Art On A Tile

A couple of posts ago I showed you this. I collaged strips of painted deli paper and then doodled with paint markers to finish it off. I did another one this weekend and tried my best to document the process. The photography is mostly done in the evening so the lighting is not great but ok. These tiles are ones that were left in a closet when I moved in to my house about 10 yrs ago. I first coated them with gesso because of the tile being very glossy. I gathered pieces of deli paper that I had done on the gelli plate and started playing, tearing and glued them down with matte medium. Until I arrived at this. I don't like this one nearly as much as the first one, I think because the paper is not distressed enough. It doesn't have that blended look. It's not what I was after but it's what I ended up with. Still was fun. I think I will try painting more on the tile first and then perhaps add some collage. I've got about 10-12 more tiles to play with. It's nearly time to start collaging the pumpkins. Thanks for stopping by.

The Question of the Day

I am on vacation from work this week.....My job requires that leave time be requested a year ahead of time. How was I to know they would begin building a recycling center right around the corner from my house this month which required putting in a new sewer system.............. right in front of my house?? The noise became more noisy throughout the day. Tuesday morning I got up and made myself breakfast. An egg sandwich on toasted Italian bread with turkey bacon. I don't normally eat this for breakfast, however this was the last meal I was going to have over the next 24 hours. What I was preparing myself for was this. After I ate my sandwich like it was my last meal on earth. I read that I would not be eating any more solid food until after my procedure. I analyzed this. I could get a whopping headache from not eating, I could even become hypoglycemic. I quickly decided on one more thing. Protein. More carbs. Without going in to to much more discussion about this wonderful ordeal, let's just say that by the time my daughter picked me up this morning to take me to the hospital for this procedure, I was pretty headachey and had an attack of the "gleecies" (I made that word up.) I got prepped,answered a bunch of questions including what color was my last BM, (like I really wanted to know, I told her I hadn't looked.) the IV in place, and waited for the nurse to come and get me. I discovered that I'd been watching too many reruns of HOUSE and Grey's Anatomy. I was becoming anxious so I asked the nurse for a pen and paper to keep my mind off of things which were now consuming my thoughts. Once wheeled in to the procedure room, the nurse then proceeded to ask me some more questions, followed by the doctor, followed by the now standard "Time Out" questions which I answered and then I held up the clip board and asked her jokingly, "What color was YOUR BM this morning?" She asked me if I was ready for the happy medicine I said I was. My daughter has gotten a real kick out of informing me how many times I asked her if she had to work today on the ride home. I had no recollection of getting dressed after the procedure. Nor do I have any memory of my asking her to take us to the Thai restaurant for take out chicken pad thai, or that I also insisted on going to Chipotle for a burrito bowl and having her repeat back to me what I wanted. I did all this? I said all that? I asked you this?? I laughed so hard because she was laughing so hard while pretending to be me. This is my daughter who wants to go to nursing school and who will be 23 years old tomorrow. God I love her! It's 10pm right now. I am happy to report that I will not needing to do this again for another 10 years. I am hoping the bulldozers and all the other hard hats will move up the street allowing me to get at least a couple more days of quiet. I've had enough rumbling for awhile.

If You're Happy in Your Head........ The Smash Book Overhaul- part 4

I'm sharing with you my Smash Book Overhaul. Only one page today. "If you're happy in your head, then solitude is blessed and alone is ok." ~ Tanya Davis, spoken word artist. Happy Spring!! Wishing you a peaceful weekend. I'm joining the fun over here and here.

The Smash Book Overhaul -Part 2

I'm going to show you these pages a bit at a time because I wanted to explain in some cases what was done. Here's the inside front cover. ....... some doodling, playing with an assortment of markers and gel pens. Notice the mandala on the index card which is glued down. Remember ICAD, index card a day? It's coming up in June again. The next page is sort of a flap page. I took bits of paper I altered using Citrasolv , which is a natural cleaner. Pages with photos from a National Geographic magazine were soaked and or sprayed in/with Citrasolv for various amounts of time and voila! YOu get many different new images. It is a messy process but if you have some time and patience you've gotta try it at least once. I have often left disposable aluminum pans soaking for days with a dozen strips and forgotten about them only to return and have the liquid dried up and the paper stuck together. But peeling them apart promises great surprises. I also have left them hanging outside letting the ink drip off onto the ground or paper and then letting them dry from there. I've also manipulated the ink around with various tools to get patterns, create designs, writing and drawing in to the ink.Pockets and puddles of ink blend and bleed. It's best done in a ventilated area or outside. While the citrus orange leaves the room smelling very nice, it can be overwhelming for some people. Throughout the book you will find bits and pieces of paper made with this technique. I have tried this with other magazines but it doesn't work. The secret is in the ink that Nat'l Geographic uses in printing. I think I discovered washi tape around that same time, so I bordered the page with some washi tape strips. Oh, yes, and there's a bit of a piece of map showing through. Stay tuned for more.

