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On Tuesday, there was a session at Brindabella on Bush Painting. Kristy did a great job of taking the class and we all went home with a great piece of art.

Kristy originally learnt this technique from Garry Holmes in her hometown of Lismore and she’s been painting ever since! I took photos of each step so here is a visual guide in case you would like to follow along.

First, we applied a line of blue along the top followed by a line of pink - both applied in turn with a wet brush to create a blended effect:

Next we put some yellow paint on one corner of the brush and black on the other corner and “splodged” some trees along the horizon, followed by a line underneath the trees:

Then we added some fields:

Below the fields, some pink followed by blue - again with a wet brush:

Some more “splodging” for bushes at the bottom of the (yellow) fields and some larger trees along the very bottom:

Nearly finished! A gnarled old tree on the banks of the river was next, done freehand with a thin brush:

Now we need to fill in the middle ground, so we added a few trees using white for the trunk and pink and yellow splodges for the leaves:

Using a thin brush and some white, we added a fence (mine is on the far left) and used a dark grey for some shading. One last thing - a bird on the foreground branch completes the scene:

And we’re all done! A not-too-bad bush painting. It seems a lot easier when it’s broken down like that, huh?

Still with painting, I found an AWESOME paint easel for the kids for just $5 from the local recycling centre. Of course, I then had to make art smocks for the kids - I just bought a couple of op shop shirts for $6 each and sewed them to fit, added a bit of trim and the kids are all ready to paint a masterpiece for themselves:

They were pretty happy!

Lots of concentrating, and then a big cheesy smile for the camera:

Great work, you two!

Oh yes, and I made a hat for Jack the other day too:

I still have to make him another one in school colours (plain navy blue) but I thought this would be good for weekend wear. He loved the tape measure fabric - I knew he would!

Oh, and in case you are wondering about the vintage wallpaper pack competition, I haven’t forgotten. I hope to get to it tomorrow, so until then feel free to leave a comment to enter.

Today I did some face painting with a group of other people at a small local festival. A few of us (including me) were fairly new to face painting so we had a little hands-on training day on Friday morning at the organiser, Kaye’s house to run through and practice the techniques and designs, and generally get organised.

Today we only offered a handful of options for the kids to choose from, to keep it simple - of course the girls all wanted to be butterflies, fairies and princesses and the boys all wanted to be skull faces, batman and spiderman. Special requests that we also did included Egyptian eyes and pyramids, fire breathing dragons, rainbows, flowers, a few ninja turtles, lots of happy feet penguins, and even the new spiderman - he’s black and silver, just so you know.

It was such fun, making small children happy and being up close and personal with them. Some are so shy and quiet during the painting and then reward you with a huge slowly spreading smile once they see the finished art in the mirror. Some kids are bold and brassy and know exactly what they want and how they want it. Some kids forget to say please and thankyou and some parents give you an idea of where their kids learnt their lack of manners from.

The vast majority of kids are so sweet and happy to have us paint their faces, choosing their favourite colours (pink and purple for the girls, almost exclusively) and wriggling or sitting stock still while we work on them. I am looking forward to doing more of this - thanks Kaye!

 Still at it.  The great Christmas present craftfest that is.  Nearly finished…

Yesterday I made a noticeboard for my almost 18 year old neice.  I love how it turned out:

 

I used a big corkboard (that has been up in the shed since Sam decided he no longer wanted it) and simply covered it with lime green gingham.  I then wrapped it with pink and green ribbon and tied buttons each time they crossed.  I added a silk flower in the top left and stuck a few things on it to get it started. Easy peasy!

 

I also got stuck into stencilling for the kids on my list:

 

The one above is for baby Freya and the one just below for my 5 year old neice Camryn:

 

This one is for Emma - I sewed some white ricrac onto it after it dried:

 

This one is for Mani - Freya’s big brother who is 3:

This one for my nephew (Cam’s brother) Kyle who is 6:

 

and a scary face for my Jack who is 5:

 

More tomorrow… 

I have been working on some arty things when I get some time. Still experimenting and playing - figuring things out. Here are a couple of works in progress:

Both of these I have been working on for quite a while now, doing a bit, stopping, looking at them for a day or so, doing a bit more. They are still not done, but I am enjoying the process.

Here is a shot from above of these and a few more that I am working on:

The only reason there are so many on the go at once is that I kept mixing up too much paint - so I would grab another canvas and slap some paint on. For me at least, this approach isn’t really working. You end up having so much happening that you can’t really think about one piece at a time. Not to mention that they all tend to have the same colours!

Maybe I should put most of them away and bring them out another day, when I have forgotten about them.  That way I could focus on just one (or two) and get them finished!
This is the other work table - getting a bit messy!  I just love STUFF, but where do I put it all?

Here are my latest entries in my artist journal:

The one above is from the 1st June and this one is from the 5th June:

I have been using up leftover paint by painting backgrounds in my art journal and I love the explosions of colour. Have you started your art journal yet?