Sheet of 40 Inchies Progression...

This is the sheet as I shared it a couple of weeks ago in the Everyday Matters, Creative Every Day, and Theme Thursday challenges. Several of you expressed interest and wanted me to post progress pictures. Here is what I have so far...

Step 1-1" squares drawn off on watercolor paper in Moleskine WC book. I dampened the squares out of sequence and added dabs of watercolor, letting the colors merge together and dry.
If you look closely, the dried paint in some of the squares already suggests a subject. They just need refining.

If you dampen joining squares at the same time they will run together and colors you may not want will get into the squares. By the way, you can do these in any media on any surface.

I am doing each square as a seperate little painting, but you could also color the whole page to harmonize, then add your designs. I tend to make things complicated, and sometimes, a little chaotic. :)


Step 2-Still filling in backgrounds...

Step 3-All 40 backgrounds filled in! It's been fun, but now the REALLY fun part begins...Pulling out and creating the images! A few of them are coming along...

Step 4-I added a border of "stitches" with an ultra-fine black sharpie. I'm also adding a frame of "stitches" as I complete a square, so the squares that are completely stitched around I think are done. Right now there are about 5, but if you look closely you'll see in several of the other squares where I've pulled out images in pencil, ready to finish. Others are not so clear just yet, as to what they will share.

I haven't decided yet whether I will cut them apart and use them that way, or leave them as they are, with drawn stitching, and use them for a journal cover. I also considered using a sewing machine to really stitch between them, but I don't know if they'd stay together or not, with the needle perforations. We'll see how it goes...

Anyway, this is as far as I am for now. Looking at the sheet as a whole gives you some idea of how my mind works. Scary ain't it! :)

There are still many images to come, and I'll post the finished sheet as soon as it's done.

Hope at least one square made you smile. :)

4 EDM Challenges, CED, & Theme Thursday

This post includes doodle drawings and sketches for Everyday Matters, Creative Every Day, and Theme Thursday combined. They are numbered whatever challenge they are for EDM, they are all for CED, and they represent a COLLECTION of sketches for Theme Thursday. I've had a blast doing them!

These are only sketches. Some are only line drawings and some have shading that may not be entirely accurate since they were born from doodles and I had nothing to actually go by. The pencil I used did not show up well when scanned, so I digitally darkened them so you could see them better.

Anyway, on with the quirkiness...


EDM #243-Draw a pillow...Doodle Emu? napping on one

EDM #224-Draw a pitcher...Pitcher of milk with cantaloup and peaches...doodle sketches, of course

EDM #173-Draw a memory... Late 1950's memory of my older cousin, whom I idolized, and her cat Tiger, who was actually solid black. I might add that the figure bears little resemblence to my cousin, but it's a great memory...

EDM #58-Draw a Hat...Images drawn out of my doodle marks...Looks like the mouse had a hat lunch...

EDM #58/2...Draw a Hat... Another doodle character wearing a hat...I love hats...Wonder what she's thinking...

A project I started this morning. I drew 40 one inch squares on a page in my Moleskine WC book and proceeded to start filling them in with watercolor. None of these are finished, but I thought I'd share them anyway. I will share the page again when I have them all filled in. I may or may not cut them apart. If I don't, I will add frame lines around them. Each 1" square is will be a finished painting when I'm through.


I'm having a lot of fun experimenting. Hope at least one of them made you smile. :)

ATCs & Peeling Paint

This week's challenge at Artygirlz is to make an atc. I'm sharing three. These two are watercolor/wc pencils, pencil, and ultra fine black sharpie on wc paper in a Moleskine wc pocket book. They are some of my doodle drawings painted.

I am late with the Inspire Me Thursday challenge for last week, which is peeling paint. Below are two inchies and an atc, which have the peeling paint technique applied to them in acrylics. The atc has four layers of paint, which was very bright, so I stamped on a piece of rice paper and glued on top to tone it down. The words are written in a fine black sharpie.

The inchies are done in copper and blue, then coated with acrylic medium, which is making them look kind of milky looking. They also have copper glitter embedded in the medium. They are backgrounds ready for something to be added. All are laying on a postcard sized piece of acrylic coated wc paper.

Close up of ATC

I missed participating in both challenges for a week or two. It's good to back back. Thanks for looking and I hope you enjoy. 8:)

Artyz Girls-Small

This week's challenge at Artygirlz is Small. I absolutely lovvvvve small things and miniatures, and i have a large dollhouse full of things to prove it. LOL Therefore I love atcs and inchies. Unfortunately, my eyes aren't what they used to be, but I still enjoy making them.

I'm sharing an inchie and an atc. Both are mixed media on cardstock. The inchie has a shiny finish plus metallic copper glitter and threads and didn't photograph as well as I'd have liked, but it's one of my favorites that I've made. The atc figure is a photograph of a doll in my collection downsized to fit against the stamped background. The stamp is from The Montage Collection and is quite a bit larger than the atc. The quote says, "When the wind stops you smell the fragrance of the orchid."