Finished

I have finished three pieces at the same time. Whooee!! I can't say that often. You've seen this one before at various stages...before and during the 29 faces challenge. This began as this. on a piece of cardboard. Sorry. This picture is blurry but I wanted to show you the progression. It then became this where I thought it might be finished. And I kind of liked it at this point and I thought about putting it in a cheap frame or mounting it on a cheapo canvas but it was such an odd size I couldn't do either. Hence the challenge of cutting it up so it would fit on a canvas. I reworked it and then added the "acrylic skins." That stuff is so hard to work with in my opinion. I think it's the equivalent of making saran wrap and you know how that stuff sticks together if you don't get it on something in one full swoop. I liked the look of the doodling the skins gave but had no more patience to separate the skins from the plastic page protector so I went ahead and doodled with a black marker. I finished it with the inks splatters so she looks like this now. I can now hang her on the wall. Do you like it? Tell me what you think. I'm still deciding on a title or name for her. Although I am late getting to the party I am sharing this over here.

Ask for Peace

........... doodling tea light candles................ and ..............and wood burning on wooden boxes (lids)............... and mail art before it went out.............. I have made an incredible amount of art in a year's time considering that I work a full time job. I want to say thank you for supporting me and for taking the time to leave comments. Comments are so appreciated for those of us who brave putting ourselves out there. Of course, I wish for all to enjoy the holidays in whatever manner you do, but most of all, I wish you peace................... xoxoxo........ See you in the new year..............Jo

This Weather is Ridiculous

I don't know where you are in the world but here in Virginia it has been nearly 60 degrees for the last several days and headed for 70 tomorrow. Having lived most of my life in the North I want it to be cold this time of year. I want frost and snowflakes. I want December weather to be December weather. Right now I have a couple of windows open and my flip flops on. Maybe that's why I needed to do this. Not having any specific paint markers for glassware etc in the house, I just experimented with sharpie fine point markers. Maybe by the time I fill the plate with snowflakes the weather will return to normal, what ever that is. I'm glad you stopped in....................x0x0 jo

Happy Lights

Some of you may remember those little candles with the tissue paper our kids made in school. They usually came home the last day of school before the Christmas break. I decided to make some of my own. Here are some beginnings. I found it a bit tricky as tissue paper is so delicate and I did tear a couple of tiny holes in it as I was trying to lay the paper down so carefully on a mod podged surface. I was delighted to find some glass ware at the thrift store for a couple of dollars and today was gifted 3 cases of mason jars. How great is that! And how cool they look with a tea light candle in them! There's no end to what you could do as far as designs. I love houses and city scenes so that's what I started with. If I still had a fireplace I would have tons of them on the mantle. Maybe next year I'll remember to start making these in the summer time....... Thanks for stopping by.................xoxoxo Jo. I am headed over to "Aimee's place" because it's Glue It Tuesday and there's a lot of fun and good stuff happening over there.

The Return of the Mojo and Doodling Pumpkins

After a couple of weeks off I have returned or my mojo has returned. I think I was in a state of "funk" as was my mojo. I cleaned up my studio and looked at all the art I have created. I tried not to be too hard on myself, tried not to feel too guilty for not blogging. I watched a lot of Netflix after work and just let things happen slowly without pressure. I missed being in my studio but nothing was happening. I happened to be in the produce section in the grocery store and saw a bag full of mini pumpkins. They were just too cute to pass up. But wait! My mojo told me I had to do something with those pumpkins other than put them on the dining room table. That same day I happened to check out Alisa Burke's blog. and see the amazing art she has done on pumpkins. That was enough to get me going. I went back to the store and bought a large pumpkin. Dabbed on some acrylic paint with a sponge. It wasn't working. The pumpkin was too slippery. I gessoed it in hopes that it would provide some tooth to hold the paint. It was ok until I started doodling on it. I then took it outside to spray it with black spray paint. It took a couple of days to completely cover it and let it dry. Then I started playing. Thank you, Alisa Burke for your inspiration. To all my bloggy friends, thanks for stopping in here and for all your kind comments. I have more to show you............................xoxoxo jo

