Sunday, April 27, 2014

In the style of Suzi Blu

My Suzi Blu girl.  Not quite as grungy as Suzi does them...and, I doubt I would ever manage to do a grungy one anyway....     but, I love her!





















See the little area with pink roses and stems?  That is some pretty tissue paper I happened to have hanging around ....so I glued down two pieces ...  ... one other is up on the left corner ... I just couldn't believe how perfectly it fit with my colours...





















Here it is .... near some of my own chosen pinks and greens ..





















A few of my means of getting some texture and odd areas of interest.  I found a bit of scratty, sort of open weave straw ribbon or whatever it is .. no clue why I had it in my box of assorted oddities.  A piece of golden open weave ribbon.. and I punched out my own version of sequin waste to put paint onto in a few areas.  Worked just like the waste does.
















Almost reminds you of stars in her hair and on her dress....





















Still have't found any beeswax to smooth onto the whole canvas..but, maybe I won't bother anyway.... my big fear at this point.... what if I ruin her?  Yes, I know our first attempts are supposed to be experimental anyway ... but, I do like my result ...and ... well...    ..



Wednesday, April 23, 2014

We must stop !!

This is getting ridiculous!!  We must stop!

The seriousness of chopping down too many trees......




Sunday, April 20, 2014

Blog buddies are special

One of my blogging buddies gifted me with what she referred to as "a book on drawing".. imagine my surprise when I opened a parcel to discover this!  Suzi Blu has been of interest to me for a couple of years now..I have watched several of her videos on Youtube and thought about taking this class a few times.  Never got around to it ...

Now, I have it.  There is even a DVD included with the book!





















I sketched out a little idea.... after going through the book.





















Got a few 5 x 7 canvases... I couldn't find any birch wood pieces like Suzi uses...I will for the next attempt though.  Canvas just doesn't quite work the same .... but, for now...I wanted to give one a try.

I drew and coloured a head.





















Glued it on and proceeded to try a bit of colouring.... I did use some watercolours as well as the acrylics Suzi recommended....  it's all a bit of an experiment really when one doesn't actually quite know how supplies will work.....





















It's not finished, but still seems a long ways off from this....





















I'll be spending some time today adding more colour depth and interest... in between stuffing a little chicken .....and doing some baking.........



Friday, April 11, 2014

Friday smile....

.... and, in keeping with old photos as one of the gals did .....

how 'bout these handsome guys.... no laffin' either ...one of 'em is my Dad.... oh, alright then, go on ...have a good laugh.  He's the handsome one;  the buff one. The others are his war buddies ...both of whom he apparently saved from some horrific encounter or other.
He could still walk around a school gymnasium on his hands at the age of almost 60 .... helped my youngest sister build a log cabin in his 70's ... and survived 'til he was 87 ... having smoked since he was 10 and polishing off as much booze as any man could for most of his life ... every year that I knew him anyway...





Laugh, and carry on...... what else can we do some days?


Monday, April 7, 2014

here's one for you....

...   a little waif in the Art Doll Quarterly magazine ... one of those sad, kind of slightly creepy things I guess... some folks don't like this sort of thing for sure.... but, in a way I find them kind of cute and sad.
















Thought I would give it a try in my simple rendition of drawing with pencil and coloured pencil.. I will eventually try to add a bit of Shiva Paintstick colour to this one, along with a few others....
















.....


Friday, April 4, 2014

"I got you something shiny!"

The words all women love to hear.




Especially when it is a husband or loved one saying them.  Particularly when he has a triumphant, big grin plastered all over his sweet face and hands behind his back.  And, usually, most of us immediately think of something like this.

But ..... sometimes it is surprising what those words can mean.... ... when the "something" arrives in a 6 x 6 inch box in a plastic bag.

I had looked at the art shop, a large hobby shop, and Michael's, all to no avail.  Who the heck sells them?  I was stumped.  But, then on his way home from the office last week, Mr. BV stopped and found this for me.

Shiny.  Chrome.  And, shiny black too.... she's a beaut!



With a special little lever that creates suction on the bottom so it can be moved to any flat firm surface.  A lovely new pencil sharpener!  Our old one was just that...really old... actually it was vintage and worked perfectly... til one day somebody knocked it off the workbench because it was not actually screwed into place...sigh... still miss that little burgundy sharpener... it softly ground and sharpened pencils perfectly.  This one just doesn't have quite the same feel or sound to it...but, it works a charm.





I was thrilled to get my "something shiny" .....








Tuesday, April 1, 2014

All over Canada..


We are getting to this stage......