Christmas Wreath Designs

Those of you who do celebrate Christmas may enjoy these cookies as much as we did. 

I had my Christmas Wreath drawing put on white chocolate covered oreo cookies in one of my Zazzle stores. I have a lot of my different christmas paintings and drawings available on them as well as many other things for other occasions.

Her's another look at the marker drawing that I used.

I drew these wreaths on outgoing mail but didn't think they were that good so I didn't bother to have them scanned for the store. I plan to keep practicing until I come up with one that I really like.

Sunday Afternoon

It's been a quiet weekend, tending the tomatoes, doing a bit of painting and designing for zazzle.

Watched some Holiday Movies, did a bit of texting and e-mail and of course took a nap. It was pleasant but dull.

The most exciting thing was the appearance of the first tomatoes.

There are more details on both the tomatoes and the sweater project on the old posts by those titles.

Shut in's Winter Story

I have a go fund me page set up to help get me a van to transport my large and specially equipped wheelchair in so I could get out of the house once in a while but that's going slowly and doesn't look like it will happen anytime soon. So one day runs into another and things can get pretty dull. Please help me escape that.
http://www.gofundme.com/wheelchairandwheelchairvan

In the meantime, instead of going outdoors, I have this:

3 mini tomato plants in a hydroponic planter.

The best thing I have going for me when I'm stuck at home is that I've still got lots of ideas and the time to try various art supplies to work them out.

Today I'm just "Playing" with some Dala Horse outlines.

Both landscapes and florals are ideas that have worked well for me in the past so I thought I'd try different paints and spins on the ideas and see what I come up with.

My favorite of the 2 so far are the flowers. I won't bother to keep the landscape. The outlines seem to have spoiled it. I liked it in acrylics on wood much better than watercolor and marker. you just can't get the same effect.

Things aren't always dull around here. Yesterday one of my sisters dropped into do a bit of kareoke.

Yes, this time of year is always full of surprises.

Who knows what's next. In the meantime I'm designing a new line of clothes on zazzle.

Busy Time of Year

There isn't as much time these days to draw and paint as I'm trying to clear some space for company. I don't know about you but when
I'm doing a lot of drawing and painting the materials that I'm working with seem to end up anywhere and everywhere until you can't spot a tabletop to set anything on. Fun when you're working but a bit scary when you're done.

This is the Art Studio side of the room.

The red thing on the bookcase is my hydroponic planter. We've got Miniature Tomato plants in it. As you can see they'tr doing pretty well.

As you can see I've done my best to organize and label things to help keep them under control.

I've also been trying to design some last minute products and presents on Zazzle. 

My entire world is contained in an 11 by 14 foot room which at the same time struggles to be my living room, my art studio and my dining room. As you can imagine this presents it's own problems.

This is the opposite side of the room which mostly gallery space for the most recent paintings.

Under this is a table, a desk, a restaurant coffee station and a scanner/ printer. They aren't in the photo because they're still a mess right now.

I'm having company tomorrow but that should be the end of it until next year.

I designed these door pulls for furniture that you don't want to put labels on. The font for each one is chosen to give you a visual clue of what it is before you even read it. The mix of styles isn't obvious from a distance but it adds a bit of charm and whimsy to what could be something boring.

The best thing about the handles and knobs is that I've made them for all sorts of crafts and hobbies so you'll never loose track of your precious supplies and projects again.

I've got so many ideas spinning that i can't wait to get back to the paints.

Mixed Media Christmas Designs

On this card I was inspired by the bright green scarf on the puppy photo so I decided to draw a border in marker that repeats this bright green.

Here's a border design I drew on the side of the inside of the card.

And I went for a fun change of design on the envelope.

This was an envelope for another card. I was practicing along with a you tube video.

This is the back flap of the envelope.

Here's the front of the 2nd card as I got more practice on different holiday plants.

I liked this wreath so well that i put it on white frosted oreo cookies in my zazzle store 

WWW.zazzle.com/julia_art and ordered some for my holiday parties to see how well people like the idea.

Christmas Tomatoes

I just love the way that sounds "Christmas Tomatoes" of course these were just started a while ago and will be nowhere near ready for Christmas I just love the sight of young garden plants in the winter.

I'm not sure what kind of luck I'll have with these as the seeds were saved from my miniature tomato plants from 2 seasons ago but I figured it was worth a try.

I took the first photo with the plant light on so here's one with it off. So you can get a better look at the plants.

The flash washed the color out a bit but you can see that they're doing pretty well so far.

December 8th, 2019

There are two tomato seedlings in soil that were planted at the same time as the hydroponic ones. I was curious about how what you're growing in affects the size and health of the plants and I was shocked at the difference between them.

They share a medium sized blue planter with a gerbia daisy and 2 tiny gnomes.

You've got to admit there is quite a difference.

December 12,2019
The First Flowers

December 14th

I trimmed all of this off this morning.  The plants were beginning to crowd and shade each other. The roots had grown so long that the roots had wandered into the fill chamber so I lifted the plants and pruned about 8 inches off of the bottom of each one. The planter I have is a small one that's more for herbs than big plants so this is going to be a challenge.

Did you notice how many more flowers have opened in the last couple of days? I just love to see that each morning.

December 15, 2019

December 18,2019

Nearly everyday there seem to be more and more flowers on them and the plants are looking nice and healthy some I'm hoping for better results this time.

December 22, 2019

I keep trimming leaves to reduce the weight so the tomatoes won't tip over the way the last ones did. You can really see all of the blossoms now.

The biggest excitement is that the tomatoes are beginning to appear. I noticed 3 this morning.

New Years Day

As You can see there have been quite a few changes. As the plants got bigger I trimmed off a lot of the leaves for several reasons. One was to keep the plants from shading each other and the other was to force the growth into producing more tomatoes. It seems to be working and trimming extra branches off keeps them from getting top heavy and tipping over.

The shorter plant on the end is nearly covered with tomatoes where the other 2 are just getting started.

The one with the most tomatoes is the one that I pruned more severely so it does seem to make a big difference.

January 6 2020

That first plant was beginning to tip over from the weight and I considered a number of solutions. 

The easiest and best solution was simply the lid from a prescription pill bottle set into the back of the plant on the heavy side to push it in the other direction.

I'm not quite sure how many tomatoes are on the plants at this point but they're looking pretty healthy.

This photo was taken on Jan. 27, 2020. The plants were tipping over so I trimmed most of the leaves and extra branches off to lighten the load and force the plants to put all of the effort into ripening the tomatoes already on it. That strategy seems to be working well.

January 29, 2020

Slim Pickings:

Finally a bite to eat, Feb. 1st I was able to harvest a few tomatoes a day.

meanwhile: 

The tomatoes in soil haven't grown at all. Good thing that the red daisy is doing well and about to flower again as it has been doing from time to time since I got it last summer.