Girl With Fox
This is a 11.5″ x15.5″ mixed media painting done on 100% rag paper.
This painting kind of strays a little from what I usually paint or at least the way I paint. I used a historical photograph I found on the web as inspiration. I usually take all my own reference photographs, but I just found this photograph so intriguing. Who is this girl holding a fox? It just looks like something from an old fairy tale. I had it pinned on my wall for the longest time and just had to paint it.
PRETEND- Illustration Friday -Looking For Fairies Amongst The Flowers
I was looking for fairies in the Garden
I left a little cottage teapot for them
So that they could set up house
Perhaps they would prefer to sleep within the flowers
If I were a fairy I’d live amongst the poppies
Their big papery petals would be my walls
and close by I would have lupins and foxgloves and hollyhocks too
Their lovely fragrance would surround me as I
drift
off
to
sleep
Another Circus Girl Painting…
This is a new Circus Girl painting that I just finished today. It is a mixed media piece on a 4″x8″ profile (3″deep) canvas.
Shopping In My Sleep (or The Phantom Wardrobe)
“Lace Coat” 8″x12″, mixed media painting on canvas, 2007
So this morning when I was getting dressed I wondered to myself where that perfect little black cardigan I just bought was. Then I realized I had only dreamt about buying that cardigan.
I was so bummed.
It all came flooding back to me.
I had dreamt about shopping for clothes and I’d found quite a few cute little numbers. I felt so jipped, I mean, a lot of these pieces that I acquired were classics that would have filled a lot of gaps in my wardrobe quite nicely . I felt like I’d got them for a good price too but that, I can’t be sure of. I know I’d tried on a lot of stuff so, to wake up and realize that it was all for nought, was just so unfair! (Now I sound like my five year old).
I still feel kind of robbed and I can’t help but think, that maybe, all the clothes that I purchased in the dream are actually hanging in my closet but are somehow, mysteriously INVISIBLE. Like a “phantom wardrobe”.
I am sure that it is going to make it even harder for me to decide what to wear ever day and kind of makes the expression, “I have nothing to wear”, even that much more literal.
Horizontally Challenged
Not only am I not a landscape artist, I will take it one step further and say that I am not even a horizontal artist! I have painted quite a few paintings over the last six months and I have only completed one horizontal piece. (The above painting of Lilies). The other horizontal painting I started never got finished. This is rare for me. If I start a painting, I usually finish it, but not this one. This one was NOT good and was going to remain that way. So I ditched it.
None of this matters really but yesterday I was just wondering why I like vertical so much. I was looking at a new painting that I was working on and it struck me: VERTICAL! AGAIN! WHY?
I guess the answer is fairly obvious. I am a figurative painter (mostly) and we humans are vertical by nature. So it does make sense. Let’s just say, I am horizontally challeged. Hey, come to think of it, having two little kids makes me horizontally challenged in more ways than the way I turn my canvas! HA!
I Talked To A Crow Today
I talked to a crow today,
or rather, he talked to me.
I’m not sure what he was going on about
but he did go on and on and on.
I talked to a crow today,
he had an awful lot to say.
“Mr. Crow,” I said politely, ” will you please let me get a word in?”
But he wasn’t even listening.
He went on and on and on.
That is the way it is with crows,
and sometimes with people too.
Not really interested in conversing,
but rather in the sound of their own voice.
I listened to a crow today,
he went on and on and on.
A Still Moment
This is a painting that I just completed of Scarlett sitting at the dining room table. She is so still and at peace, not at all like her normal two year old self. There was just a beautiful stillness at that moment that I wanted to try to capture.
Wishing
There is nothing wrong with a little wish now and then. There is the star wish, the fountain wish, the birthday wish and of course, we can’t forget the wishbone wish. I’ve wished for plenty of things in my life. The only problem with wishing is that we are always to the future, which kind of implies that we aren’t enjoying the right now. I think that my next wish will be that I don’t wish anymore because I am just enjoying right now too much to even care.
The Orange Peeler
My orange peeler.
One day I handed Scarlett a bowl of tiny oranges and was surprised to see how long it kept her busy. As I watched her I had this weird vision in my head of rows of toddlers peeling oranges. An orange peeling factory. I am still working on a large 2’x5′ canvas of six Scarletts, all peeling away. Meanwhile, I have painted two other versions of just a single Scarlett.
Anyway, all that aside, this is a great way to keep a two year old busy when you are working in the kitchen.
Circus Images Dance In My Head
Circus images are swirling around my head. This story is slowly writing it self and I am being very cautious and very attentive, trying to listen carefully to the direction it wants to go. It is an exciting process. What is going to happen next?
Imogen Harlequin
I did this painting of Imogen. Like the larger version, I can’t seem to part with it. I put it up on Etsy and then took it off. It is hard to part with your paintings. Especially ones of your children. I really regret selling a few already but that is why you do them isn’t it? To send them out in the world. They can really become a huge weight when they are hanging around the house staring at you. You always remember the ones you sell a little more fondly than the ones you see everyday. I wonder if our recollection of them is better than the actual painting? I hope not. That could be pretty disappointing during a retrospective. YIKES!