Hope you enjoy them. Have a great day! :)

Inchies Swap Returns

I received my inchies from the first swap I ever participated in the other day and thought I'd share them with you. It was in the Mojo Art Group, and there wound up being only three of us playing, but that was okay. It was fun and a good experience. Each of us made twelve 1" x 1" square original works of art and sent to the hostess, Tammy, who divided them up and mailed us back twelve from the other players, thus I have twelve more tiny original works of art from friends to add to my collection.

Tammy also included a delicious bar of her favorite organic spice chocolate candy with the return. I had never eaten organic candy, so that was also a first experience. It was very tasty. I'm trying hard to save J (hubby) a piece of it. :)




Anyway, here is a photo of the inchies I received. Lori's are on the left and Tammy's are on the right. Click on pic to enlarge. Sorry, the photo doesn't do them justice (they have glittery accents), but aren't they gorgeous?

I selected twelve from the batch in the photo in the archives to swap. Just click on inchies in the labels list and it should take you there if you want to see them. Sorry I don't have a seperate photo of the twelve I swapped uploaded.

Thanks Tammy and Lori. I enjoyed swapping inchies with you. Maybe we can do it again sometime. :)

Inchies, Mickey & Minnie

I tried this yesterday and had a long post about what's been going on with me besides inchies, but as I was reading back over it my thumb accidentally hit the touch pad on my laptop and most of the post disappeared and I can't find it, so I'm going to go ahead and share my inchies with you today and when I can I'll try to re-post what I sent into oblivion. :)

This is my first batch of inchies made during Oct & Nov. I was going to try making some anyway, but Tammy over at the MojoArtGroup decided to hostess a 12 for 12 swap, and I decided to play. I started out to make enough for the swap, but got carried away and made a bunch. Some turned out better than others, but I had a lot of fun with all of them, plus it's good therapy. :)

I tried making pictures in all kinds of light, but couldn't get a good one, so wound up scanning them in. A lot of detail doesn't show up, such as most of the blue background ones have sparklies in the background, and some have glitter, the orange ones aren't that dark and have chinese characters in the backgrounds, etc. Some have a matte finish and some have a gel medium finish making them shiny, so that made it hard to get a good picture.

Rarely do I get excited over anything, but I'm a tad excited right now. I was checking out the post after I posted it and wishing the pictures were better, and I discovered that if you click on the picture it will enlarge and you can see a lot more of the details. I'm still a greenhorn at this blogging thing you know. :) Passing this on for friends/family that might not know you can do this either.

All kinds of things were used to make them. I made the backgrounds on watercolor paper using stamps, acrylics, watercolors, pastels, liqui-gem acrylic with sparklies, etc., then cut them into 1x1 inch squares after they were dry, which I then painted, collaged, stamped, added glitter to, etc. In other words, each square was an experiment. :)















I finally decided on 12 to swap and they are fixed up and ready to put in the mail (not telling which 12 yet though :)). This is my first swap and I'm a little nervous, but I'm sure it'll be okay. I look forward to receiving 12 back from the other participants. They are all wonderful artists and I hope they aren't disappointed in mine.

Each of these little squares is a seperate 1x1 inch picture. The clown faces and pears on some of them are miniaturized prints of some of my linoleum block prints. The hearts (except the white one) and feather ones are carved eraser stamps (the gold ink on red doesn't show up much in the picture). The one in the top right corner of the first picture with the pink pears was my very first attempt. It has sparklies in the background that don't show up. I tried to make each one different. Sorry the pictures aren't better. :(

Anyway, as I said it was fun and therapeutic and I'm going to be making more, but not for a while. Too much going on between now and Christmas, like Christmas cards to make and shopping, which I haven't started yet, and Thanksgiving before that, plus a zillion other things that I've avoided while playing. :o

Right now I have to get busy on a project a friend dropped off on me yesterday evening. It's a wooden cutout blank of Mickey and Minnie Mouse sitting together on the moon. She brought me a picture to go by and wants me to draw in all their features, limbs, clothes, etc. so she can paint them. I tried to tell her I couldn't draw it, but she said I could do anything and left it. She's one of my best friends since we were kids, and she told me if it took me a year it would be ok (she knows I work slow :)), but patience is not one of her strong points, and I know she will call in a day or two to see if I've started it yet. I tried scanning and enlarging the picture so I could trace it off, but 2x the size isn't quite big enough and 3x was way too big. So I now have out a piece of charcoal and am going to see if I can sketch it off onto the wood enough that she has lines to fill in between with paint. If that doesn't work, I'll think of something else. So here I go... :)

Take care of yourselves. OK? :)

PS: I'm having a heck of a time getting this to post with seperate paragraphs, and have tried several times to get it to change, so I'm going to post it, and if the last paragraphs all run together again, sorry, and I'll try again later to fix it. If they're seperated...great!

