The girl with the fancy chapeau. . .

She wore her chapeau with a confidence and aplomb that few people could emulate. . .

Another girl sketched in the car on the way home last weekend.  I started with a strange little motif that suddenly looked like a hat to me so I drew a girl to wear it. 

Used my Prismacolor portrait colors to color her in.

Linking to Sunday Sketches and

Creative Every Day

The watercolor owl. . .

We spent last weekend in Mississippi with my cousin Selena and family.  Selena loves all things owl and while we were there I was inspired to try my hand at a Cori Dantini inspired owl.  While my owl is nowhere as whimsical as one of Cori's - I definitely swiped the shape of her owl for mine. 

Forgot to take a pic of the pencil sketch but you can see some of it through the watercolor.  When we travel I usually take a few art supplies with me - this trip I had my KOI watercolors, a few pencils and black pens/markers, some Stabilo watercolor pencils and my favorite white Sharpie paint pen.  It all fits along with my notebook and a small handtowel into a small makeup bag. 

I always love how a picture starts to come together with the pen work!  It is so worth the time that it takes when suddenly your bird comes alive with personality! 

Some pencil shading and a liberal dose of "dots" and the critter is done.  This isn't the first time Selena has inspired me to play with owls - check out this post! 

Linking to Paint Party Friday,

Illustration Friday - REFLECT,

Mix It Monthly

Martha's Mushroom Musing. . .

What do you do on long road trips??  I tend to doodle weird things like the gal above.  Doesn't she look like she has on a housedress?  My husband's grandma was always in a housedress.  Don't really see those anymore - probably for the best although I'd probably enjoy the pockets!

BTW - do you see the "m" on her dress?  Works with the alliteration. . .

Linking to Creative Every Day

Are you feeling the flower?

This girl felt the need for a little something special - something that would lend an air of "je ne sais quoi".  What to do?  WAIT - a flower would be perfect!

Naturally, however, there were detractors - those people who said that her flower was too big or too "flower-y" to be pretty - and by people I mean the boys in this family.  Guess I won't be sporting a flower in my hair any time soon.

Linking to Paint Party Friday and

Art Journal Every Day

The Tomboy

"If we wait until we are ready,

we'll be waiting for the rest of our lives."

          - Lemony Snicket

Super busy week that didn't allow me to paint at all until late today.  Guess that's why she looks a little upset - a girl needs to paint!  Am I right? 

Started with a pencil sketch on a background that was stenciled, splatted and scraped with paint. 

A little bit of underpainting. . . 

Only used 4 colors of paint - Titanium White, Quinacridone Crimson, Paynes Gray and Quinacridone/Nickel Azo Gold.  It is fun to mix up the skintones but they dry out so fast!  Maybe I need to add an extender?

Linking to Art Journal Every Day and

Paint Party Friday

Spoonflower -

Have you heard of Spoonflower?  It is an amazing site where you can have fabric, wallpaper, decals and gift wrap printed from your own designs.  Seriously, how cool is that??!!  They will print 8" test swatches for only $5 so I decided to take a plunge and upload a design.

This geometric abstract was a recent favorite of mine from my art journal and I was amazed at how true the colors turned out on the cotton fabric once it arrived.  You can choose many different ways to line up your pattern and many different sizes.  I think it would be fun to make some handmade notebooks with this pattern on the cover - maybe the smaller of the two sizes I had printed.

Your designs are private unless you choose to make them public.  Once public, you make 10% Spoondollar commissions off your design if someone chooses to have it printed.  There are many gorgeous, trendy designs on the site to choose from.

Have you ever used Spoonflower?  What did you think?  What did you make with your designs?

My first profile. . .

Can you tell that she is looking over her shoulder?  It is a bony shoulder but was based on a pic from Vogue magazine where all the girls have bony shoulders, right?!  I've been scared to try a profile but I'm glad I finally took the plunge - the eye is too big but for the most part she's okay.  I asked Caleb if he liked her and he said, "Nope, she's ugly." - But then I showed her the model and he thought she was ugly too.  LOL!

Linking to Creative Every Day

Illustration Friday - PATTERN

Have you ever made a repeating pattern?  I've been wanting to for some time now but hadn't gotten around to it.  This week's theme of PATTERN at Illustration Friday was just the push that I needed to get going.

I started with a piece of 5" square cardstock and doodled a design in the middle of the page.

The first step is to cut your paper and half and tape it back together - super scary first step!!

BTW - I followed the tutorial found here at Design Sponge.

Then cut your paper in half again the other way and tape back together so that your design element that used to be in the middle is now on the outside.  It amazes me how a doodle that seemed so substantial still left so much white space once it was cut up!!

Then get busy doodling in the middle of your design.  Here is my finished doodle that then got

scanned into the computer and tweaked a bit in Photoshop Elements.  First, you have to save your design as a pattern (Edit   Define Pattern).  Then open a new Blank File (Edit   Fill Layer   Use:Pattern) and fill your file with your pattern!!  Cool, huh?

Linking to Illustration Friday - PATTERN,

Sunday Sketches

Illustration Friday - REFRAIN

"A pretty girl is like a melody

that haunts you night and day.

just like the strain

of a haunting REFRAIN.

She'll start upon a marathon

and run around your brain."

        -Irving Berlin

The theme work this past week at Illustration Friday has been refrain - I think I took it in an unexpected direction though. 

I made an ATC - go figure!!  I hardly ever work that small.

Linking to Paint Party Friday,

Art Journal Every Day and

Paper Saturday

Would you color this girl??

Doodlers Anonymous recently announced a call for art for their Coloring Book, Volume 3.  I took a leap and sent in this girl and she made the cut!!  I am so excited!!  I've been drawing girls for a couple years now but have never attempted to have one published - Can't wait for my copy to arrive!