Halloween fun

This is the second year in a row we've hosted a Halloween party for our girls and some of their friends.  This year, we did a craft that was a take on Alisa Burke's post on her recycled toilet paper roll monsters (see http://alisaburke.blogspot.com/2010/10/little-monsters-tutorial.html.)  I thought this would be something 2nd and 5th graders could do but was worried about drying time for the paint.  So I improvised.  I let them use duct tape!  It was immediate color satisfaction since it was simply peel and stick.  They had trouble at first ripping the tape but once they got the hang of it, they went nuts with their ideas.  Here are the results of our fun:

Other photos for you to enjoy:

Homemade costume...we bought the hat, wig and tights (already had the shoes) but all else was made.  She designed and directed me in the production...so bossy that girl!

a giant oreo!

mini Michael Jackson!

My woodland fairy princess...shoving chocolate in her face.

I did the do...pretty good, eh?  I'm not much of a hair stylist but I was quite proud of this one!

I know this post comes late as far as Halloween goes...but my hubby and I went on a trip the day after so I hadn't gotten a chance to post yet.  I have more to post from the trip and some venting about moving to do but I'll save that for next time :)

I'm in a Gallery! Yay!!

Just wanted to repost from Lori Sander's blog...she has a gallery and is featuring several different artists' works and some of them are mine.  Yeehaw!!  So fun to know my art is in a gallery and people who don't know me might be picking up an original piece, holding it, looking at it, etc.  It's a very different feeling than just putting images on facebook or flickr or my blog...exciting but a little scary!  :)

Hope to share more of my art with the "real" world as my confidence grows.  How did those of you who have featured your art in shows or art fairs get through it the first time?  I'm petrified and don't even know where to start.  I need a check list!!  Help!  How do you get "ready" and then how do you know you are "ready" for a show?  ARG.  If anyone wants to comment, I'd love some feedback on the subject.  Any little tidbits of advice will be greatly appreciated!

Have an awesome week!
Smiles!

Witch

Finally finished this little witch (11x14 on watercolor paper).  She's much more stylized and cutesie than I normally would paint but I was in a children's-book-sorta mood.  Enjoy!

simple jack o'lantern

Not feeling well...been in bed for 2 days but I think I'm on the mend.  As I sit and listen to my husband sawing away on his coffin creation (we'll use it in our haunted house) and my children laughing,  I find myself wishing I had my energy back.  Couple more days and I'll feel myself again-- I HATE being sick (it's hard to slow down when you're used to being a busy mom!).  Halloween is just around the corner and I always draw a jack o'lantern or two (or 20!).  Here's one for you.  I hope you are having fun getting ready for Fall.  We are -- or at least 4 of us are ;)

Artist on facebook

Just wanted to share a link to this artist's facebook page...haven't seen a blog or website for her but you can look at her very cool spiritual art on her fb page.  Check it out!

http://www.facebook.com/patrice.b.george

still here...adjusting to my Tuesdays and Thursdays

My son started preschool last week and he had a really rough start.  I think he's got the hang of it now and it's such a relief!  You'd think with my new found freedom, albeit brief and only twice a week, that I'd be painting like a mad woman here in the studio.  NO.  I'm working on the house,  purging and organizing, hoping that with those things off my brain, I can focus on my art.  So, I have no new art to share but for those of you new to my blog, here a few pieces from last fall.  These paintings were a distinct shift in my art and set me on my current path.  Oh, and some of them are still available as originals or prints.  Some of the originals will be in a gallery in Livingston, Tx (as soon as I can get off my booty and package them up to ship!)   I've sold a few here and there but I'm not getting back into my ETSY shop until I have more time.  Until then, I'll sell when someone shows interest and paint when I can get time.  It's so fun to look these pieces now...makes me smile.  Hope you'll like looking at them, too.