Happy Birthday To Me

Today is my birthday. I don't get excited about birthdays and holidays. Wish I could, but I don't. I never did really. I don't want a party or to go out and eat or do anything special. A simple "Happy Birthday" from people who care about me and a quiet day at home is enough of a celebration for me. Is that weird? Most people seem to think so. :)

I didn't realize that it had been so long since I posted. I just haven't been in the mood to write anything much lately. I wonder if anyone is reading the posts anyway, but that's ok. I enjoy sharing when I do post in case someone does drop by. :)

Not too much going on with me right now. I've been kind of down for a couple of weeks because of a weight gain, which I really, seriously do not need, especially when I'm due for a Dr.'s appointment. I joined an online weight loss support group, which is a great group of women, but I haven't really gotten started on an exercise/healthy eating routine yet. I meant to, but a few days after I joined J (hubby) had to go to Paducah, KY for a brush up on fire fighting. We spent part of two days traveling there and back and two days with him in school and me holed up in a very nice motel suite of rooms.

I took some art/writing supplies, my laptop pc, my camera, and two novels to keep me busy. I meant to finish my writing assignment, which I've had to extend the deadline on yet again, but I didn't. I spent the time re-ironing our clothes, straightening up, watching TV, looking out the window (we were on the 5th floor overlooking the pool house and lounge area), taking long soaks in the tub, napping, and eating. I did take some pictures and work with them on the pc and do a little reading the second day.

We had bought microwavable breakfast and lunch food and junk food snacks for in-room eating. The first night J had to study, so we ordered a big pizza delivered to the room. The second night he went out and got tacos, etc., and we ate in the room. He was really tired. We stopped in Murray, KY at the Cracker Barrel going and coming to eat lunch. I finally had one of those delicious chocolate cobblers with ice cream. I always want one, but am usually too full to have it. This time we ate salads, then shared the cobbler. It was worth the wait. Then we stopped and got BBQ sandwiches to eat for supper when we got home.

Point is I gained four pounds in four days. I wanted to cry when I stepped on the scales. I knew part of it was water retention, but I was miserable for a week, all puffy and feeling sluggish. I finally lost it, plus another half pound. I was so happy. Well, I got on the scales this morning and have gained two and a half pounds back, so that wasn't too good a birthday present, but I'm thankful to be alive and ok, and to have family and friends that care about me and that I care about, and THAT is a good present. :)

I did get to go to Michael's the morning we left Paducah. I felt like I was in Disneyland. Now, I do get excited in art and book stores. :) I got some gorgeous decorative papers, a couple of new stamps, some yarn fibers on sale, and some beautiful glass beads. J got some beads, as well. He enjoys making jewelry. It keeps his hands busy while watching TV.

Oh yes, I also found a small piece of fabric at Michael's for the contrary art doll that refused to wear what I already had. It's kind of antique background with inspirational words written on it. I cut it so that the word "Joy" is "tattooed" on her cheek. I have her sewn and stuffed with a painted face and am in the process of finding hair and embellishments to suit her. Of course, she's nothing like I had in mind when I started her, and she's full of imperfections, but that's part of the fun of creating. You're often surprised by the creation. :) I'll post a pic when she's finished.

I signed up for my very first art swap ever in the Mojo Art Group. It's also the first swap for the group, so several firsts going on here. Tammy is graciously hosting an inchies swap. These are also my first inchies. These are works of art on 1"x1" squares, and they are a lot of fun. She was very lenient with us. The only rule is the size and we have to make twelve to send in to her, any style, any media, any subject. She will then send us twelve back, so we will have tiny original works of art from all the artists who participated. What fun! Mine are in progress. I'll post a pic when they're finished.

OK, here is something that IS finished. The latest Mojo Art Group challenge was "Hand Jive" using our hands as the basis for a piece of art. I tried a few ideas, but nothing would come together. I wanted to play, so the morning of the deadline I inked my right hand with a variegated ink pad and layed it in opposite directions, as in friends reaching out to one another, on one of the decorative papers I bought on our trip. I then used my new brush alphabet stamps to stamp the words on strips of paper, which I glued in place, then used my other new stamps in the palms of the hands. The stamp in the right hand says, "Of all possessions a friend is the most precious." As usual, it looks better than the pic, (I'm not the greatest photographer), but here it is.

I guess this is why I haven't been writing much. I've been more into my art persona, plus J has been home for a month, which keeps me pretty busy. As you can see, when I do get started writing, I don't know when to quit, which explains the long posts. Sorry! Not really. :)

Have a great week and HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!