Doodling My Way

As I have previously mentioned I'm making my way though some of the workshops over at 21 Secrets and picking up some new ideas and information, not to mention having some fun as well. I have finished Cathy Bluteau's 'Doodling Our Way' class where she suggests we build and doodle around flowers cut out from magazines. I took it one step further and drew flowers from my own painted papersand built around them. I love Copic markers (which is what Cathy Bluteau used) but don't have many of them so I enhanced my color with water color crayons. And while I finished this project, I'm not oohing and ahhing over it. Maybe I'm critiquing it far too much, but it didn't turn out the way I had imagined it. Nonetheless, it was fun so I'll probably do it again. And just for fun, here is what I was doing a year ago on this date. I have to chuckle because it still looks the same today. Perhaps I might do something with it. I almost like it better than what I just showed you. It feels a lot more free. .............Thanks for stopping by..............jo

ICADS and Madam I'm Adam

Yesterday I hadn't completed my ICAD. I simply didn't feel like it. ICAD, in case you don't know, means index card a day; conceived by Tammy Garcia; thereby doing something, any art, in any way on an index card. You can find out more about it here. I really wanted to write "I don't feel like making art on an index card today" and call it a day, but I chickened out. I'm kind of cheating here because I quite often make art on an index card in my car in the morning before going in to work, and if I have been doing this for a long time, I always have something around to embellish upon. Several mornings I might just spread water color over the cards and on another morning, I might glue bits of torn paper. Small, baby steps, little increments of time add up to a lot of little canvases over a period of time. So here are ICADS for today and yesterday, which were done within the last two weeks. This is what happens if you do something creative everyday even if it's on an index card. You can build up quite a little reserve. :) Playing with watercolor and doodling made for some interesting cards. I'm going to become pretty bored with titling the next two months "ICADS" so I'm going to have to come up with something else. Did you know that "Madam, I'm Adam," written backwards, also reads,"Madam, I'm Adam?" Thank you to my friend Robin, who reminded me of what that was called . (see yesterday's post.) It's called a palindrome. I was having a brain fart, but Robin, obviously had the brain power......................................... Thanks for stopping by................jo

Round

I made a round post card. Yes. I did say a round postcard- for a swap I'm doing with Karen only I won't show it to you because it hasn't been mailed yet and I want to keep it a secret until the person gets it. I don't know how Karen does this. She's amazing. She hosts so many cool swaps and I've seen some pretty amazing art pass through her site ,including her own. I went there a few moments ago and she has a picture of what 87 green themed mail art post cards look like spread out on her dining room table, before mailing. I am quiet sure I do not have the patience to do all she does to get these swaps going not to mention all the collecting, organizing and mailing it takes. I bet her mailbox is always overflowing. It's very worth your while to check out that site as well as her own I'll show you the front of the round postcard when my for now anonymous partner receives it. I'm going to go doodle on my egg. Thanks for taking a minute with me. Hope you had /have a good day..............................jo

Art or Doodling?

Before I started my blog in 2009 I had been doing what I called doodling. I don't know whether it's because I didn't have the nerve to call myself an artist, didn't consider what I was doing as "art" or a bit of both. I didn't have a lot of art supplies and I thought 5 x 7 Moleskine journals were pretty cool. I wasn't even doing art in the car in the mornings at that time. I was playing and playing through a lot of emotional pain at the time. Art was my friend. I needed to keep showing up to meet up with art. Talk about mindless, doodling. But so much fun. I started to buy some gel pens and markers. Then I started to get strange, like "extra galactic," wierd stuff, or so I thought. Then I went back to black and white where you can see my beginnings of trees and buildings start to appear. Sorry one of them is very blurry. In my thinking about this art and doodling, I see that my doodling or what I saw as doodling then, shows up in my art work now. You know how everyone is always saying to keep a sketchbook or journal? This is the place you doodle your thoughts and ideas. I guess these are mine. Recently I purchased Dawn DeVries Sokol's book Art Doodle Love. I must admit I was drawn to the colorful pages with prompts and or suggestions for playing, doodling, and although I've only worked on one of the pages, I've traded in my morning faces for morning doodles this week in the car. The prompt was to fill in the colored areas with a doodle of anything each day for a week. Here's what I have done. I have a feeling I will enjoy playing in and with this book. Thanks for visiting....................................................................................................jo