Yellow Garden Spider (Argiope aurantia)

It's not very often that you might see such a creature so close to your master bedroom...this lady decided to make her web just outside one of my master windows.  It's given us a perfect opportunity to observe her closely without fear of being bitten.  My kids have loved looking at her.  Isn't she gorgeous?  Thought I'd share since so many times we, as artists (as humans really!!) can be inspired by nature.  Look at her incredible coloring!!  Maybe I'll paint something thinking of her....hope she can inspire you, too!!

Summer is drawing to a close but some things will never change.  Boys toys crack me up.  After having two girls, the boy thing is a nice change.  We now have Barbies AND superheroes in our home.  Spidey can be found all over the house these days.  This time...he's resting on my art table. 

Also, my sweet hubby helped me keep little people out of my studio long enough to do a painting.  Here's a not-so-great photo of it.  I'm becoming increasingly interested in the way stitching looks mixed with painting.  I've been experimenting and while I love the way real stitching looks, I think I'll keep it simple with drawn stitches.  These faces of mine are changing a bit.  It makes me think of how focused our society is on the way people look....the efforts we put forth to look "good" and the money spent on augmentation, lifts, and tucks.  I don't know what to call this painting...any ideas?

More painting to come!  I'll post as I get them done.  Smiles!

summer busy-ness

I don't know if I've painted a single thing this summer other than "Make a Wish" from my previous post.   I've worked a little here and there in some of my art journals and also done some sketching but otherwise, we've been busy, busy, busy.  Here are some wonderful photos of the things that have kept me away from blogging and my studio -- can't think of anything better to pull me away than my family!!

Happy end of summer days...stay cool!

Smiles!

On top of all of this, we also had Vacation Bible School, a trip to my folks (their patio is pictured above), a trip to my sister's, and the girls had a trip with Tom to Cary, North Carolina.  We still have a visit to Schlitterbahn next week -- that should be a blast and a one night visit from friends passing through town.  After that, we'll be getting ready for school!!!  WHEW.

"Make A Wish"

  
 Summer months are busy for us.  My husband and I have birthdays 5 days apart in June.  We have my mother-in-law, 3 nieces, 2 nephews, my brother, and my brother-in-law's birthdays in the summer.  If you add in our anniversary, my parents' anniversary and Father's Day, we've got a lot of special occasions all within 3 months.  It's NUTS!!  With all of these special things going on, I guess I had candles and cake on my brain.

    I'm always thinking of new things or new ways to re-invent these characters.  I try to stay with my core elements -- the things I love like brilliant color, lots of textural layers, blending and shading, and a childlike quality in the overall feel.  I try not to overthink the outlining and I do it quickly the way a child would.  I'm still having such a great time creating these "people".  I may do more dogs (I have several sketches that I haven't used yet and some new ones I just finished) but I still love doing faces.  Kids appeal to me because they have such a wonderful way of looking at the world.  My own kids inspire me daily (hourly!!) and they never cease to amaze me with their simple yet profound thoughts on so many subjects. 

So, enjoy this little piece...especially if it's your birthday!!  And even if it's not your birthday, you can make a wish just the same.  Maybe it will come true!!!

Smiles as always!

Artists pay it forward...for charity

Just an update on the artist project I contributed to recently. The book is completed and is now up for bidding on Ebay...click here to see it.  The current bid is up to $510.  It's very exciting and it was a great feeling knowing I donated something for a great cause. "A Place to Bark" will benefit from the proceeds, and someone will have an amazing collection of art from many artists on the topic of "heart".  I'm posting the painting I donated just for those new to my blog. Here ya' go:

Happy Tuesday!

The Word is Art: Slide Show A Place to Bark Fundraiser Book

This is worth a look.  I feel lucky to have been asked to participate and to be part of a group of amazing artists.  I wish I'd had more time to donate a few more paintings.  Check it out!!

The Word is Art: Slide Show A Place to Bark Fundraiser Book

Bad blogger, bad blogger!

I realize that I had promised to share the texture secret from the post before last and forgot to share!!  So, here it is. 

