finally

some bits of foliage left over from summer...fall is soon coming

I walked the dog tonight and was

picking at all my neighbors' plantings along the road and sidewalk.

My anniversary/September bouquet kicked the bucket so

I need something new to study.

I noticed the house at the corner has these terrific flowers but

the pots are on either side of the front door,

and I wouldn't dare, truly.

 

Earlier this morning I noticed down the block these amazing

morning glories but

1. I just couldn't pick it as it was true perfection and

 2. its broad daylight

I console myself by saying that I'll probably never 

capture that blue/purple anyway.

I found my stash of index cards from ICAD challenge from a while back.



 I have been following DPP at Daisy Yellow and

thought I saw 'circles' as a prompt..when

 I went back to link up my art to her blog, I couldn't

 find it as a prompt at all.. I'll just chalk that one up to a 40s-moment.

I found another stash of small pieces of watercolor paper I cut last winter.
 I didn't realize what a squirrel I am.



I'm glad this week is over. So many big unexpected things happened,

forcing the cash to fly out of my wallet. 

 I'm going look on the bright side and just say they were all improvements...

to the car, the kid's glasses...etc.

Half full, half full.

Have a totally FULL weekend!

September Song

Not That Long Ago - watercolor painting completed this week

School started this week, my boy is now in 7th grade.

 

Time sure flies! I'm always reminded of that this time of year.

 

Yesterday was our 21st anniversary and received a

gorgeous  bouquet of flowers

from my guy:)

 

I had a fun time looking through 

our wedding album with my son.

 

We did alot of laughing,

some of the photos seem funny now:)

 

Some things feel like they occured so long ago

and others feel like yesterday.

 

And then there are times when

I can't even remember yesterday, LOL!

 

Enjoy your weekend,

I'm planning on painting/drawing

that fabulous bouquet.

 Happy Saturday!

 

End of August

Oh my, where has this summer gone! Tomorrow is the last day of August. I'm off to the ocean tomorrow and plan to do some painting while I'm at the beach. We'll see how that turns out, LOL. I've been very busy the past few weeks but getting some artwork in here and there.  I painted a few things while on my vacation this week.



this is an abstract that I am still working on , putting the finishing touches.

 

I got this great insect book out of the library and having some fun making up my
 own journal pages based on the information and the illustrations.




Random nonsense in blue

I have been procrastinating on posting...its been about 3 weeks :(. The last few times I've posted it's taken me a long time to upload my photos etc. I guess I need to post more often so that there are less images to post, huh? I'll get back on track soon, I promise and there be alot less time between posts.

We celebrated an anniversary and my husband sent me an amazing and gorgeous bouquet. One of the best ever! Two days after I got it I had left for a few days to my parents and I was afraid the bouquet would completely wilt while I was away but its still going strong!

 

 I painted this one today, a week later:

 

OK I was going to post more but this blogger is really annoying me now!

I hope to catch up on everyone's blogs this weekend and looking forward to browsing and catching up on everyone's posts.

Take care and happy end-of- summer!

Have a safe holiday weekend,

 

ICAD Three (#s 20,21,22)

Playing catch-up this weekend.

Spread out on the back porch today at my mom's house and painted.

Then finished inking up the cards I started but didn't get round to doing earlier in the week: 

Cute little gift we all got with our mother's day presents. Adorable and cheery!

I sort of  THINK this works... CT looked at this and said 'huh?'  LOL

It was a lazy Saturday today.

I am almost embarassed to say I slept till 11am.

I guess I needed the rest, huh?

Camp starts next Monday, already, so we'll have to round up all equipment needed tomorrow and replace what needs to be replaced.

My brother flies in next Wed and stays on our fair island for a week. Lucky fella ;)

We're going to tuck a trip to NYC in there somewhere for sure.

Spring Street here we come!

Enjoy your day!