Pink Frosting
Come on, admit it, the frosting is the best part. As we get older we eat the cake part as well. It is all part of good cupcake etiquette. It just wouldn’t be acceptable to do what all three year olds do and lick that puppy until it is a wet and shiny globe resembling the top of Daddy Warbuck’s head.
Some Days are Better Than Others
Imogen had a rough day on Sunday. It was a learning experience for all of us. I hate when she is sad and that is part of the problem. When she is sad, I am sad and I don’t like to be sad either. So what do you do? Give her everything? Spoil her ROTTEN? Say NO and mean it. Yep, it was a hard day.
Lilies
This is a multi media 2.5″x3.5″ original ACEO.
I love lilies. Painting them is a great excuse for buying them. Shhhh…don’t tell my husband.
Wooly Hat
This is a new ACEO I did of my daughter’s best friend. She is wearing the woolen hat that her mother knit her. Too bad you can’t see her matching leg warmers.
Things To Wear
I don’t get a chance to shop very often. Unless you count grocery shopping, and I do not consider dragging an almost two year old and an almost five year old around the shops, really shopping. Gone are the days when I could try on a dozen items, checking myself out for extended periods of time. Now to think about it, way too much time! Oh, if I had all the wasted time of singleness. But that is a whole other story.
Top 5 ways I shop (or at least feel like I have!):
(Not in any particular order)
The Dash In, Dash Out
Ok, so I have your kids busy in the double stroller. I don’t’ know how, perhaps one is asleep and the other has a newly bought toy or a treat I have withheld until just the right moment. This isn’t about giving you ideas on how to get your kids to be good while your shopping, it is about what you are willing to do to get some done, so figure that part out for yourself.
The dash in, dash out consists of running into the store of choice and quickly scouring the racks, usually the sale racks. Often you admire the clothes that are completely inappropriate for a stay at home Mother. Those beautiful pencil skirts at Club Monaco right now, for instance. Great for the office, not so great for running around the park or looking under furniture on your hands and knees for wayward puzzle pieces. This kind of shopping can result in not very well thought out purchases that hang in your closet, mocking you whenever given the chance. It also does not work very well when shopping for bras or bathing suits, which is, perhaps, why all my bras are a little older than I would like to admit and my bathing suit is celebrating a decade. On second thought, forget about trying anything on. You’ll never get that double stroller in the change room with you anyway! Just buy what you want and get out before anyone gets hurt!
Cover to Cover
Recently, I have discovered the joy of magazine shopping. I don’t mean catalogue shopping. This is more like window shopping while looking through a magazine. You know the magazine: Wish, Lou Lou, Chocolate are just a few. You can analyse each page, filled with the latest and greatest, without risking any compulsive buying and while the kids, at arms length, are splashing around in a bubble bath. This is definitely the cheapest way you’ll ever shop, just the cost of a magazine. Of course, if you are like me, you seriously run the chance of spending way to much on magazines! They are so conveniently displayed at the grocery store check out and remember, this is the shopping that you still do!
Ham, Peas and Panties (Oh, just get your mind out of the gutter!)
As I mentioned earlier, I do get to grocery shop. So what do those smarty pants at Joe do? How unfair, putting all those cute little numbers right next to the produce . How can you help but buy that sassy little blouse or those kick ass shoes? They don’t cost much more than a chicken. And besides, we’ve been eating way too much chicken lately.
Ebay Express
My husband has great luck buying clothes on ebay, but I can never find anything I like enough, or that fulfills the bargain shopper in me. Part of me is never completely convinced that by the time I’ve paid shipping, I couldn’t find a better deal somewhere else. Also there is the fear of losing the bid. When I want it I want it. I really only look at ‘buy it now’ items anyway. This could be part of the problem. Control freak that I am.I know, how did this get on my list if I don’t even like it? I guess, I just wish I could find something because you can do it in the comfort of your own home. . I just need to keep browsing, perhaps tonight with a glass or red. Now that is a relaxing way to shop!
Paint ’em
I really do love clothes. I mean, I love them! I could never, ever, ever get tired of shopping! EVER! It always makes me happy! Are you starting to see my dilemma?
This brings me to the fifth way: my new painting series, Things to Wear. These light hearted paintings allows me to enjoy( or even covet) a new desired trend without having to leave the house or having to spend any money. I may never have a enough money to buy a pair of PRADA shoes but I can paint them. I know, not quite as fulfilling but let’s face it, where am I going to wear a $500 pair of shoes? I have to admit, clothes are fun to paint, with all their different patterns and textures. It also gives me licence to mix styles, colours, and prints, in a way I never would in real life. But, by far the best things about painting this series are never having to look at the price tag, everything fitting perfectly and last and not least, never having to look at your butt in one of those three way mirrors.
Striped Jacket
New Painting of this great striped jacket inspired by Ralph Lauren. I wouldn’t be able to wear it and sit on my living room chair, I’d blend right in! Of course I had to add a yellow belt. I am really into the yellow accessories at the moment!