As many of you know, I adore texture and I'll take it any way I can get it.  The best way for me to build up texture is simply by slathering paint on, little by little.  (The way a pallette might look if you don't peel off the dried puddles of acrylic paint).  A little like this:

Scraping, stamping, smooshing, drybrushing, splattering, dripping, dropping and a whole host of other ways of applying paint can be used.  If you apply each layer and allow it to dry before applying the next layer, you will have a lovely, multicolored background with lots of little surprises peeking through (impressions made by stamps with various colors, found object impressions, scraping, dripping -- whatever you did to make the layer).  I love how the background can almost have an aged, shabby look, like years of various colors trying to show themselves.  HOWEVER, this process can take some time, especially if you don't like using a heat gun (because you might wake up the sleeping toddler in the next room).  If you rush, you will make mud.  I mean MUD ...brownish, grayish, yuckishness.  Yucky.  Yuck. 

Don't do that.  It's just altogether yucky.

So to cheat Father Time, I like to collage bits of various thicknesses of paper.  Paper weight paper is great because it requires less gel medium or a lighter weight gel medium.  (Like scrapbook paper, one sided).  Sometimes I tear up old paintings I didn't like that were done on heavy watercolor paper.  That way, I already have painted pieces with lots of variety.  I've also been known
 to paint whole sheets of watercolor paper to tear up for my characters facial features.  Paper is a great way to add texture and variety to your backgrounds.

Knowing this, I became very excited when I came across some old dry wall tape.  DRY WALLTAPE??  Yes, you heard me (read me).  Dry wall, joint tape.  It is glueless, comes on a roll, and is available at any hardware store.  It can be painted, gel mediumed if you will, cut up, laid down in strips, whatever.  It is very absorbent and it is MEANT to be painted or had joint compound spread over it, so it will hold up to whatever you want to do with it.

So, there you have it.  Some of you are sitting there going, "Duh, I so already knew that."  But it was new for me and I always want to share my excitement over new things.  Here's one of my applications...in a journal.  I left the edges uncut -- kind like it that way.  So, new for you or not, give it a try.  Let me know what you think! 

 

inside my new project

Fun with recycled board books....these are the first 2 pages.  I'll fill each page with a funky portrait.  Should be fun!  The book is only like 3 and half inches square, so it'll go fast.  Painting small helps me feel like I'm getting things done.  It's also a mindless, worryless project because it's something I think I'll just keep for ourselves.  We'll see, eh?

Newest paintings

I've been working lately on these three paintings (in addition to the portait of my daughter from my last post).  I promised to share the texture secret (it may not be so secret but it's new to me).  I'll do that in my next post.  Here are the paintings...almost done but still have some details to add to all of them:

Feels great to be painting again!!! 

Portrait painting in progress...maybe I'll try me next!

This is my daughter Ellie.  I'm trying to do a portrait of her.  I made it easier on myself by blowing up a decent photo and turning it into a black and white.  Then I used vellum to trace some of the basic structures of her face and made a "carbon" for myself by rubbing blue watercolor pencil on the back of the vellum.  I should've reversed the photo and then when I traced, I could've had pencil marks ready to transfer.  Live and learn!

The blue watercolor pencil did not transfer well but left enough of a mark for me to lift up the vellum, look, lay down my tracing, and then sketch over my blue marks with pencil.  (I had taped my image onto my canvas).  As much as I might feel like a purist at times, wanting to sketch just by looking instead of tracing a black and white copy, I just don't have the luxury of time to sketch these days.  I "cheated" with the sketch if you will, so I could just get to the painting!  Anyhoo, here's a shot of the vellum.  You'll see blue, read and graphite.  The blue is on the back (my carbon attempt) and the red was traced over to transfer the image and to let me know where I had already traced.  If I had used pencil over pencil, I'd be lost as far as what I needed to trace...make sense? 

Here's where I am now with the color photo to reference hair and shadows, etc.  I am still working on this and hope to finish this weekend.  I'll post more images as I go along.  It's a stretch for me since my portraits lately have crazy features!!  At some point in my artistic journey, I could sketch realistic faces easily and it felt very natural.  BUT if you don't sketch daily, portraiture is tedious.  If you LOVE painting realistic faces, sketch, sketch, sketch and paint, paint, paint!!!  It is extremely helpful in my view!

