What I'm Working On...IF I Can Find the Space!

 I'm sitting in front of my laptop pondering where I'm going to make space to work today.  My current studio/playroom is our dining room.

Just for fun I thought I'd show you what I'm facing as I sit here. Sorry about the picture quality. I forgot to turn the flash on, and there's a flouresent light overhead with a yellowish tint to its light. Needless to say we never use the table for eating! LOL

 Here are some of my ABSOLUTELY favorite tools that I always have within arm's reach. Laptop, Mp3, gum, scrap paper for notes, post its, and COFFEE. Art Journal page for a screen saver! WIP felt doll #2 guarding my coffee.

 Still to my right and up a little, WIP felt doll with the rest of her top laying near on a box of wool felting supplies, waiting patiently for me to get back to them. Behind them an old computer desk full of books, beading, stamping, half-finished paintings and projects, and misc.

 Straight ahead is my sewing machine on the other side of the table with a stack of art journals in progress between me and it. I've been sewing on some of the journal pages, although I did repair two pair of hubby's pajama pants while I was at it. Between the journals and the machine are piles of paint and stacks of background and misc papers, plus files of stuff. My water container and brushes and my styrofoam plate palette is on the left side of the table. The painting corner to the left I'll explain on down the post.

 To the left of me is my printer on a TV table with my drawing board laying on top of it, where I've been doing my larger painting. I know, NOT a good idea! :/

Still to my left, two large cheap watercolor papers that I've been working on for the last 2-3 days for backgrounds. I've gessoed and painted both sides of each page. Also a zentangle that I started last night in my Moleskine journal while watching TV with hubby. Great alternative to eating! Behind is a portrait of my little Pekingese, Kibbles, who has been gone since 1997. I can't bring myself to finish it.

I'm not going to show you the view from the other side of the table or the floor. But I can scarcely believe it myself. :o It is like getting through a mine field to get to the other side of the table, and any day now I'm going to straighten it up. :)

I have a very large studio upstairs, but it has steep stairs (and I'm prone to falling), it costs too much to heat and cool it, plus since hubby retired he likes me down here with him, so I'm relagated to our very small dining room, but I'm blessed to have a space at all, so it's all good.

 This is the whole sheet of the corner showing in the picture above. The light glared on one end of it and the following pictures, but you get the idea. As I said above, these are big sheets of cheap textured watercolor paper that I've randomly applied liquid acrylics and inks to, using brush, bubble wrap, sponge wedge, etc.

I planned on cutting this sheet up for collaging or journal pages, but a pinkish face shape appeared on the left side and I've. since taking the picture, painted in a face, shoulders, and hair, and I've lightened up and changed the background. Right now I'm liking it, and I'll show you when it's done, unless I really mess it up, and it still winds up in pieces. I did sponge paint the back of the paper with a sea sponge, just in case. :/

The second sheet I used mostly acrylic inks on. I drizzled them on then used an old credit card to try to spread them. They soaked into the paper pretty fast. despite the gesso, thus the blurred effect. I used a brush handle to draw squiggles and stuff in the damp ink. It does look better in person.

This is the back of the previous sheet, using acrylic inks, liquid acrylics, bubble wrap, and a sponge wedge. This sheet will most likely be cut up for journal pages, or atcs, or.......

So these are some of the projects I'm working on, plus I started two more zentangles while visiting with company yesterday and finished one of them last night while watching TV with hubby. I'll show you those in a different post.

By the way, the answer to the riddle about a space to work? I stand up to paint on the makeshift table to the left, and I either hold my sketchbook on my lap or take it to the living room to draw or zentangle, I take my needle felting to the living room and hold it on my lap, and I set the sewing machine down in the floor to glue stuff in my art journals. I can also take those to the living room to write or draw in. It would be much easier if I could work on only one project at a time, but I can't. I have to have a variety of projects going at once, or I get bored. It's not about the finished item for me. It's about the learning and doing of it, the process of figuring things out. But I will eventually finish them...

I'm so glad you visited, and I really hope something here made you smile. Now to get back to one of those fun projects... :)