Klimt in the garden with Rumi : July

I'm happy to say that I'm now up to date with my art cards inspired by Effy's A Year of Rumi online class. July's quote is "Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames." Inspired by Effy's page of a fan, I decided to try one on my card. These art cards are very challenging to me since they are only 5 3/4" square. Always gatherings to start - this time it's fabrics with similar patterning....

Loving the fan print on the left (which I think will be my backing) and that inspired the use of a new fan stencil. Effy's sample was a red fan, so I was inspired by that colour here - adding a bit of warmth to my Winter. 

Not much "in the garden" here until I realised I had a flower shape on the back after I added my satin stitched edge

and the perfect garden addition for the front = a sweet butterfly brad

My art cards are completely different from Effy's lessons and thinking I might go back and repeat some of the prompts in my art journal using her ideas...keep you posted ♥

Find out more about the "A Year with Rumi" class with Effy Wild HERE. You can also enjoy this class by joining Effy's Patreon account and paying monthly. Check out the labels below for more entries about my project. My previous post shows the other art cards in this series so far.

Klimt in the garden with Rumi : Wonders

School holidays have allowed me to catch up on my art cards inspired by Effy's A Year of Rumi online class. The latest one I shared was the Klimt Lovers, and now it's time for June's quote "We carry inside us the wonders we seek outside us". I thought I would put the quote in the middle of my piece of watercolour card this time and celebrate Klimt in the Garden in a big way, including butterflies since they are my favourite symbol of transformation and wonder. 
Remembering that my base watercolour card is a 5 3/4" square, my initial gatherings are always about sparking inspiration without expecting that everything will be included in the final piece.

I love to start with a gold base for the glow it gives and used a small brayer to apply the paint this time. As I did my gatherings, I was attracted to the blues and I kept being drawn to the imagery of birds and nests. The blues feel like a wintery colour (current season in NZ), and I've been home for a couple of weeks on holidays being settled and getting back on my feet {nesting} - eggs can also be a symbol of hope and new life - birds sing joyfully and spread their wings to new places but can always return to their home. I draw an Oracle card each week and this week's is "Abundance" (Vintage Wisdom Oracle deck)

A lot goes on in my head while I'm gathering! Sharing so that you see layers of meaning are often captured within the finished art cards. As I tried things out, the card took a different direction than 'planned' 

Still using a mix of metallic machine stitching and hand stitching

I wrote the date information on a piece of paper and stitched that to the backing fabric before attaching to the card. Bringing back the winter blue

This card is the ninth in my series. I haven't yet done July's prompt so there should be 6 more cards in this collection by the end of the year ♥

Find out more about the "A Year with Rumi" class with Effy Wild HERE. You can also enjoy this class by joining Effy's Patreon account and paying monthly. Check out the labels below for more entries about my project.

Another face transfer transformed

In my previous art journal post I shared the transformation of an image transfer to a finished face in my journal. Read about the initial transfer process there. 
I'm now ready to share the journey of the second face. Click on any photo to see it larger

Gesso through stencils above - glazes added below and pulled into the face for initial shading

Always amazed how much the face comes to life just with the addition of black and white pens - that's all I've changed for the next stage!

Some better face/eye shading (I prefer this pencil shading) but not sure what her story is yet...

and then it was obvious

My favourite word and the butterfly is one of my recurring symbols of transformation, change, transition, joy and beauty 

Ready to start the new school term on Monday with confidence, energy, and desire to keep my creative fire burning bright

Loving that both these faces are from my own head and not based on a particular lesson. I am making my own art ♥

I am working in an altered art journal and my pages always start like this :

I wonder what's going to happen next?.....

Baby Quilt

My friend asked me if I knew someone who could turn her purchased quilt panel into a quilt for her grandson and since she's a special friend (and it will be small!) I said I would do it. I began working on it in our last school holidays when I went into my stash to see what fabrics might work

I decided I had what was needed and only had to purchase the backing fabric

This red stripe perfectly sets off the centre

but I had instructions that the parents like muted colours so kept it soft with the rest
and thought simple squares were best to highlight the lovely panel. 

And now it's school holidays again and it became my priority project. I kept the quilting simple too - crossing through the squares

and outlining of the centre panel rectangles

I attached the binding next

But after looking at it the next day, decided I needed a little more quilting in the centre panel. I had used a lovely variegated blue for the main quilting with cream in the bobbin

and decided to just use cream to outline the main shapes so it doesn't detract from the loveliness of the panel 

The finished quilt measures 35 x 42 inches (that's 89 x 106.5 cm).

Given to my friend today so she can deliver it with love to her grandson and his family who live by the sea ♥

My 9th Bloggiversary!

I think blogging for 9 years is a pretty amazing achievement💖 At my first bloggiversary I had done 120 posts and had 34 followers.

My Original Blog Header

This is post 1110 and I now get many more visits per post than that number of followers. I know many people have given up blogging for Facebook and Instagram which are a much quicker hit of art (and you can find me there too if you click on those links), but I've kept up my blog because it's more than just sharing a finished piece of art for me.

Blog Header 2016

I want to tell my story in the hope that I inspire others to be creative and find time for art in their lives; I want to share the inspiration I find in the form of excellent teachers, special workshops, and FREE online offerings; I want to help you discover fun new supplies and then where to purchase them; I want to engage with you via comments or emails; I want to share my love of all sorts of different kinds of creativity in my life.

I also want to capture my process so that I can look back and remember how I did something; to celebrate completing projects; 

to set myself challenges; to capture my journey both artistically and for self-growth; 

to be able to set goals and see how I'm making progress; to have a record of achievement when I feel like I'm not doing anything....

I've learned that we all have seasons of creativity, and sometimes you need a break, but sometimes what's needed is a look at what was happening last year to recognise how far you've come, or that this feeling of not wanting to do much is a regular response to this time of year. In short (which this isn't!) I am grateful to be here, in full colour, sharing my process and my thoughts about my creative life, and I'm especially grateful for your presence here as well. 

I am currently coming out of a time of low creativity for a variety of reasons. I love my monthly reviews as a chance to reflect and to plan ahead. I am now in the middle of school holidays and have been very grateful for the time to recover properly, and to have a chance to have a bit of tidy up as we look forward to the second half of the year. Here's a before and after photo from the beginning of the week

I am so lucky to have the space. Mine is very practical - I would rather art and organise my supplies than make it all really pretty. So while I do have pretty things around

my main focus this last few days has been to organise a few things. I've been very interested and inspired by Laly Mille's free 5-day email workshop of videos covering her favourite supplies. Find out more and sign up HERE.

Of course there was lots in there that I already knew, but she has such a lovely way of explaining things and as a result of watching her I've re-sorted all my pens/ pencils/ markers

as well as organised all my brushes by size and shape for paints

vs gesso and glues

and I feel like I can put my hands on things more practically than before

Today I've basted the quilt that's on my list for completion for the coming week 

and I'm planning my next move on this art journal page....

and after that - you just never know! For now, I am happy to be here, sharing my creativity with you and looking forward to seeing what the rest of July looks like. I hope you are inspired to continue on with me. I can't wait to see what's going to happen in the next 12 months.

 Talk soon 😊