I've taken artistic liberty and prettied up the background...you can't really tell but the canvas has a lot of texture.  I'll tell you more about that later.  It's something I've been experimenting with and you can get it at any hardware store!!!  Stay tuned for more info.

 

Happy painting ya'll!

miles of smiles from Texas to you!

Still had some more dogs in mind.  Just haven't had much time to paint.  Plus, I've been doing Mary Ann Moss's Remains of the Day Journal class (http://dispatchfromla.typepad.com/dispatch_from_la/rotdoci.html)  which is very time consuming and SLOW for me.  While it is VERY cool, I think I will only do one journal.  My studio is small and I cannot store tons of paper (beyond what I already have leftover from scrapbooking days). 

I found (I shouldn't say found because she's been around for a while and is very prolific) an artist whose work I totally am in love with and her name is Jennifer Mercede.  A couple of her pieces can be found in the Land of Nod catalog.  Her work is very FUN to look at and has childlike qualities without being childish.  It's very charming and I would love to have one of her pieces.

Another artist I'm eyeing lately is Dan Casado.  I found him through a friend and I always look for his work to post on his Flickr site (http://www.flickr.com/photos/dan-casado/)  His work is amazing and very fresh.  I love how he leaves a lot of his background collage work showing through.  I need to do more of that since I really do put a lot of effort into my backgrounds.  I end up covering most of my layers with more solid color and I'm trying to refrain!  It's hard to know when to stop, you know? 

Well, I hope all of you are having a very artful morning and if not, MAKE IT SO!!

Smiles!

Homemade Doll

My oldest daughter, Abby, had an environmental project to do for school.  She decided to see if she could make a doll out of materials found around the house.  This is the end result. 

The arms and legs are toilet paper cores sliced vertically and curled to make them skinnier (her idea).  The are attached with duct tape to the body which is made from part of an empty plastic water bottle.  We "stuffed" her with plastic bags and attached a plastic egg (small) with masking tape to the top of the water bottle to form her head.  Then I suggested covering her completely with masking tape to solidify and "sturdify" her body.  The stockings are made from an old sock and the top and skirt are made from flannel receiving blankets.  The design on the front of her shirt is from a kleenex box.  Her hair is an old sock and her hat is an old mismatched baby sock.  My daughter did all of the painting and decorating of the face.  Facial features are scraps of paper cut up. 

I'm so proud of her.  She's only 9 and she did most of the work (minus the sewing of the clothes).  Her project was well received by her teacher and although no grades were given on these, I give it an A++!!

Good job Abby!  I love you hun!

Here's a picture of Abby (and her friend Udani) with her doll:

This photo was from the "Academy Awards" night where all of the projects (movies and science projects) were shared...hence the dressy attire.  They had a great time! 

Lastly, here's a cute shot of Abby getting out of the limo they staged outside of the school for photo ops.  The organizers of the evening did so much work and many of the kids dressed to the 9s.  Abby played along and threw her head back as if she were a famous person...well, she is to me anyway!

 

Hope you all are enjoying life...I'm enjoying the many blessings in mine!

Blue

Blue
Originally uploaded by meganhoover

Blue

This mixed media painting on watercolor paper was a donation to Renee Troy who is putting together an art book for charity. Proceeds from the final bid on Ebay will go to A Place to Bark www.aplacetobark.com/index.html and the winner gets to enjoy a homemade book comprised of original art from a variety of talented folks. To see more about the project, visit Renee's blog ... www.reneetroyartonline.com/

Swimmer

Swimmer
Originally uploaded by meganhoover

Got this one finished during Jack's nap...life is ultra slow artistically when you have little ones so I'm always thrilled to FINISH something!!! Yahoo! One of my secrets to finishing is by doing a lot of backgrounds that will be ready to go when I get a chance like today. I can do backgrounds in short bursts by just scraping some paint or playing with stamps for a few minutes...even while Jack's awake. Then I've got half the job done for the next time I when I might have longer to work.